Gunmetal Gray

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Zoya Zakharova was on mission at the moment, but she couldn’t help but harbor a quick fantasy.

In her imagination she was somewhere dry and sunbaked, with a drink in her hand and the smell of cut flowers close by, filling her with happiness and tranquility.

The dream faded as a blade of saw grass sliced her forearm just aft of her glove, bringing her back to the reality that she was wading through a god-awful-smelling canal full of snakes, leeches, and vermin. She’d spent almost an hour up to her neck in the slimy ditch, pushing a large clump of water hyacinth along with her to break up the outline of a human head. Her body felt like it would never dry out once she climbed out of this dank water, and even if it did, she was convinced she’d never be able to wash the smell of rotten vegetation off her skin.

Still, at least the op was going nominally. The Zaslon operators were in front of her, and she’d had no contact with them at all, but she’d listened in minutes earlier as Mikhail gave the all clear to the team to move on to the objective waypoint of tonight’s action. The target location looked as it had on the satellite photos, the task force was on schedule, and the prospects of locating Fan were good.

But now, as she rubbed the pain on her forearm from the saw grass and just before the first members of the task force ahead of her approached the last gentle turn in the canal before arriving at the compound, she heard a new transmission from Mikhail. While his voice remained professional, this time she detected unmistakable urgency. “All call signs: hold, hold, hold.”

Ahead of her Vasily raised his right arm into a fist, and the team stopped instantly in the shoulder-high water. The men tucked deep into the grasses alongside the canal, and Zoya did the same.

Vasily came over the net now. “Report when able, Seven.”

Mikhail responded ten seconds later. “Anna Seven to all call signs. I have two PAVN trucks on scene. I count two-four uniformed dismounts, twenty-four, all armed with rifles. They are dispersing in squad-sized elements around the eastern side of the compound, a pair have remained at the trucks, and two more went around the western side, but I can’t see around the vehicles there so I’m not sure if they went inside a back door or are still on the grounds.”

It took Vasily a moment to respond to all this information; it was a surprising change in the equation, to say the least. “Is your position secure?”

“My position is secure, for now. I can’t see the eastern entrance of the main house itself, but I think some of them might have headed inside. Most are moving on foot back over towards the road and the front of the property. None of them have come over here near the canal. It looks like they don’t expect anyone to attack from the flooded fields, but they are setting up a defensive cordon close to the dirt road.”

Vasily just said, “Roger that.”

Zoya had listened to all of this, and she fully expected to next hear Vasily ordering his unit to stand down, to back out of the area without continuing the mission. They didn’t know how many Wild Tigers were inside the villa, but now the fact that there were at least three times more armed opposition on the property than the total Zaslon force, in the form of regular army troops, no less — she knew it would be madness to continue on.

Vasily’s next call left her momentarily dumbstruck. “Seven, this is One. We are approaching from the west now; notify us of any changes in the force distribution.”

Zoya shook her head there in the darkness, then triggered her own radio. Whispering, she said, “Sirena for One. We need to retrograde out of the target area and reassess.”

Vasily responded to this over the radio, not even bothering with the standard protocol of identifying himself. “Negative. We are at Omega. We proceed.”

Zoya just stood there in the tall grasses. “We are not at the objective, One. We can exfiltrate. We need to exfiltrate.”

“I’m assault commander, Koshka. We continue.”

“Nyet, I am canceling the assault. I have authority to—”

Vasily came over the radio now, blocking Zoya’s radio traffic with his whispering, angry voice. “We came for this target, we are taking this target. The PAVN infantry is a third-rate force. They do not have heavy weapons. We will not relinquish the advantage we have now. Stealth will get us close to the target, and our CQB tactics will get us the rest of the way. I will put Anna Eight on the far side of the canal along with Mikhail, and together the two of them can provide overwatch, engage and occupy the infantry on the east side of the compound if we lose the initiative while we hit the house.” To all this Vasily added a warning. “We are going forward. Get off the net, Koshka.”

The Zaslon unit began moving again. Zoya watched them for a moment, then muttered “Der’mo” under her breath. She pushed back out into the deeper part of the canal and followed the others as they began rounding the bend to the target. She felt confident this unit would be able to defeat the larger force in combat, but she had no interest in engaging in a protracted battle. Going loud was a last resort, but Vasily seemed ready to commit to it rather than risk losing the target.

