At the gate of the laser site a GAZ jeep sat, with a heavy machine gun aboard. General Pokryshkin ran from the control building when he heard the explosions, and was stunned to see that only blazing stumps remained of his three guard towers. The commander of the KGB detachment raced down to him on his vehicle.
"We're under attack," the officer said unnecessarily.
"Get your men together--right here." Pokryshkin looked up to see running men. They were dressed in Soviet uniforms, but somehow he knew that they were not Russians. The General climbed into the back of the jeep and brought the machine gun around over the head of the astonished KGB officer. The first time he pressed the trigger nothing happened, and he had to ratchet a round into the chamber. The second time, Pokryshkin had the satisfaction of watching three men fall. The guard force commander needed no further encouragement. He barked rapid orders into his radio. The battle under way degenerated at once into confusion, as it had to--both sides were wearing identical uniforms and using identical weapons. But there were more Afghans than Russians.
Morozov and several of his unmarried friends had stepped outside when they heard the noise. Most of them had military experience, though he did not. It didn't matter--nobody had the first idea what they should do. Five men came running out of the darkness. They were wearing uniforms and carrying rifles.
"Come! All of you come, follow us!" More weapons started firing close by, and two of the KGB troops went down, one dead, one wounded. He fired back, emptying his rifle in one long burst. There was a scream in the darkness, followed by shouts. Morozov ran inside and called for people to make for the door. The engineers needed little prompting.
"Up the hill," the sergeant said. "To the apartment block. Fast as you can!" The four KGB troops waved them along, looking for targets, but seeing only flashes. Bullets were flying everywhere now. Another of the troops went down screaming out his last breath, but the sergeant got the one who killed him. When the last engineer left the room, he and a private grabbed the spare rifles and helped their comrade back up the hill.
It was too big a mission for eighty men, the Archer realized too late. Too much ground to cover, too many buildings, but there were many unbelievers running around, and that was why he'd brought his men here. He watched one of them explode a bus with an RPG-7 antitank round. It burst into flames and slid off the road, rolling down the side of the mountain while those inside screamed. Teams of men with explosives went into the buildings. They found machine tools bathed in oil and set their charges quickly, running out before the explosions could begin the fires. The Archer had realized a minute too late which building was the guard barracks, and now that was ablaze as he led his section in to mop up the men who'd been kept there. He was too late, but didn't know it yet. A stray mortar round had cut the power line that handled all of the site's lighting, and all of his men were robbed of their night vision by the flashes of their own weapons.
"Well done, Sergeant!" Bondarenko told the boy. He'd already ordered the engineers upstairs. "We'll set our perimeter around the building. They may force us back. If so, we'll make our stand on the first floor. The walls are concrete. RPGs can hurt us, but the roof and walls will stop bullets. Pick one man to go inside and find men with military experience. Give them those two rifles. Whenever a man goes down, retrieve his weapon and get it to someone who knows how to use it. I'm going inside for a moment to see if I can get a telephone to work--"
"There's a radiotelephone in the first-floor office," the sergeant said. "All the buildings have them."
"Good! Hold the perimeter, Sergeant. I'll be back to you in two minutes." Bondarenko ran inside. The radiotelephone was hanging on a wall hook, and he was relieved to see it was a military type, powered by its own battery. The Colonel shouldered it and ran back outside.
The attackers--who were they? he wondered--had planned their attack poorly. First they had failed to identify the KGB barracks before launching their assault; second, they hadn't hit the residential area as quickly as they should have. They were moving in now, but they found a line of Border Guards lying in the snow. They were only KGB troops, Bondarenko knew, but they did have basic training, and most of all they knew that there was no place to run. That young sergeant was a good one, he saw. He moved from point to point along the perimeter, not using his weapon but encouraging the men and telling them what to do. The Colonel activated the radio.
"This is Colonel G. I. Bondarenko at Project Bright Star. We are under attack. I repeat, Bright Star is under attack. Any unit on this net respond at once, over."
