The Flood

by Michael Stephen Fuchs

  “But we have come to the end of your questions,” the man said. “Now mine.” He paused to take another drag, then blew it basically right in Aliyev’s face. He sat up straighter, and pushed up the sleeves of his matched fatigues – which were a solid, matte, dark-charcoal gray, with only a muted tricolor Russian flag on the left shoulder – revealing big tattoos on both forearms.

  Aliyev could see that the first tattoo was an elaborate crest. Across the top in an arc was written АНТИ ТЕРРОР – “ANTI TERROR”. Below that was a big red A over a shield with a dagger through it. Aliyev recognized this coat of arms from somewhere – almost certainly from his friend who had been in Russian special forces, and later the Russian mafia, and who had sold him all his guns. With a wash of terror, he found he knew what the crest represented.

  Alfa Group.

  This had been an elite, stand-alone sub-unit of Spetsnaz, the Russian special forces – and one that reported directly to the much-feared FSB (successor to the KGB), under the direct control and sanction of Russia’s top political leadership. They had basically been Putin’s remorseless killers – and the ones who responded to most of the terrorist acts in Russia, usually by Chechen separatists, including the Moscow theatre hostage crisis and the Beslan school massacre. And by “respond to” what was meant was that they stormed in and killed everyone.

  Absolutely everyone.

  Aliyev’s blood ran cold as he realized whose power he was in. Now the man began his questioning – and it wasn’t long before it took a violent turn.

  “You are working with the British and Americans.”

  “What?”

  The Russian stood up, raised his big and menacing assault boot, and shoved it in Aliyev’s chest, knocking him over backward in his chair. Aliyev hit the floor hard, taking much of the impact on the back of his head. His eyes swam, but he could see the big man flick the remains of the cigarette onto him, then walk over and stand right over his immobilized form, one leg to either side, staring straight down at him.

  “You think we are amateurs? That we can’t detect radio transmissions in our own backyard? Or triangulate the end points?”

  Aliyev worked his mouth dryly, trying to get the word Nyet out.

  The very large man squatted down right over Aliyev’s chest – and stuck his hoary finger right in his face, an inch away. Now Aliyev had a second to make out the tattoo on the other arm. It had the words ВОЛЧЬЯ СТАЯ (“WOLF PACK”) over a drawing of a gray wolf with an entire severed leg of some hapless dead prey, maybe a caribou of some sort, in its mouth.

  The text below read АКЕЛА – “AKELA”.

  Aliyev swallowed dryly again. He knew the gray wolves of the Russian steppes were not just mean, but also smart – with multiple modes of communication and complex pack-hunting techniques. (He knew these seemingly random facts about wolves because he’d made a careful study of all the dangerous wildlife of the Eurasian steppe – brown bears, wild boars, wolverines – before deciding where to build his dacha.) And he could easily imagine why a unit of Spetsnaz’s Alfa Group would take them as their mascot.

  Finger still in Aliyev’s face, this pack leader, evidently known as Akela, now demanded: “What was your involvement in the sinking of the Admiral Nakhimov?”

  Aliyev’s mouth opened and closed again. He didn’t have to feign bafflement at this, and he certainly didn’t have to feign terror.

  Akela put the pad of his finger into Aliyev’s forehead and pressed – hard. He was actually pressing his head into the floor, painfully, with a single finger. “It won’t matter in the end,” he said. “The Mirovye Lohi cannot be killed.”

  Aliyev didn’t know who The World Fuckers were, but he was pretty sure he didn’t want to meet them. The Wolf Pack was more than enough for one day – or one lifetime for that matter.

  “No,” Akela said, sticking his face even closer to Aliyev’s. “All the Americans did was bloody their noses – and make them very, very angry. But Spetsnaza cannot be deterred or frightened away. Pain, discomfort, death – all of these are nothing to them. They are unbeatable, not to mention undefeated, at every level of combat – from teeth and claws, to knives and sniper rifles, all the way up to ICBMs. And they absolutely will not stop, ever… ”

  Finally, the hulking and supremely menacing bad-ass Russian commando stood up and looked down at Aliyev with utterly emotionless eyes, his cruel mouth turned up at one corner.

  “…until they have Patient Zero.”

  Alpha team will return – but so will Spetsnaz Alfa Group – in

  ARISEN, BOOK ELEVEN – DEATHMATCH

  Come back and live through the beginning of the end of the world in

  ARISEN : GENESIS, the pulse-pounding and bestselling first ARISEN prequel.

  Love this book? Share the love, support independent authors, and make me your best friend forever by posting a quick review on Amazon.com. Thanks!

  Want to be alerted when the next ARISEN book is released? Sign up for e-mail alerts at www.zulualpha.co.uk/alerts and we’ll keep you updated. (And we’ll never share your address or use it for anything else.)

  You can also interact with other Arisen readers, plus the writers themselves, by liking the Arisen Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/ZulaAlpha

  And you can follow Michael on Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus, RSS, or by e-mail.

  Thanks and Acknowledgements

  My deep and sincere thanks to indispensable über-readers Mark George Pitely, Amanda Jo Moore, and ETC Mark D. Wiggins, USCG (ret); the amazing Editrice; and 1SG Don Harper, US Army (ret). Thanks as always to Anna K. Brooksbank, Sara Natalie Fuchs, Richard S. Fuchs, Virginia Ann Sayers-King, Valerie Sayers, Alexander M. Heublein, Matthew David Grabowy, and Michael and Jayne Barnard, for their indispensable support. Also, Bruce, Wanda, Alec, and Brendan Fyfe for their service and sacrifice. Eternal thanks to Glynn James for coming up with Arisen.

