KHARKIV OBLAST
SATURDAY
If Harvath never saw the inside of another train again—Ukrainian or otherwise—it would be too soon.
He had seen Nicholas and the dogs off at the Kyiv-Pasazhyrskyi railway station with the help of Kozar’s men, Artem and Symon, who were accompanying him to Kharkiv and had unloaded his gear onto a luggage cart and tracked down the platform for their next train.
With a few minutes to spare before departure, they had grabbed coffees and something to eat. Then they had boarded the train.
Even though they didn’t have a private carriage, they did have a small, albeit musty, compartment all to themselves. Not that it made much difference. The train was practically empty. Very few people were headed east toward the front lines of the war.
Pulling out of the station, there was a definite mood change. Instead of leaving their tactical gear packed away, Artem and Symon got everything out and had it staged in the compartment—rifles, chest rigs, helmets, all of it. They suggested Harvath do the same.
Once he had pre-positioned his most necessary gear, he turned his attention out the window and drank what remained of his coffee.
Unlike the overnight trip from Poland, which took place with the shades drawn, they were now traveling in daylight and able to do so with the window curtains open.
Outside, they passed farm after farm. There were fields as far as the eye could see. It reminded him a lot of driving through Wisconsin or Iowa.
The pastoral scenery was so peaceful, it was hard to process that the war was on this region’s doorstep—that the tractors and livestock he was looking at now could be tanks and Russian troops within hours or days. The fragility of civilization couldn’t have been depicted in greater relief.
Yet, as the farmers, their families, and various other villagers and townspeople proved, life persisted. It carried on, despite the circumstances.
In some cases, life carried on with a greater, renewed vigor because of the circumstances.
Living, he saw as the train passed and people went about their business, could become the ultimate act of courage, of pride, and the ultimate act of defiance.
It reminded him of the line spoken decades ago by Ronald Reagan, “There’s no argument over the choice between peace and war, but there’s only one guaranteed way you can have peace—and you can have it in the next second—surrender.”
That kind of peace, however, wasn’t true peace. As was made evident by the balance of the speech, it was an invitation to forgo freedom and live in slavery.
Everywhere Harvath looked, it was obvious which decision the Ukrainians had made. There would be no peace as long as the Russians occupied their country. He respected them for that. Immensely.
Eventually he got tired of watching the Ukrainian countryside pass by. As Artem was reading a newspaper he had miraculously found and Symon was quietly rewatching a video his wife sent of their kids, he decided to close his eyes for a while. After what he’d learned about the Raven unit, he hadn’t slept well last night and there was no telling when he’d get a chance to catch up on his rest.
With his eyes closed, the train rocking gently side to side, and his mind forcing out all thoughts, it wasn’t difficult for him to fall asleep.
They were nearing Kharkiv when he was jerked awake by the train’s rapid deceleration and the sound of squealing brakes.
Opening his eyes, he saw that Artem was already up and exiting the compartment. “What’s going on?”
Symon took a look out the window. “There must be something wrong up ahead. Grab your kit.”
Harvath did as the man suggested, quickly putting on his plate carrier and battle belt, then slinging his rifle. He was grateful to Gage for also including ammunition in his care package.
He followed Symon into the gangway and toward the vestibule. As they moved, a voice delivered a message over the public address system.
“There’s something wrong with the tracks,” Symon explained. “The engineer is going to investigate. Want to stretch your legs?”
“How do you know it’s not an ambush?”
“Russian sabotage is practically a daily occurrence. All around the country, they strike different pieces of track. That’s why the trains travel at reduced speed. Welcome to life in Ukraine.”
Harvath was about to respond when they arrived at the vestibule and Symon, helmet in hand, pointed at the doors on both sides and asked, “Port or starboard?”
Tactically, Harvath could come up with good reasons against both. They were in the middle of the Ukrainian countryside. There was nothing but fields outside and very little cover or concealment along the tracks.
