Private Rogue

Chapter 48

Floyd woke suddenly. He hadn’t been dreaming, he was too exhausted. He came round from a black void that felt like death, and immediately wished he could go back to that blessed oblivion. Every muscle ached and his eyes burned with fatigue. He felt feverish, as though there were hot coals somewhere deep inside him, but when he touched his skin his temperature seemed normal. He suspected he was starting to experience the combined effects of altitude sickness and exhaustion.

He could see bright sunshine through the tiny crawlspace that allowed access to the cave where he’d planned to spend the day. He saw a shadow cross the light, and the hairs on his neck bristled. His stomach filled with acid as he realized something must have woken him. Was it a creature of some kind? A branch blown by the wind? He held his breath and listened closely, but heard nothing except the breeze through the trees.

He rolled onto his stomach, grabbed the coat he’d been using as an extra blanket, and slid it over his shoulders. He crawled to the cave mouth, which was only a little broader than his shoulders and taller than the width of his torso. He’d found the tiny entrance at dawn, after having spent much of the early hours looking for a place to bed down. He was at the foot of the last mountain before the range that would take him to the border. One final push up and over the next set of peaks would take him into the adjacent valley, on to a pass that led to the border with Pakistan.

To ears that had become attuned to silence, the scratching of loose rock sounded like the applause of a crowd of thousands. Floyd tried to move more quietly, but it was hard to do when crawling. He approached the end of the tunnel and used his forearms to inch forward and pull himself to the lip. He poked his head out and saw nothing but snow and the trunks of cedar trees. He hauled himself out carefully and slowly.

“Don’t move,” a voice said in a thick Russian accent.

Floyd glanced round to see a man in blue, gray and white snow camouflage and a gray ski mask standing on a rocky outcrop above the cave mouth. He had a Vityaz-SN submachine gun aimed at Floyd’s chest.

“Get on the ground,” the gunman ordered, before saying something in Russian into a handheld radio.

Floyd knew other men would soon join them, and his odds would diminish with every new arrival. He also knew that if they wanted him dead, he would have been shot already. He was alive for a reason, and he was determined to play that to maximum advantage.

The gunman jumped off the rocks and landed in the snow a few feet away from Floyd.

“I said get on the ground!”

Floyd rushed him, aiming his shoulder at the man’s midriff. People with guns are accustomed to being obeyed, and Floyd knew he would have the element of surprise. The gunman raised the submachine gun as if to strike, but Floyd reached him before he could do so. He felt a satisfying compression as his shoulder hit the man’s abdomen. The Russian groaned as he was thrust back into the rocks around the cave mouth. Floyd stood tall, grabbed the man’s head and forced it back. There was a loud crack as it hit the rock and the man’s eyes rolled back in his head. His body went limp and Floyd allowed him to fall to the ground. He searched the man and took the Vityaz, along with three spare magazines of ammunition and the radio.

“Hey!” a voice yelled, and Floyd turned to see other men moving through the trees toward him.

He flipped the safety off and fired a short burst from the Vityaz, which he swung in an undirected arc. The gunfire had the desired effect, the men scattering for cover. Floyd seized the moment he’d bought himself and ran west, heading into the thickest part of the forest.

Snow-covered branches whipped at him and huge clumps of powder pelted him as he pressed through the trees. There was an eruption of gunfire above and around him, and the air filled with woodchips and the smell of cedar. He knew they were aiming high and wide in an attempt to frighten him into stopping, but he wasn’t that dumb.

Memories of Beth, Maria and Danny gave his exhausted spirit a much-needed boost, flooding his battered body with an infusion of energy. Floyd knew that if he stopped and allowed these men to take him, as soon as they had whatever they wanted from him, he’d be completely expendable. He couldn’t let that happen. He had to escape.