Читать книгу Citadel Of Fear - Don Pendleton - Страница 10

The Annex

Akira Tokaido sang to himself. “Money, money, money, muh-nee… Money!”

Kurtzman and Wethers exchanged weary looks of mutual sympathy.

“Boy couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket…” Kurtzman muttered.

Wethers glanced over at the young Japanese-American hacker. One of these days someone was just going to have to tell him that ponytails for computer geeks had gone out of fashion. “And he has exactly as much rhythm as one would expect…”

However, Kurtzman admitted to himself, Tokaido’s instincts were correct. When you lacked a face, a fingerprint or a smoking gun—though Phoenix had rather boldly latched onto a pair of smoking automatic cannons—you followed the money trail.

The brothers Gazinskiy had told a fascinating tale and almost none of it made any sense. It would have been clear to a child that the Gazinskiy boys were tools and nothing more. No one would miss them.

Nikita Propenko was a power tool—a tool of a higher order—but even if he died badly and in public, little more would happen than a few dangerous men in Moscow drinking a shot of vodka in his name, shaking their heads and muttering “He never should have gone into Poland.”

Propenko had been offered a big fee, big enough to tempt him from his lucrative private work in Russia and its former republics. They had hired a small army of hammerheads but they had also hired a very dangerous and disciplined man to run them. The cannons had been his idea and he had enough pull to buy artillery on the black market. Anyone other than Phoenix Force would have been wiped out, captured or extracted, taking heavy casualties every step of the way. Propenko had demanded cold, hard Euros.

The Gazinskiy brothers, besides being low-rent muscle and peddlers of extremely low-rent flesh, were also low-rent cyber criminals. They had a fairly lucrative sideline running online scams in former stan-suffixed Russian republics where entire rural areas were just starting to explore the internet and connectivity.

The Gazinskiys had accepted bitcoins as payment.

The Central Bank of the Russian Federation had issued a statement stating that it considered the exchange of bitcoins for goods, services or currencies a “dubious activity.” This was a veiled threat, but both an admonition and an admission that the Russian Federation currently had almost no ability to regulate it or control bitcoin transactions.

Bitcoins were the first, real, online alternate currency and, despite many national governments trying to crack down on their use, they were still the choice of cyber geeks who wanted their transactions off the grid, as well as cyber criminals that wanted the same.

The Gazinskiy brothers had used their massive infusion of bitcoins to buy and sell drugs in Kaliningrad without the Russian mafiya “made men” above them knowing about it. Bitcoins were the currency of the cyber savvy; the technology behind them and the people running it continuing to evolve faster than governments and traditional financial institutions could adapt. The jury was out as to whether they were an abomination, the way of the future or little more than a temporary blip on the world economic radar. What they offered was anonymity and transactions at the rate of high-speed cable that left regulators scrambling.

Akira Tokaido was the kind of man who left entire intelligence agencies, state security services and militaries scrambling in his wake. This was just his game. His current problem was that he was not cracking government agencies, terrorist cells or databases; he was fighting people exactly like himself.

He was relishing the challenge.

“Money, money, money, muh-nee…” Tokaido howled tonelessly. “Money!”

“Akira?” Kurtzman asked.

“No, these guys are good, really good.” Tokaido stared at the lines of code scrolling down his massive main screen. His cursor moved across the streams like the planchette of an Ouija board. “This is going to take a while.”

“No, Akira, I mean—”

“Could you shut up?” Wethers finished.

Tokaido gave Wethers a vaguely hurt look and shoved in his ear buds. He went back to examining data and began nodding his head. Without thinking his lips started moving. “Money, money…”

Kurtzman stared at Wethers helplessly. “Phoenix still at Luffy-Land?”

Wethers cracked his first smile of the day, and it had been a long day. “Word is they’re getting us T-shirts.”

“Didn’t know it was a franchise.”

Wethers considered the file they had compiled on their subjects. “Mrs. Gazinskiy raised herself some ambitious boys, if not bright ones.”

“Phoenix has put the Gazinskiys to work. They’ve put out the word that Propenko is alive, very pissed off and wants either payback or to get paid.” Kurtzman grinned. “Now we wait to see who comes knocking and whether they’re carrying checkbooks or more automatic cannons.”

“They’ve worked with less,” Wethers pointed out.

Kurtzman was very well aware of that, but Kaliningrad was a bad neck of the woods to get caught in.

The exclave was very nearly a militarized city-state and while Phoenix could run roughshod over the local criminals, if police and military got involved they would be met with an overwhelming force that would take a very dim view of them if they were captured. Calvin James would stick out like a sore thumb. They had snuck him in under cover of night, but if he stepped out in daylight it would be like a unicorn sighting. The Kaliningrad oblast was one very white wood.