Symon walked over to the door on the right and peered through the glass, assessing the situation. He then stepped over to the door on the left.
After taking a look, he turned to Harvath and said, “We’re going out this door. Put your helmet on.” Smiling, he added, “Just in case.”
No sooner had the man uttered those words than a high-caliber sniper’s bullet pierced the glass and went through his skull, just above his right temple.
As blood, bone, and bits of brain showered the vestibule, Harvath hit the deck. He had no idea where Artem was, though he assumed the man had moved through the train up to the first carriage to figure out what was going on. They didn’t have radios or any other means by which to communicate.
Harvath thought about hitting the opposite door and dropping down under the train, but he knew that as crude as the Russians were, if they wanted to kill as many passengers as possible, they’d have hitters on that side, too.
By the same token, the train was almost empty. If they’d done any reconnaissance whatsoever, they’d know that. This couldn’t be about flushing out passengers just so they could gun them down, could it?
Then Harvath, who hated wearing helmets, heard a telltale whistle through the broken window and couldn’t get his on fast enough.
They weren’t shooting people as they got off the train, they were shooting people to keep them on the train. At least to keep them on the train for the incoming mortar rounds to do their work.
Scrambling to his feet, but keeping below the window line, Harvath sprinted for the rear of the train.
As he moved, mortar round after mortar round landed behind him. The Russians had sabotaged the tracks not just to interfere with this particular route, but to bring one of its trains to a standstill so that they could effectively shell a stationary target.
There was no time to grab the rest of his gear and he sped right past his compartment. The sounds of the explosions were deafening.
His back was burning; absolutely on fucking fire. He couldn’t tell if it was from the heat of the mortars detonating, or if he’d been riddled with shrapnel and his brain hadn’t yet had time to connect the dots.
All he knew was that movement was life. Get off the X. Move. And that was exactly what he continued to do. Still crouching low, he ran as fast as he could to the back of the train. What he would do once he got there, he still hadn’t figured out. There were two more cars to go.
In the next vestibule, there was a young woman facedown on the floor. The broken window above her and the amount of blood pooled around her told him all he needed to know. There was no point in stopping to check on her or render aid. She was dead.
He noted that she had been shot on the opposite side of the train from Symon. That meant that he had assessed the situation correctly. There were shooters on both sides. The question remaining was, how many?
Was it a single sniper—one left, one right—with enough setback to be able to target the length of all the cars? Or were there teams positioned up and down the tracks?
This was one of the worst parts of what he was called to do—making life-or-death decisions with little to no reliable information. And just like right now, there never seemed to be enough time in which to make them. But he had no choice. The explosions were chewing up the train, the mortars landing closer and closer to his position. The only way out of this was via the rear door at the back of the train.
There was just one problem. The final carriage was a dining car with even bigger windows and they lined both sides. Unless Harvath planned on crawling, which there was not enough time to do, he was going to have to risk exposure—unless.
At the head of the car was a fire extinguisher. Ripping it off the wall, he pulled the pin and clamped down on the handle, filling the carriage with retardant fog. It wasn’t perfect, but it would at least add a little camouflage to his movements. Putting his head down, he charged.
Instantly as he entered the carriage, the windows began shattering from sniper fire. They had no idea who he was or where he was, just that someone was very likely attempting an escape. In order to compensate for the poor visibility, they were throwing rounds everywhere. Harvath knew that if he didn’t make it to that door in the next three seconds, one of those bullets was going to find him. He ran as fast as he could, his ears already ringing from the explosions.
Hitting the door, he tried to open it, but it was locked. The mechanism was foreign to him and he couldn’t see well enough to unlock it.
As he struggled with the handle, the sniper fire intensified. The bullets were not only coming through the windows, but also through the walls. The glasses, dishes, and ceramic coffee cups were shattering across the shelves just behind him.
