by Matt Rogers
‘I am telling you the truth. Look into my eyes. I do not know them. But maybe they have something to do with my business in Vladivostok.’
‘Viktor,’ Slater hissed. ‘Tell me. What the hell is going on in Vladivostok? What’s your business there?’
‘Maybe you know. I cannot tell you.’
‘What do you mean I know?’
‘You might be connected. Why are you headed to Vladivostok?’
‘I’ve been on this train for a week. I’m following it to the end of the line.’
‘Why?’
‘No particular reason.’
‘This is also a coincidence,’ Viktor mused.
And how many coincidences could there possibly be?
Slater remembered his last two adventures — if you could call them that. Yemen, followed swiftly by the carnage in Macau. That wasn’t even taking into account the decade of madness preceding those isolated incidents — they, however, were more notable because of their randomness.
His career had involved being surgically implanted into the toughest war zones on the planet, sent to wreak havoc as a one-man wrecking ball.
But he’d got out of the game.
And still the madness had followed, hanging over him like a cloud.
He remembered his conversations with a fellow operative, the solo freight train named Jason King. His comrade hadn’t been able to escape the carnage either. It attracted both of them like flies to shit — it was about time Slater accepted that. He didn’t know whether he was deliberately seeking out chaos, or whether some subliminal node in his brain was forcing him into the fray without him realising.
But his life had devolved into a seemingly endless list of coincidences, each of which culminated in devastation.
Slater looked back at the dead Federal Security Service officer at his feet and couldn’t help but realise that the confrontation was another spark, another moment of ignition that no doubt would spiral into something uncontrollable.
‘Viktor,’ he said slowly. ‘You might not understand what I mean by this, but I can’t avoid getting involved now. I can’t walk away from this, now that I’ve killed this man. It’s not who I am — it’d be going against my DNA. I’m going to see this through to the end. Now, for God’s sakes, tell me what you’re involved in.’
‘I am going back to Vladivostok to die,’ Viktor said.
7
The words hung in the air, poignant enough for Slater to take a moment to pause and consider their weight. Viktor wasn’t joking — Slater could see the raw fear in his eyes, the acceptance that he would soon meet his maker. That’s why he had been scared out of his mind. He was grappling with the notion that he wouldn’t be on this earth for much longer.
And it seemed inevitable.
Slater understood, finally.
There was no-one accompanying Viktor. He was acting on his own accord, complying with whoever had ordered him to Vladivostok.
Slater imagined there was an understanding in play.
The knowledge that if Viktor didn’t do as instructed he would end up in unimaginable pain.
Or his family would die.
Slater had years of experience with those kinds of situations. It was unfathomable what someone would do to protect their loved ones.
‘What do you need to do in Vladivostok?’ Slater said.
‘Nothing.’
‘Just die?’
‘I will return to my place of employment.’
Slater’s eyes widened. ‘You’re going back? You’re originally from the city?’
‘Yes. I live there.’
‘You’re being awfully uncooperative, Viktor.’
‘There is only so much I can tell you.’
‘Why?’
‘Because you seem like the kind of man to go and crawl around places you are not welcome. And once I am dead … if it comes out that I told you what I am involved in … I can only imagine the consequences.’
‘You have a family?’
‘Yes.’
‘Have they been promised safety if you return?’
‘Yes.’
‘I see.’
‘So, you see, I cannot tell you. Because if you go investigate — which I know you will — and you fail, my wife and children will be tortured and executed.’
‘I never fail.’
‘You will fail,’ Viktor said, with the kind of unbridled certainty that Slater knew didn’t come around often.
The man was absolutely sure.
‘You think those three guys I’m fixated on have something to do with it?’
‘Maybe. Not my business.’
‘You don’t care, do you?’
Viktor sighed. ‘It is hard to care about anything when you know you are going to die.’
‘Why did you run?’
Viktor said nothing.
‘How did they get in touch with you? To tell you to come back.’
Viktor said nothing.
‘Where are your wife and children?’
Viktor said nothing.
Slater grimaced — he sensed that he’d reached the end of the line. Adrenalin and panic had kept Viktor talking but now the man was regaining common sense, clamming up as he realised he’d already said too much.
‘What stops me following you when we arrive in Vladivostok?’ Slater said finally.
‘If you do that, then you are a cruel man,’ Viktor said. ‘You will be sentencing my family to death.’
‘You seem to think failure is inevitable.’
‘You cannot stop what is happening.’
‘You sure about that?’
‘Yes.’
Slater sighed. ‘It’s twelve hours from Khabarovsk to Vladivostok. You really don’t think I could come up with something if you work with me? I want to help you.’
‘Thank you for the offer, but I must decline.’
‘You saw what I just did. I can do it to the men holding your balls in a vice.’
‘No, you cannot.’
‘What if I told you who I really am?’ Slater said. ‘Would you work with me then? You don’t know anything about me.’
‘I do not wish to know anything about you. Please, sir, if you want to help me … leave me be. I have accepted my fate. Do not make it worse for me and my family.’
