Rules of War

by Matthew Betley

  As one of the Spetsnaz commandos filmed, one man held the rebel fighter—in reality, a boy no more than nineteen—by the legs, pinning him to the gravel road, while a second Russian stepped on his head with a boot. As the camera recorded, the major bent over, taunted the Chechen, and proceeded to cut his throat, working his way from the side to the front.

  It was the gurgling screams and dying cries that had slammed home the reality of Grigori’s situation, a reality he had learned in Chechen blood: it was kill or be killed. There was no quarter to be given to the rebels, no peace to be had. There was only death, but not for him and his fellow Spetsnaz soldiers. No. Death was for the enemy, regardless of the form it took.

  Since that day, he’d led his men across several fronts, including Georgia and Crimea, with only one guiding principle—no mercy for the enemy. He was convinced it was why he’d survived every violent confrontation, every bullet that cracked near him, and every barrage of mortar or artillery fire. It was also why he was extremely cautious, especially in hostile territory. In fact, it was why the other seven men in the unit slept in three shifts and rotated patrols throughout the abandoned hotel. Armed with suppressed H&K 4.6x30mm MP7A1 machine pistols with reflex sights, they had more than enough firepower to handle any wayward Venezuelans who wandered past the chain-link fence that had been emplaced days before his unit had arrived. To provide an extra layer of protection, multiple motion-sensor-activated, night-vision HD cameras mounted on the third floor provided a bird’s-eye view in all directions.

  Staring at the city, he decided that in the morning he’d speak to the Venezuelan general to confirm the timeline, and he’d consider placing a call to the Russian embassy. Tired, he decided to grab some sleep, if only for a few hours, as he’d take one of the midnight patrols with two of the other men.

  He walked back toward the center of the room, glanced one last time at the bank of monitors side by side on a table . . . and froze.

  All thoughts of sleep were suddenly swept away, replaced by an urgent alertness as he grabbed the handheld encrypted push-to-talk radio from the table and pressed the talk button.

  * * *

  Logan knelt inside the tree line and waited, scrutinizing the angled glass surface of the building that housed the indoor pool. From the diagrams Santiago had provided, the pool building contained a second-floor walkway that not only overlooked the pool inside but also connected to the guest room tower. The building itself resembled one of the many Quonset huts scattered across the base operations area of the Mountain Warfare Training Center in Bridgeport, California, where he and his Force Reconnaissance Company Marines had conducted Mountain Warfare Survival and High-Angle Shooting training. I just hope I don’t have to capture and kill a rabbit on this trip. Bad guys, check; soft, fluffy bunnies, not so much. They’re not all Monty Python monsters.

  From forty meters away, he scanned the building with a Bushnell night vision monocular that Santiago had provided. The SEBIN inspector had also equipped the four men with suppressed H&K 9mm MP5s with red dot reflex scopes and suppressed Glock 17 9mm pistols, weapons that both Logan and Cole were comfortable with from their Marine Corps days.

  Outer layers now off and packed away in their backpacks, which they staged just inside the tree line in order to lighten the proverbial soldier’s load before they entered battle, the four men were outfitted in black long-sleeve neoprene shirts, the lightest black Kevlar vests Santiago could find, and black tactical chest rigs for extra magazines. The Glocks were held in place on their web belts via gun clips that could accommodate the suppressors. Logan didn’t expect heavy resistance, but if heavy resistance came at them, they were as prepared as possible for it.

  The plan was simple—make entry into the pool building through the exit on the east side wall of glass, work their way to the second-floor walkway, infiltrate the guest tower, and move up floor by floor via the only stairwell on the north side of the tower. All hostiles they encountered were considered enemy combatants. They wanted to take at least one alive, but their safety came before that of the enemy’s, especially an enemy that had aligned itself with the Organization. They’ll either surrender or die, Logan thought, and put the monocular away.

  Logan turned once and looked at each of the men. “Once we’re in, we don’t stop until we hit the roof. I don’t want to give them a chance to destroy whatever’s up there. We move fast—”

  “Please say ‘and furious,’ just once,” Cole quietly interjected.