Harvath fought to maintain his cool. In the back of his mind, however, he was aware that not only were the odds of getting hit by one of the bullets increasing exponentially, but so were the chances that the final mortar, meant to destroy the carriage he was standing in, had already been loosed. At any moment, he would hear its shrill, unmistakable, inbound whistle. Then he did. The mortar was headed straight for him.
Feeling along the doorframe, he found what he was looking for—an emergency release. He punched it and the lock released. Throwing the door open, he didn’t have time to weigh his options. All he could do was jump—and that’s what he did.
As he jumped, the last and final mortar hit the carriage. The force of the blast sent Harvath flying beyond the tracks and into the field.
He landed hard, taking the brutal brunt of the fall on his left side. But at least he was alive. For the moment.
Around him clods of dirt began jumping into the air. At least one of the snipers had him in his sights.
Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a shallow culvert several feet away and lunged for it, hoping to escape their crosshairs. Off in the distance, air raid sirens wailed.
The Russian sabotage team had achieved their goal. The train was destroyed. He didn’t hold out much hope for additional survivors. It had been all too easy for the snipers to pick off their targets.
The only reason Harvath wasn’t dead too was that he had known to keep moving. He’d also been lucky as hell. If the other people on that train had received half the training that he’d had, maybe some of them would have survived as well. He was reminded for the umpteenth time that life was often not only unfair, but also exceedingly cruel, especially in times of war.
He thought about engaging the snipers but realized that it would be a waste of his ammo. He had no idea where they were specifically. He would be firing blind.
The question then became, who could hold out the longest? Unless they still had a mortar team out there and were willing to waste shells trying to dial them in on his location, he figured he had the advantage. He could simply wait them out. At some point, a local response team was going to show up and then the shooters would have to break off. But what if that wasn’t their plan?
What if the snipers planned to continue to lie in wait to take out anyone and everyone who arrived to render assistance? The bloodbath, Harvath realized, would only get worse. He couldn’t let that happen. He needed to act.
From the limited amount he could see, without raising his head too high up and getting it blown off, farther back in the field was a small copse of trees. If Harvath was a sniper and had responsibility for staking out the train from this side of the tracks, that’s where he would be.
What he needed was a way to confirm his supposition. He needed some means by which to flush the sniper out, to make him reveal himself. As it turned out, someone else was about to do that for him. That someone was Artem.
The Ukrainian Intelligence operative was alive. But by the way he was moving, he looked to be seriously injured. Even so, he had risked opening himself up to attack to reach another, injured passenger and pull her to safety behind a piece of nearby wreckage. It was an act of pure selflessness and courage.
As soon as he had gotten to the woman, he was fully in the open and visible to the Russian sniper who began firing from within the copse of trees. It was all the confirmation Harvath needed. With his magnifier engaged, he began putting rounds on the target.
He strafed the copse like he was sweeping a well-oiled Weedwacker through soft summer grass.
The sniper on the opposite side of the tracks tried to engage him, but the wind was pushing the smoke from the bombed-out train carriages right at him, making it very difficult to see.
Harvath emptied an entire mag of 7.62, reloaded the Galil, and continued to fire. He didn’t stop shooting until he saw that Artem and the woman were out of the line of fire and had made it back behind cover.
Harvath waited to see if the sniper would readjust and attack his position, but no attack came. The only gunfire was from the sniper on the other side. His rounds were so poorly placed that they didn’t come anywhere near the culvert Harvath was taking cover in. He decided he wasn’t going to get a better chance than right now to make his move.
Using the heavy, black smoke from the burning train to mask his advance, he headed for the copse of trees, rifle up and at the ready.
Once he was twenty yards out, he kicked it into high gear and rushed the sniper’s position.
Stepping through the trees, he found the Russian, in his bloodstained ghillie suit, with multiple rounds to his head, neck, and torso. Harvath didn’t bother to reach down and check for a pulse. The man was definitely dead. One down and, he hoped, only one more to go.
