The Kill Box
Page 1
Books by
H. RIPLEY RAWLINGS IV
Assault by Fire
The Kill Box
Red Metal (with Mark Greaney)
THE KILL BOX
A TYCE ASHER NOVEL
H. RIPLEY RAWLINGS IV
Lt. Col., USMC (ret.)
PINNACLE BOOKS
Kensington Publishing Corp.
www.kensingtonbooks.com
All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.
Table of Contents
Also by
Title Page
Copyright Page
The 150th Cavalry Regiment
Epigraph
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
CHAPTER 37
CHAPTER 38
CHAPTER 39
CHAPTER 40
CHAPTER 41
EPILOGUE
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Teaser chapter
PINNACLE BOOKS are published by
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Copyright © 2021 H. Ripley Rawlings IV
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.
Maps by Milica Sttamenkovic.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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ISBN: 978-0-7860-4708-6
Electronic edition:
ISBN: 978-0-7860-4709-3 (e-book)
ORGANIZATION OF U.S. RESISTANCE FORCES
The 150th Cavalry Regiment
Colonel DAVID NEPO (Missing in Action):
Commanding Officer, 150th Cavalry, West Virginia Army National Guard.
Major TYCE ASHER: U.S. Marine officer, wounded in Iraq, leads the regiment when the colonel is reported MIA. Lost left leg in combat in Fallujah, Iraq.
Gunnery Sergeant CHARLES “TREY” DIXON III: Called “Gunny,” keeps the men in line and expects the troops to act like warriors 24/7.
Staff Sergeant ALEJANDRA ENCANTAR CELESTINA DIAZ-PEREZ: The squadron’s heavy weapons expert.
Navy Commander VICTORIA REMINGTON: The raven-haired, impeccably well-educated navy doctor from Connecticut. The Italian Fury.
Captain WILLIAM “NED” BLAKE: U.S. C Troop commander, 19th Army special forces commander.
First Sergeant BRENDEN HULL: U.S. C Troop Staff Non-Commissioned Officer In Charge, 19th Army special forces commander.
Lieutenant TOM BRYCE: Marine Corps, Company D Commander 4th Light Armored Reconnaissance, the Dragoons.
Corporal “TRIGGER”: The 1st Squadron’s Belgian Malinois. Military working dog. Been with the unit more than three years.
LAWTON CUSTIS: Retired U.S. Army one-star general, manager of the Virginia AAF Tank Museum of Military History.
WYNAND: Bearded moonshiner and fixer who knows how to get things done, albeit often on the wrong side of the law.
GEORGIA-BLUE TEMPLETON: Nicknamed “Blue.” Reliable and massively built mountain man sniper.
SUSANNA HOLLY: Mayor of the West Virginia town of Parsons, in her forties. Blue eyed, fit, red haired.
Russians
President KRYPTOV of Russia.
Army General GRIGOR TYMPKIN: Commander of the Eastern Special Liberation Army, formerly the Occupation Army, in the Eastern third of the Russian invasion.
Major General VIKTOR KOLIKOFF: Russian officer and mastermind of the invasion of the U.S., now the operations chief for all of the U.S. invasion but refocused by General Tympkin on his own priorities in the war.
The SPETS-VTOR: An advanced Russian computer system, short for Spetsial’nyy Schetchik Vtorzheniy, or “Special Invasion Calculating Machine.”
Majors PITOR PAVEL, IVAN DRUGOV, and DANILO QUICO: staff officers to General Kolikoff.
Captain CHRISTOV SHENKOV: A Russian special forces commander.
Call sign:
Steppe Wolf.
Major STAZIA VAN ANDJÖRSSON, a.k.a. STACEY VAN ANDERSSON. An SVR special forces major.
Call sign:
Panther Chameleon.
Major UINTERGRIN of the Russian 27th Chem-Bio Brigade.
Il leone non può proteggersi dalle trappole e la volpe non può difendersi dai lupi. Bisogna quindi essere una volpe per riconoscere trappole e un leone per spaventare i lupi. (The lion cannot protect himself from traps, and the fox cannot defend himself from wolves. One must therefore be a fox to recognize traps, and a lion to frighten wolves.)
—NICCOLÒ MACHIAVELLI, The Prince
PROLOGUE
Twelve years ago
Bethesda, MD
The man was vaguely aware of some sounds nearby. Voices, and a beeping noise. All else was a haze of confusion.
Where am I? came his first cogent thought. This was followed closely by a sobering second thought. Wait . . . who am I?
He heard some other sounds, like heavy sighs from a wheezing old man. Someone with a very raspy throat and an even drier mouth. Concentrating hard through the fog and confusion in his mind, he realized the noises were actually coming from him.
