Chapter 1

As far as Pavel Voronov was concerned, the past two decades, for the most part, had been awful. Voronov had once been one of the highest-ranking generals in the Soviet military, but upon the downfall of the Soviet Union in the 1990s, everything had turned against him. He had lost his position in the military and had been forced by political rivals to leave the country. As such, he had lived the past twenty years as an exile and he had never been too happy about it.

Fortunately for him, however, not everything had gone poorly since his banishment. Over the years, he had used his contacts in the former Soviet military to form an impressive underground network, and he had used that network to become one of the world’s most successful black market arms dealers. During the past year, he had made enough money to buy a small, uninhabited island off of the west coast of Costa Rica.

And that was where he stood now. On a small hill overlooking his new compound. The place was still under construction and tractors and other earth moving equipment were everywhere, hard at work. It would still be several months until the compound was fully completed but Voronov was happy anyway. Upon completion, the compound would be his new home and the launching point for his newest and greatest endeavor.

He called it Operation Apocalypse, and when it was launched, he would finally have his revenge on all of the people who had wronged him and corrupted his beloved homeland. Operation Apocalypse would ravage Moscow, spread like a virus across the rest of Russia, then conquer the remainder of the world, one city at a time. When it was finally completed, nothing on the planet would remain unaffected.

Voronov lit a cigarette, raised it to his lips, and began to walk hurriedly to his office. Undoubtedly, Operation Apocalypse would be a success and would be his crowning achievement, but in the meantime, in the months prior to its launch, there was still much to be done . . . .