Paladin of Shadows 4 - Unto the Breach

by John Ringo

  "This is the new girl," Yaroslav wheezed. "All my other girls I had to sell. I will sell this one as soon as I can. Then we are done."

  "We don't need her for long," the man said. He was a cold one, Katya could tell. About 175 centimeters, cold gray eyes, slim face. She ran through the dossiers she'd been shown and tried not to blanch. Kurt Schwenke, the former Stasi agent and terrorist. She was going to have to be very careful around this man. He was a trained agent which meant that anything she did out of character was going to give her away. She instantly decided she was going to switch roles as soon as Yaroslav was gone. Just enough that Schwenke would catch it. It was a fine line to run. She had to show her hard side without in any way making him think she was an agent.

  "I go now," Yaroslav said. "She will work for you. She is very biddable."

  After Yaroslav had waddled out of the room Schwenke walked around her, looking her up and down.

  "Biddable?" the German finally scoffed. "Is he blind?"

  "Most men are," Katya said, coldly.

  "I am not, bitch," Schwenke stated, stopping in front of her and then slapping her, hard.

  With the change in demeanor Katya could have, would have, avoided the slap as much as possible. She couldn't have used a trained block, that would give too much away. But she could have lifted her arms, turned away, flinched, something.

  If she'd had time. The man was faster than a snake. All she could do was spin away from the powerful slap and try to remain conscious.

  She found herself on the floor, propping herself up with her hands and trying to breathe just before a boot crashed into her side.

  "I am not," Schwenke said, just as coldly. "So let us not play games, yes? What are you?"

  "A whore," Katya said, curled on her side. "I was born in an orphanage in Novy Birsk. I was raped by a man like you when I was eight. If I could press a button and kill every man on earth I would. But I know better than to cross you. Good enough?"

  "Perhaps," Schwenke said, kicking her. "And perhaps too pat. Why are you here?"

  "Because I killed my last pimp," Katya spat. "Veniamin was a bastard. But he has friends. He knew too many of the men in the Balkans trade and too many in Russia. If I stayed, I'd be as dead as the pig. Turkey, though, there I could disappear. So kill me or beat me or fuck me, I don't care. But if you piss me off too much, you'd better kill me."

  Schwenke paused and then laughed. Shrilly.

  "Better bitches than you have tried to kill me," he said, still chortling. "But I like your spirit. Feel free to try. We can make a game of it, yes? You try to kill me, I try to kill you. Nothing obvious. Shooting you, beating you to death with a lead club, these would be too easy. Fun but too easy. Poison? Do you know poisons? I know thousands. Shall we play the poison game, bitch?"

  "Teach me a few and I'll gladly give you a blowjob that will curl your toes," Katya said. It was pure honesty and that shown through.

  "Perhaps," Schwenke said. "Perhaps. But you would probably not enjoy bedding me. I am a master of pain."

  "I have been hurt," Katya said. "Plenty of men have beaten me."

  "Who said anything about beating?" Schwenke asked. "I prefer to simply give them a little cocktail. That way they scream and scream in pain as a fuck them. Then the pain passes and they are so grateful. Until I brew the next cocktail. I make them watch as I prepare the syringe. They begin to scream before the needle even touches them. Would you like to scream?"

  Katya was stunned. She'd run into some real bastards, absolute sadists, as pimps. But this guy was just fucking nuts. More around the bend, if possible, than Katya herself.

  "I've screamed until I was hoarse, plenty of times," Katya said. "But if you'd settle for fake screaming and just teach me your recipe, I promise you won't know the difference."

  "Oh, but I would," Kurt pouted. "But for my recipe, would you take my little cocktail? Voluntarily?"

  "I don't know," Katya temporized. "How much am I getting paid? I'll fuck you for the recipe. For the pain...seven hundred euros. And Yaroslav doesn't find out. For that much pain I'm not going to cut in the pimp."

  "What a delightful child you are," Schwenke said. "We'll talk about it, yes? In the meantime, you've been hired for other reasons."

  "Who's the bitch?" Katya asked. "Your newest playtoy?"

  "No," the German said. "Alas, I'm not permitted to play with her. Not as long as her father cooperates. She stays in the chair except for two exercise periods each day. That is when she craps or pisses or whatever. Her hands are never untied. Her feet are shackled whenever she is out of the chair. You have to feed her, get her to the latrine, get her on the pisser. The men are not permitted to talk to her. You will only talk to her as little as possible. If any of the men try to see her, to touch her or rape her, you will report it to me. They won't, though. They know the penalty. They start with my little cocktails. At night she lies in the bed. She must be shackled then, as well. You will shackle her and then return to whatever pisshole you call home here. I will check to make sure they are tight. In the morning you return. If I am unsatisfied by the tightness of her bonds the night before we will have another little chat."

  "I won't let her go," Katya said, chuckling. "I'd just as soon watch her raped."

  "You don't want to know why we are keeping her?" Schwenke asked.

  "I assume for ransom," Katya replied with a shrug.