"Gennady, this is Pokryshkin at the laser site. We're in the control building. What is your situation?"
"I'm at the apartments. I have all the civilians we could find inside. I have forty men, and we're going to try to hold this place. What about help?"
"I'm trying. Gennady, we cannot get you any help from here. Can you hold?"
"Ask me in twenty minutes."
"Protect my people, Colonel. Protect my people!" Pokryshkin shouted into the microphone.
"To the death, Comrade General. Out." Bondarenko kept the radio on his back and hefted his rifle. "Sergeant!"
"Here, Colonel!" The young man appeared. "They're probing now, not really attacking yet--"
"Looking for weaknesses." Bondarenko got back down to his knees. The air seemed alive with gunfire, but it was not yet concentrated. Above and behind the two, windows were shattering. Bullets pounded into the pre-cast concrete sections that formed the building wall, spraying everyone outside with chips. "Position yourself at the corner opposite this one. You'll command the north and east walls. I'll handle these two. Tell your men to fire only when they have targets--"
"Already done, Comrade."
"Good!" Bondarenko punched the young man on the shoulder. "Don't fall back until you have to, but tell me if you do. The people in this building are priceless assets. They must survive. Go!" The Colonel watched the sergeant run off. Perhaps the KGB did train some of its people. He ran to this corner of the building.
He now had twenty--no, he counted eighteen men. Their camouflage clothing made them hard to spot. He ran from man to man, his back bowed by the weight of the radio, spacing them out, telling them to husband their rounds. He was just finishing the line on the west side when there came a chorus of human voices from the darkness.
"Here they come!" a private screamed.
"Hold your fire!" the Colonel bellowed.
The running figures appeared as though by magic. One moment the scene was empty of anything but falling snow--the next, there was a line of men firing Kalashnikov rifles from the hip. He let them get to within fifty meters.
"Fire!" He saw ten of them go down in an instant. The rest wavered and stopped, then fell back, leaving two more bodies behind. There was more firing from the opposite side of the building. Bondarenko wondered if the sergeant had held, but that was not in his hands. Some nearby screams told him that his men had taken casualties, too. On checking the line he found that one had made no noise at all. He was down to fifteen men.
The climb-out was routine enough, Colonel von Eich thought. A few feet behind him, the Russian in the jump seat was giving the electrical panel an occasional look.
"How's the electricity doing?" the pilot asked in some irritation.
"No problem with engine and hydraulic power. Seems to be in the lighting system," the engineer replied, quietly turning off the tail and wingtip anticollision lights.
"Well ..." The cockpit instrument lights were all on, of course, and there was no additional illumination for the flight crew. "We'll fix it when we get to Shannon."
"Colonel." It was the voice of the crew chief in the pilot's headset.
"Go ahead," the engineer said, making sure that the Russian's headset was not on that channel.
"Go ahead, Sarge."
"We have our two . . . our two new passengers, sir, but Mr. Ryan--he got left behind, Colonel."
"Repeat that?" von Eich said.
&n
bsp; "He said to move out, sir. Two guys with guns, sir, they--he said to move out, sir," the crew chief said again.
Von Eich let out a breath. "Okay. How are things back there?"
"I got them in the back row, sir. I don't think anybody noticed, even, what with the engine noise and all."
"Keep it that way."
"Yes, sir. I have Freddie keeping the rest of the passengers forward. The aft can is broke, sir."
"Pity," the pilot observed. "Tell 'em to go forward if they gotta go."
"Right, Colonel."
"Seventy-five minutes," the navigator advised.
Christ, Ryan, the pilot thought. I hope you like it there . . .
"I should kill you here and now!" Golovko said.
They were in the Chairman's car. Ryan found himself facing four very irate KGB officers. The maddest seemed to be the guy in the right-front seat. Gerasimov's bodyguard, Jack thought, the one who worked close in. He looked like the physical type, and Ryan was glad that there was a seatback separating them. He had a more immediate problem. He looked at Golovko and thought it might be a good idea to calm him down.
"Sergey, that would set off an international incident like you would not believe," Jack said calmly. The next conversations he heard were in Russian. He couldn't understand what they were saying, but the emotional content was clear enough. They didn't know what to do. That suited Ryan just fine.
Clark was walking along a street three blocks from the waterfront when he saw them. It was eleven forty-five. They were right on time, thank God. This part of the city had restaurants and, though he scarcely believed it, some discos. They were walking out of one when he spotted them. Two women, dressed as he'd been told to expect, with a male companion. The bodyguard. Only one, also as per orders. It was an agreeable surprise that so far everything had gone according to plan. Clark counted another dozen or so other people on the sidewalk, some in loud groups, some in quiet couples, many of them weaving from too much drink. But it was a Friday night, and that's what people all over the world did on Friday night. He maintained visual contact with the three people who concerned him, and closed in.
The bodyguard was a pro. He stayed on their right, keeping his gun hand free. He was ahead of them, but that didn't keep his head from scanning in all directions. Clark adjusted the scarf on his neck, then reached in his pocket. The pistol was there as he increased his pace to catch up. It wasn't hard. The two women seemed to be in no hurry as they approached the corner. The older one seemed to be looking around at the city. The buildings looked old, but weren't. The Second World War had swept through Talinn in two explosive waves, leaving behind nothing but scorched stones. But whoever made such decisions had opted to rebuild the city much as it had been, and the town had a feel very different from the Russian cities Clark had visited before. It made him think of Germany somehow, though he couldn't imagine why. That was his last frivolous thought of the night. He was now thirty feet behind them, just another man walking home on a cold February night, his face lowered to avoid the wind and a fur hat pulled down over his head. He could hear their voices now, and they were speaking Russian. Time.
"Russkiy," Clark said with a Moscow accent. "You mean not everyone in this city is an arrogant Balt?"
"This is an old and lovely city, Comrade," the older woman answered. "Show some respect."
Here we go ... Clark told himself. He walked forward with the curving steps of a man in his cups.
"Your pardon, lovely lady. Have a good evening," he said as he passed. He moved around the women and bumped into the bodyguard. "Excuse me, Comrade--" The man found that there was a pistol aimed at his face. "Turn left and go into the alley. Hands out where I can see them, Comrade."
The shock on the poor bastard's face was amusing as hell, Clark thought, reminding himself that this was a skilled man with a gun in his pocket. He grabbed the back of the man's collar and kept him out at arm's length, with his gun held in tight.
"Mother . . ." Katryn said in quiet alarm.
"Hush and do as I say. Do as this man says."
"But--"
"Against the wall," Clark told the man. He kept the gun aimed at the center of the bodyguard's head while he switched hands, then he chopped hard on the side of his neck with his right hand. The man fell stunned, and Clark put handcuffs on his wrists. Next he gagged him, tied up his ankles, and dragged him to the darkest spot he could find.
"Ladies, if you will come with me, please?"
"What is this?" Katryn asked.
"I don't know," her mother admitted. "Your father told me to--"
"Miss, your father has decided that he wants to visit America, and he wants you and your mother to join him," Clark said in flawless Russian.
Katryn did not reply. The lighting in the alley was very poor, but he could see her face lose all of the color it had. Her mother looked little better.
"But," the young girl said finally. "But that's treason ... I don't believe it."
"He told me ... he told me to do whatever this man says," Maria said. "Katryn--we must."
"But--"
"Katryn," her mother said. "What will happen to your life if your father defects and you remain behind? What will happen to your friends? What will happen to you? They will use you to get him back, anything they have to do, Katusha ..."
"Time to leave, folks." Clark took both women by the arm.
"But--" Katryn gestured at the bodyguard.
