Black Flagged Vektor (4)

by Konkoly, Steven

  Farrington adjusted his backpack and walked through the station, constantly scanning for anyone that might have taken an unhealthy interest in his arrival. Moving through the packed station, he headed directly for the transit exit located beneath a massively wide, three-story window facing the gray city. A call placed to Viktor fifteen minutes outside of Novosibirsk had confirmed his pickup. Someone would meet him at the top of the stairs outside of the station and escort him to a waiting car. The bratva would take him to a secluded location, where the team would stay for the duration of the trip. Everyone agreed that moving six operatives between hotels would be cumbersome and risky if any of them attracted attention while entering Russia.

  The worst-case scenario involved Russian intelligence agencies detecting an anomaly in one of their profiles that warranted further investigation. Follow-on attempts to locate his operatives would quickly dead-end at various points of entry into western Russia, leaving authorities with nothing to pursue. Each operative’s trail ended at their first border entry point. Like Farrington, they immediately switched to their Russian identities for follow-on travel, strictly avoiding airports. Train or rental car transit would bring them together in Novosibirsk undetected.

  Well aware that he might be on an internal Russian watch list, he took advantage of an unexpected chance to change identities in Yekaterinburg, when an apathetic ticketing agent neglected to request his identity papers. The agent asked him to spell his name, and Farrington obliged, becoming Boris Ushenko for the final leg of his journey.

  The only exception to this tactic had been Erin Foley. She had arrived in Vladivostok through a series of flights originating in Australia. Since she would spend four days on a train, arriving in Novosibirsk ahead of the team, Berg didn’t think it would be wise to switch her identity. Too many prying eyes on the train, which he felt was their only discreet option to smuggle her into Novosibirsk. Berg and Sanderson accepted the possibility that one of the seven operatives would be flagged entering Russia, and they couldn’t take the chance that it would be Foley.

  Unlike the rest of the team, Foley was far from nondescript and could be easily traced by investigative teams flashing her photograph on the streets. They had changed her appearance significantly, but they could do little to hide the fact that she was an attractive, confident woman that men and women alike tended to remember. Given the notoriety of her Stockholm debut, the last thing the Russian FIS would expect was for her to voluntarily set foot on Russian soil. Routing her through Vladivostok offered additional insurance, since prying eyes would be focused on Europe and western Russia.

  Unfortunately, the rest of the team had to enter through the west. Novosibirsk stood as the commercial gateway to eastern Siberia, offering the only airport in Siberia with direct flights outside of Russia, and the Trans Siberian-Mongolian Railway was the only viable commercial rail option approaching from the east.

  Crossing into Russia from Europe carried a higher risk of detection, but offered hundreds of options and put them in close proximity to Novosibirsk. Each operative arrived within a day or two of crossing the border. With the mission planned for Sunday evening, they had two full days to prepare, four days in Russia. Even if the Russians detected one of their entries, he couldn’t imagine any scenario that put them in a position to stop the operation.

  Farrington walked through the doors and up the stairs leading to street level, immediately spotting his contact when he reached the top. A bulky man wearing a black leather jacket held a piece of tattered cardboard with a prearranged generic Russian name scribbled in black marker. The name was meaningless, one of the safeguards agreed upon earlier, and nothing that would attract attention or prove memorable to anyone at the station. He approached the gruff driver and nodded, hoping for some kind of sign that everything was all right. The thick man raised a small handheld radio to his mouth and spoke a few words, putting it to his ear for the response. Farrington noted the deep scars on his face and a trace of tattoo reaching his lower jaw, just above his gray turtleneck sweater. He dropped the radio into his pocket immediately, folding the sign in half.

  “Viktor says we need to hurry if we’re going to make it to dinner on time. Let’s go,” he said, repeating another prearranged signal.

  If the man had said anything different, Farrington would have kept walking, prepared to fight his way out of whatever situation presented itself. The fight would have very likely been short-lived, since he carried no weapons at this point, but he would have made every attempt possible to escape. He hadn’t expected any trouble. Everyone on his team had arrived without incident and had been ferried off to a discreet location on the outskirts of the city. Farrington started to relax a little. As far as he could tell, the first phase of the operation had been successful. His strike team had arrived intact.

  He followed the bratva soldier across a large cement walkway to a black BMW sedan idling between two buses in the designated station pickup zone. He could see two men in the front seat. Neither of them looked in his direction as he neared the vehicle. Scarface opened the rear passenger door and nodded for him to get in. He was met by thick, noxious cigarette smoke upon entry, sliding across the back seat to the driver’s side of the car. Before Scarface could lower his hulking frame into the car, the man in the front passenger seat turned and extended his hand.

  “Viktor,” he said simply.

  Farrington accepted the gesture and they shook hands firmly. “Yuri Rastov. Thank you for the hospitality,” Farrington said.

  “My pleasure, Mr. Rastov. As you are probably already aware, everybody is waiting for you at one of our secure locations.”

  Once Scarface closed his door, the car sped away from the curb, drifting through the tangle of taxis and vans converging on passengers from nearly a dozen different trains. As the gateway to Siberia, Novosibirsk’s station was the largest and busiest rail depot east of Yekaterinburg.

  “It sounds like Ms. Reynolds is prepared,” Farrington said.

  “She is,” Viktor grumbled.

  “She wasn’t happy being held at the warehouse,” Farrington said.

  “I don’t suspect anyone is watching her, but it would look rather odd if she suddenly emerged from her hotel dressed like a high-priced escort and made a beeline straight for one of the city’s nightclubs. Agreed?”

  Farrington nodded, his attention distracted when Scarface flipped open a silver butane lighter and lit a cigarette. He offered one to Farrington, who didn’t hesitate to accept it. His first drag was rough, but he managed to keep from breaking into the telltale cough of an amateur smoker. The nicotine hit his bloodstream immediately, easing his tension. He leaned back in the seat.

  “You need to trust me with these things. You all may look the part, talk like locals and smoke our cigarettes without hacking up a lung, but this is a different part of the world. A different part of Russia. Even I stick out like a fucking sore thumb around here,” Viktor said and turned to face the windshield.

  “I’ll have a talk with everyone on the team,” Farrington said.

  “Especially the woman,” Viktor griped. “She’s been giving my men shit ever since we picked her up.”

  “She’s hardcore. That’s why we brought her along.”

  “She’s coming close to getting her ass beaten,” Viktor said, eliciting a grunt from Scarface.

  “I didn’t realize the bratva beat up women,” Farrington said.

  “We don’t hit little old ladies, but mouthy bitches like that?” Viktor shook his head.

  “If you hit her, you better hit her good,” Farrington warned him.

  Viktor turned in his seat with a perplexed look and shrugged his shoulders. “Why is that?”

  “Because you won’t get another chance. I’ve seen her in action, and it’s not a pretty sight…for the other guy,” Farrington said. “I’ll talk to her.”

  Viktor smiled and took a long drag on his cigarette, exhaling the noxious smoke onto the dashboard. Without turning, he asked
, “How do you like our cigarettes?”

  “Fucking horrible,” Farrington grimaced. “I thought your people controlled the distribution of Western cigarettes in Russia?”

  “We do, but none of our people smoke them. They taste like candy with all of the chemicals your companies add. These are real cigarettes.”

  “Well, they taste like shit. I’m surprised anyone starts smoking here.”

  “We make sure they start out with your cigarettes,” Viktor said, laughing.

  “Sounds like you’ve thought of everything.”

  Viktor poked his own head with one of his index fingers. “We’re running a sophisticated, multi-platform business organization, complete with marketing and strategic planning. You’d be surprised by the level of thought that goes into these decisions.”

  Farrington decided not to bite on this discussion. He had little interest in listening to this thug try to compare their criminal organization to a legitimate high-end corporation. Drugs, human trafficking, extortion, protection rackets, bribery, violence and murder topped the list of “deliverables” provided by the Solntsevskaya Bratva. Controlling stakes in legitimate products were “acquired” through business transactions heavily influenced by one of the “deliverables” mentioned above. Like every version of organized crime worldwide, the bratva provided nothing in return for everything. Their collaboration with the bratva was an unholy alliance sanctioned by Berg and approved by Sanderson, a one-time deal sealed by a little over five million dollars. He didn’t like it on any level. He especially didn’t like trusting the safety of his team to a payoff.

  “Viktor?”

  The Russian turned his head and regarded him without speaking.

  “I need you to understand something. If you decide to sell us out or sabotage our mission, you’re a dead man, along with everyone involved…all the way to Mr. Penkin,” Farrington said.

  Viktor’s eyes opened wide for a fraction of a second before his face tightened into a practiced neutral expression. His response to hearing his boss’s name had achieved the desired effect.

  “We’re not playing games,” Farrington added.

  “We didn’t think you were. This mission of yours carries significant risk to us, which is why I insist that you follow our rules right up until your men hit Vektor. After that, you’re completely on your own.”

  “That’s how we normally operate. This is a one-time collaboration,” Farrington said.

  “Which never happened,” Viktor said.

  “Exactly. I get the sense that we’re both on the same wavelength.”

  Viktor didn’t respond to this statement, which was meant to soften the blow of threatening his life. He could tell that Viktor was spinning Penkin’s name around in his head, trying to make sense of the implications. He imagined that Viktor would place a frantic call to Matvey Penkin as soon as he could break free from Farrington. Penkin would double up the communications security procedures surrounding any of his sensitive operations and start examining anyone close to him. He wouldn’t find anything of course, but the message would be received loud and clear.

  The CIA knew the names of the players and wouldn’t hesitate to send another team to clean up the loose ends if the mission went sideways. All the more reason for Viktor and his crew to ensure everything went smoothly right up until the moment his men breached Vektor. It also gave Farrington some assurance that none of vehicles involved in their exfiltration plan would suffer from a suspicious engine seizure or brake malfunction. Penkin’s branch of the Solntsevskaya Bratva had good reason to check and double-check every piece of equipment and vehicle presented to Farrington’s team. Their own lives now depended on it.

  He could sense that Viktor wanted to say something, but was hesitating. Scarface betrayed no reaction to his threat, demonstrating the considerable discipline demanded by the bratva. Finally, Viktor turned and spoke.

  “We’re good, but a word of advice. Don’t mention that name again, under any circumstances. Very dangerous for everyone involved.”

  “I understand. What time does Ms. Reynolds head out?”

  “Late. Around eleven. This is like New York City, the city that never sleeps. Yes?”

  “I find that hard to believe. This looks like an old-school Soviet city,” Farrington remarked.

  “Well, it’s not exactly Moscow, but some of the clubs stay open all night,” Viktor said. “Not as expensive as Moscow either. This is a sleepy corner of Russia, slowly awakening to the realities of the Federation. There are many opportunities for us here.”

  “Still sleeping off the hangover of communist prosperity?”

  They all laughed at his joke, including the previously unreadable Scarface.

  “Very good, Yuri. You have a sense of humor after all. I was beginning to worry about you. I don’t trust anyone that can’t laugh. This is going to work out for both of us. Trust me on that. We’ll drink to this later.”

  “I hope your vodka is better than these cigarettes,” Farrington said, flipping his out of the window.

  “Worse. Your days of Grey Goose and Ketel One are over. We drink the real stuff here.”

  Farrington snorted. “No wonder the average Russian life expectancy is so low.”

  On average, Russian males fell just short of sixty-five years, compared to seventy-five years in the United States. Life expectancy had been on the rise in Russia until the fall of communism, when the state-provided healthcare system collapsed in the turmoil immediately following the transition to a quasi-capitalist system. Russian life expectancy figures never rebounded.