Slater didn’t respond for what felt like an eternity. He needed time to think, time to process what had unfolded — less than half an hour ago he’d been without a worry in the world, and now he was embroiled in a situation he knew nothing about, fighting to worm an explanation out of a man who wanted nothing to do with him.
Perhaps Viktor was right.
Perhaps it wasn’t his place to decide to get involved.
But he was involved. He sensed the presence of the dead man behind him and felt a stab of guilt, despite the fact that the officer had pulled a gun on him with every intention of using it.
Counter-terrorism.
What the hell are you up to, Viktor?
But the man was horrified around death, which meant this wasn’t his fault. He had no motivation to bring Slater on board — he was resigned to his fate.
Slater made up his mind, and begrudgingly shrugged his shoulders.
‘Fine,’ he said. ‘I’ll respect your wishes. I hope you’re content with your decision.’
‘I am.’
‘Then goodbye, Viktor.’
‘What are you going to do with…?’
‘The dead guy? No point pretending he’s not there.’
‘You kill so … casually.’
‘I didn’t intend to kill him.’
‘You hit him so hard…’
‘That’s how I hit people. Sometimes I can’t restrain myself if there’s a Grach heading for my face.’
‘A what?’
‘It’s a type of—’ Slater said, then stopped in his tracks. ‘You know what — forget it. This isn’t my problem. You said as much yourself.’
‘You never told me what you’re goin
g to do with him.’
‘Leave him in here.’
‘You sure that’s a good idea?’
‘I’ll handle it. Go back to your seat, Viktor. And if your decision changes, you’ve got eleven hours to approach me. I’ll be in the same seat. If you want to talk, don’t be shy. I’m not going to force you into anything.’
‘Thank you,’ Viktor said, ‘but I made my decision long ago.’
‘I can see that.’
Slater stepped aside — it took every ounce of effort to do so. He turned his eyes away from Viktor as the man shuffled past, stepping tentatively over the corpse on his way out. Viktor creaked the door open a crack and checked the coast was clear before slipping out into the corridor. He shut it quietly behind him.
Slater was left alone with a dead Federal Security Service officer, and his thoughts.
You’re letting a man die.
A man who might not deserve it.
He shook the thought off and set to work hiding the body as best he could.
8
The plaster ceiling tiles didn’t budge, no matter how much effort Slater put into shifting them. After retrieving the MP-443 Grach and shoving it into his waistband, he balanced on the cistern for as long as he deemed prudent, then abandoned his efforts and simply stuffed the body into one corner of the room.
There was nowhere to hide it, so he exited the bathroom just a couple of minutes after Viktor and ducked into a neighbouring supply closet, making sure none of the train’s staff caught him in the act. He found a yellow caution sign gathering dust on an otherwise empty metal shelf and peeled the sticky backing off as he crossed back to the bathroom door. He slapped the sticker on the wood and shuffled back to his seat, accepting that it was unlikely to prevent anyone checking but hoping it would suffice to get him through the next eleven hours.
Even if the corpse was discovered, the staff wouldn’t want mass panic to break out. They would keep it contained until they arrived at Vladivostok. If they opted to keep all the passengers on the train until the police arrived, Slater would force his way out.
Until then…
He took up the same position in the empty booth, staring out at the undulating landscape. The terrain varied from craggy rock formations towering over everything in sight to endless fields of snow disappearing into the horizon. Slater let his mind go blank, aware that if he dwelled on what had occurred he would find it hard to resist getting involved.
Because that’s what you do for a living.
You get involved.
The sheer isolation of the region captured his attention for several hours. He sensed Viktor’s presence across the carriage but positioned himself in the window seat, cutting off his view of the rest of the passengers. Apart from the three men opposite. They, however, seemed to pay him no attention at all. He guessed they had their own problems to dwell on. The one in the expensive suit certainly did — every time Slater threw a glance in that direction the guy was still nervously sweating.
Whatever the hell was going down in Vladivostok, he couldn’t imagine a scenario where he wouldn’t stumble across it in due course. It seemed to be a combination of fate and sheer dumb luck, but he couldn’t go for months without running into something horrific.
In Yemen he had thwarted plans to release a weaponised strain of the Marburg virus across the streets of London, and in Macau he had intervened in the kidnapping of a nine-year-old girl embroiled in a dark world he would much rather forget.
Shien.
He wondered where she was now.
Thinking of the dead man in the bathroom, he realised he had made the right call by leaving Shien in the hands of an old friend. He couldn’t stay with her. He couldn’t stay with anyone, or form an attachment to them.
He attracted disaster.
But, on the other hand, he fixed problems, too.
So maybe he was destined to be alone until his body broke down and he became useless to the crusade of vigilante justice he’d been taking part in ever since he left the ranks of the United States government.
Hours passed, but it felt like minutes. Slater had been through so much over the course of his life, and the times where he could sink into the depths of his own mind flew past. His life had been one of pain and suffering and constant discomfort, but in these moments where he could analyse what he’d done he found himself realising that he wouldn’t trade his experiences for anything else. He thought of the havoc he’d prevented, both during his time in the service of the government and outside of it.
