Tom Clancy Under Fire (42 page)

•   •   •

THEY DROVE BACK DOWNTOWN.
The city’s streets were quieter, but only slightly less crowded as the hardier protesters settled in for the night in tents and folding chairs. Here and there Jack could see the glow of charcoal grills and LED lanterns.

Right now this was an adventure for them, he thought. Had Medzhid told them the truth during his speech the night before—that some of them may die along the way—would they be as enthusiastic about all this? Ideals like freedom and self-determination were powerful and worthy goals but right now these things existed only in the minds of the Dagestani people. Aside from having to stand in the rain they’d yet to feel the kind of suffering that usually goes hand-in-hand with gaining one’s independence. Even if this coup was bloodless and Medzhid proved to be the leader they hoped for, breaking away from the Russian Federation would mean years of hardship and uncertainty and an economy that was as fragile as a sheet of rice paper.

Hated and feared as Stalin was, for decades after his death there were tens of thousands of Russians who wanted him back because he made the trains run on time. How many Dagestanis might feel the same way about Valeri Volodin in a few years’ time?

•   •   •

AS SETH HAD INSTRUCTED,
Jack pulled up to the wrought-iron gate at the back of the Ministry of the Interior building and gave the guard their names. Jack pulled the Suburban through, followed by Spellman and Dom. They found a pair of parking spaces beside the rear entrance, where Seth was waiting.

“Any luck?”

“Some,” said Jack.

Seth led them down a tiled corridor to an elevator, which took them to the building’s top floor. When the doors opened, Jack heard the sounds of overlapping voices and telephones ringing. They followed Seth toward a pair of tall oak doors emblazoned with the MOI’s yellow eagle emblem. An oil portrait of Medzhid looked down at them from the wall above.

Through the doors was an open office space with burgundy carpet and dark paneling covered in oil paintings of what Jack assumed were moments from Russian and Dagestani history, most of them depicting either battles or the founding of settlements.

Sconces spaced at intervals along the walls cast the room in a soft glow. Four seating areas with couches, club chairs, and coffee tables occupied the center of the space. It felt to Jack like a hotel lobby.

Medzhid emerged from one of the side offices, walking fast and studying a file, with Yana and Vasim in tow. As Medzhid strode past them he glanced up and said, “Everyone is well? Good. Make yourselves at home. Seth will show you around,” then disappeared into another office and closed the door behind him.

“Yana, get the ERF watch officer on the phone!”

Ysabel whispered to Jack, “Serious game face.”

“It’s almost game time.”

Seth gave them a stationary tour, pointing at the various doors while describing their function: communications, bedrooms, kitchen, conference rooms one and two.

“Give me five minutes and I’ll meet you in conference room two. The phones are secure in here, so go ahead and use them.”

Seth went back through the main doors. Jack heard the clicking of his shoes fade down the hallway.

“Looks a bit like a bunker,” Dom said. “Matt, do you guys know something we don’t know?”

Spellman shook his head. “Just a precaution in case we’ve misread Volodin.”

“If we’ve misread Volodin, an iron gate and some oak doors won’t do us a damned bit of good.”

“It won’t come to that.”

Jack said, “I need to call home.”

They walked down the hallway and found the conference room. Jack dialed The Campus. As they always seemed to be when he called lately, Gerry, John, and Gavin were there. Jack gave them the latest.

“The
Igarka
out of Astrakhan,” Gavin repeated. “Got it. Should be easy to check her registry.”

“Unless it’s a micro-micro-Kamsarmax,” Clark said, “any cargo carrier would have no trouble accommodating a Kvant. The fact that this one’s a ramp loader should tell us something. It’s kinda dicey to swing a fifteen-ton APC aboard with a crane. One more thing you should keep in mind: Just because the
Igarka
’s slated for a pier doesn’t mean she’s going to put in.”

“What do you mean?” asked Dom.

“In most ports you need to have paid for a mooring to get an anchorage. Some vessels use one, some both. It depends on the reason for the visit. How far out into the harbor was she?”

“A quarter-mile, maybe less,” said Jack.

“That’s plenty close. If there’s a Kvant aboard, it can do its tracking from the anchorage. Hell, if I was there and about twenty years younger I’d take a swim and see what’s what. As it stands, you might have to do it yourselves.”

Gerry asked, “Jack, did you ask Seth about the outlying garrisons?”

“I did. He doesn’t have anything in place. He’s working on something, but his assets are spread thin. Medzhid, too.”

Spellman said, “It’s a calculated risk we had to take, Gerry.”

“We get that, but if Volodin’s going to actively oppose this thing, those garrisons will be the first ones to move. You’ll only get about ten hours’ notice before you’ve got twelve thousand troops on your doorstep.”

“Troops that’ve been fighting Chechen and Georgian terrorists for the past two years,” John Clark added.

“We know the numbers and we know the risks. If push comes to shove, Medzhid will back down before there’s any bloodshed.”

