The Russian Defector

by Ethan Jones

  Honchar pocketed the thick wad of cash.

  Carrie drew in a deep breath. She hated going into a war zone, perhaps a deathtrap, without a weapon. She would be searched before she was allowed to go through the checkpoint. If she was allowed to go through.

  She shook her head as the Lada kept going toward the checkpoint. A couple of turns, and they’d be facing at least thirty gunmen armed to their teeth. If a single one of them became nervous for whatever reason, it would all be over.

  Carrie drew in a deep breath and tried to calm herself. Although outnumbered and outgunned, Carrie wasn’t alone. She peered through the binoculars at the building on the side controlled by the Ukrainian army. Carrie had called ahead to announce their arrival. Unbeknownst to Honchar and the separatist militias operating the checkpoint, a few snipers were closely following the Lada’s movements. The Ukrainian army troops also had two trucks ready for intervention, if it became necessary.

  Carrie hoped it wouldn’t.

  They had to do their best to avoid a firefight. If gunfire erupted, the militias had the upper hand. Carrie and her team would be surrounded. Even if all the snipers were dead accurate, by the time the trucks reached the checkpoint, the team’s chances of survival would be very close to nil.

  She muttered a short prayer for the operation to run smoothly.

  The driver rounded the last corner and came to a stretch of straight road. A powerful floodlight beam shot down from the army truck. Carrie blinked at the strong light. The driver had started to slow down as four gunmen moved onto the road. They were all dressed in dark green fatigues, and all but one pointed their rifles at the Lada. The gunman at the back, the one whose rifle was aimed skyward, opened up with a couple of short bursts.

  “He’s serious,” Carrie said.

  The driver nodded. “Yes, and nervous.”

  Carrie looked at Honchar. “No mistakes.”

  Honchar nodded. “No mistakes.”

  His look was focused, and his facial muscles were tight.

  Carrie glanced at the asset in the front seat. “Stay calm, and this will be over. A couple of minutes.”

  The asset tried to steady his trembling shoulders.

  The driver rolled down the window and stopped about ten yards away from the nearest gunmen. One of them approached the SUV cautiously, his rifle still trained at the driver’s head. “Who are you, and where are you going?”

  “My name’s Anton Olearchyk, and I report to Commander Honchar.” The driver cocked his head toward the back. “Like you, we’re fighting for our people’s independence…”

  “Honchar?” The guard looked in the backseat and took a step closer to the SUV. “I’ve heard of him and the battles he’s fought…”

  “Well, he’s right there,” the driver said. “He’ll tell you what we’re doing…”

  Honchar stuck his head out the window. “We have to get across the front line right away—”

  “Why?” demanded the gunman.

  “Come here,” Honchar said.

  “Why?”

  “Come here, now. Nothing bad will happen to you. I want you to see something.”

  The gunman, who was in his early twenties, with a fresh face and suspicious eyes, looked in the backseat. He locked eyes with Carrie for a long moment. She gave him a timid look of desperation mixed with hope.

  “Who is she?” the gunman asked.

  “A British reporter. She infiltrated the area a few days ago—”

  “We’ve received no such news—”

  “If you did, then you’d have caught her. But here she is. We’re handing her back.” He gestured with his hand beyond the checkpoint. “People are waiting for her. So we must go.”

  “Not so fast.” The gunman frowned. “How much did they pay you?”

  “That’s none of your business.”

  The gunman brought his rifle closer to Honchar’s face. “It is now, if you’re going through our checkpoint.”

  Honchar studied the man’s face. “Look, I don’t know what your problem is, but there’s an easy way and a hard way to do this. Which one do you prefer?”

  “I prefer the right one,” the gunman said almost solemnly.

  The second gunman had approached the SUV from the other side and was giving Carrie a suspicious look. She offered a small smile, but the gunman’s stoic face remained frozen in a menacing gaze. His rifle was pointed at Carrie’s head.