  "Ah, and such a ransom," Schwenke said. "You will not ask her her name. If I find that you discover her identity, you will be killed. I may play with you first, but you will definitely be killed. She does not want you to be killed, I'm sure, so she won't tell you. But if you piss her off enough, she can kill you by simply mentioning her name. She did so to one of the girls who was...unkind to her."

  "I will be kindness in itself," Katya promised. "What if she is a problem?"

  "Then bring it to me," the ex-Stasi said. "Here you are, the two of you trapped like a proton circled by an electron. Unable to escape each other short of the death of either. Or, of course, she being moved on. So I would suggest that, despite your nature, you become the very best of friends."

  * * *

  "Hello, ladies," Mike said, looking around the room. "Thanks for staying up until the middle of the night to meet with me."

  "You are very busy, Kildar," Mother Ferani said. "We are at your disposal."

  "Here is the situation," Mike said, gesturing at the pile of recently received steerable chutes. "As you know, a team is being inserted by advanced parachute techniques to set up a radio center. I've got all I can do just training them to minimal standards. And we all want Julia, Olga, Jeseph, Ivan and Pat well trained. But that will require that, towards the end of training, they do multiple jumps per day. The Master Chief and I are the only qualified parachute packers in the area. I won't have the time to pack thirty chutes a day. That's the six of us doing five jumps per day, which is what I'm shooting for. Somebody is going to have to pack the chutes."

  "Us," Mother Ferani said, her eyes wide.

  "Yes," Mike replied, simply. "These days either specialized members of the military who use the chutes, riggers they're called, or the users themselves generally pack the chutes. Because the very lives of the users depend upon them being packed right. On the other hand, I don't have the time to train the team on HALO and packing. Nor do they have the time to do their own packing even if I did.

  "However, four of the Six Families are represented on the jump. And a mother, sister or cousin of each of the team members is represented here. If they cannot trust their own mother, sister or cousin, who can they trust? Anyone who really feels they are not prepared to hold the lives of their son, brother or cousin in their hands after this training can opt out. There are actually about twice as many of you as I need. There's a reason for that too, but I won't get into it. However, if you don't think you want that responsibility, you can opt out. After you're trained."

  "Very well, Kildar," Mother Ferani said. "We are at your command in th
ings such as this. And I find it to be an honor."

  "Great," Mike said, tiredly. "Let's get started. But just one thing I'll add: It's pretty apparent that the Keldara are going to get used for more and more 'special' missions. And the Keldara don't seem to mind, even when there are losses. So it makes sense to make sure they're all as prepared as possible..."

  "You're going to extend the training," Liza Mahona said from the group.

  "After this mission is over I'm going to institute unit-wide training in airborne and HALO techniques," Mike said with a nod. "We'll work on SCUBA later."

  "What is SCUBA?"

  * * *

  Chapter Seventeen

  Kacey yanked back the door of the Blackhawk and stepped out fast, carrying her flight bag in one hand and a carry-on in the other. Tammie, similarly encumbered, followed fast behind but paused to wave to the crew-chief and slide the door shut.

  Their greeting party was a middle height man dressed in casual clothes, more or less ignoring the rotor wash, and a bigger guy that had a look that Kacey somehow tagged as " local" wearing a digi-cam pattern she'd never seen before. The guy in digicam was wearing a sidearm of some sort in fast-draw holster. It might have been an H&K USP, but Kacey wasn't enough of an expert in side-arms to be sure. The odd thing about the local took a second to sink in: he was so damned good looking it was scary. He looked like he could have stepped off a Hollywood set but she was sure he was a local.

  The landing area was a farm in a valley just about surrounded by really high mountains, pretty prosperous with some new tractors working the fields and an SUV or two in sight. But the houses looked pretty much like the ones she'd seen in the Kurdish area in Iraq: dressed stone and slate roofs. They looked like they might have electricity.

  "Captain Bathlick?" the casually dressed man asked. "I'm Mike Jenkins. Thanks for coming out here just to talk."

  Up close it was clear that, while casual, the clothes were not cheap. The black comfortable shoes had that look that said "Italian leather", the pants were exquisite and the golf shirt looked as if it was silk. He'd fit right in at a Palm Beach golf-course. But just as she thought that she heard a crackle of gunfire over the sound of the spooling up rotors. It was the crackle that said "ranges" though, to her ear, not "firefight."

  "That would be me," Kacey replied, setting down her case to shake his hand. The local immediately grabbed it and the nearly matching one from Tammie and trotted over to the waiting Expedition. Jenkins quickly shook Tammie's hand as well and then gestured at the Expedition.

  "Let's get out of the rotor wash," Mr. Jenkins yelled, heading for the SUV. He got in the driver seat after waving them to the back. Once they were in he turned around and grinned. "Welcome to Never Never Land. I'd give you the cook's tour, but I'm pressed for time. We'll talk then you can tell me to stuff it or look around and make up your mind."

  "Can we get a vague idea what we're here for?" Tammie asked.

  "I've been asked, as a favor, to do something for the US government. And the government of Russia. And the government of Georgia." Mr. Jenkins put the SUV in gear and headed up towards the road. It was only then that Kacey noticed what could only be described as a Turkish castle straight out of Arabian Nights up on the ridgeline. "To do that favor, I need at least two helicopter pilots. The rest can, has to, wait."