“His call,” Gerry said. “Just be damned sure you guys have an exit plan in place. Four Americans and one Iranian in Medzhid’s inner circle . . . Volodin would probably reopen Bamlag West specially for you, then drop you in a hole.”

•   •   •

JACK AWOKE
to a buzzing sensation against his cheek. He forced open his eyes and fumbled around until his hand touched his vibrating phone. He read the screen: Ysabel. He looked to her side of the bed. It was empty.

“Where are you?” he asked.

“In conference room two. Wake up the others and come in here.”

Jack, Seth, Dom, and Spellman shuffled in a few minutes later. Ysabel gestured to a carafe on the table and said, “Fresh coffee.”

“Are we going to be awake long enough to need coffee?” asked Jack. The clock on the wall read 11:20.

“That depends on whether you want to find Wellesley’s Krasukhas.”

This got everyone’s attention. They sat down and Spellman poured the coffee.

“I couldn’t sleep,” Ysabel said, “so I thought I’d do a little snooping in Pechkin’s phone. He was pretty good at keeping his call history cleared, but he forgot one. About an hour before he got to Khasavyurt the other day, he called a local Makhachkala number. I just called it. I got an answering machine.”

Ysabel stopped and smiled as though savoring the moment.

“Oh, come on,” Dom said. “Put us out of our misery.”

“The number belongs to a branch of Hamrah Engineering.”

Seth sat forward. “Where?”

“Agachaul.”

“Where the hell is that?” asked Dom.

Spellman answered: “It’s about three miles from here on the other side of the Tarki-Taus.”

“You’re shitting me.”

Ysabel shook her head. “According to Hamrah’s main website, it’s called the Agachaul Logistics Center, whatever that is.”

“It’s a fancy name for storage warehouses,” Seth replied.

Jack asked, “You didn’t know about this place?”

“No. I was too busy playing surveyor on the railway’s main lines.”

“Well, clearly Pechkin knew about the place,” said Spellman. “Ysabel, what about the route between Agachaul and here? Is there a road that—”

“Leads up to the ridge? Yes. Right up the northern slope, onto the maintenance road, then past the clearings.”

Jack smiled. “Ysabel, I could kiss—”

“You bet you will. Later. What are we going to do with this?”

Seth said, “Well, provided I haven’t been fired from my old job, I can probably get us in there.”

Agachaul

A
T DUSK,
dark swollen clouds had begun to roll over the city, and now, as Jack and the others pulled out of the Interior Ministry parking lot, the rain was starting to fall.

Following Ysabel’s directions Jack took the coast road south, then followed the Yargog-M29 highway as it looped out of the city and into a narrow valley tucked against the reverse slope of the Tarki-Tau hills. After two river crossings they pulled into Agachaul. Save a few lighted windows off the main road, the village was dark.

“Seems like an unlikely place for a logistics center,” Ysabel said.

“According to Seth, the Parsabad–Artezian project ran on a shoestring budget for a while. I’m sure land was cheaper outside Makhachkala.”

Behind them, the headlights of Seth’s Suburban blinked. Jack pulled onto the shoulder, then rolled down his window as Seth pulled alongside.

“I’ll take us in from here,” Seth called through his window. “The warehouse is on the northern edge of the town on the left side. Let’s switch to headsets.”

Seth pulled away and Jack fell in behind him.

A few minutes later they passed the warehouse. There was no mistaking it, two aircraft hangar–sized structures fronted by rolling garage doors and separated by a smaller, tin-roofed breezeway. Like Agachaul itself, the complex was dark.

“Is this place still in use?” Jack asked Ysabel. “I don’t see any vehicles in the parking lot.”

“The website didn’t say. It sure doesn’t look active, does it?”

Seth called over the headset, “We’re going to pull in, Jack. Drive past me, then pull over up ahead and wait.”

“Roger.”

Seth slowed the Suburban, doused the headlights, then turned off the road and pulled up to the gate. He leaned from his window and punched the keypad box. The gate started rolling open.

“Still gainfully employed, I guess,” Seth called. “Sit tight. We’ll take a spin around the lot and see if we draw any attention.”

Jack and Ysabel watched as the Suburban disappeared around the side of the southernmost warehouse. When it emerged around the opposite end, Seth said, “We’re good, Jack. Nothing’s moving. The keypad code is 77426.”

Jack did a U-turn, pulled up to the gate, typed in the code, then drove to where Seth was parked before the breezeway entrance, a double-doored glass alcove.

Jack and Ysabel got out and joined the others at the back of Seth’s Suburban. Dom handed out the Ruger pistols, then the ARXs. Jack gave Ysabel a quick run through the assault rifle’s operation. He hoped none of them had cause to use the weapons. If the Krasukhas were inside, their security teams probably wouldn’t be far away. Fifty against five was impossible odds.

“What’s the plan, Seth?” asked Dom.