Wethers knew exactly what the Stony Man cybernetics chief was thinking. He was thinking it, too. He was also trying to think positively.

“Plus, the bad guys absolutely got shut down in Sweden. Propenko is claiming to have killed some people and escaped. He is the only solid lead they have to work with at the moment. Whoever hired him will be very interested in debriefing him.”

“Which may include torturing the living hell out of him and his new friends.”

“There is that, but Propenko has a very heavy reputation. I think there is a decent chance they might even rehire him, and his new friends.”

* * *

Kaliningrad, Luffy-Land

CALVIN JAMES REPORTED from the roof. “We’ve got company. A limousine and she’s riding low. I’m saying she’s armored. Two SUVs riding escort on the limo’s twelve and six.”

“Copy that,” McCarter replied. “It’s showtime.”

While Phoenix had waited, they had checked on the apartment Propenko had been renting. Nothing was missing, but the Russian reported that someone with a fair degree of skill had searched the place. Propenko had filled a bag with clothes and guns and gear.

Kaliningrad wasn’t exactly the fashion capital of Paris or Milan, but he’d bought the most expensive off-the-rack suits available for Phoenix Force. McCarter, Manning and Propenko looked decently dapper and decidedly dangerous. McCarter had decided to stay with the three-man team he had presented to the Grazinskiys and to keep James and Encizo as unseen aces in the hole.

The limo pulled to a halt outside. Two men each jumped out of the backs of the SUVs and one man raced to open the limo’s door. A man about six feet tall and nearly five feet wide emerged.

Propenko grunted as he peered through one of the boarded-up windows.

“Someone of note?” McCarter asked as he peered through his opening.

“Gospodin Gaz,” the Russian affirmed. “Minor mafiya royalty.”

McCarter had operated with and against Russians many times and this was far from his first time operating on Russian Federation soil. He knew a fairly extensive range of Russian words and phrases. Gospodin Gaz roughly translated into “Mr. Gas.”

McCarter considered the brutal, Mack-truck-built man emerging from the limo. “Glorified bagman,” he mused.

“Correct. Gaza has moved far up food chain from simple collections.”

McCarter was fairly certain he didn’t want to know but asked, anyway. “Why do they call him Mr. Gas?”

“Back in day, when collection proved difficult? They send Gaz. He comes with a can of gasoline. Perhaps for place of business. Perhaps for house. Perhaps for you.”

“Nice,” Manning commented.

“He did five-year stint in Siberian maximum hard-labor colony. He ran it for four and a half.”

McCarter eyed Propenko. “You two have run into each other before?”

“We are acquainted.” The Russian blew cigarette smoke and shrugged. “Gaz also known for loyalty and dealing square. Sometimes he is called in as third party during difficult negotiations.”

McCarter watched the Russian mobster, flanked by his five men, lumber up the steps. None of the guards wore tracksuits or gold chains. They dressed well and smelled more ex-military than musclemen or hammerheads. Save one, who was smaller, wiry like a terrier and seemed as agitated as one.

“So this could be a positive development.”

Propenko lit himself a CCCP. “Perhaps.”

The doorbell rang.

McCarter glanced at the brothers Gazinskiy. They sat forlornly on a couch. The ladies of the establishment had been sent home and the hammerheads had been carted off to a non-licensed infirmary that dealt with these kinds of situations. Ilya wore a neck collar and the shattered remnants of Artyom’s septum were held together by medical tape. McCarter nodded at Artyom.

The nasally impaired gangster got up and went to the door. McCarter and Propenko went to the bar. Manning stayed off to one side and smiled at Artyom.

“Not one word,” Manning warned.

Artyom flinched and answered the door. Gaz’s men flowed into Luffy-Land, forming a skirmish line. Gaz ignored the Gazinskiys and walked up to the bar. Propenko slid the pack of cigarettes down the zinc bar. “Let us speak English.”

Up close, Gaz was a very ugly man. Someone had flattened his nose the way Manning had flattened Artyom’s, but he had never had it fixed. His thick-fingered hands were red and scarred. The mobster’s ugly face was blotched from years of heavy drinking. His thick, gray hair was Soviet-era cosmonaut. He smiled to reveal yellowed, crooked teeth and shrugged as if the matter was of no importance. “Sure, Nika. If it pleases you.” He lit a cigarette. “You look good.”

“You look as I remember you.”

“I will take this as compliment. Piles are killing me.”

“Too much easy living?” McCarter asked.

The Russian eyed McCarter.

McCarter noted that the Russian seemed utterly unperturbed and didn’t ask Propenko about his new friend.

