In moments the Lada carrying Hadit, a Turkmen vendor of sundry cheap plastic nicknacks a selection of which were in the trunk, disappeared into the rain and darkness leaving nothing behind of Vladimir Yaroslav but a fat suit lying on the floor like the shed skin of a snake.
Chapter Thirty
Mike stayed still in his hide as an out of tune Lada puttered to the south. From the sound of it, it took the fork headed for Azerbaijan.
But that wasn’t what he was listening for. That was the sound of multiple engines coming from the north.
He’d found a nice little hide, a dug out portion to the streambank which was relatively flat and just about covered in bushes. First he’d slowly laid out a heavy ghillie blanket then slithered under it, snuggling into the comforting mud of the bank. Once under that he’d divested himself of some of his encumbering gear; the blanket was thick and lined with mylar to keep from letting loose any heat.
Once prepared he settled in to wait. When the vehicles, they sounded like small trucks or SUVs, pulled to a stop he still waited. He could hear the group deploying, quietly and professionally. They dropped into the streambed and walked down it, within a foot of his position at one point, without noticing that the pile of junk along the side of the stream was something other than a pile of junk. The night was still awfully dark and he’d have been hard to see in daylight much less under NVGs. For that matter, the patterning of the cover under the strips of burlap was a digital pattern designed to defeat NVGs. To a night vision system it simply didn’t exist. It was part of the pattern of pixels. If they’d scanned carefully with a thermal imager, they might have noticed him. But NVGs were worse than useless.
The fedayeen were, as normal, late. When he heard the second group of vehicles he pressed the transmitter and started the countdown.
The next was art rather than science. The other group of vehicles approached. Their lights would be on. Even if they were tactical lights they would partially blind the group Russians. And as the Islamics deployed the Russians, even though they each had a sector they were supposed to be watching, were going to be casting quick glances over their shoulder…
Now.
He stood up and casually walked up out of the streambed, fiddling with his zipper as he did.
Over all the rest of his gear he had a Russian military issue poncho. The weapon he’d chosen for the op was a BIZON 7.62x25 submachine gun. The weapon was a favorite of Russian special operations groups, firing a 7.62x25 bullet from an integrally silenced barrel. Heavier and less accurate than the silenced M4, it was still a pretty good weapon.
AS he’d guessed, the former Spetznaz were armed with a motley collection of personal weapons. He spotted two Makarovs before he was even up on the flat.
“You should have taken a piss before we left,” one of the guards growled, turning back from a glance over his shoulder at the Islamics. The guy was just about covered in frag grenades. Personally, Mike hated the things. He used them when he had to but never carried more than one unless absolutely necessary. He’d seen too many people frag themselves. This fucker clearly loved the damned things. Stupid fuck.
“Tea,” Mike muttered back. Over the last year his Russian had gotten perfect and while accented, the accent didn’t sound American. That was because it was a Keldara accent. But the Russian would have to be quick as hell to notice that in the middle of an op.
Suddenly, Mike was just another of the Spetznaz guards. Several of them sported ponchos virtually identical to his. Same gun, same walk, same wariness.
Just one problem.
The two groups had stopped about sixty yards apart. That was fine, there were Keldara positioned on the far side of the engagement. The two groups would pincer the meet as soon as Mike initiated. But Mike had intended to get to the package and take it down then initiate. It was the only way he could be sure there wouldn’t be a nuke dropped on his head.
The problem was that the principles, and a select group of guards, was moving to the no-man’s land in the middle of the two groups. On the Russian side there were four guards, Sergei Rudenko and Arensky. Arensky was carrying what Mike presumed was the package, a briefcase. On the Islamic side there were four guards, these guys encumbered with bags but still with their hands on their weapons, Al-Kariya the Al Qaeda moneyman from the bulk and another guy, slimmer, nobody Mike knew about.
There was no way that Mike could approach that group. Too much ground to cover. Too open. Too obvious.
Fuck.
Mike wandered one way then back, looking up at the woods where the Keldara waited then stopped by where he’d come out of the stream. Three of the Russians had gathered there, not exactly taking advantage of the shelter of one of the Mercedes SUVs they’d come in but close. One of them was the guy who had challenged Mike’s “bathroom trip.”
Fuck. This was gonna suck.
As he approached the group his C2 device buzzed, once. Adams was initiating. Out of time.
He reached over, casually pulled a pin out of one of the frags on the guy’s harness and then pushed the man, hard, into the group.
Two steps and he was rollling across the hood of the Mercedes SUV, hitting the ground on the far side on both feet and aiming into the group of principles.
“Lasko! Go!”
Lasko had been continually adjusting his aim based on his read of the wind and, ignoring the sudden crash of multiple grenades, his finger stroked the trigger as soon as he heard the “Go” command.
“Target down,” Sion muttered. “Shift right. Sniper on ridgeline. Target down. I lost the third one.”
“Jackrabbiting,” Lasko said. “Back… ”
There was a thud next to him and looking over it was clear that Sion was not going to be drinking any more beer. Or, what was worse, doing any more spotting.
He was already down as the next round cracked overhead.
“Right,” Lasko muttered. “If that’s the way you want to play it.”
He had two more hides prepared. Time to play the game.
“Sniper teams, engage targets in valley,” Lasko said, thumbing his throat mike. “I’ll take the enemy sniper.”
Mike triggered a burst into the group of principles, trying for the distant figure that he assumed to be Sergei. The man was next to Arensky, anyway. Arensky and Al-Kariya were easy to spot. Neither one of them looked as if they knew what to do in the firefight that was erupting around them.
What he got, instead, were the two guards who moved to place themselves by the principles. It was the right move but it cost them their lives.
Sergei snatched the case away from Arensky and picked him up by the collar, pounding towards the nearest vehicle as the mujaheddin closed in around Al-Kariya and began firing at the Russians.
Suddenly it was a free-for-all. Both groups, highly suspicious of each other, thought that they had been betrayed. The Russians were laying down fire on the fedayeen as the fedayeen backed up to their vehicles. Rounds were cracking downrange in both directions as Mike leapt to his feet and began pounding towards the retreating Russian.
Mike had counted on that. He figured when things went south, especially if it was from fire within the area, they would start fighting each other.
Neither group noticed, until too late, that they were being attacked from behind.
“Back!” Rashid shouted, drawing a pistol out of his robes.
He couldn’t see who had fired but the explosion looked as if it must have been a rocket launcher and some of the Russians were down. The pig Sergei Rudenko had dragged the doctor, and the smallpox, away. The Russians were clearly attacking them, it was time to run.