by Jack Murphy
The four men were getting closer, their snowshoes kicking up white clouds with each step as their boots pounded the snow.
Serov would not let his men see his concern as they continued to dig in. This was far from his first operation. He had taken part in both Chechen civil wars, seen action in Dagestan and Georgia, and waged nasty war-by-proxy in Nagorno-Karabakh. He had led covert operations in Iraq, Syria, and most recently, in Ukraine, making him one of the Kremlin’s most experienced paramilitary operatives. That had brought him to the attention of a former mentor, one of the old men in the castle who had recruited him into Oculus.
The Chinese operatives stopped at the edge of the embankment, just in front of Serov.
“Are you Dragon Caster?” one of them asked as he threw back his hood. The Chinese operative was younger than the Russian would have expected, but also bigger, more muscular and taller than any other Chinese soldier he had ever seen. That much was clear, even under the bulky parka he wore.
“I am,” Serov responded. The code name was to maintain compartmentalization. None of them knew each other’s real names.
The Russian colonel never saw the pistol, just the flash from the weapon that materialized in the Chinese operative’s hand at an impossible speed. The suppressed shot sounded like a cough, and Serov’s head kicked back in a spray of blood, a third eye appearing on his forehead. The Oculus commander was dead before his body hit the ground. It rolled to a stop at the bottom of the embankment, leaking a swirling trail of dark red in its wake.
The body came to rest next to a refrigerator-sized box sitting on top of a sled with a white camouflage net tossed over it. The device was surrounded by four guards, standing by with Tavor assault rifles at the ready. All three nationalities of operatives set their shovels down and looked up at their new leader. The young Chinese man stepped forward.
“My name is Iron Hammer. I’ve been sent to take control of this element and get this mission back on track. That starts tonight.”
His smile left the men of Oculus with an unsettled feeling; it wasn’t that they had any particular loyalty to Serov, but they all feared what their new commander had in store for them.
* * *
Tampa, Florida
“Anything new from the Global Hawk feed?” Craig asked.
“Nothing yet,” Gary answered.
With communications being jammed off and on, it was hit or miss. At the moment, they had the feed live on the flatscreen but had been unable to locate any personnel.
“From the bodies we’ve seen we can at least tell that they are heading in a generally eastern direction,” Will offered. “We should make contact with the captain of the Carrickfergus and instruct him to head to the other side of Ellesmere Island. It is going to take him a few days anyway.”
SCOPE had not had contact with Deckard or his men in over 24 hours, but knew there was a pitched and running gunfight underway as their eye in the sky would sometimes spot a dead body, red splotches in the snow, or ski tracks. On one grisly occasion they had seen a pack of Arctic wolves tearing into a corpse at the foot of a mountain, but had been unable to tell if the body was that of a friendly or an enemy.
Meanwhile, the national security complex was slowly getting back on its feet. ISIS was officially taking the blame, but the media was still in a frenzy of contradictory narratives, blaming attacks on Iran, Black Bloc anarchists, white supremacists, Islamic terrorists, and even drug cartels. The media had been the ultimate force multiplier for the recent terrorist attacks, taking a dire situation and then churning it up into a full-on frenzy as citizens expected to wake up the next morning to find mothers cannibalizing their own children for sustenance in a post-apocalyptic world.
Will stood to go take a smoke break.
He knew what he was seeing was a concerted effort by Iranian, Russian, and Chinese elements working together to counter American influence. Thanks to Deckard, he could finally prove it rather than be the laughing stock of the intelligence community. This three-nation alliance was the inevitable consequence of America’s creation of post-World War Two global order. The Iranians, Russians, and Chinese were not evil people, simply self-interested actors pushing back against a world order they had no say in crafting.
America had shaped the global economy through Bretton-Woods, the conference that laid the framework for the modern monetary system, which was then backstopped by the IMF and World Bank after World War II. The Westphalian system, which moderates international politics and how states interact with one another, was created by dozens of envoys, ambassadors, and politicians after the Thirty Years' War in Europe in 1648.
Other great powers like Russia, China, and Iran had no say in the establishment of Bretton Woods or the Westphalian system, both of which led to a Western-dominated world. But Will was a pragmatist. Say what you will about the decadence of the Western world, if the globe were to come to be dominated by the likes of Russia or China, it would not be a very nice place to live. With Russia or China as a global superpower, the world would become less democratic, have less respect for human rights, and leave little room for individual creativity, initiative, or innovation. These were autocratic regimes whose main driving interest was regime preservation. Self-perpetuation, almost as if the state itself was a living organism. Perhaps it was.
Stepping outside into the warm Tampa air, Will wondered where the world would stand tomorrow.
* * *
The plan was simple: chaos and terror.
Many of the Chinese in Oculus has been recruited out of the MSS intelligence service or military units like Sea Dragon, Snow Leopard, Arrow, and Night Tiger. However, the newly arrived Chinese operatives were assigned to a special project that was a part of a larger effort at weapons modernization called shashoujian or Assassin's Mace. More accurately, they were a program within Assassin's Mace.
The four operatives had crossed frozen arctic terrain faster than the most talented and experienced mountaineer could have, with very little equipment to help them on their way. It would have been a suicide mission; anyone else would have frozen to death within a few kilometers. But this was not the case for Jiahao and his men.
Jiahao holstered his pistol and looked to his three men.
“Shun.”
The Chinese operative stepped forward, ready to follow his commander’s orders.
“Now that it is dark, I want you to follow the ski trails back. The enemy has no doubt followed them and even now plots an ambush. I want you to teach them a lesson that they will not soon forget.”
“Consider it done,” Shun answered. Unslinging his Tavor assault rifle, he handed it off to one of his teammates. “This will just slow me down.”
With only a pistol, knife, and snowshoes, Shun ran into the darkness and disappeared.
Jiahao smiled. He would have gone himself, but as the new leader, he had to spend the night in preparations, ensuring that the men were ready for the next day’s movements. In the meantime, Shun would strike terror into the hearts of the Kazakhs and their American puppeteers. Soon, they would get a taste of what Assassin’s Mace was capable of.
* * *
Wind howled through Samruk International’s patrol base, extinguishing the small fire that had been lit to melt snow for drinking water.
Pat held his Kalashnikov close, attempting to stay warm while on guard duty. The JTF2 operators had done an excellent job finding a depression in the ground that offered them some cover from the wind sweeping across the tundra, but there was only so much that could be done with temperatures easily reaching -30 degrees. In the low ground, the mercenaries dug out their crow’s foot-shaped patrol base and four-man snow shelters.
The former Delta Force operator balled up his fists and his toes, attempting to keep them from freezing in the night.
Suddenly, he stopped in his tracks, his eyes instinctively turning toward something. Nothing was moving, everything was silent apart from the arctic wind. Pat stepped forward. It wasn’t something he s
aw, but something he heard, barely audible but certainly there. He heard the sound again. Something falling? Pat moved closer to the snow shelters, walking down to the far end of the crow’s foot.
Snow being kicked. A body hitting the floor.
Pat ran straight toward it.
He burst into the snow shelter that he heard the sounds coming from, his Kalashnikov leading the way. Flicking on his Petzl headlamp, he scanned for threats.
The roof of the snow shelter had been collapsed toward the back end. Bodies lay on the ground, Pat’s face twisting in a grimace as his headlamp illuminated their wounds. Their joints were broken, arms and legs twisted in unnatural directions. Faces were lumpy and blue, like they had been worked over with a lead pipe. A shiver went up the American’s spine.
Wolves?
No, impossible.
Pat felt it still in the shelter, right there with him. Then its eyes opened. In overwhites, it blended right in with the sides of the shelter. The former Delta operator went to bring his weapon into play, but wasn’t even close. The rifle was slapped aside and then torn right off of him, the sling propelling his head forward as he lost control of the Kalashnikov. For a samurai, there were few greater dishonors than to be disarmed by an opponent.
The rifle spun away into the snow and Pat found himself in a fight for his life. Blows rained down on him as he backpedaled. As someone who routinely boxed his entire Delta squadron for physical training, it was the first time he had squared off with a martial artist who was faster than he was. Fists, elbows, and knees came at him faster than he could react.
Suddenly, he was picked off his feet and hurled skyward, rocketing right through the roof of the snow shelter. In a burst of ice, he was flung into the night and came down hard on the tundra. Trying to shake off the shock to his system, Pat rolled over on his back and struggled to his feet. His attacker shot straight up into the air, jumping twice his height and landing in a crouch a few feet away from Pat.
Now able to see his attacker, Pat understood that he was facing off against one of the Chinese members of Oculus. His movements were nothing short of supernatural. Settling into a boxer’s stance, he prepared for the onslaught he knew was coming.
This time, he was ready, ducking and weaving away from fists and open palm strikes. Pat took small steps to his right, then his left, then back, narrowly avoiding the Chinese commando. He didn't dare reach for any of the hand weapons he kept secreted on his body. The moment he reached for a knife, garrote wire, or brass knuckles, he knew the commando would launch another fusillade of strikes, taking advantage of his momentary distraction.
A low kick striking Pat on his thigh caused him to buckle at the knees. Continuing the movement, the attacker stomped on his booted foot, pinning him in position. Keeping his hands up, Pat protected his face, but his attacker’s fists had more power behind them than anything he had ever experienced inside the ring or on the streets. Tearing his foot free, Pat stumbled backwards, struggling to stay upright.
In the blink of an eye, he saw the opening. The kung fu killer attempted a roundhouse kick. In the nanosecond that he gave up his back, Pat blitzed forward. His quick footwork closed the distance and he landed a left and a heavy right on the Chinese commando’s skull. This time, it was his opponent who stumbled. The man quickly recovered before the former Delta operator could follow up his assault.
“Impressive.”
The word was carried in the wind in perfect English.
“Not so bad yourself, Jackie Chan.”
Pat didn’t wait for a response but strode forward while shooting out a punch far before before he closed the distance, it was designed to distract rather than do damage. Then he launched his boot up into the commando’s groin. The Chinese soldier smirked, easily deflecting the attack. A counter-kick hit Pat in the mid-section, opening him up for a fraction of a second.
Then the fists came down on the American in rapid succession. It was a Wing Chun technique called Do Lin Wan Kuen. The chain attack emphasized a series of short, rapid punches that brutalized Pat’s rib cage. Ignoring the pain in his side, Pat punched, but his attacker blocked, then chopped the American in the neck. Pat’s vision went blurry. He felt like he had nearly lost his head.
Pat threw another punch, but the commando blocked it with his elbow and executed a low kick. Pat felt something snap inside his leg, causing him to limp backwards. The killer who had infiltrated their patrol base was now stepping on the gas pedal to finish the fight. His speed and power were trained—well trained—but also supernatural.
Pat dodged another punch that flew over his head in a blur of motion, but then took an overhand right to the side of the head that spilled him to the ground. He fought the black walls closing in. What little of the world he could see was spinning.
The Chinese assassin reached under his overwhites and withdrew a dagger. Smiling, he reached down to begin carving his turkey.
Two shots cut through the night. The assassin pancaked himself into the snow as another shot passed over him and his victim. Pat squirmed, his hand searching until it landed on the hilt of his own knife, which he yanked free of its sheath.
Curses in Russian greeted his ear.
“Pat? Pat? What the hell happened?”
It was Korgan, their burly sergeant major now at his side.
“Where is he?” Pat croaked.
“I don’t know. Who was that?”
Pat rolled over and saw nothing but snow stretching out into the darkness.
Chapter 28
“The boys are whispering about a ghost that snuck into our patrol base last night,” Sergeant Major Korgan said as he skied alongside Deckard.
“A fucking ghost didn’t gut four of our men and go Hong Kong fooey on Pat.”
The former Delta operator was now strapped into a plastic stretcher called a Skedco, which was being pulled through the snow by four mercenaries. The bodies of the dead had been buried in the snow for later retrieval.
Samruk had initiated their movement at dawn, handrailing the enemy’s trail. The Canadian JTF2 counterterrorism operators were leading the movement since they were the most fresh of the group, not to mention the most experienced in the Canadian Arctic. Their warrant officer had been correct about the enemy heading for the frozen fjord.
The ski trail led right into it. Frozen over, the fjord acted as a natural line of drift and a flat, high-speed trail for humans to traverse.
“Who could have done something like that? Pat said he only saw one man.”
“I don’t know,” Deckard said, shaking his head. “I’ve seen Pat surrounded in a bar by unconscious bodies stacked around him like cordwood. He’s an animal who could take any one of us apart in hand-to-hand combat. Whoever did that to him….” His words trailed off. “Shit, I just don’t know.”
“I fear that we may have awakened something,” the sergeant major responded, the old superstitions from the steppes of Kazakhstan still strong in the veteran soldier.
Deckard frowned.
“C’mon, let’s get the hell off this rock,” he said as he skied out onto the frozen river. In a few more hours they would reach the coast.
* * *
The Arctic fiber optic station looked abandoned and empty from a distance, with a door open and swinging back and forth in the breeze. Deckard had walked into one too many traps recently to take those impressions at face value. It suddenly dawned on Deckard that they were standing atop a frozen river, meaning that if they took indirect fire, they would be in a real shit state with no cover and nowhere to retreat to. Combat in general consists of a series of sub-optimal decisions to make, but this was especially true in the high north.
“I don’t see their trawler,” Aghassi said as he looked through a pair of binoculars.
“Oculus probably hijacked it and left, but they may have left some party favors for us.”
“Drones, land mines, boobytraps, lasers, automated gun systems—”
“OK, yeah, thanks. I got it.�
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The former Task Force Orange operator scanned the one-story building, looking for signs of life.
“Interesting that they left the communications mast standing. The first thing I would have done is cripple the communications in the building before escaping.”
“Maybe they are baiting us in.”
Aghassi lowered the binoculars and looked at Deckard. “Or maybe someone wants to talk to you.”
The mage.
“All right, get gun positions up and set intersecting fields of fire on the structure. Put the assault line a few hundred meters away from the building and cheat a small element forward. No one goes through the doors. Use windows or create another entry.”
“Hey, hold on, we’ve got something,” Aghassi said as he looked through the binos again.
Sure enough, a lone figure had stepped out of the building and was walking toward the Samruk International mercenaries with his hands held high in the air. Rochenoire snatched up a squad of Kazakhs and set up a hasty blocking position, with one PKM machine gun pointed downrange, ready to rock and roll.
“Advance forward,” the former SEAL yelled at the lone figure. As he got closer, they could see that it was a male, wearing commercial cold-weather gear, and that he looked to be about 50 pounds overweight. Fit the bill for a civilian working at the Arctic fiber optic cable station, but they had to be sure.
“My name is Toby Baker!” the civilian yelled out to the mercenaries. “I’m an electrical engineer!”
“What the fuck ever,” the former SEAL shouted back. “Take off your jacket and drop trou!”
“What?”
“Fucking do it if you don’t want to get shot!”
Toby reluctantly unzipped his blue and gray parka, setting it on the ground next to him before undoing his belt buckle and dropping his pants.