Shutting out the pain he was in, Harvath let the Galil hang from its sling, grabbed the sniper’s rifle—an older, yet still highly effective Lobaev SVL—plus an extra magazine, and hauled ass toward the wreckage.
As he did, he prayed the breeze would hold and allow the smoke to continue to obscure his movements.
Nearing the train, he called out to make sure Artem knew there was a “friendly” coming in. Harvath hadn’t traveled all the way to Ukraine to get shot by somebody on the same side of the conflict.
The intelligence operative responded and directed Harvath to where he and the female passenger he had rescued were taking cover.
The first thing Harvath noticed was what bad shape Artem was in. It was more serious than he had thought. His left thigh had been shredded and he had lost a lot of blood. He was about to ask why the fuck the man hadn’t applied a tourniquet when he looked over at the female passenger. She was in even worse shape, and she was pregnant.
Artem had sacrificed his tourniquet for her. In doing so, he had very likely saved her life. But he had also put his own in great danger.
Setting down the sniper rifle, Harvath pulled his tourniquet from his chest rig and expertly applied it to the man’s wound.
“Symon?” the intelligence officer asked.
Harvath shook his head. “I’m sorry,” he said, marking the time on his watch. He needed to get them both to a hospital immediately. Before he could do that, however, there was the issue of the other sniper to deal with.
Several minutes had gone by without any shooting from that direction. Had the man fled? Or was he still out there, dug in, and simply biding his time?
He knew where the smart money was. Snipers were nothing if not the most patient of predators.
There was also the persistent rumor that any Russian who attempted to retreat or who fell short of their mission was being shot on sight. That kind of policy was never going to be good for morale, but it undoubtedly boosted soldiers’ interest in getting the job done, which only added to the pile of smart money pointing to at least one more sniper still being out there.
In grabbing the dead Russian’s rifle, Harvath had hoped that he could use Artem to flush out the other shooter and finish him off, but the Ukrainian man was on the verge of passing out. He was out of the fight. Harvath was going to have to come up with another idea.
He pulled his cell phone from his pocket, wanting to warn local authorities and prevent them from falling for the ambush. For all he knew, in addition to the sniper, there still might be a mortar team out there.
He tried to get a signal, but his device showed no bars. Quickly turning to the others, he asked, “Do either of you have your cell phone?”
Artem could barely keep his eyes open, but pointed to where a pocket must have been on his left side. That meant he was a no.
Harvath, who spoke a little Russian, addressed the woman, hoping that she might understand his question. She did, but shook her head and said something about her purse or her bag being somewhere on the train.
As the train was nothing but twisted, burning steel, that meant she too was a no. It also meant that there was no way to warn the local authorities. He needed to figure something else out.
The smoke was the only advantage he had. All of the other counterattack methods he might employ—calling in fire support, rushing the sniper, or conducting some sort of pincer movement—were out of the question. That left him with just one option, to evacuate his wounded and retreat.
Laying aside the sniper rifle, he looked around for anything in the wreckage that could function as an improvised stretcher. They’d be able to move a lot faster if he could drag Artem rather than having to carry him. Where, precisely, he was going to drag him was the next question, which really didn’t matter at this second. He just wanted to get as far away from the train, and the remaining sniper, as quickly as possible.
Moving through the debris, he was hoping to find a blanket or a tarp of some sort that he could lay Artem on top of. The female passenger’s injury was to her arm. And while she might have to move slowly because of how far along she was, he hoped she’d be able to do so without his assistance. What the hell she was doing this close to the front lines in her advanced state of pregnancy was anyone’s guess. He didn’t have the time or the desire to learn her story. The wind could shift at any moment and all three of them would be sitting ducks.
He found some webbing connected to a couple of short, dented poles that might do the trick, but worried that the thin nylon wouldn’t hold up to being dragged across the ground, and so kept on looking.
