Arctic Storm Rising

Thirty-Six

As soon as the Ka-60 touched down, Spetsnaz troops slammed both side doors open and poured out in a rush. Bent low, the fourteen Russian commandos fanned out around the helicopter and then dropped flat in the snow with their weapons ready. Camouflage smocks and white helmet covers helped them blend with their surroundings.

Major Gennady Korenev carefully scanned the steep, treeless hill rising several hundred meters away. A narrow saddle of bare rock tied it to a larger ridge running off to the northeast. He couldn’t make out any movement on that southern spur, but trampled patches in the snow roughly halfway up its slope showed that several men at least had moved across that flank and then around to the other side. He lowered his night vision binoculars and nodded. The Americans, as he’d expected, were somewhere ahead of them.

Getting back to his feet, he trotted back to the grounded Ka-60. With its engines off, the big main rotors had almost stopped turning. He leaned in through one of the side doors to speak to the two pilots. “Keep your eyes open. We’re moving out after the enemy now, but we’ll be back once that little job’s done. Then we’ll all push on to pinpoint the main objective, the PAK-DA bomber.”

They nodded. “Good hunting, Major,” the lead pilot said. “We’ll be ready to take off again when you return.”

With a soft whistle, Korenev signaled his men back up out of the snow. More rapid hand signals started them moving toward the higher ground. The Spetsnaz troops went forward in short rushes, sprinting ahead by twos and then going prone to cover the men coming up behind them. It was a tactic that guaranteed his detachment always had a solid base of fire waiting on overwatch — ready to immediately engage any enemies who showed themselves.

Korenev stayed a few meters behind the right flank of the advancing troops, while Captain Primakov, his second-in-command, did the same over on the left. This physical separation helped ensure that a sudden burst of enemy fire couldn’t take them both out at once. It also allowed tighter control over the Spetsnaz unit as it maneuvered.

So the major was close by when one of his men suddenly stopped and dropped to a knee to peer at something in the moonlit snow just ahead. And when the soldier signaled him over, he was there in seconds. “What’ve you got, Vanya?”

The other man pointed to a pair of thin, rail-like tracks and two sets of deeper boot prints running roughly southeast toward a gap in the hills between this valley and the next. “More of the Americans,” he said quietly. “Two of them towing something on a sled.”

“Supplies,” Korenev guessed. “Or perhaps heavier weapons.” The intelligence reports provided by Moscow’s prized source had claimed that the Americans had left their larger-caliber weapons, a recoilless rifle, and man-portable antiair missiles behind for this mission. But he was experienced enough to understand the limitations of even the most perfect-seeming intelligence. He shrugged. “If they’ve split their forces, so much the better for us. We’ll finish off the larger group and then mop these two up for dessert.”

The other man smiled wolfishly and then darted forward, obeying his commander’s silent hand signal to resume the advance. Korenev drifted along in his wake, allowing the gap between them to widen.

Suddenly, higher up on the hill they were advancing toward, a small bright light began blinking at them in short, rhythmic flashes. Startled, the major threw himself prone again. Ahead and to his left, his soldiers did the same, bringing their mix of assault rifles and automatic weapons to bear. But then Korenev realized those flashes were in the same shorthand code used for silent communication between Russian special forces units. And that this message carried the prefix SIROTA, to verify that it came directly from the GRU’s most prized agent. He mouthed the words as they were spelled out by that blinking light: enemy force deploying in ambush on flank of hill southeast of my position. caution advised.

Slowly, the major stood up, making sure he could be seen. Then he crossed his clenched fists over his head twice — confirming that he’d received the warning. The light blinked off immediately, leaving the dark mass of the hill once more cloaked in shadows and thin strips of moonlight.

Korenev waved Primakov over to join him. “What now?” the younger officer asked.

The major bared his teeth in a predatory grin. “Simple, while the Americans wait like imbeciles for us to walk blindly into their trap, we’ll veer to the left.” He indicated the main ridge to the northeast of the spur. “And climb up that way instead. Then we’ll swing back to the right and come in to hit them from above and behind.” He hefted his AK-12 assault rifle and patted the stock. “With the tables turned, it shouldn’t take long to finish off our American friends.”