He smacked his dry, flaking lips and tried to open his eyes. They wouldn’t budge. His world remained in relative darkness. He was vaguely aware of a dull beating in his chest and a throbbing in his head. Then he became aware that a pain was spreading out all over his body. At least, to his slowly awakening senses, it felt like it was spreading. He couldn’t tell. Everything just hurt. Badly.
At least I know I’m alive, he thought with grim amusement.
“Ow,” a voice said, and he recognized the sound. It was his own voice, but distant and somehow unfamiliar.
I can hear, he thought, trying to take stock, so there is that.
A few things were beginning to come back to him. Had there been gunfire? He remembered driving in a vehicle, then there was maybe a grenade going off.
No, he thought. It was more intense than that. Huge explosion. Fireball. I was blown out of my vehicle. There was rapid gunfire.
The feeling of confusion was now mixed with shock, and maybe some fear. The memories coming back were too rapid to comprehend but so vivid that he began to feel a pain in his stomach.
Then what? he thought.
He concentrated even ha
rder now, but the harder he tried, the less he could remember. It was like turning on a car’s high beams in thick fog on a dark night. When you flick them on, they just illuminate the fog and conceal everything behind it.
The beeping noise grew faster: ping-ping-ping.
Wait, I’m in a hospital. More rational thought was returning. A growing awareness of the here and now overwhelmed him.
He tried to open his eyes, but they were stuck shut. Oh my God, he thought, am I blind? He tried to move his arms, but they didn’t seem to be working, either.
Alone and in his dark, hazy, pain-filled world, he remembered a man shooting at him. He’d shot back. In fact, he shot the guy twice without thinking and killed him. He could see the man’s face clearly. The spittle on his mouth, the wild look in his eyes: a mixture of fear and determination. A look of sudden surprise as the two bullets caught the man full force, the body crumpling to the ground. From below, a knife cut across his own calf, and someone wrestled him down to the floor—a floor filled with spent brass shell casings, gore, and dead or half-dead bodies. A grenade exploded, right next to him. And then . . . nothing.
I was in a full-fledged battle, he remembered. He tried to move his legs, but, like his arms, nothing moved. Dear God, did I lose my arms and legs? A wave of terror passed over him as he thought, I’m blind, and I’m limbless.
The machine’s ping was going even faster now.
Then he heard a door open.
“Hey, Marine, glad to see you’re awake.” It was a reassuring female voice. It brought him great comfort. “You’ve been through a lot.”
He tried to lift an arm but still couldn’t tell if it was moving. As if the voice’s owner sensed the purpose of his awkward motions, she said, “You have bandages on both arms from where the doctors removed shrapnel. You had almost ten grams in you.” He tried to lift an arm toward the bandages on his eyes. “You shouldn’t mess with the bandages. You were very badly wounded, and the surgeons are still worried about infections. Just get some rest now. Everything is going to be just fine.” He heard the door open again, and the sounds of the woman leaving the room.
She didn’t get far. He heard another female voice outside the door. “Nurse, there was an alarm.”
“Yes, doctor. I checked him, he’s fine. He’s just coming around.”
“Good. This one is the Marine? The one from Fallujah.”
“Yes, doctor. A combat infantry officer named Tyce Asher.”
“I heard the Deputy Commandant came by and pinned the Purple Heart medal on him personally.”
“Yes, a few days ago. Though he was unconscious through the whole thing.”
“Okay. Pretty tricky coming out of a drug-induced coma like that. The heavy sedation leaves them immobile. He’ll be very confused for the next day or two. Go ahead and get the next of kin over here.”
“He has none. There was a Marine sergeant listed. Umm, Dixon is his name. He’s the command rep and has been by a bunch of times. The sergeant was to be informed if he woke. He’s staying at a nearby hotel.”
“Did you tell him yet, about . . . ?”
“Not yet. I didn’t have the heart.”
“Okay. I guess I’ll be the one letting him know we had to amputate a leg.”
Two years ago
Paris, France
From the corner of the café, the man watched the three Russians pay their bill and leave. He folded his newspaper, downed the remainder of his café au lait, and continued following them. He and his French DSGE unit had been tailing them for the past few days. They hadn’t been hard to track—in fact, it was pretty clear they were not trained in any kind of counterintelligence. Still, he stayed a respectable distance away as they entered the Paris Metro tunnel.
Twenty minutes later, the Russians arrived at the Quatre-Septembre Metro stop, the agent still tailing them. They walked to Palais Brongniart, the former Paris stock exchange. At the entrance to the Palais, they fumbled for their IDs, paid an entry fee, and went in.