  Honchar said, “Here’s the right way to handle this situation. I have two thousand dollars in my pocket,” he said in a low voice. “For you and your friend there. Or just for yourself.” Honchar’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Just let us go through.”

  “Where’s the money?”

  “Right here.” Honchar tapped his front pocket. “I’ll get it out now.”

  “Slowly, very slowly.”

  Honchar showed the gunman the folded banknotes and handed them to him. The gunman slid them discreetly inside one of his jacket pockets, underneath his chest rig filled with rifle magazines.

  “So, we’re good now?” Honchar asked.

  “Not quite. The commander needs to authorize your passing.”

  “But we’re good?”

  The gunman shrugged and took a couple of steps back.

  “What’s the commander’s name?”

  The gunman didn’t answer. He turned around and said something to the other gunman, who moved closer to the Lada. The other two gunmen, who had remained about ten yards back up to this point, took a few steps forward and in front of the SUV.

  The gunman who had taken the bribe headed toward the BMW sedan.

  “What’s going on?” Carrie whispered to Honchar.

  “He’ll talk to his boss, the commander,” Honchar replied in a disappointed voice full of frustration. “He took the money, the vermin…”

  “Will we need to pay the boss as well?”

  “We might have to … We’ll see what he says when he comes back…”

  Carrie leaned back and tried to calm herself. Every second they passed on this side of the checkpoint made their escape harder. Freedom was a short distance away, but the obstacles seemed unsurpassable. We can’t fight our way out of this. She sighed. Hopefully, it won’t come to that.

  The tense seconds turned into minutes. The asset kept looking back and forth at the driver and Carrie. She tried to calm him, but the more time that passed, the more her efforts seemed to fail. At about the five-minute mark, the gunman who had taken the bribe appeared from around the BMW. He waited for a moment, and a short-statured man stepped out of the BMW’s backseat. He was stocky and barrel-chested, with broad shoulders, and walked with purpose, but in a cocky way.

  “He must be the boss,” Honchar said.

  Carrie nodded. Honchar was right. The gunman walking in front of the stocky man was more vigilant than the first time around. The other three gunmen stood up straighter and held their rifles tighter.

  As the boss approached the team’s SUV, Carrie pegged him at about fifty years, although the receding hairline, the gray hair, and the wrinkled face caused him to look much older. From the scowl stamped on his face and the way he was carrying his body—slightly hunched, with his arms somewhat raised and his fists tight, like a boxer—Carrie knew he was coming in for a fight.

  She leaned closer to the driver and whispered, “This is going to get ugly. Be ready.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Outside the Swiss Medical Center

  Helsinki, Finland

  “No, I’m not convinced that Sokolov is playing us. But the inconsistency leads me to believe—”

  “What you’re calling ‘inconsistency’ might be simply a memory lapse.” Moretti cut off Justin in a slightly annoyed voice. “Sokolov is under immense pressure. We can expect some details to be inaccurate.”

  “That’s a very important detail, sir.”

  “It may or may not be. He knows full well that SVR wolves will praise you one day and devour you the next… Or he got the da
tes wrong.”

  “Or he’s not telling the truth, the whole truth…”

  “We checked the intel he provided on the double agent. It was rock solid. The evidence against him was superb. Initially, the FBI couldn’t believe it, but once we gave them the name, it all clicked. The agent was arrested red-handed, with hundreds of classified files stored in a USB flash drive in his house.”

  “Would a seasoned FBI agent really keep compromising material in his house?”

  “What can I say, Justin? People do stupid things. Would you think a seasoned FBI agent, decorated three times, would betray his own country?”

  “I’m assuming he confessed?” Justin tried to give his voice a neutral tone, but irony seeped through it.

  “He actually did, because the evidence was staring him in the face.”

  “And also the intern, the case against her was … strong as well?” He wanted to say “rock-solid,” but he knew Moretti would scold him for the unrestrained sarcasm.