Flynn moved warily downhill through the icy boulder field that covered this part of the slope, careful to watch where he placed his feet to avoid any unnecessary noise. Before heading here on his own, he’d ordered the rest of his men to take up concealed firing positions in the jumble of rocks and boulders farther up the slope. And he’d left his M4 carbine behind a while back, worried that the longer weapon might clatter against rock surfaces and give him away. Instead, he’d drawn his Glock 19 sidearm. That left him with one hand free for balance on this uneven, slippery surface.

He halted at the base of a weathered granite boulder twice the size of a man and stood listening. The soft, clicking noises he’d heard coming from ahead had just stopped, as suddenly as they had started. Cautiously, Flynn edged around the side of the boulder… and found Takirak crouched a couple of yards away, staring down into the valley. Soldiers camouflaged in snow smocks were on the move there, turning to parallel the high ground as they advanced to the northeast. Their helmets and other gear gave them a look almost identical to that of American special forces troops, but their weapons were clearly Russian.

And the National Guard sergeant still held the flashlight he’d been using as a signaling device.

Flynn sighed. There were moments when he really hated being right. This was probably the worst of them. He sighted along the barrel of his pistol, aiming at Takirak’s back. “So, Andy,” he said quietly, almost conversationally. “Just how long have you been betraying your country?”

For a long, seemingly endless moment, the other man froze solid, not moving a muscle. But then he turned his head slowly toward Flynn. “I have never betrayed my country, Captain,” he replied with a thin, tight smile on his face. “Ya russkiy, chlen sibirskogo plemeni yupikov. I am a Russian, a member of the Siberian Yupik tribe.” He shrugged. “And for what it matters, a colonel in the GRU.”

Flynn whistled softly under his breath, suddenly seeing the bigger picture they’d all missed. Along with the Inuits and Aleuts, the Yupiks were one of the three main groups of native peoples spread over the sprawling northern regions from Russia’s Far East to Alaska, Canada, and Greenland. They shared related languages and common cultures. Recruiting one of them to act as a deep-cover agent in Alaska, with a lack of family ties explained by his supposed status as an orphan fostered down in the Lower Forty-Eight, was a brilliant move by Russia’s military intelligence service.

With his cover established, Takirak had been perfectly placed for years to spy on the vital oil fields and pipelines at Prudhoe Bay — and, through his service with the Alaska National Guard, on U.S. military installations across the state. No doubt, in the event of war, he would have been ordered to carry out sabotage missions against them. Flynn shook his head slightly in dismay. Man, we let the fox, or rather Amaruq the Gray Wolf, saunter right into the henhouse, he thought coldly, imagining how pleased the men in Moscow must have been when Takirak wangled his way into this assignment to guard the radars making up Alaska’s portion of the North Warning System.

Abruptly, Takirak whirled toward him — hurling his flashlight like a missile. It crashed into Flynn’s shoulder, sending him staggering back a couple of steps, partially off-balance. Before he could bring his Glock back on target, the Russian sprang to his feet, crashed into him, and chopped down hard at his right hand. Flynn’s pistol went flying, clattering away into the rocks somewhere out of his reach.

Shit. Not good. Shaking off the stinging pain from his hand, Flynn shoved the older man back a couple of paces and then went for him. Takirak lunged to meet him head-on. Grunting with effort, they exchanged a flurry of short, vicious strikes aimed at vulnerable points — turning and twisting to absorb some painful blows, while parrying others. Neither gained a decisive edge. At last, almost by mutual accord, they separated slightly and crouched staring at each other, panting, scraped up, and bloody.

Takirak spat blood out of his mouth, without taking his cold, hard eyes off Flynn. Both men drew the combat knives they carried on their body armor and closed in again. There was no holding back now — only one of them would walk away from this.