The French agent signaled to his number two man across the street to hold his position, then reached into his raincoat and activated a concealed radio to call his headquarters.
“Chief, they have entered the Palais Brongniart.”
“Why?” came back the one-word question from his superior.
“I have no idea, boss. Looks like the Paris consumer electronics show is going on here. Should I follow?”
“Agent, when three officers from the Russian army enter our country with fake passports, spend three days grossly inebriated and womanizing, then finally attend the premier global technology show, yes, I suspect this is something you need to be curious about.”
The agent acknowledged, then proceeded into the convention center. He was immediately surrounded by barking robot dogs, swarms of drones dancing overhead in synchronized orbits, and everywhere beautiful ladies in slinky, computer-themed outfits standing next to signs or booths proclaiming the virtues of some groundbreaking piece of technology.
It took him nearly a half hour to locate the three Russian officers. He slipped casually nearby and watched as the three men looked to be closing a deal. They pulled out a credit card and paid for something on the spot, receiving a receipt in exchange. Then they left.
The agent called his partner to ensure he picked them up once they left the venue. His partner reported spotting them immediately. Then the agent went over to the vendor, flashed his badge, and demanded to know what they’d purchased. PlayStations, the man told him. Hundreds of PlayStations.
The DGSE man called his chief with the news, and his boss laughed. “Oh well, looks like a load of nothing. Russian army morale officers trying to keep the troops happy with some modern video games. Tail them to the airport and watch them board just to be sure it’s not some elaborate ruse, then come back to base. We have more important matters heating up. The U.S. is getting froggy in Iran, and we need to keep an eye on a group of Iranian officials coming in tomorrow.”
* * *
Twenty hours later, the three Russians had switched planes three times and were back in their uniforms, landing in Siberia. They each wore the rank of Russian infantry captain. As the plane’s aft ramp lowered, the freezing Siberian winds whipping into the plane’s loading bay, they covered their faces and wrapped their heavy coats around themselves. A Russian colonel walked up the gangway to meet them.
He didn’t waste time. “Did you get them?”
One of the men spoke up. “Yes, Comrade Colonel Kolikoff.”
“All of them?”
“Three hundred brand-new PlayStations will be delivered to the special address in two months’ time.”
“Excellent, Captain Pavel.” Colonel Kolikoff smiled broadly. “We will add them to the German computers we already have.”
“What’s next, Comrade Colonel?” one captain asked.
“Then, my dear Captain Drugov, the SPETS-VTOR will be one of the fastest military computers in the world. General Tympkin has something big planned for us.”
“More computations for Ukraine?”
“No. More complicated. We are to plan a large invasion from start to finish.”
Six months ago
Norfolk, Virginia
The woman looked sharp in her formal U.S. Navy “mess dress” uniform. Two of the security officers eyed her up as she stepped out of her Uber. She walked briskly toward the checkpoint outside the Norfolk Naval Shipyard. The breast of her starched white Navy dinner jacket was adorned with a simple row of three medals, and on her sleeve was the rank of a petty officer. Four gold braids, aiguillettes, cascaded over her shoulder, which the guards knew meant she worked for a four-star admiral. But what really caught their eyes were her legs. The slits on her skirt opened up with every step, revealing tightly toned, tanned calves with no pantyhose.
She flashed them a bright, confident smile. “Good evening, gentlemen.”
The lead agent caught himself staring and put on an official tone. “Name,” he said, pu
lling out a clipboard.
“Stacey Van Andersson.” she said, accenting each syllable in her last name.
“Von A . . . what?” The unusual name caught him off guard. “What is that, Norwegian? Spell if for me.”
“Finnish, actually. V-a-n A-n-d—”
“Okay, okay,” he interrupted. “I found it. ID, please.” He ran his pen over the names on his clipboard.
She opened up a small black patent leather purse and handed over her Navy identity card. The agent checked her name off the list and held up the ID to compare the photo with the woman. She widened her eyes and imitated the picture in her photo. She was pretty, very pretty. Light blond hair pulled up in a high braided bun and the sun-kissed skin of someone who enjoyed nature in her off-duty hours. Something caused the man to hesitate a little longer than was proper. Her eyes. One was an ice-cold blue, and the other a deep, impenetrable brown.
“Ahem.” Someone behind her coughed meaningfully.
The agent was suddenly conscious of the gathering group of well-dressed diplomats and VIPs trying to figure out the reason for the holdup. He quickly waved her through the metal detectors and pointed to a sign that instructed everyone to surrender their electronic devices. Then he went back to checking in the new arrivals.