Devil's Fortress, page 18
The Russian sat upright in surprise. They were only thirty minutes out from Al-Ibediyya. What could possibly be so urgent that it could not wait until he was on the ground? “Go ahead. This is Kondakov,” he snapped into his mike.
“This is Duskhin,” a voice tinged by static replied. “We have a problem, sir.”
Kondakov frowned. Oleg Duskhin was the Raven Syndicate officer assigned to command the security forces at the processing plant. According to his file, he was judged to be of only average competence. But the same assessment also showed that Duskhin was completely trustworthy, which was probably how he’d ended up in this African backwater where vast sums in gold could present an unfortunate temptation for abler but greedier men. “What is this problem?”
Duskhin hesitated for several long seconds. “We’ve lost contact with the surveillance team tasked to keep track of those Western spies,” he admitted finally. “Given the situation, I would welcome further instructions.”
Kondakov bit down on an oath. He was willing to bet that Duskhin’s people had somehow screwed up and allowed the enemy agents to spot them. He realized that wasn’t much of a surprise if he were being fair. The skill sets required to enforce a regime of terror among poverty-stricken Sudanese miners were not equal to the challenge of discreetly monitoring highly trained Western intelligence operatives. He sat quietly for a moment, weighing different options.
Perhaps unnerved by the continuing radio silence, Duskhin tentatively said, “Perhaps I could deploy some of my other security troops to search for these people and try to discover what’s happened to my surveillance team? We’re only a few minutes’ drive outside the town. That way, I might have more information for you by the time your helicopter lands?”
“Absolutely not,” Kondakov said. The idea of even more amateurs muddying the already roiled waters was not welcome at all. “Your guards will only get in our way,” he said flatly. “My specialists and I will be on the ground shortly, and we’ll take things from there. All I want from you are two fast vehicles, both fully fueled and in top mechanical condition. Is that clearly understood?”
Dushkin sounded relieved. “Yes, sir. I’ll organize that at once. We’ll be ready for you the moment your helicopter lands.”
Brusquely, Kondakov signed off. Then, with an exasperated sigh, he turned to the man next to him, the senior member of his hunter-killer team. Bullnecked Stepan Makeyev was a veteran of the GRU’s shadowy Unit 29155—the death squad commanded by Kondakov for many years. Makeyev held an unsurpassed record for his number of liquidations of dissidents, traitors, and dangerous foreigners. Speaking rapidly, Kondakov outlined their current tactical problem.
When he was finished, Makeyev pursed his thick lips. “By the time we land, these spies will have a considerable head start on us,” he pointed out. “Hunting them down may prove difficult.”
“That’s where you’re wrong, Stepan,” he said confidently. Running through the situation with the other man had given him time to think more carefully and recover his poise. “There’s only one real direction they can run. And that’s along the Nile road to Egypt. With this helicopter to scout ahead for us, it will be easy enough to find them.” He shrugged his shoulders. “Now that Duskhin’s idiots have tipped our hand, the only real difficulty may lie in taking at least one of these agents alive, which is our top priority.” Smiling thinly, he fondly patted the hard-sided case in the other seat beside him. It contained some of his favorite instruments of torture. “I’ve been looking forward to practicing a few of my old skills.”
Makeyev nodded. There was no real human expression on his broad face. “And what if the people we’re hunting bolt off the Nile route and head out into the desert instead?”
“So much the better for us,” Kondakov said with a careless shrug. He waved a hand at the lifeless vista outside the Mi-8’s cockpit. “There’s nothing out there. No gasoline. No water. Nothing. They would only drive into a blind alley without any way out.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-THREE
outside the al-ibediyya gold processing plant
a short time later
Five hundred yards outside the Raven Syndicate–owned compound, Tadeusz Kossak lay motionless in a shallow trough he’d laboriously scraped out of the sun-hardened soil the night before. His legs and lower back ached dully, a lingering reminder of the shrapnel wounds he’d suffered in Russia weeks earlier. While those injuries were healed now, at least enough to pass the scrutiny of a doctor who provided discreet, off-the-books medical services to Four’s agents, he could still feel every one of them. But those pains were minor compared to his real enemy now, which was the heat.