  Santiago and Hector exchanged a glance, and Logan ignored his friend.

  “And quietly. I’ve got point. Cole, on my right. You two cover three to six and six to nine o’clock. Once we get up top, we’ll see what we see. Just be prepared to call in that air support,” Logan said to Santiago.

  Their retrogade plan was simple. Once they’d secured the site and the intelligence, Santiago would call in the SEBIN Eurocopter AS532 Cougar the director had placed at their disposal. The pilot and copilot had been handpicked by the director for their discretion and aversion to questions. The only thing they needed to know was where to go.

  Santiago nodded, Logan turned around, and the four men moved out of the tree line, two by two, toward stone steps that led up to the outdoor patio and exit door.

  * * *

  “All patrol members to the pool building,” Grigori said in Spanish, another requirement all team members had for this mission. “I say again, all patrol members to the pool building. Four unknown threats with automatic weapons and tactical gear. Engage at once. They’ll be inside within thirty seconds. I’m remaining up here until you have this situation neutralized. Alpha out.”

  Looking around the penthouse suite at the equipment and maps, the last thing Grigori wanted was to risk a compromise of the mission, although he immediately realized that at some level, the operation had already been compromised. Otherwise, these men wouldn’t even be here.

  As the commanding officer, it was his painful duty to wait and to protect the contents of the room. But if need be, he’d engage directly. Any mission, any time, any place. Grigori, an honorable and devoted Russian and a warrior who believed the words of the Spetsnaz motto, thought, That time is now.

  CHAPTER 14

  The four-man fire team led by Logan West reached the exit door and discovered it propped open, the bottom two hinges broken away, leaving the door to vibrate gently as it whistled in the wind. Although no longer functional, it was still secured by a heavy chain and a new padlock, which Logan had spotted through the monocular.

  As the crisp night wind whipped around them, Santiago handed a small pair of powerful bolt cutters to Logan, and within seconds, the chain unraveled and fell to the patio, clanging loudly on the stone.

  No point in hiding now, Logan thought. Ready or not, here we come.

  He stepped into the mountaintop natatorium and was assaulted by the smell of dust, decay, and mildew. Guess those renovations haven’t started yet.

  Logan moved forward, his objective the stairwell at the far end to the left of a small building that contained restrooms and showers. The second-story overlook walkway was directly in front and above them. Stacks of boxes were scattered in random locations underneath, and to their right, the empty pool sloped down and away into the shadows. The pool had been dug so that guests could wade up through the shallow end to enjoy the view down the side of the mountain just past the outdoor patio, directly behind Logan. Clouds passed in front of the half-full moon, and shadows skittered ominously across the enormous empty pool, creating shifting shapes of deep black under the walkway.

  Logan was stepping softly when the first sounds of movement reached him, followed by a distinct click above that he recognized immediately—the selector switch on a weapon being shifted. Oh no, he thought, even as he screamed “Move!” and dashed forward, diving under the walkway as the first bullets struck the large panes of glass behind them, shattering the silence and sending sections of glass cascading to the floor.

  Cole,
Santiago, and Hector reached Logan’s location a split second behind him, and the four men huddled behind the large box.

  “Hold on,” Logan said, aimed upward, and fired several shots into the walkway over his head. He had no idea if he hit the shooter, but it was worth trying.

  Loud high-pitched thwacks of suppressed weapons filled the space as more rounds struck the box they crouched behind for cover.

  Logan glanced around the left side of the stack and spotted small, bright bursts of light from on top of the walkway that extended around and on the roof of the bathhouse fifty feet away. He saw no suppressed flashes on the first floor, which meant only one thing—they’d been ambushed by an enemy that held the high ground. Never a good thing, he thought.

  “This is not good. Either someone told them we were coming, or they have surveillance cameras set up,” Cole said.