  The line about how if your life depends on your cardio, you will run, even on four packs a day, is from Iraq war veteran, PMC, and general badass (and friend) Paul Trejo.

  The comfort of “a dwarfy hope” is from probably the very best and loveliest novel you’ve never read, Tibor Fischer’s Under the Frog.

  The quip that when a problem goes from difficult to completely impossible, it becomes easy again is from Michael Kinsley.

  “Be bold – and mighty forces will come to your aid” is from Basil King.

  “Tough. Deal with it. Adapt and overcome” is, as always, from Master Chief Brandon Webb USNAVWARSPECOM (ret). You should go read his memoir The Red Circle right now. It’s perhaps the best Navy SEAL memoir – and, yes, I’ve read them all. After that you might want to read his new book Among Heroes: A U.S. Navy SEAL's True Story of Friendship, Heroism, and the Ultimate Sacrifice, which is pretty damned amazing as well, plus important.

  When Fick kisses Graybeard on the forehead before getting out of the helo, he did it in imitation of Medal of Honor recipient Captain William D. Swenson. (You can see him do it here. )

  Surprise – “your operation just turned conventional” is from Iassen Donov in SOFREP.

  Re: Wesley on his door - see: http://www.discovery.com/tv-shows/mythbusters/videos/titanic-survival-results/

  Thanks to the suddenly/strangely indispensable Automatic Cyrillic Converter at http://mashke.org/Conv/

  Random shout-out, and mad propz, to the equally magisterial and indispensable Internet Movie Firearms Database.

  Some books that were indispensable, helpful, or just inspirational in producing both Books Nine and Ten of ARISEN include:

  Ashley's War: The Untold Story of a Team of Women Soldiers on the Special Ops Battlefield, by Gayle Tzemach Lemmon

  No Hero: The Evolution of a Navy SEAL, by Mark Own

  Plenty of Time When We Get Home: Love and Recovery in the Aftermath of War, by Kayla Williams

  The Lion's Gate: On the Front Lines of the Six Day War, by Steven Pressfield

  The Mission, the Men, and Me:
Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

  Band of Brothers: E Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne from Normandy to Hitler's Eagle's Nest, by Stephen E. Ambrose

  On Writing, by Ernest Hemingway

  Secrets Of Story: Well Told (Screenwriting Blue Books Book 4), by William C. Martell

  The Anatomy of Story: 22 Steps to Becoming a Master Storyteller, by John Truby

  Save the Cat!® Strikes Back, by Blake Snyder

  The entire playlist I wrote Books Nine and Ten to is available here. (I’m sorry it’s jumbled, but by the end I had moved most of the best stuff to the top, plus ordered it very specifically, plus put some songs in more than once (a lot more), to get the maximum jolt.) Very special extra recognition and thanks go out to:

  Soundgarden, “Jesus Christ Pose” (God, I miss the nineties.)

  XXX Car Ride (feat. Kem Secksdiin Famus & Str8 Jacket), “Bring the Pain” (“My goonies stay clipped up / That’s how we do it in the Midwest…”)

  Celldweller, “New Elysium” (Klayton’s still got it! Him and me both, I hope. And leave it to him to invent a new kind of music video. It rocks.)

  Hollywood Undead, “Usual Suspects” (again!) and “Been to Hell”

  Halestorm, “Amen” (God bless Halestorm.)

  Fort Minor, “Remember Name” (Thanks, Matt.)

  The beautiful new Children 18:3 album, Come In - all of it (I dumped the entire thing both in my work folder – for writing; and my running folder – for all the creative/story work.)

  Joel Nielsen, “Questionable Ethics 1”, from the Black Mesa video game soundtrack. Absolutely the one single thing to be said against this completely asskicking song is that it’s only 82 seconds long. My solution?

  The (largely instrumental) playlist I edited Books Nine and Ten to is also available here.

  A portion of the proceeds from this book will go to support the USX Veteran Everest Expedition. Amazing undertaking, terrific cause. Watch their awesome short video and learn more here.

  ARISEN

  Hope Never Dies.

  Fans of the bestselling ARISEN series call it “Staggeringly good - the most consistently excellent franchise in zombie literature” … “Wall to wall adrenaline - edge of your seat unputdownable until the very last page” … “totally stunning in its originality” … “jaw dropping” … “moves like an avalanche” … “You can smell the smoke, feel the explosions, and hear the rounds headed down range” … “edge of the seat, nail biting, page turning mayhem” … “had me holding my breath more times than I could count” … “a knock down drag out kick ass read - the best ZA book series around, period” … “rolls along like an out of control freight train” … “Left me shaking at the last page…”

  Alpha team will return in

  ARISEN, BOOK ELEVEN – DEATHMATCH

  They are the most capable, committed, and indispensable counter-terrorist operators in the world.

  They have no rivals for skill, speed, ferocity, intelligence, flexibility, and sheer resolve.

  Somewhere in the world, things are going horrifyingly wrong…

  Readers call the D-BOYS series “a high-octane adrenaline-fueled action thrill-ride”, “one of the best action thrillers of the year (or any year for that matter)”, “a riveting, fast paced classic!!”, “pure action”, “The Best Techno Military Thriller I have read!”, “Awesome!”, “Gripping”, “Edge of your seat action”, “Kick butt in the most serious of ways and a thrill to read”, “What a wild ride!!! I simply could not put this book down”, “has a real humanity and philosophical side as well”, “a truly fast action, high octane book”, “Up there with Clancy and W.E.B. Griffin”, “one of the best Spec Ops reads I have run into”, and “hi-tech and action in one well-rounded explosive thriller.”

  Table of Contents

  Secrets Of Story: Well Told