His desert camouflage ghillie suit—one he’d handcrafted for himself using strips of lightweight, fire-resistant synthetic fabrics in tans, sand-yellows, light browns, and rock grays—broke up his silhouette and allowed him to blend perfectly with the arid landscape around him. Unfortunately, what the suit could not do was keep him cool under the blazing summer sun. In fact, it made the situation worse, since the ghillie suit’s complex layers of cloth, netting, and bits of dried native brush trapped the substantial amount of heat generated by his own body even at rest. When combined with the already high daytime temperatures, it was almost unbearable.
Kossak shrugged inwardly, striving to ignore the sweat pouring off his face and body. No one in Poland’s elite special forces or later in the Quartet Directorate had ever promised that his work as a scout and sniper would be easy or painless. Endurance and sheer grit in the face of intense physical discomfort were necessary traits for this work. As important in some ways, he knew, as the skill required to accurately hit targets at impossibly long ranges. Without his ability to sneak undetected to within the line of sight of an enemy, and lie hidden for hours or sometimes even days, his talent for precision shooting was nothing more than a carnival trick, or perhaps a way to rack up medals and awards in shooting competitions. He winced. He could not imagine being condemned to such a dull, meaningless existence.
He licked his blistered lips and then took a tiny sip of water from the CamelBak hydration pack he wore under his camouflage suit. It was scorching hot. Cautiously, he swished the water around the inside of his mouth, waiting for it to cool a little before swallowing.
Then, through his headset, the Pole heard Shannon Cooke’s voice. “Lead to all Trawlers,” the other man radioed. “Stand by. I have the Bait team’s vehicle in sight. They’re a couple of miles out, tooling up the southern track, poking along all nice and sedate—like an old married couple out for a Sunday drive after church.”
Kossak smiled slightly. Long experience with Cooke had shown that the calmer and more “country” the Virginian sounded, the more keyed up he really was. The need to wait silently—in searing heat and mounting uncertainty—for the first elements of this intricate plan to come together must have been hard on him, too. “Copy that, Lead,” he heard Cole Hynes reply. “Their timing is good. That Tango whirlybird is coming in from the east right now. I make it about five miles away, and I figure it’ll be touching down in just a couple of minutes, tops.”
The Pole nodded to himself in satisfaction. It was time for him to go to work. The heat-induced torment he’d been enduring inside the confines of his sweltering camouflage suit instantly subsided, pushed far to the back of his mind by the prospect of action. With slow, practiced movements, he pulled his long-barreled Lobaev DXL-5 heavy rifle into position. Like him, the weapon was swathed in strips of camouflage cloth to break up its distinctive silhouette. He sighted through the scope he’d attached, a Vortex Optics Razor HD Gen II, and panned slowly across the razor wire–fenced Russian compound—noting signs of movement.
Two large SUVs—one black and the other gray—had driven out of the processing plant’s motor pool. They were now parked next to a large paved area that served as a helicopter landing pad in an isolated corner of the complex. Several hundred yards away, the plant’s industrial and administrative buildings shimmered in the heat haze. Two Raven Syndicate security men cradling assault rifles nervously stood guard near the vehicles, looking miserable in their bulky body armor. A man he judged to be their boss had just climbed out of one of the air-conditioned SUVs. Clad in jeans and a short-sleeved linen shirt, he was dressed far more comfortably than his subordinates. But he also appeared ill at ease, obsessively checking his watch while he shouted at someone over his smartphone. One side of Kossak’s mouth quirked up. Obviously, these men did not see the imminent arrival of a Syndicate bigwig as a blessing.
The Mi-8 appeared on the horizon. Rotor blades whirling, it swept low across the desert, rapidly taking on shape and definition as it approached. The big helicopter flared out when it reached the pad and slowly settled onto its tricycle landing gear. The shrill howl from its twin turboshaft engines diminished somewhat but did not fade away entirely. The Sudanese flight crew seemed ready to lift off again, just as soon as they had delivered their passengers.
