Covert Warriors

by W. E. B. Griffin

  Ol’ Alek seems to have a lock on the international movement of perishable foodstuffs.

  And the international movement of God only knows what else that God only knows who wants moved very discreetly from hither to yon and is prepared to pay whatever it costs.

  Despite his protestations that he’s absolutely through doing that sort of thing.

  Where the hell is the Lear?

  There were no other fixed-wing aircraft on the tarmac. Castillo had expected to see Pevsner’s Learjet 45.

  The only aircraft visible besides the huge cargo jets were two Bell 206L-4 helicopters, both painted with the legend CHILEAN HELICOPTERS S.A.

  They were probably used to ferry the crews here from Santiago or wherever the hell else they were whooping it up between flights.

  But where the hell is Pevsner’s Lear?

  “I don’t see the Lear,” Castillo said to his seatmate, who was in the process of applying lipstick, an act he found quite erotic.

  They were in the small section of a dozen seats behind the bulkhead that separated them from the flight deck.

  “Alek knew when we would arrive,” Sweaty said. “It will be here.”

  The massive 777 stopped moving.

  Max, who had spent just about all of the flight sound asleep, now awoke. He sat on his haunches and looked expectantly at the cabin door.

  One of the crew came into the passenger compartment. There were seven men, all Russians, on the crew. All of them wore wings. Five of them wore the four-stripe shoulder boards of captains, and the other two the three-stripe shoulder boards of first officers.

  The ranks didn’t seem to matter, as one of the captains functioned as the steward, cooking and serving lunch and making drinks, and the last time Castillo walked into the cockpit to see where the hell they were over South America, one of the first officers was occupying the pilot’s seat.

  He had come first to the conclusion that Russians did things differently, and then idly wondered what kind of passports the crew was carrying, and then decided that they more than likely had a selection of passports from which to choose, depending on where they had landed.

  As a stairway mounted on a pickup truck was backed against the fuselage, the captain worked open the door.

  When there was the light bump of the stairway contacting the aircraft, Max jumped to his feet, effortlessly shouldered the captain out of the way, and ran down the stairway.

  “Isn’t that sweet?” Castillo said. “He can’t wait to see his babies.”

  “He’s been on this plane for nine hours. I know what he wants to do,” Sweaty said, then immediately stopped, realizing that she had been had.

  “I better get down there before those two guys at the bottom of the steps see Max and wet their pants,” Castillo said, and started to get out of his seat.

  “My God,” Koussevitzky suddenly said. “It’s Blatov! And Koshkov!”

  Koussevitzky beat Castillo to the door.

  Castillo got there in time to see the two men salute, and heard one of them say, “Kapitáns Blatov and Koshkov reporting for duty, sir!”

  Koussevitzky ran quickly down the stairs and the three men embraced. Castillo—moving slowly—made it all the way down the stairs before they broke apart. When they did, he saw tears running down all of their cheeks.

  “Colonel Castillo, may I present Kapitáns Blatov and Koshkov, late of Vega Group Two?”

  Both Blatov and Koshkov snapped to attention and saluted.

  Castillo returned it, in Pavlovian response, and then put out his hand.

  Koussevitzky saw the lack of understanding on Castillo’s face.

  “It was General Sirinov’s plan, Carlos,” Koussevitzky said, “that should something go wrong on La Orchila Island, a second Tupelov based in Cuba would fly in our reserve force.”

  “But by the time we got there, Podpolkovnik Castillo,” Kapitán Koshkov said, “all we found was Major Koussevitzky resting against what was left of the hangar wall, drinking emergency liquid against the pain of the wound Podpolkovnik Alekseeva had given him.”

  Castillo looked at him and thought: Emergency liquid? What the hell is that?

  “Emergency liquid?” he asked.

  “Vodka, Carlos,” Koshkov explained with a smile. “One knows when one has been really accepted as a Spetsnaz when the officer inspecting your equipment before a mission does not inspect your two water bottles to make sure one of them doesn’t contain emergency liquid.”