Gaz grinned but his eyes were cold. “I had plenty hard labor in Siberia. Enough for lifetime.” Gaz deigned to glance at the Gazinskiy brothers sitting obediently on the couch. The mobster waved his cigarette to encompass Luffy-Land. “Speaking of soft life, you boys going into business? I tell you, Gazinskiys not made-men. Never will be, but they are paid up. Not sure Luffy-Land is worth headache for you.”

McCarter glanced around Luffy-Land’s dubious charms. The wiry guy was mad-dogging him but McCarter ignored him. “No, but it got us a meeting with you, Gospodin.”

Gaz made a noise. McCarter had just called him “sir.”

“Call me Gaz. my friends do.”

“Offer you a beer, Gaz?”

“Always!” Gaz raised a scarred eyebrow. “Unless there is something stronger?”

McCarter went behind the bar and poured three shots of Absolut. His was barely a splash. The three men downed them amiably.

Gaz smacked his lips. “So, Nika, word is you are unhappy.”

“None of us are happy,” McCarter remarked.

The young, skinny, agitated Russian took a step out of the skirmish line. “Who is this guy? Who cares if he is unhappy? He owes us money! He owes us blood!”

McCarter gave Gaz a patient look. Gaz sighed and spoke too low for the skinny man to hear. “That is the Pan Dory.”

McCarter nodded sympathetically. Pan was an ancient Slavic honorific for “royalty.” Dory was the diminutive for the Russian given name Dorofei. Russian honorifics and given name diminutives were never mixed, except with great affection or even greater condescension. Gaz had just sneered and called the man “The Little Lord.”

McCarter began to see the situation very clearly. “He is supposed to be learning from you?”

“Supposed to be. Father ranks rather high in certain circles in Kaliningrad.”

“And Luffy-Land is part of the little kingdom his father has given him,” McCarter concluded.

“Yes. I am afraid Gazinskiy brothers earn for Dory. You have taken Luffy-Land. As I say, we have slight problem.”

“Slight problem?” Dory stalked forward. “We have big problem! Who are these pricks?”

Manning stepped forward and intercepted him.

“And who is this smiling…” Dory trailed off.

McCarter was smiling at Dory. It was the special smile he reserved for intimidating unpleasant people. The smile that convinced very bad people that he was considering killing them and the deciding factor would be the next thing that came out of their mouth.

Dory met Manning’s gaze, blinked first and closed his mouth.

Gaz started dropping knowledge. He nodded at Propenko. “You know this man, and his reputation, Dory?”

“That is Nika—”

“Yes. Well, Nika Propenko is now mercenary and now doing jobs outside Russian Federation. Things went bad in Poland, and I am thinking he call upon his new Western friends.” Gaz put his hands on his chest and made an attempt at looking personally hurt by this development. “Instead of calling on old friends and homeboys.”

Propenko dragged deeply on his cigarette. “Hard to know who to trust.”

Dory regained a tiny amount of outrage. “Propenko brings foreign mercenaries into a place I control?” He shot a nervous, angry look at Manning. “And this smiling asshole is—”

Manning spoke the German he had been raised with. “Your worst nightmare.”

Gaz’s head snapped around. “German?”

Manning smiled menacingly. “Jah.”

McCarter watched wheels turn in Gaz’s mind.

The Berlin Wall had officially fallen in 1989. Before it had, East Germany had been an Orwellian nightmare. Their secret police and border guards had made the same services of their Soviet overlords look like mild-mannered milquetoasts, and in the Eastern bloc, East German organized crime was the worst of the worst and feared out of all relation to their numbers and actual influence. In Russia, even to this day, German was the language of the enemy. In Russian criminal circles, a smiling man speaking German was the Slavic version of the white devil.

Propenko had been doing work for criminals and parties unknown of late, and the fact that he had escaped from Poland, come back and kicked ass in Kaliningrad was causing shock waves. That he appeared to have a Nazi devil on a leash only added to the wampum he was walking with.

“Nika, my friend,” Gaz asked, “what is it you and your friends want?”

“Money,” McCarter suggested.

“Payback,” Propenko snarled.

Manning dropped the dead smile and shrugged. “A job?”

Gaz shoved out his shot glass and McCarter poured. The Russian leaned in and spoke low. “Listen, despite certain discrepancy and—” he looked back at Dory “—disrespect,

we can make this work out.” Gaz looked at McCarter warily and turned back to Propenko. “Forgive me, Nika. But you act like this man is your superior.”

Propenko simultaneously lied through his teeth and told the stone-cold truth at the same time. “The last time I took job from man in West?” He lifted his chin at McCarter. “I worked for him. He got me out of jam.”

Gaz chain-lit another cigarette. “I believe you. Your reputation is known. You say you want payback?”

“I was shot, captured and interrogated. