13

CHECHNYA—LATER THAT DAY

The prisoner’s moans weren’t enough to match his voiceprints, but Ferg decided they’d keep the bastard incapacitated with the Demerol rather than trying to get him to say something coherent over the sat phone. The visual image was a match at least, and as far as he was concerned, that was good enough. According to Corrigan, the Russians were telling headquarters that they had completely obliterated the guerrilla stronghold. Sixteen Chechens had been killed. The attackers had suffered three fatalities and five wounded.

The skies overhead were filled with Russian aircraft, complicating the team’s escape plans. They were about fifteen miles southwest of the cave complex, holed up in rocks with a good view of the valley to the west, all the way to the eastwest train line to Georgia. There was an airstrip about three miles to the south where they had originally planned their pickup, but Van Buren had put the operation temporarily on hold. The Russians had put some Hinds there, along with supporting troops.

“Shouldn’t have pissed them off, huh?” Ferguson told him.

“Guess not.”

“It was an old car. Could have used a wash and wax.”

“So you saved him money.”

“Yeah.”

“We’re working on finding a better site,” the SF colonel told Ferguson. “But the Russians are watching the main airports pretty closely. We may end up going to a backup plan, maybe getting a pair of helicopters.”

“We’re not particular,” said Ferg. “Just get us the hell out of here.”

“It’s safer for you to sit and wait. Only be a few days.”

“I don’t like waiting around, VB.”

“Neither do I.” Van Buren sighed on the other end of the line. “Corrigan says there’s a car for you at Narzan. Some CIA ops drove it down from Moscow in case you needed it. Fully fueled and everything.”

“Yeah, he already told me. But that’s seventy-five kilometers away. We might just as well walk to Georgia.”

“Your call.”

Ferguson snapped off the phone without saying anything else.

“Maybe we can take the bikes and swing up to the train line west of Groznyy,” said Conners, who’d been listening nearby. “Ride it all the way to Moscow.”

“There’s an idea,” said Rankin sarcastically.

“I’m serious,” said Conners. “Once we’re in the car, we can get pretty far. I’ve been looking at the maps, Ferg. Turn on the laptop.”

Ferguson humored him, though he realized it would be far safer to wait there than try and hop a freight. A train line did run north out of Chechnya, and Conners showed Ferg from sat photos that it wasn’t well guarded beyond Groznyy heading north.

“We need two spots to get on,” said Conners. “Nice grade with a curve would be perfect. Two guys get on, blow a lock off a boxcar, climb in, dump out shit, get the door open, make it easy to throw raghead over there in.”

“What, you saw this in a dream?” asked Ferguson, impressed.

“We used to hop trains all the time when I was a kid. Rode one up from Jersey to Ramapo up in New York once, caught another back. Be like old times.”

“Patrol,” warned Guns, who had the lookout. “Trucks, a BMP.”

Ferguson went to the edge of the mountainside overlooking the road. He could see the Russians moving in a small caravan southward. Suddenly a white cloud appeared near the lead vehicle.

“Great,” said Ferguson. “Just what we need.”

They watched as a group of Chechen rebels picked off the Russian patrol from a hillside about a mile and a half away. By the time a pair of helicopter gunships arrived to assist the ground troops, it was too late; three of their trucks had been destroyed, probably by radio charges planted in the road though the rebels had also used rockets and possibly grenades.

“Nice little operation,” said Rankin, genuinely admiring it.

“That’ll take the heat off,” said Guns.

“All right boys, saddle up,” said Ferg. “Narzan’s about fifty miles away. We have a car waiting for us. We walk fast, we can make it in two nights.”

It was in fact less than fifty miles to the Chechen city, which sat west of Groznyy on the main eastwest highway in central Chechnya, but they couldn’t travel in a straight line. They took turns carrying their prisoner on a makeshift stretcher, trekking over trails that roughly paralleled what passed for the main road west.

After about three hours of walking, they came to a small settlement at the intersection of three different mountains. They’d gone about five miles at that point—fantastic time considering the terrain—but the village stopped them cold. There were a dozen buildings scattered along the main road, which was more a trail than a highway. Rankin and Ferguson scouted the approach and saw two sentries in sandbagged positions next to barricades that blocked the way. They were Chechen guerrillas.

Given the topography, there were dozens if not hundreds of spots where reinforcements might be lurking. If not for their prisoner, they might have been able to work a deal with the rebels. Instead, they had to find a way to skirt the tiny village; it was nearly light before they managed to get beyond it by crossing a field to the east and climbing a fifty-foot sheer wall. They pulled Kiro up by a rope, slipping and sliding, until they found their way to a cave about two miles southeast of the hamlet.