  "The US, Russia and Georgia?" Kacey asked, leaning back in her seat and looking around. Most of the people in the valley were in "local" clothing but here and there there were more people in digicam. A couple were carrying sub-guns, M4s, on friction rigs. Most of them Kacey still tagged as "locals" but a couple had a look that she knew made them Western military. Not sure how to say the difference but it was there. But they clearly weren't an SF team, they looked more like "security specialists." What in the fuck was going on? "I guess we should at least stick around long enough to find out why."

  "Oh, yeah," Mr. Jenkins said, opening up the center compartment and pulling out two envelopes. "Your 'I'm willing to travel' money." He held the two envelopes over his shoulder as he steered onto a winding road that looked damned near vertical.

  Kacey quickly snatched the envelopes so he'd have his hands free to drive and handed one to Tammie. She didn't want to count it, it seemed rude, but it sure felt like what five thousand dollars should feel like. It was heavy. Bills could be paid and that was good. Whatever came from the "interview." It sounded like Jenkins would be willing to hire anyone who could fly. That meant they'd have to be interviewing him.

  The castle turned out to be their destination. There was a curtain wall with some really huge doors on the gate and an interior keep, she'd guess that was what it was, that had been converted into a house. Again, it looked really Turkish, Ottoman was probably the right term. It had a couple of little towers like minarets on it at least.

  "In case you're wondering, this is my house," Mr. Jenkins said. "And farm. The people who work the farm are called the Keldara. The full explanation of the Keldara is a long discussion. We'll have to shelve that one, too, for the time being. If you'll follow me, your bags will be taken to your rooms."

  "We'd like to keep our flight bags with us," Kacey said, uneasily.

  "If it makes you comfortable," Mr. Jenkins said, smiling. "But they're only going to your room. Whether you take the job or not you'll probably prefer to stay overnight."

  "Okay," Tammie said, handing over her flight-bag with a shrug. She still had a purse. "Lead on."

  Kacey gave up her flight-bag somewhat more reluctantly but then followed the two into the house.

  The first thing she noticed wasn't the décor, it was the women. There were three rather good looking teenage females in school uniforms in the front room of the castle. All three popped to their feet as Mr. Jenkins walked in and giggled then one gabbled at him in what was probably the local language.

  Jenkins replied shortly, but in a friendly tone, then turned to Tammie and Kacey.

  "These young ladies are Tinata, Lida and Klavdiya. They would like to make your acquaintance."

  "Of course," Tammie said, grinning and walking over to shake hands. "Hello."

  "Hello, I am pleased to meet you," one of the girls said, very slowly in English.

  "Thank you," Tammie said, nearly as slowly. "I am please to meet you, too. What is your name?"

  "I am Klavdiya," the girl said carefully.

  "Hello, Klavdiya," Tammie said, smiling. "I am Tammie."

  Mr. Jenkins said something briefly in the other language and the girls then cut the greeting shorter. When the ritual was all over, he waved the two pilots towards the back of the castle.

  "To be brutally honest, the girls are members of my harem," Jenkins said without looking over his shoulder to gauge their reaction. "And, no, none of them are over eighteen. The story of how I ended up with a harem will..."

  "Have to wait," Kacey said, snorting. "I can tell there are a lot of stories here. But if you're trying to shock me, or Tammie, we're pretty much unshockable."

  "Good," Jenkins said, reaching a heavy wooden door and gesturing them into the room. It was set up as an office but there were no windows and only the one door. The first word that came to Kacey's mind was "cozy." There was a nice fireplace, currently unlit, on one wall. The second word that came to mind, though, was "secure." Bugging it would be hell except maybe through the fireplace. There was a couch and three overstuffed chairs arranged on one side in a "seating area" a desk and advanced desk chair. No filing cabinets, though. Mr. Jenkins grabbed one of the overstuffed chairs and swung it around so he could face the couch and waved them to it. "Sit, please. I know you've been doing a lot of sitting, but I've got to go back to teaching HALO as fast as I can and I'd like to get this over with."

  "And that's another one that begs the question 'what is going on?'" Tammie said.

  "Before I get to that, I need to lay out a few ground rules," Mr. Jenkins said. "Obviously what I do isn't covered by US security regs. So I can't throw that at you. But if you're goin
g to talk, in the military or out, you talk. From what I've been told, you're very good at keeping your mouths shut. It's one of the requirements I laid on the people I set to finding me some pilots. I didn't expect females, frankly, but I don't really care, either. I've got females going much more in harm's way than you'll be. I've got a green intel team that's going to be doing their cherry combat drop with nothing but green jumpers on their team into nasty terrain in the middle of absolute Injun Country. Two of them are female. So you can see that I don't hold your sex against you. I'll use whatever tools come to hand. In this case it is, potentially, you two."

  "We don't talk," Kacey said. "But I take it the US government doesn't want this talked about, either?"

  "Not a bit," Mr. Jenkins said, leaning back. "This is as black as it comes. So black they can't even use their black ops boys. The term is 'deniability.' I don't work for the US government, they just occasionally let me know about issues that need attending to. If I successfully attend to them, I get some money from that."