  Kapitáns Koshkov and Blatov then snapped to attention again and raised their arms in a salute.

  “Well, what have we here?” Tom Barlow asked, offering his hand. “A veterans’ convention?”

  “It is good to see you again, Polkovnik Berezovsky,” Blatov said. And then quickly added, as Sweaty came off the stairs, “And you, Podpolkovnik Alekseeva.”

  Sweaty extended her hand. Koshkov and Blatov bent over it and kissed it.

  Unless both of them had really been into the emergency liquid, I don’t think a U.S. Army female light colonel has ever had her hand kissed by two captains.

  “How did you get out?” Sweaty asked.

  “It was only a question of time, Podpolkovnik Alekseeva, until they got around to deciding we were involved in the La Orchila Island disaster.”

  “That’s not what I asked.”

  “We are Spetsnaz, Podpolkovnik Alekseeva,” Koshkov replied. “We can do anything.”

  Castillo pushed back a grin as he thought: Years ago, when I was a bushy-tailed Special Forces captain, we used to say, “Green Berets can do anything immediately. The impossible takes a little longer.”

  He took another, closer look at Captains Koshkov and Blatov and decided, presuming they could speak English, they’d fit right in in the Stockade.

  “Either of you speak English?” Castillo asked in English.

  “About as well, Colonel,” Koshkov answered in English, “as you speak Russian.”

  “I once studied to be a poet in Saint Petersburg,” Castillo said. Both smiled broadly.

  “So, I understand, did Vladimir Vladimirovich,” Blatov said. “That’s the word going around.”

  “What are you doing here?” Koussevitzky asked.

  “We’re going to take you to Casa en el Bosque,” Koshkov said.

  “In those?” Castillo asked, indicating the Bells.

  Koshkov nodded.

  “They’re really very nice little helicopters,” he said.

  “Very nice little helicopters,” my ass. The factory calls them Long Rangers but they’re better known as Super Rangers. High-inertia two-bladed rotors. Lots of power. Just the thing to fly through the Andes as darkness falls, presuming you have the know-how to fly them. Say a hundred hours under a good instructor.

  I wonder where Alek Pevsner got them?

  “How much time do you have in them, Captain?” Castillo asked.

  Koshkov thought a minute, shrugged, then said, “About ten hours.”

  Ten hours?

  Max interrupted his thought by walking up to Koshkov, sitting on his haunches, and offering his paw.

  Max likes him. I’ll be damned!

  Koshkov stiffened; his face showed fear.

  He confirmed this by announcing, “I’m not a friend of dogs.”

  “Well, you better shake that one’s paw, or he’ll eat you,” Castillo said.

  With great reluctance, Koshkov stooped and took Max’s paw.

  “Get in the chopper, Max,” Castillo ordered, gesturing.

  Max dutifully trotted to the closest helicopter and jumped inside. Koshkov was visibly relieved.

  When Castillo got to the Bell, there was a man in the co-pilot’s seat. A good pilot—say, one with a hundred hours under a good instructor—could fly a Super Ranger by himself, but a co-pilot, even one presumably with less than ten hours in the bird, was a nice thing to have.

  “May I sit there, please?” Castillo asked politely.

  The co-pilot didn’t like that, but Koshkov sig
naled for him to give up his seat, and he did so.

  Once he was seated in the co-pilot’s position, a quick look at the interior of the Bell—especially at the panel—told Castillo that it was brand-new. The forward and side-looking radar screens, the GPS screen, and the radar altimeter bore the logos of the AFC Corporation, and that translated as “damn the cost, get the best.”

  He strapped himself in and put on the helmet that the co-pilot had reluctantly turned over to him.

  “Test, test,” he said through the throat microphone.

  “Loud and clear,” Koshkov reported. “Ready?”

  “One thing, Captain Koshkov,” Castillo said. “If at any time during this flight I put my hands on the controls and say, ‘I’ve got it!’ and you don’t instantly take your hands off the controls, I will order Max to pull you out of your seat by sinking his teeth into your throat, and then, when we get on the ground, I will tell him to eat you, starting with your penis and testicles.”