Through his scope, Kossak saw the two Raven Syndicate guards double-time across the asphalt in response to a shouted order from their superior. They bent low under the Mi-8’s still-turning rotors and yanked open one of its side doors. Half a dozen other men dropped out of the helicopter’s aft cabin and immediately headed toward the waiting SUVs. Downwash from the spinning rotors whipped at their clothing.
Here we go, the Pole thought calmly. He zeroed in on the new arrivals, shifting his aim from face to face while mentally comparing them against the Quartet Directorate intelligence files he’d studied so thoroughly in preparation for this operation. He stopped at the sight of the tall, balding man wearing wire-rim spectacles who brought up the rear of the little group. That was Vasily Kondakov. There wasn’t a shadow of a doubt in his mind. There was no mistaking that cruel, self-satisfied demeanor. This man, once a high-ranking officer in Russia’s GRU, exuded power, which was appropriate for someone now believed to be Voronin’s top deputy.
“Trawler Lead,” Kossak radioed quietly, taking great pains to speak with absolute precision. “I have identified the primary target. Standing by for your order.”
Meticulously, he adjusted his aim.
“Understood,” Cooke replied. “Bait and all Trawlers. Confirm your readiness.”
Kossak listened as a flurry of responses, all cool and thoroughly professional, but each conveying an unmistakable edge of eagerness, flooded through his headset. His finger settled into position against the trigger of his long sniper rifle.
“All right, boys and girl. Light ’em up!” Cooke ordered.
The Pole squeezed the trigger in the brief moment between one breath and the next. CRAACK. A 12.7mm round streaked downrange, slashing across the intervening desert at four thousand feet per second, three and a half times the speed of sound.
on the landing pad
that same time
Kondakov mopped at his brow with a handkerchief while following the hunter-killer team out from under the helicopter’s still-turning blades. He’d started sweating profusely the moment he stepped into the heat waves shimmering off the landing pad’s asphalt surface. He frowned. It had been years since he’d been in the field himself. He was far more used to pulling other men’s strings from the comfort of a climate-controlled office.
Still dabbing at his forehead, he straightened up at the edge of the pad and glanced back at the grounded Mi-8. As soon as his team was inside the SUVs waiting for them and ready to move out in pursuit, he would order the helicopter into the air again. Once aloft, it could scour the highway north along the Nile for any sign of those two Western agents as they undoubtedly scrambled to escape.
Kondakov nodded in satisfaction. His plan to box the enemy agents in from the air while closing around them on the ground wasn’t complicated. Then again, he decided, it didn’t need to be. No matter how skilled or desperate these operatives were, he and his men already held the winning hand in this little game. It was just a matter of time―
And then his eyes widened in horrified astonishment as the Mi-8’s cockpit canopy shattered—blown inward by a massive, high-powered bullet. Hit squarely in the chest, one of the Sudanese pilots disintegrated in a spray of bright red blood and bone fragments, pulped by the enormous impact of a round capable of piercing steel. Half a second later, a second shot killed the other pilot.
For a moment longer, Kondakov stood frozen in disbelief, staring at the helicopter’s smashed cockpit. But then, with a low growl, Stepan Makeyev knocked him flat. He smacked into the tarmac with a startled yelp and lost his grip on the small case containing his specialized torture devices. It spun out of his hands, landing a couple of meters away.
“Keep your damn fool head down, Colonel,” the big man snarled from beside him on the ground, reverting to Kondakov’s old GRU rank in the heat of the moment. Around them, the other Raven Syndicate hunter-killer team members had thrown themselves prone, too. They were already frantically clawing at their slung weapons and equipment bags.
Only meters away, a third heavy rifle round slammed into the front end of a parked SUV. Splinters spalled away from its smashed engine block. The next SUV rocked on its wheels, punctured by a fourth armor-piercing bullet that struck its fuel tank. The sickly-sweet smell of leaking gasoline permeated the air.
Pressed flat against the blisteringly hot tarmac, Kondakov craned his head to the side, desperately scanning the desert beyond the perimeter to pick out the enemy sniper who was methodically picking off targets. A sudden flash of movement off to his right drew his eyes. Only a few hundred meters away, a white Toyota Land Cruiser sped straight toward the coiled razor wire fence guarding the gold processing plant. A thick plume of dust trailed behind it.
