Rodriguez took a sip of the energy drink she’d brought in with her as she watched the tattooist work. “I can’t believe I’m doing this. I’m not even drunk.”
“And I can’t believe you’ve been in the Navy half your life and this is your first tattoo,” O’Hare said. Rodriguez leaned forward as the tattooist slowly peeled the stencil away. As the paper came off, Rodriguez saw the Australian had another tattoo, just above her panty line. Some words, in a flowing script.
“Is ait an mac an saol?” Rodriguez said, reading them out loud, no doubt pronouncing them wrongly. “What language is that?”
“Gaelic,” O’Hare said.
“What does it mean?”
“That, Lieutenant Commander Rodriguez, is for me to know and you to never find out,” Bunny grinned.
Sarge hiked back to Savoonga with a heavy heart. There had been three bodies inside the water tank, as far as he could tell.
He had wrapped a scarf around his face and gone down into the tank. He wanted to be sure it was Perri Tungyan and Dave Iworrigan in there. He had found two rifles, a Makarov pistol. And a Russian soldier in a private’s uniform. The bodies were pretty torn up, but the freezing weather had stopped them from decomposing. He had seen enough photos of Perri and Dave to recognize them easily.
He knew why Perri and Dave were inside the water tower; he’d probably been the last one to speak to them. But what the Russian was doing there, he had no idea. He was a policeman, not a war vet, but he’d be willing to bet the carnage he had seen inside that tank had been caused by a bomb or grenade.
It looked like some bizarre three-way suicide pact but that was ridiculous. Had someone thrown a grenade in from outside, killing them all or leaving them to die? Had they died in a bombing or mortar strike? He shook his head. The island was crawling with war crimes investigators — a special team from The Hague appointed by the UN Security Council. Russia had accused the US of bombing its own citizens at Savoonga, the US had accused Russia of using them as human shields. The US had accused Russian troops of the massacre of the sick and elderly residents of Gambell, while Russia accused US troops of killing its wounded soldiers there and hiding their bodies in a mass grave.
Perri, Dave and the Russian private would probably just be added to the long list of tragic mysteries that Saint Lawrence now held.
The pockets on his cargo trousers were heavy with the wallets he’d taken off the bodies of the boys inside the water tank. The Russian had an ID card on him, too bloodied for him to read, but he took it with him as well, to give to the investigators. He had to work out how he was going to get the boys’ bodies back to Gambell, and what he was going to tell their families — but that was a problem for tomorrow.
Sarge knew only one thing for sure. If it hadn’t been for the boys inside that water tank getting the warning out, the air battle over Little Diomede could have turned out very differently, and with it, the entire conflict. Maybe even the whole of history.
But then, history belonged to small people doing great things, didn’t it?
He was pretty sure Dostoyevsky had said that.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Growing up I read a book by British adventure writer, Brian Callison, called ‘The Dawn Attack’. It was an hour by hour account of a fictional British commando raid on a Norwegian port in World War Two but what sets it apart is the use of multiple perspectives — both land, sea and air, and of both sides of the conflict — which served to highlight that wars are started by politicians and generals but fought by ordinary people doing extraordinary things. It does not glorify war; the author successfully paints the picture of an ultimately meaningless action in a brutal war, and of painful, lonely and pointless battlefield deaths, but it is an exhilarating read. I’d guess I have read it at least twenty times over the years.
I always told myself, one day I’ll try to write a book in the style of ‘Dawn Attack’. This pale attempt is that. So if you enjoyed this one, I strongly recommend you read the book that was the inspiration.
And thanks for supporting Indie Publishing! If you liked Bering Strait, please go back to Amazon and/or Goodreads and leave your rating — ratings are like gold to Indie Publishers and all sales of FX Holden books go to charity. Yes, all!
You can always contact me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/hardcorethrillers if you’d like to chat, ask questions, or just follow the page to find out about giveaways or teasers for upcoming novels.
Cheers,
FX Holden