  It did not produce the reaction he expected.

  Koshkov smiled at him and said, “If at any time during our flight the co-pilot desires to take control of the aircraft, the pilot will be honored to turn it over to the author of Light Helicopter Operation in Extreme Altitude and Mountainous Terrain Conditions.”

  “Where the hell did you see that?”

  “By Major C. G. Castillo, Chief Flight Examiner, 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment,” Koshkov finished. “I used it to teach the subject when I was at the Spetsnaz aviation school.”

  “I will be damned.”

  “When we land, you can tell me how I did,” Koshkov said. “Picking it up now.”

  The Bell lifted gently off. Koshkov lowered the nose, and then made a running takeoff.

  VII

  [ONE]

  Casa en el Bosque

  San Carlos de Bariloche

  Río Negro Province, Argentina

  2105 17 April 2007

  At just about the moment the AFC GPS showed that they were over the estate, floodlights came on, illuminating the polo field, which was, Castillo judged, about 500 meters from the mansion.

  As Koshkov brought the Super Ranger in for a smooth touchdown, with the second chopper following, Castillo saw there was a welcoming party.

  Standing in front of the stable—which also served as a hangar—was a large welcoming party: Aleksandr Pevsner; his wife, Anna; and their three children, Elena, Sergei, and Aleksandr. Elena held one of Max’s pups in her arms.

  Janos, Pevsner’s huge Hungarian bodyguard, stood where Castillo expected him to be, three feet behind Pevsner.

  Standing three feet away was Berezovsky’s wife, Lora, and their daughter, Sof’ya, who was holding another fruit of Max’s loins in her arms. And to one side stood four women, three with small children in their arms, who had to be the wives of the pilots.

  If it weren’t for those dozen or more guys, all armed with Kalashnikov rifles, standing behind everybody, trying to be as discreet as possible, this would be a touching scene. If this were December, it could be Home for Christmas.

  “How’d I do?” Koshkov asked as he braked the rotors.

  “Not bad for someone who obviously has no natural flying talent at all,” Castillo said.

  Koshkov smiled and shook his head.

  Max, seeing his pups, was first off the Super Ranger. With some trepidation, first Elena and then Sof’ya put their now-squirming pups on the ground. In attack mode, the dogs raced toward their father. Together, they weighed about half as much as Max.

  Max instantly rolled on his back with his paws in the air, in surrender mode. The pups began to gnaw on his stomach and ears.

  “I shudder to think,” Aleksandr Pevsner said, as he shook Castillo’s hand, “that the children’s animals will eventually reach his size.”

  The kissing ritual began. Anna kissed Castillo. Sweaty kissed Pevsner, and then Anna. Castillo was not surprised when Anna kissed Lester Bradley—her husband was alive because Lester had put a .45 round in the forehead of Pevsner’s would-be assassin, and from then on he was considered a member of the family—but he was surprised when both Blatov and Koshkov got into the line of people waiting to swap kisses with the Laird of Karinhall and his lady.

  “More relatives?” Castillo asked Sweaty.

  She nodded.

  “Kiril and Anatoly,” she replied, “are—let me see—second cousins, once removed. Aleksandr is Kiril’s godfather.”

  “And that would make Kiril’s baby what?” Castillo said. “A third cousin twice removed? Or just a second cousin twice removed?”

  Sweaty considered the question seriously for perhaps thirty seconds before realizing she was being teased.

  “You will pay for that, my love,” she said.

  “Which means they’re Oprichniks in good standing?” he pursued.

  “I’m getting sorry I ever told you about the Oprichnina,” Sweaty said.

  “Yes or no?”

  “Of course,” Sweaty said. “They couldn’t have become Spetsnaz officers otherwise.”

  “Every Spetsnaz officer is an Oprichnik?”

  “I didn’t say that,” Sweaty said.

  “Yes, you did,” Castillo said.

  He sensed Aleksandr Pevsner’s eyes on him.

  “Very impressive, Alek,” Castillo said, indicating the men with the Kalashnikovs. “But where’s the band?”