“Jack’s call,” replied Seth. “The only thing I know about the place is the entry code.”

Jack mentally flipped a coin and decided on the simple approach. He walked to the front door and waited while Seth punched his code into the keypad. With a soft buzz the lock disengaged. With Jack and Dom in the lead, the group stepped through and into a wide concrete corridor lit only by the light coming through the doors and from a humming soda machine standing beside a potted fake palm.

Four office doors, two on each side, lined the corridor. At the halfway point a pair of hallways branched off, one leading to the south warehouse, the other to the north warehouse.

Jack pointed left. Dom led them down the hallway to a steel door. He tried the knob, then gave them a thumbs-up. He opened the door a crack; through it Jack saw darkness. Jack nodded and Dom went through, followed by the others with Jack bringing up the rear.

Sitting in the middle of the hangar in a staggered line abreast were four Krasukhas painted in a dark green forest camouflage pattern. Clark hadn’t been kidding. These were beasts, impossible to mistake for anything but high-tech military vehicles. The flanks were lined with square and rectangular pods Jack assumed were part of the onboard EW suite. Folded snugly against the top was a ten-foot-wide parabolic energy director. At the back of each vehicle was what looked like a drawbridge-style ramp. Folded lengthwise along the length of each Krasukha was a heavy green canvas tarpaulin with fixed ratchet straps; while these wouldn’t disguise the Krasukha under close scrutiny, in passing they might be mistaken for standard semi-trailer trucks.

Spellman said, “Nicely done, Ysabel. You found the needle in the haystack.”

“Thank you.”

Jack gestured to the others and made a twirling motion with his index finger. They split up, made a circuit of the interior, then regrouped. “All clear,” Dom whispered.

Jack stared at the Krasukhas. Part of him hadn’t expected to find them here. Now that they had, he wasn’t sure of their next move. They had no way of destroying the Krasukhas, or even disabling them; the exteriors were armored, as were the tires and probably any vital system. They were built for the battlefield.

Jack felt powerless.

“What now?” Seth asked. “Pop the tires, put sugar in the gas tanks, call Daddy Volodin and tell him the kids are off joyriding again?”

Dom laughed softly. “Fuckin’ hell, Seth.”

Jack walked to the nearest Krasukha, stepped onto the running board, and tried the door. It was open. He leaned in, then hopped back down. “No keys.”

“Something like that you’d expect to at least have push-button ignition,” muttered Seth.

“You’re on fire tonight, man. Jack, what’re you thinking?”

Behind them came the clicking of boots on concrete. A male voice started humming.

“Cover,” Jack whispered.

They moved to the wall and stacked up on the hinge side of the door. Jack drew his Ruger. The footsteps stopped. They heard the tinkling of coins followed by the thunk of a soda can tumbling down the machine’s chute. A few seconds later a door banged shut.

“One road,” Ysabel whispered. “There’s only one way up to the ridge.”

“She’s right,” Spellman said. “We shut that down, we shut them down.”

Nothing short of cratering the road would do that, Jack knew, but every minute they could delay the Krasukhas was another minute Seth’s hubs could be broadcasting.

“Let’s get out of here,” Jack said.

He led them back through the main corridor and out the main doors to the Suburbans. A half-mile down the highway, he pulled over. He and Ysabel walked back to the other Suburban.

“Seth, when do things kick off?”

He checked his watch. “Six hours. Our first e-mail/text blast goes out at eight. The first wave of protesters should be at their rally points by nine.”

If Seth’s previous estimates were correct or even close, Makhachkala’s streets would go from crowded to standing room only, especially outside the government buildings and President Nabiyev’s private residence. Nabiyev would immediately order the ISPs shut down. And in response, Seth would order their satellite Internet hubs powered up. None of this would come as a surprise to Wellesley; he and Pechkin had had a year or more to hone their counter-coup plan.

These Krasukhas would need to be in place on the ridge and operational before dawn.

“Dom, you’re with me. Grab everything. Seth: You, Matt, and Ysabel go back to the city. Convince Medzhid to send us some of his ERF troops—threaten him, bribe him, whatever it takes.”

Ysabel said, “Jack, I thought we agreed we were never having this conversation again.”

“It’s not a conversation, Ysabel.”

“Why are you doing this?”

He’d half hoped she would go along with his request. He didn’t know how to answer her question. Why was he doing this? It certainly wasn’t because he couldn’t count on her, or that she hadn’t earned her place on their thrown-together team. He could, and she had. That one obvious reason for his decision: He didn’t want her to get hurt; the thought left a hollow feeling in his belly. He didn’t want Dom to get hurt, either, or Matt, or Seth, but that was different, wasn’t it? He knew why that was, of course, but he didn’t want to think about that right now. He couldn’t think about that right now.

“Matt, drag her if you have to.”

“You got it.”

“Jack, please, don’t—”

Jack turned around and walked back to his Suburban.