Jesus, the Russian was fast, Flynn realized desperately, rolling away from a lightning-quick thrust that flickered right past his face. Backpedaling now, he narrowly blocked a second strike, but only at the cost of a ragged gash across the outside of his left forearm. He clenched his teeth hard against a sudden flare of white-hot pain from the wound.

Frantically, he thrust back at Takirak. Almost contemptuously, the enemy agent parried his strike. Then he hammered his fist into the inside of Flynn’s right wrist — briefly paralyzing the nerves there.

Horrified, Flynn saw his blade fall out of his numbed fingers. Inside, he knew the advantage was shifting irreversibly to his enemy. So get off your ass and fight, he growled silently to himself.

Or die.

Furious now, he lowered his head and charged. Ignoring a knife slash that glanced off his helmet, he body-slammed the Russian, driving him back against a boulder with enormous force. He heard Takirak cry out in sudden agony. They both went down again, but this time Flynn ended up on top.

Quickly, he pinned the other man’s knife hand with his left knee. Grim-faced now, Takirak heaved up against him. Flynn bore down. His fingers closed on a piece of broken rock and he smashed it across the Russian’s face. He heard bone crunch. Spatters of blood flew across the trampled snow.

Takirak’s eyes glinted fiercely above the red mask of his stone-shattered face. Again, ferociously, he heaved up with frightening strength. This time, Flynn couldn’t keep his hold. He was hurled away from the other man, and fell sprawling on his back.

Furiously muttering obscenities through his ruined mouth, Takirak rolled back upright with terrifying speed. He dove toward Flynn, who desperately scrabbled through the snow beside him. His hand closed on his combat knife. Blindly, he stabbed upward with everything he had… and buried the blade in the Russian’s throat, all the way to the hilt. A bright scarlet fountain of blood, steaming in the freezing air, sprayed across Flynn’s face. Above him, Takirak arched backward, clawing at the knife handle protruding from his neck. His eyes opened wide in horror, and then all the light went out of them. He slumped forward, shuddered once, and died.

Alexei Petrov stalked silently toward the tent where Bondarovich, the other mercenaries, and his former copilot, Oleg Bunin, were sleeping. He carried a green steel jerry can containing twenty liters of gasoline. It was one of those they used to refuel their snowmobiles. Several of the fuel cans had been stockpiled at one end of the camp in preparation for their escape to Canada. One side of his mouth quirked upward in an ironic grin. Never let it be said that he had allowed any of the resources so thoughtfully provided by Pavel Voronin and his master, Dmitri Grishin, to go to waste.

Just outside the tent, he set down the jerry can, unlatched its cap, and pulled it open, wrinkling his nose at the sharp tang of raw gasoline. Then, squatting beside the tent door, he carefully unzipped it from the bottom — not far, just a few centimeters. He heard a faint noise from inside as some of the four drowsing men bundled up in their sleeping bags stirred suddenly, apparently disturbed by the icy wind now whipping through the tiny opening.

Unhurriedly, Petrov tipped the jerry can over and watched the gasoline pour out. It sloshed out in waves, flowed through the unzipped door, and rippled across the tent’s polypropylene fabric floor in an amber tide. Satisfied, he stood up and moved back a few meters. Then he pulled out a loaded flare pistol, cocked the hammer, and fired downward through the door.

With a crackling hiss, the flare exploded. A blinding, red-tinged flash lit the inside of the tent, replaced by a flickering orange glow as burning gasoline sprayed everywhere. Coolly, Petrov dropped the spent flare gun and pulled out his pistol. He ignored the agonized screams echoing from Bondarovich and the others. They’d been abruptly jolted out of sleep… only to find themselves trapped in a hell of whirling, wind-driven fire. Already blazing like torches, burning men stumbled toward the door, frantically trying to squeeze out through the narrow opening. Methodically, Petrov shot them one by one.

When the screams finally stopped, he lowered his pistol, turned, and walked away toward the distant aircraft shelter. Behind him, dancing tongues of fire licked up into the sky.