  “Fewer than five people in my country even know we’re here,” Santiago said, as Hector risked leaning out to the right and unleashed several rounds from his MP5.

  “Doesn’t matter. Nothing changes,” Logan said sternly. “We just need to go through these guys. There are at least three of them. Hand me a grenade.”

  Hector, who had volunteered to carry two breaching charges and other explosives, pulled a grenade out of a loop on his chest harness and handed Logan a German-made Diehl DM51 fragmentation grenade. Logan pulled the pin but held the spoon in place. “On my signal, shoot the hell out of that walkway.”

  Incoming rounds struck the empty pool, the windows, and the box. Unfortunately for the three Spetsnaz shooters, they hadn’t synchronized their gunfire, and all three weapons simultaneously emptied, leaving the sudden quiet unnerving and eerie.

  Shuffling and scuffling sounds of movement reached them, and Logan heard the first empty magazine clatter to the floor as one of the shooters reloaded. “Now.”

  Santiago, Cole, and Hector unleashed a sustained volley of fire that shattered the glass railing and struck the glass wall at the other end of the pool house.

  The enemy weapons went quiet as their operators went into the prone position on the rooftop of the bathhouse, suppressed by the crack of bullets over their heads.

  Logan stood up to his full height, cocked his right arm back, released the spoon on the grenade, and hurled the weapon like a baseball. It soared over the empty pool and disappeared into the darkness. Please be close.

  All four men ducked back behind cover just as the grenade detonated with a blinding flash, briefly illuminating the natatorium in a garish light, followed by a thunderous BOOM that shattered whatever glass hadn’t been destroyed by the gunfire. Sixty-five-hundred steel balls encased in the fragmentary shell of the grenade tore through the space, as well as the three shooters on top of the walkway.

  Two of the men were killed instantly, but the third rose to his feet, stunned, and staggered toward his fate.

  Logan and Cole were already moving, MP5s raised and locked on the area on top of the bathhouse. As the figure materialized out of the darkness, Logan and Cole opened fire.

  Several rounds struck the shooter in the chest, and he toppled over the railing, diving headfirst into the empty deep end of the pool, performing an involuntary forward somersault. There was a sickening sound as his head, neck, and shoulders slammed into the concrete of the deep end.

  No one spoke, and the four men combat-walked forward toward the base of the open-air staircase to the left side of the bathhouse, weapons steady and elevated in front of them.

  * * *

  Who are these men? Grigori thought. It was a question of professional curiosity, as he knew the answer was irrelevant. What was relevant was the fact that they’d just killed four of his soldiers, men he’d fought with on other continents, men he considered brothers. His men had even had the tactical advantage, yet one grenade and excellent marksmanship had neutralized that advantage. How quickly tides of war turn, he thought with a rising anger that yearned for justice for his dead comrades.

  The last thing he’d seen from the mounted camera inside the pool house was one of his Spetsnaz plummet over the ruined railing to his death. The four intruders had disappeared under the walkway, but he knew which way they’d be coming.

  “Sir, what do you want us to do?” asked Major Oleg Poroshenko. A second Spetsnaz soldier stood behind him, waiting for orders. When Grigori had issued his first commands, the two men had dashed into the room from the suite next door that they were using for billeting.

  Grigori pulled himself away from the camera, grabbed his MP7A1 machine pistol, and clipped the push-to-talk radio to his web belt. “Oleg, you’re with me. We try to delay them,” he said in Russian, having reverted to his native tongue. “Fedor, I need you to execute the emergency destruction plan. Burn all the maps and then destroy all the computers and communications equipment. If you have time—and I mean if—head up to the roof and destroy the antennas. I don’t want to leave that encrypted gear up there intact. Once that’s done, get off this tower via the escape route and meet us at the station. This place is burned. Understood?”

  “Yes, sir,” Fedor Azarov replied. “Be safe, sir. Kill these motherless cowards for Mother Russia.”

  Grigori felt a wave of pride. Professional to the end. “For Mother Russia, Fedor. I hope to see you soon, but if not, it’s been my honor.”