In theory she could have pulled the plug on the entire hit, but the reality was Vasily controlled his men, which meant he controlled this operation, and this late in the decision-making process, Zoya was just along for the ride.

Court eyed the two PAVN soldiers standing next to the ZIL-131 trucks. They stood together talking, just twenty-five yards ahead of him and slightly on his right. They held their rifles in their arms but didn’t act at all like they considered it possible they would be involved in any sort of fighting. From their relaxed demeanor Court got the idea these guys had been told to watch the trucks while the other men were sent to occupy security points in and around the villa.

These two young soldiers were the only people in view at the moment, other than the man lying on the far side of the canal, but he knew most of a Vietnamese army platoon was still close by, and he was still pinned into this position.

Court lay there next to the hot generator and marveled at what a complete and utter disaster this was turning into. The only good thing Court could see about this was that it all but confirmed his suspicions that Fan was indeed here on the property. There was no way this other paramilitary unit would show up, and the Vietnamese army would show up, unless there was something, or someone, extremely valuable in the big old house just off Court’s left shoulder.

He kept his eye on the sniper through his thermal in the hopes the man would bug out now that the damn PAVN had arrived on the scene. But the sniper did not move at all.

And then, to Court’s utter astonishment, a second man crawled out of the canal, slowly and with all the skill of a master of reconnaissance and sniper craft, just twenty feet or so to the west of the first man. Once on the other side of the canal, the new arrival turned to face the compound, and Court could see the telltale outline of a short-barreled rifle when the man brought it in front of his own body and obstructed his white-hot thermal image.

Now there were two assholes with eyes on Court’s position.

It occurred to Court that it was possible these men were a support element for an assault on the compound, and that theory looked even more likely seconds later when several white-hot signatures began appearing over the lip of the canal.

One of the Wild Tiger sentries passed in front of Court with a flashlight again, and now the man swept it around with a noticeable increase in vigor. Court wondered if the man had been alerted to a new threat, or if he was just trying to look competent in front of the soldiers all around the villa.

The figures in the canal dipped down as the sentry passed, then rose again.

Court tried to do a head count and decided there were eight or nine in all, including the pair on the southern side of the canal.

He realized this force had to have known this place was crawling with Vietnamese regular army. In total there was a defensive unit here on the property at least four or five times the number of armed men in or by the canal. Either these attackers planned on doing this entire operation in a low-profile manner — something Court would like to see them try — or else this unit was just supremely confident in their abilities at large-scale ass kicking.

And this made Court think they might be Russian — Spetsnaz from the Russian military, or possibly even the vaunted Shield force from the Russian foreign intelligence service; Zaslon, in Russian. Zaslon was known as the best of the best, akin to the CIA’s Special Activities Division Ground Branch, the unit Court himself had worked in for years.

Zaslon guys weren’t afraid to go loud, and they were often given rules of engagement that would allow just that.

Court wondered if this entire place was about to turn into a shooting gallery. If it did, he wondered if he would be able to just stay right here, tucked down and out of the fight, while chaos ensued all around.

He decided he didn’t like his chances, but he thought he had a better shot of getting through the next few minutes than either the guys on the banks of the irrigation canal or the guys wandering around the big dark property unaware of the guys by the irrigation canal, so he decided he would just continue to lie here still and silent and be ready for an opportunity to make his way back to the flooded rice paddies as soon as possible so he could egress out of the kill zone.

Just as he decided to wait this one out, he saw a pair of flashes in the dark to the south, and then the two PAVN men standing at the back of the parked trucks fell to their knees. One man then crumpled straight down and slumped under the tailgate of one of the trucks, and the other rocked forward, slamming dead onto his face without making a sound.

The two Vietnamese infantrymen had been felled by suppressed rounds from the snipers in the trees on the far side of the canal.

Seconds later the white-hot images of seven figures appeared over the lip of the canal, and they began approaching the property. The team moved in perfect harmony; Court was immediately impressed with the craft by which they worked, and from their coordination and confidence he felt sure this was the same team he’d seen hit the cargo ship on Po Toi.

One pair of operators went to the west, towards the barn, moving behind the parking area and out of Court’s view. The other five continued his way, through the grass lot where the vehicles were parked, just south of the trucks.

Court tried to identify their weapons and determined they were short-barreled Kalashnikovs of some type, and they all wore silencers. From this he thought it even more likely they were Russian operators, but he knew he couldn’t make a determination from their firearms alone.