  “The band?”

  “I sort of expected a brass band to welcome us. Or at least somebody playing ‘The Volga Boatmen’ on a balalaika.”

  Pevsner shook his head resignedly.

  “Let’s go down to the house and have dinner,” he said. “Afterward, we have a lot to talk about.”

  “Would you like to freshen up?” the Laird of Karinhall, the perfect host, asked, “or after a drink?”

  “Give me ten minutes,” Sweaty said.

  There was nothing in her reply, or tone of voice, that suggests she has anything more romantic—or carnal—on her mind than freshening up.

  Damn!

  Oh, I know. It’s because I mocked the family. And the Oprichnina.

  “I’ll have a little of the emergency liquid, please,” Castillo said, smiling at Kiril Koshkov and indicating a bottle of vodka encased in a block of ice.

  “Oh, that’s right, you heard about that, didn’t you?” Koshkov said with a smile.

  “Kiril’s been telling me how undisciplined you Spetsnaz are,” Castillo replied.

  Pevsner was also smiling broadly as he generously poured the literally ice-cold vodka into a chilled glass.

  What the hell are you smiling about, Alek? You never were Spetsnaz, and I don’t think you even know what we’re talking about.

  Epiphany time!

  You’re smiling because you know that even one drink will make me one drink stupider when we have our little chat. With a little luck, I will be two—or more—drinks stupider when we have the chat.

  The thing for me to remember about you, Alek, ol’ buddy, is that you were SVR, and while you can take the boy out of Russia, you can’t take the SVR out of the boy.

  Not a problem. I will have two or more drinks—after that flight through the Andes, I’m entitled. And we will have our little chat in the morning, not tonight.

  It was fifteen minutes—during which time Castillo had two substantial belts of vodka—before Sweaty rejoined the family, and then everyone went into the dining room. Not surprising Castillo at all were both another frosty glass of chilled vodka and a bottle of Saint Felicien Cabernet Sauvignon waiting for him at his place at the enormous table.

  Sweaty was seated beside him.

  “I waited for you,” Sweaty said quietly.

  “Really? What did you want?”

  She said, “It’s not important.” Her eyes told him carnal was off the table for tonight. And maybe for the next day, too.

  What was on the table for tonight was a feast of Chilean seafood—absolutely marvelous oysters and enormous lobsters.

>   About half a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon later, Castillo was watching when former Gunnery Sergeant Lester Bradley, USMC, stopped cracking the claw of an enormous lobster, pushed his chair away from the table, picked something up from the floor, and discreetly put it on his lap.

  Castillo knew what had happened: When Lester rose in the morning, he stuffed a theoretically invisible flesh-colored speaker into his ear canal. When a call came to his closed Brick and there was no answer, it spoke a number into the earpiece, identifying the person who was having trouble getting through.

  Castillo naturally wondered who was calling. He learned who it was only after Lester pushed back from the table, took a handset from the Brick, walked over to Castillo, and handed it to him.

  The illuminated LEDs on the handset told Castillo that the Brick was in Category I encryption status and showed him the number 6.

  Castillo put the handset to his ear.

  “Castillo,” he said.

  There was a very brief period during which the system compared the digital interpretation of his voice with its database, found a 99.9 percent match, and illuminated the number 1 on the calling party’s handset, telling A. Franklin Lammelle, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, that he was now connected with Lieutenant Colonel C. G. Castillo, U.S. Army, Retired.

  “Where the hell have you been, Charley?” Lammelle began the conversation. “I’ve been calling every five minutes for the past half hour.”

  “I was occupied.”

  “Doing what, that you couldn’t answer?”

  “For most of that time, I was dodging rock-filled clouds in a helicopter flown by a guy who finished flight school six weeks ago in Sevastopol. I don’t take calls under those conditions.”

  He exchanged smiles with Koshkov.

  Lester didn’t think I should have gotten on the phone, either; otherwise he would have handed it to me.

  “Rock-filled clouds where?”

  “The Andes.”

  “What the hell are you doing down there? The locator’s not working.”