"He'll be fine. We don't kill people. It's bad for business." Clark led them back to the street, turning left toward the harbor.
The Major had divided his men into two groups. The smaller one was setting explosive charges on everything they could find. A light pole or a laser, it didn't matter to them. The large group had cut down most of the KGB troops who'd tried to come here, and was arrayed around the control bunker. It wasn't actually a bunker, but whoever had made the construction plans for the place had evidently thought that the control room should have the same sort of protection as those at the Leninsk Cosmodrome, or maybe he'd thought that the mountain might someday be subjected to a nuclear airburst attack. Most likely was that someone had decided the manual prescribed this sort of structure for this sort of place. What had resulted was a building with reinforced-concrete walls fully a meter thick. His men had killed the KGB commander and taken his vehicle, with the heavy machine gun, and were pouring fire into the vision slits cut in the structure. In fact, no one used them for looking, and their rounds had long since pounded through the thick glass and were chewing into the room's computers and control gear.
Inside, General Pokryshkin had taken command by default. He had thirty or so KGB troops, armed only with light weapons and what little ammunition they'd been carrying when the attack had begun. A lieutenant was handling the defense as best he could, while the General was trying to get help by radio.
"It will take an hour," a regimental commander was saying. "My men are moving out right now!"
"Fast as you can!" Pokryshkin said. "People are dying here." He'd already thought of helicopters, but in this weather they'd accomplish nothing at all. A helicopter assault would not even have been a gamble, just suicide. He set down the radio and picked up his service automatic. He could hear the noise from the outside. All the site's equipment was being blown up. He could live with that now. As great a catastrophe as that was, the people mattered more. Nearly a third of his engineers were in the bunker. They'd been finishing up a lengthy conference when the attack began. Had that not been the case, fewer would be here, but those would have been out working on the equipment. At least here they had a chance.
On the other side of the bunker's concrete walls, the Major was still trying to figure this one out. He'd hardly expected to find this sort of structure. His RPG antitank rounds merely chipped the wall, and aiming them at the narrow slits was difficult in the darkness. His machine-gun rounds could be guided to them with tracers, but that wasn't good enough.
Find the weak points, he told hims
elf. Take your time and think it out. He ordered his men to maintain a steady rate of fire and started moving around the building. Whoever was inside had his weapons equally dispersed, but buildings like this one always had at least one blind spot . . . The Major merely had to find it.
"What is happening?" his radio squawked.
"We have killed perhaps fifty. The rest are in a bunker and we're trying to get them, too. What of your target?"
"The apartment building," the Archer replied. "They're all in there, and--" The radio transmitted the sound of gunfire. "We will have them soon."
"Thirty minutes and we must leave, my friend," the Major said.
"Yes!" The radio went silent.
The Archer was a good man, and a brave one, the Major thought as he examined the bunker's north face, but with just a week's formal training he'd be so much more effective ... just a week to codify the things that he was learning on his own . . . and to pass on the lessons that others had shed blood for . . .
There was the place. There was a blind spot.
The last mortar rounds were targeted on the roof of the apartment block. Bondarenko smiled as he watched. Finally the other side had done something really foolish. The 82-millimeter shells didn't have a chance of breaking through the concrete roof slabs, but if they'd spread them around the building's periphery he'd have lost many of his men. He was down to ten, two of them wounded. The rifles of the fallen were inside the building now, being fired from the second floor. He counted twenty bodies outside his perimeter, and the attackers--they were Afghans, he was sure of that now--were milling about beyond his vision, trying to decide what to do. For the first time Bondarenko felt that they just might survive after all. The General had radioed to say that a motorized regiment was on the way down the road from Nurek, and though he shuddered to think what it would be like driving BTR infantry carriers over snow-covered mountain roads, the loss of a few infantry squads was as nothing compared to the corporate expertise that he was trying to protect now.
the Cardinal Of the Kremlin (1988) Page 58