That led him down a tough mental path.
He couldn’t sit back and let Viktor die.
The man was terrified, and he wasn’t thinking straight. He didn’t know who Slater was. He had accepted his death, but he didn’t need to. There was hope. He simply couldn’t see it.
Slater had never willingly let a man or woman die when he explicitly wanted the opposite. He had come up short many times — often it was impossible to prevent — but he had always given his all to protect those he determined were in need.
And he wasn’t about to let this be the first time.
So, Viktor’s opinion be damned, Slater would go hunting when they arrived in Vladivostok.
He remembered the last time he’d visited the Russian Far East — it seemed to be all he thought about when his mind settled into tranquility and took on a life of its own. That experience had spiralled into madness — Jason King had called, and Slater had answered. He couldn’t let his comrade down. King had been trapped in a mine skewered into the bowels of the Kamchatka Peninsula, beat to shit and on the verge of death. Slater had been attempting retirement in Antigua, but he hadn’t been content. Upon receiving the call he’d forcibly commandeered a private jet and thrown himself out of the aircraft over the most desolate stretch of Russia, using an emergency parachute to make a hasty landing in the wasteland. From there a relentless barrage of destruction followed in his wake.
That trip had proved what he could do.
With the knowledge that somewhere deep inside him was an unstoppable freight train of potential, he found it impossible to waste away on an island resort. He was worth hundreds of millions of dollars, but none of that mattered.
Pushing himself mattered.
Utilising the talents he’d spent his life compiling mattered.
Helping Viktor mattered.
Then, when he had all but decided to force his way into the fray, regardless of what the parties involved thought of it, he caught movement in his peripheral vision. It happened fast, and for a moment he thought he’d made a grave mistake by not staying on his guard.
He realised that if anyone had chosen that moment to rush his booth and fire a shot through the side of his head, no amount of lightning fast reflexes would save him.
But it wasn’t a hostile.
It was Viktor.
The pale man dropped into the seat opposite Slater, directly facing him across the small table in the centre of the booth. Slater stared, waiting for Viktor to utter the first words. He didn’t want to push him into saying anything he didn’t want to say.
Viktor had to want Slater to help.
‘I work for the Medved Shipbuilding Plant,’ Viktor finally said. ‘Or, at least, I did. I stumbled onto something I should not have seen, and I ran. They ordered me back when they realised what had happened. But if I go willingly to my death, then I’ll be letting things unfold exactly how my employers want them to. And I cannot do that. I need to try and stop it. So I’d like to work with you. I’d like to take your offer. I’ve had time to think.’
‘Medved,’ Slater said. ‘That means—’
‘Bear.’
Slater glanced across the aisle of the carriage and realised both of the muscly henchmen in the cheap suits were staring directly at the pair of them, their gazes fixed on Viktor.
Oh, that’s not good.
9
Viktor started to elaborate, but Slater cut him off with a single look, his eyes dark and b
roiling with intensity. Viktor understood and shut up immediately, the blood already beginning to drain from his face again. He sensed the gravity of what was taking place — he didn’t know exactly what was going on, but he latched onto the sudden tension in the air and froze on the spot.
Slater stared back at the two henchmen — they hadn’t budged.
Medved Shipbuilding Plant.
They’d overheard.
It was all connected. Somehow. Some way.
And these men had lethal intentions in their eyes.
The businessman hadn’t noticed. He was deep in his own head, staring out the window and shifting nervously in place with no knowledge of the silent standoff taking place just a foot to his right.
Slater reached down slowly and slid the MP-443 Grach out of his waistband, bringing it inch by inch into full view of the two guys in the cheap suits. One of them nodded, a wry smile spreading across his face. He lifted up his jacket to reveal a fearsome-looking sidearm resting in a holster attached to his belt. From the brief glance Slater got of the weapon, it looked like a Desert Eagle.
There would be hell to pay if a firefight broke out.
All three of them recognised that. An all-out gunfight would cause untold civilian casualties — there were at least twenty other passengers in the carriage. Slater didn’t think either of the pair cared about that, but then the train would stop in its tracks as pandemonium broke out and they wouldn’t make it to Vladivostok.
They had business to attend to in the port city.
Business that no doubt involved the shipbuilding plant.
An uneasy stalemate settled over the aisle — no-one knew what the correct course of proceedings should be. Anyone unaccustomed to tense situations would have averted their gaze, but Slater kept his eyes locked on the two men, studying their subtle mannerisms, trying to find an opening or a chance to act. At the same time his mind raced, trying to figure out exactly how the pieces of the puzzle fit together, contemplating the connection.
It all led to Vladivostok.
But there were hours of the trip left, and the situation needed to be dealt with. Slater kept staring and noticed the hesitation in both men — they were unsure. They knew Viktor was a threat, but they were puzzled. They didn’t know why.