He also noticed that one member of the group wasn’t carrying a rifle, just a pistol in his left hand. This man seemed a little smaller in frame than the others, and when he knelt down near the row of covered motorcycles, he seemed to Court to be separate from the other men moving through the lot.

While Court watched through his thermal, two of the operators slung their rifles, and then each of them took a dead Vietnamese soldier under his arms, then dragged him out of view between the two big trucks. Two of the other figures knelt down behind the BMW, and the one just carrying a pistol moved towards the BMW, putting his hand to his ear while he did so, as if listening to a radio call in his headset.

Court wished like hell he could hear that transmission.

Zoya Zakharova held her silenced Glock 19 in her left hand while she moved to the black sedan. As she progressed she used her right hand to adjust her headset to hear the transmission coming in from Yevgeni.

Yevgeni’s voice came over the earpiece. “Anna Two to One. The barn is empty. We will advance on the villa from here across the southwestern side of the property, link up with you there.”

Vasily was just feet from Zoya, tucked down behind a black BMW sedan. He keyed his mic and responded. “Ponial, Two. All remaining hostiles seem to be on the eastern side of the property, on the road, or possibly inside the villa. Both patrolling guards are out of view. We’ll meet you on the southwestern corner of the villa by the generator and make entry around the back.”

“Roger,” said Yevgeni. “Anna Seven, are we clear to move?”

Mikhail still had the best overwatch on the scene. He responded from his position behind his sniper rifle. “All call signs: clear to move with caution.”

Vasily and Sasha rose next to Zoya and started moving around the front of the BMW. Zoya herself began to rise, but Vasily grabbed her by the arm, jolting her back down. He just pointed at her angrily without speaking, then shouldered his rifle, looked around the front of the building with his night vision goggles, and took off in a steady but quick clip. Sasha followed right off his shoulder. They met up with Arseny and Pyotr at the trucks, and then all four advanced on the villa. They kept their weapons up, scanning in front of them, each moving in an arc to maintain overlapping fields of fire while they ran.

Zoya took a knee and looked over the hood of the sedan. She wished like hell she could hit the house; even armed with just a pistol she felt she could have benefitted the team, plus if it went loud she could only help exfiltrate Fan under fire if she was somewhere near Fan when the firing began.

Here in the parking area all she could do was watch her task force advance on the villa and hope they got inside quickly and quietly, before the sentries returned or before anyone started looking for the two dead men dragged under the trucks.

She didn’t like the decision to continue on with the raid, but she couldn’t stop Vasily. She prayed he knew what he was doing.

Court Gentry saw a total of six men moving right towards him, two on his right from the barn, and four coming from dead ahead. They were forty yards out, but they’d be on him in seconds, so he knew he had to risk a move. It was perfectly dark in the shadows here, but he would be in plain view of anyone close by wearing night vision gear, and the gunmen heading his way approached as if they could see where they were going, so they must have been wearing NVGs.

Court remained low to the ground but began scooting back, using his feet and hands to move. The four operators covering the open ground were between him and the snipers, so he thought he would get out of the line of sight of the scopes of the long guns — for a few seconds, anyway.

He made it around to the back of the generator without getting shot, and once there he pulled his knife quickly. He couldn’t be certain of the intentions of the men coming his way; for all he knew some of them were planning on hiding out here behind the generator, and if that happened, he’d have to try to fight them off with his small folding blade.

He’d die, of course, but he’d die fighting.

He was glad to see a row of three-foot-high bushes growing down the length of the west wall to the back porch, giving him some cover to the west if he tucked himself into a ball. This he did, and seconds later he heard the light beat of approaching boots over the hum of the big device in front of him. Staying as low as he could, he tried to widen his eyes to take in as much of the minimal light as possible, and he waited.

But he did not have to wait for long. In the back lawn off his right shoulder he heard motion as multiple sets of boots, still moving quietly, began passing his position. Court lowered as close to the ground as he could get, and as he did four dark-clad gunmen passed the generator heading around to the back of the villa. Just before they disappeared from view, the two who had been approaching from the barn met up with them, increasing their total strength to six operators.

Christ, Court thought. Those guys are going to try to ninja their way into the villa to snatch Fan Jiang, while I just squat here and do my best impersonation of a fucking bush.

But as much as the predicament he’d found himself in pissed him off, he didn’t know what the hell he could do about it.