  “Likewise, sir,” Fedor said, nodded to his commanding officer and then Oleg, and turned away to begin the destruction of every trace of their presence.

  “Let’s go avenge our fallen brothers,” Grigori said to Oleg.

  “With no mercy,” Oleg replied, and the two Russian operators fled the suite into the hallway.

  * * *

  Logan led his fire team up the stairs, the acrid smell of gunpowder following them like an invisible cloak. The soft thud of their boots on the concrete stairs echoed off the circular-vaulted ceiling, the only sound lingering in the aftermath of the brief battle.

  Halfway up, the staircase turned ninety degrees to the left, and they ascended, reaching the second floor in a section of the pool house set back from the larger overlook. Logan realized they’d emerged onto the connecting walkway between the pool house and the guest tower. Directly across from him, the glass walls and ceiling of the skywalk emptied into the pool house ten feet to his left. Logan could see through the glass wall to the curved glass exterior of the natatorium, but the darkness prevented him from seeing inside. “Cole, you and Santiago check on the fourth shooter. We don’t need any surprises on the way out of here.”

  Santiago had come up behind Cole and turned left, which placed him closer to the pool house. He was a foot away from the corner, MP5 raised, when Logan thought he saw movement. Just another shadow?

  “Hold on a second. I thought—” was all Logan managed to say as Santiago stepped out from behind the walkway’s glass wall back into the natatorium.

  Two bullets struck him squarely in the chest, and he crumpled to the floor with a grunt, falling sideways.

  Logan and Cole fired simultaneously, with Hector following suit a half second later. Bullets shattered two large sections of the enclosed walkway, and additional rounds destroyed the remaining glass exterior of the pool house that faced the guest tower, providing a clear line of sight into the dark space. A shadowy figure stood on the walkway, dark arms extended toward Santiago.

  Logan, Cole, and Hector continued to fire as glass plummeted onto the walkway, the ground floor, and the cement outside with a cacophonous tinkling sound like the world’s largest wind chimes. The fusillade of fire struck the shadow, which jittered back and forth as if deciding to go one way and then reversing course, before choosing one last time and falling forward face-first, motionless.

  Hector reached Santiago first and rolled him onto his back. Logan dreaded what they might see, and the image of Camila’s beautiful young face, looking lovingly up at her father, suddenly filled his mind. Please, God, let him be okay.

  Santiago rubbed his chest, a tremendous relief to th
e other three. “Well, I guess these things really do work,” he said a little too calmly for someone who’d come inches from death seconds before.

  “They do, but you’re still lucky he aimed center-mass,” Logan said. “I thought I saw movement in the shadows through the glass, but you’d already stepped out. I was about to call out. I should’ve yelled sooner.”

  Hector helped Santiago to his feet. “Not your fault. Just the nature of this business. I got lucky, this time,” Santiago said.

  “Hey,” Cole said, “I’m pretty sure that we’ve all been lucky once or twice. Sometimes, that’s all that counts.”

  “Amen to that,” Logan said. He’d heard enough stories about close calls and had experienced enough randomness in Iraq to believe in the power of luck. “Now, let’s get upstairs.”

  The four men turned to leave the natatorium, when a flickering light from above caught Logan’s attention. He looked up through tinted glass and saw the guest tower looming fourteen floors over him, a cylindrical black mass silhouetted against the sky. On the top floor, a yellow light flickered in and out of the empty windows, increasing and dimming in intensity. Fire.

  “Goddamnit,” Logan said, and transitioned into a sprint through the connecting walkway. “They’re burning everything up there to cover their tracks.” No way we let them escape, whoever the hell they are.

  The team dashed up a darkened stairway at the end of the connecting walkway. Intermittent periods of moonlight pierced the windows as the men climbed frantically. Logan reached the top of the stairs first, his right eye searching through the red dot scope, his left looking past it, realizing they’d entered the lobby, a massive space that was shaped like a quadrangle that hadn’t decided what it really wanted to be.