They were so tired that they all actually slept.

The first two miles the next night were not only uphill, but were very uphill—they climbed five hundred meters within a half mile on a remarkably wide path. From the satellite photos, they knew that there was a farm in a high valley on the other side of the ridge; when they arrived there they found a small cart with rickety wheels parked next to a shed. Ferguson’s conscience pricked at him when he stole it, and he left an assortment of small bills in its place. The money might be a fortune to the poor farmer—or it might be completely useless in this isolated spot, sure to raise questions if he dared spend it.

The cart made it possible to go much faster on the road. Within an hour they had come to another farm, this one obviously belonging to someone much more prosperous—there was a truck next to a shed near the barn.

“I say we steal it,” said Rankin.

“You think you can hot-wire it?” Ferguson asked him.

“I can,” said Conners. “If it’s old enough.”

They sneaked into the yard, Guns and Rankin standing guard between the house and shed as Conners worked open the hood. The truck was an old Zil based on a Western European design that probably dated to the fifties. Conners lifted the hood and hunted for the ignition coil and starting solenoid, trying to get a feel for the wiring. He had just found the coil when the engine rumbled. Startled, he jerked his head up and smacked it against the hood.

“Keys are in it,” said Ferg.

A light came on in the house as they were backing out. Rankin fired a burst from the Uzi at the side of the building, and the warning was enough to slow down whoever was inside.

Ferguson changed plans, and with the help of the satellite photos they were able to get within sight of Gora Tebulsikva on the border with Georgia several hours before dawn. They left the truck outside the town, continuing by foot to the southwest, where the hills were rutted with paths. The Russians had fenced the border with two rows of razor-wire fence and a series of guard posts, but Ferguson figured it shouldn’t be too difficult to find a passage.

He took out his phone and sat down to call Corrigan, whom he’d promised to update every hour when they were on the move.

As he was talking, Kiro woke and began struggling against his restraints. They were out of Demerol. Guns tried talking to him in Russian, but he pretended not to understand. The Marine offered him food, but Kiro refused, continuing to struggle though he must have realized it was useless. Rankin put his Uzi in his face; Kiro smiled but continued to struggle until a hard smack on the side of the head with the short but hard metal stock rendered him senseless.

As they rolled him over to make sure his restraints were still snug, Conners noticed that the prisoner’s pants were soiled. He felt a twinge of sympathy for the bastard, but it quickly passed.

“The good news is, the helicopter will meet us in the pass five miles on the other side,” Ferguson told them, snapping off his phone. “The bad news is the asshole they set up to pick us up ran off with a better-paying customer, and they’re not coming until tomorrow night.”

“Fuck,” said Rankin. “Why isn’t this an SF operation?”

“We don’t need all that fuss,” said Ferguson, who had turned down Van’s offer to send in an evac team. In the CIA op’s opinion, that would draw way too much attention and was only a last-resort option. “You worried, Skip?”

“We can’t stay here. We’re too damn exposed.”

Ferguson rubbed his face. He was tired, but if he fell asleep now he wouldn’t wake up for hours and hours. He figured the same must be true of the others.

“Let’s get across the border now,” he said, pulling his ruck back on. “We should be able to find someplace to sleep on the other side of that hill there, in those woods.”

They found a well-worn passage underneath the fence about a half mile farther south. Ferguson and Guns scouted along the fence line until they came to another somewhat less worn. Worried that despite Corrigan’s intelligence to the contrary there were high-tech sensors between the fence, Ferguson sent Guns through. By the time he made it back, it was nearly dawn.

Conners and Rankin carried Kiro between them as they approached the fence, then dragged him under like a trussed pig. Meanwhile, Guns and Ferguson scouted the area for a place to hole up. About a half mile into Georgia they spotted a military post manned by six guards, who had a jeeplike vehicle mounting a machine gun near the post. The shoulder of the road dropped off a good eight feet as it passed, but to get by without being seen they’d have to crawl along it—impossible to do with Kiro. They trekked back up the hill, moving along the valley and actually crossing back into Chechnya before coming around through another pass, this one unguarded.

It was nearly midmorning before they finally found a secure place to camp, throwing themselves down against the rocks as if they were down-filled pillows. Ferguson started talking about the plan for tomorrow; he had them climbing aboard the helicopter before realizing not one of the others was awake.