Oleg Dushkin’s two security men had spotted the oncoming vehicle at the same time. They dropped to one knee, sighting down the barrels of their 7.62mm KORD assault rifles. “Hostiles!” one shouted. “Engaging!” And then his head exploded, blown open by another 12.7mm round.
Spattered by blood and pulverized bone from his now-dead comrade, the second guard panicked. Screaming in terror, he scrambled to his feet and bolted for the nearest cover, one of their now-disabled vehicles. But before he’d taken more than a few steps, he was spun around by the crushing impact of yet another bullet. Killed instantly, the guard flopped to the ground.
“Well, shit, Colonel,” Makeyev said conversationally to Kondakov. He slammed a thirty-round magazine into his weapon, a 9mm SR-2 Veresk submachine gun. “These fucking spies are hunting us, not the other way around.” He unfolded the submachine gun’s stock with practiced ease and set it firmly against his right shoulder. “This is starting to get ugly.”
A loud, crackling hiss erupted out in the desert to their right, only about fifty meters beyond the perimeter fence. Makeyev stared in shock at a small rocket as it curved high into the air, uncoiling a length of flexible gray tube behind it. The little rocket sputtered through a shallow arc and fell inside the razor wire. Behind it, the gray tube thudded down over a stretch of the fence itself. “Incoming! Take cover!” he roared, burying his face against the tarmac.
whaaammm.
At least a dozen grenades went off with shattering force in a split-second—tearing that section of the razor wire fence apart with thousands of sharp-edged fragments. A huge pall of dust and smoke obscured the area for several seconds.
Blearily, staggered by the enormous blast, Kondakov slowly lifted his head. He was just in time to catch sight of the Land Cruiser as it raced into the gap and then burst out of the smoke. Its tires shrieked, flinging dirt and rocks aside as the vehicle swung sharply and headed straight for them. It was still picking up speed.
“Mater’ Bozh’ya. Mother of God,” Kondakov stammered, transfixed by the terrifying sight of the Toyota seemingly determined to crush him beneath its wheels. Across the tarmac, the survivors of his hunter-killer team were moaning—dazed and deafened by the powerful explosion that had just ripped apart the perimeter fence. The processing plant’s chief of security, Oleg Duskhin, lay crumpled off to the side like a tattered rag doll. Only Makeyev seemed capable of coherent thought or action. Grimly, the big man spat out a mouthful of blood and swung around, aiming his weapon toward the oncoming vehicle.
Seeing someone else prepared to fight back, Kondakov felt a brief surge of hope. Awkwardly, he fumbled for his pistol, a weapon he’d entirely forgotten until now. Swearing under his breath, he yanked his 9mm Udav out of its shoulder holster . . . and then saw a quadcopter drone blur past just overhead. Two small cylindrical objects tumbled toward the ground in its wake.
His mouth fell open in horror. “No―”
Both M84 stun grenades detonated with ear-splitting bangs and blinding flashes—flashes far brighter than the noonday sun.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-FOUR
the toyota land cruiser
that same time
Nick Flynn stomped hard on the brakes, slamming the Toyota to a screeching stop only a few yards from where stun grenades dropped by the drone had just gone off. Through its dust-smeared windshield, he could see bodies scattered across the tarmac. Some were dead. Others, those caught in the radius of the two blasts, were thrashing and rolling in pain. They’d been shocked and temporarily blinded and deafened.
Those Russians were fish in a barrel, he realized with ice-cold clarity. But equally, he knew, this tactical advantage wouldn’t last much longer. Grabbing his PP-2000 submachine gun, he leaped out of the Land Cruiser. Out the corner of his eye, he glimpsed Van Horn doing the same thing on her side of the big white vehicle.
With his weapon up and set for controlled, semi-automatic fire, Flynn stepped to the side to gain a clear view of his chosen targets. His front sights settled on one of the Russians, a big, burly man who’d recovered enough to fumble desperately for his compact submachine gun, an SR-2 Veresk. Too late, pal, he thought. He squeezed the trigger twice. Hit by both 9mm rounds, the big man slumped forward and lay still, facedown on the asphalt in a spreading pool of blood.