  “You and I have bigger impediments to our life expectancy than shitty cigarettes and vodka,” Viktor said.

  “Very true. How much further to the warehouse?”

  “Not long. I’ll need you to wear this hood when we get closer,” Viktor said, raising the black nylon bag from the center console.

  “I don’t think that will be necessary. We’re past the point of fucking each other over…I hope,” Farrington said.

  “But if you’re captured—”

  “If I’m captured, we both have bigger problems than a warehouse full of stolen goods,” Farrington said.

  Viktor lowered the hood and laughed with his mouth closed, expelling smoke through his nose. “Hard-fucking-core might be an understatement,” he said.

  They rode in silence to a red brick warehouse situated behind a concrete perimeter wall topped with concertina wire. A camera stared at them outside of the gate for a few moments before the reinforced metal gates swung inward, exposing several heavily armed, rough-looking men smoking cigarettes, low-ranking bratva muscle known as “Shestyorka.” Young men jockeying for the coveted title of “Vor.” Most of them would end up dead. Rival gang shootouts or internal cleansing would eliminate all but the most trustworthy and capable, who would be inducted into the brotherhood, leaving a void that would be immediately filled by the next petty thug on the streets. There was never a shortage of Shestyorka.

  “You know, Viktor? If you want to keep your warehouses a secret, you might consider something a little more low-key than a guarded fortress smack dab in the middle of a neighborhood,” Farrington suggested.

  “Everybody knows about this warehouse. They look the other way because we tell them to…and pay them.”

  “Then the hood is just a game? I don’t like games.”

  “Not a game. A test. Your team passed the test,” Viktor said.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “If you had put that over your head without any resistance, I would have had serious reservations about your team’s intentions toward my organization. All of your people resisted, which is a good sign. Welcome to Novosibirsk’s worst-kept, but most secure secret.”

  Farrington shook his head imperceptibly. His covert world was one subtle test after another, each organization or entity probing his or her enemies and friends alike. This was the hardest part of the job, where the lethality of a mistake might not materialize unti
l much later, at the most unexpected moment. The actual assault against Vektor Labs would be a cakewalk compared to the snake-filled, cloak-and-dagger world Karl Berg continued to manipulate. The sooner they hit Vektor, the better.

  Chapter 33

  11:38 PM

  Novosibirsk Nightclub

  Novosibirsk, Russian Federation

  “Katie Reynolds” (aka Erin Foley) sat impatiently in the back seat of a Renault SUV on a lifeless side street near Diesel nightclub, counting the seconds until she could step out into the brisk, clean Siberian air. The three men accompanying her had chain-smoked furiously since they departed the warehouse compound. She had rolled her window down halfway, hoping to make a dent in the pervasive ashtray and body odor medley, but it didn’t seem to help. The men made no effort to exhale their smoke in the opposite direction, despite her mild protest, and she didn’t bother to address the fact that they all smelled like rotting garbage. The fall of communism apparently hadn’t ushered in an era of personal hygiene.

  She did her best to keep her distance from these animals at the warehouse complex, but she still caught words like “whore” and “bitch” tossed around just loud enough for her to hear. Threatening insults combined with murderous stares had left her eager to meet up with the rest of her team. Until the strike team started to trickle in, she spent most of her time wondering if this unholy alliance hadn’t been a serious mistake. She still wasn’t convinced it was a solid idea.

  Aside from Viktor, the men she’d seen so far looked and acted like unmannered trash. A few carried themselves with dignity, possibly ex-military, but the rest resembled the kind of people you hoped to never see up close and in person under any circumstances. Degenerates and psychopaths with zero moral compasses, whose appearance at your doorstep usually heralded an era of misery, pain and death. Sitting among them made her more nauseous than the toxic cigarette exhaust that endlessly poured out of them like pollution from a factory smokestack.