Seconds later, he found exactly what he needed—some passenger’s heavy canvas duffle, complete with shoulder straps. Unzipping it, he dumped the contents and rushed with it back to the Ukrainian Intelligence officer.
Repositioning his Galil so that it hung off to his side, he drew his fixed-blade knife, sliced through the seams until he had one flat piece of material, and then laid it on the ground next to Artem. Then he bent down and helped move the man over and place him on top of it.
He had almost finished the process when he felt Artem’s entire body stiffen. The guy was about to have a seizure or, because they were both facing different directions, he had opened his eyes long enough to see something that Harvath couldn’t. A quick intake of breath from the pregnant woman, set back behind the piece of the train they had been using for cover, told him they were in trouble.
“Don’t move,” a male voice said in Russian.
The man then repeated the phrase in Ukrainian. Harvath didn’t need to turn around to know who it was. The sniper had chosen to climb out of his hole and close ranks. For the life of him, Harvath couldn’t understand why.
“Turn,” the man ordered. “Face me.”
Harvath slowly lowered Artem the rest of the way to the canvas before doing what the man asked. As he did, he felt Artem remove the Glock from the holster on his battle belt.
Harvath turned, but in such a way as to use his body as a screen, so that the Russian wouldn’t see that the Ukrainian Intelligence officer was now armed.
Looking at the sniper, Harvath had a pretty good idea why he had broken cover and approached the train.
The man, who was pointing his rifle right at him, had a bandolier full of grenades—just like the other sniper. It was an unusual item for them to have been outfitted with. Normally, snipers didn’t get in close enough to use grenades. Then, suddenly, it hit him.
Whenever the Russians were involved, the maxim was always: Anything worth doing is worth overdoing. It wouldn’t have been enough to have sabotaged the tracks and destroyed the train. Survivors needed to be killed and then booby traps needed to be set. That way, any first responders unlucky enough to roll over one of the bodies would have the very unpleasant and likely deadly experience of a grenade going off in their face. The Russians really were animals. This particular Russian animal, however, was about to be culled.
Artem had taken the Glock with his right hand, which meant that Harvath was going to have to step to his left to give him a clean shot. The only question was exactly when to make his move. With his back to the intel officer, there was no way to get any sort of cue.
“Hands up,” the sniper ordered, repeating the command in Ukrainian.
Very slowly, Harvath complied. He knew the Russian would be expecting Artem to do the same. It was now or never.
Harvath didn’t waste the moment. He pivoted hard to his left, clearing the way for the Ukrainian Intelligence officer to take out the sniper. But so weakened by blood loss, Artem couldn’t lift the pistol and take the shot.
“Po’shyol na hui,” the sniper sneered, aiming his rifle at Artem and applying pressure to the trigger. Fuck you.
The sound of a Lobaev SVL rifle going off was like the gods hurling lightning bolts. In this particular case, it looked like the Russian sniper had been their target. One minute his head was there; the next it had been turned to hamburger and his body dropped to the ground.
Harvath kicked the weapon away from the dead man—just in case—after which he made sure Artem was okay. Then he checked on the pregnant woman.
“Khoroshaya rabota,” he said, gently taking the other sniper’s rifle from her. Good job. He was in awe of both her courage and her skill.
“You’re welcome,” she replied in English, wincing from the pain she was in, but managing a small smile.
He was about to ask her if she was able to walk, when he saw a group of military and police vehicles arriving. Behind them were several ambulances.
Bending down, he took his Glock back and told Artem to hang on. He was going to make it. Help was here.
Harvath wished he could have said the same to Symon and everyone else who had been on that train, but that wasn’t possible.
Looking over at the corpse of the dead sniper, he knew that things were going to get much worse and much uglier before they got any better. Such was the nature of war. You had to fight in it in order to win it.
If this was the kind of war the Russians wanted to wage, Harvath couldn’t wait to bring the fight to them. He could be more brutal and more cunning than they could ever imagine.
These barbarians were about to learn what barbarism really tasted like.