  “I know where you’re going with this, Hall, and I don’t like it.” Moretti’s voice had turned loud and harsh. “We have a real case of a defector, and you’re making fun of it…”

  “I … no, sir, I’m just—”

  “Well, whatever it is, it has to stop. Sokolov has proven himself. While I might have had doubts at first, considering the circumstances and the intel, that’s no longer the case.”

  Justin frowned and said nothing.

  Moretti continued, “Analysts are still uncertain about the recording. It could be fake, or it could be the real thing. We might never know. In any case, beef up security around Sokolov. Start the protocol to evacuate him from the embassy ASAP.”

  “I’ll do that, sir. And I’ll be there to take him—”

  “That won’t be necessary. You’ll be given another assignment.”

  “What? But I thought Sokolov’s safety was the greatest priority…”

  “It was, but there has been a new development while you were unavailable…”

  “What is it?”

  “Sokolov demanded to talk to you, but no one could reach you. What happened?”

  Justin hesitated for a moment. “I … My phone didn’t ring.”

  It wasn’t exactly the truth, but it wasn’t a lie either. He had turned off the phone, so, of course, it wouldn’t ring.

  “Well, Sokolov then insisted on talking to someone above your pay grade, and the embassy patched him through to me. He thought that no one was going to take him seriously, and, since he was running out of time, he made an earth-shattering revelation... Something he had reserved for a later time…”

  “And what might that be?”

  “It appears the Russians have ‘misplaced’ an ICBM.”

  “What? That’s impossible.”

  “Those were my exact words. But Sokolov believes otherwise. Are you familiar with the recent explosion at Kozelsk?”

  “I read about it. That’s where the 28th Guards Missile Division is stationed, right?”

  “Right, but there’s more to it. The Russian government has been converting the site and using it as testing grounds. The official version was that the recent explosion was an accident. They were simply testing an experimental liquid propulsion system with isotopes.”

  Justin nodded. He knew the truth was more complicated. There had been unconfirmed reports that the Russians were testing a new cruise missile. It was nuclear propelled, and there had been a considerable spike in radiation in the area. The CIA suspected the missile tested was the prototype called SSC-X-9 Skyfall. The Russian president had given an elated speech about the missile’s capabilities. The missile was going to give Russia the advantage in the arms race with the United States.

  Moretti continued, “In the ensuing chaos and confusion, three ICBMs disappeared. Everyone thought they were being transferred to another location, because of concerns of new explosions, fires, and radiation.”

  “Where did they end up?”

  “Two showed up where they were supposed to, a base about fifty kilometers south. The third one, well, that’s the problem… The Russians deny its disappearance, but Sokolov and others believe it’s still missing.”

  “Who are the others?”

  “The NSA has intercepted communications among Ukrainian separatists and their Russian bosses. They don’t specifically mention the missing missile, but the implication is clear. They discuss how the use of unauthorized force against a Western nation could bring about devastating consequences and turn the tide of war against the separatists.”

  “So the missile is in rebel-controlled areas of Ukraine?”

  “It appears that way.”

  “Where exactly?”

  “We didn’t know the location, until Sokolov mentioned it. The missile, according to his intel on the ground, is stashed near the airfield of Zhdanvatka, southeast of Horlivka.”

  Justin frowned. That was in the heart of the rebel-controlled area. “How accurate is Sokolov’s intel?”

  “We checked with the NSA and the CIA. All indicators show an increased amount of activity around Horlivka. A convoy arrived three days ago, bringing heavy weapons and ammunition.”

  “What type of missile is it?”

  “RS-24 Yars.”

  Justin shook his head. It was perhaps the worst kind of missile to fall into the wrong hands. The RS-24 Yars was a solid-fuel, road-mobile missile. Its range was twelve thousand kilometers, or the entire continent of Europe and North America. The missile could be launched within seven minutes and was equipped with a number of defense systems to evade interception. The weapon could deploy active and passive decoys and was maneuverable during the flight.

  “It’s not nuclear, is it?” Justin asked in a low tone, as if he was afraid of the reply.

  “No, thank God, no. The Russians wouldn’t have let that happen.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure. They allowed their missile to be stolen, or otherwise taken…”

  “Yes, well, they’re who they are. We can’t change them. But we can do something about the missile, so that it doesn’t incite World War III.”

  Justin nodded. “You talked about the separatists perhaps attacking a Western nation?”

  “Yes, those were the intercepts, and that was Sokolov’s understanding. No mention of a particular country. It could be Ukraine, or a neighboring country, hostile to the Russian occupation.”

  “That’s most of Europe.” Justin’s voice had turned somber.

  “True. The Russians are trying to recover the missile, to cover the embarrassment, but even worse, to avoid it from being deployed. Even though it might be in the hands of the rebels, Russia will be blamed for the attack. If it’s a NATO country, the consequences, to quote the Russian colonels, would be ‘devastating.’”

  “Yes, no one will believe Russia had nothing to do with it, especially after ‘losing’ it…”

  “Right. So that’s why your operation has changed. Sokolov will be protected by a new team that’s coming from Poland. Plus, I’ve talked to my counterpart in SUPO and have explained the developments. As long as we share intel, the Finns are willing to provide us all the support we need.”

  “And the imminent Russian attack?”

  “Once they realize the scale of the embassy’s defenses, they’re not going to dare. I’ve talked to the Director-General about the missile crisis, and he’s in contact with his SVR Russian counterpart.”

  “And?”

  “It’s all denials, so far, but the message is clear. We know about the missile, and they’d better retrieve it or neutralize it. But, of course, we can’t rely on the Russians. We’ll go in and confirm the intel is one hundred percent accurate. If, unfortunately, that proves to be the case, your team is to destroy the missile.”

  He nodded with determination. “We certainly will, sir.”

  “I can confirm that Carrie will be a part of this op, that is, when she wraps up her current assignment. She’s in Ukraine, of all places…”

&
nbsp; Justin wasn’t surprised. He had heard from Karolin and the grapevine about their agency responding to an escalating situation in Ukraine. He knew Moretti would deploy the best the agency had: Carrie.

  Moretti said, “There has been a change of plans. Vale and Dolina will not be a part of this operation. Carrie has some local contacts, trusted men who are familiar with the terrain and the situation on the ground. We might also receive support from the Russians.”

  Justin frowned. “Is that necessary, after all that has happened?”

  Moretti didn’t answer right away. “We’re keeping the communication channels open. If they want to offer assistance, genuine assistance, we’ll accept it.”

  Justin’s frown grew deeper. “How can we tell if that’s the case?”

  “We’ll assess it, as we do with all intel and reports. The Russians, if they truly want to cooperate, can make the difference between this mission being possible or impossible.”

  “And why would they help us, if we have one of their high-ranking SVR official, and we’re not handing him over?”

  “I thought about it. The Russians want to find this missile as much as we want. Like I said, to avoid a scandal if it becomes public knowledge that they lost it, or if the rebels decide to use it. I know this happens very rarely, but our interests align.”

  Justin sighed. He disagreed with Moretti’s approach, but his boss had made up his mind. When he reached that point, nothing good came of arguing. “All right, sir,” Justin said in a resigned tone. “I’ll make plans to reach Donetsk ASAP.”

  “Good. The rest of the team will meet you there. Questions?”

  “Not at the moment.”

  “Good luck, Justin. This is a tough one, but you can handle it.”

  “Sure can,” Justin said, but his voice didn’t ring with the firmness he had intended.

  He ended the call and looked at his face in the rearview mirror for a long moment. The leg and back pain had all but disappeared, but he felt light-headed. I just need something to eat, and I’ll be fine. Then, grab my go-bag and head to the airport.

  He put the car into gear and smiled. It will be good to see you again, Carrie. And it will be just like old times…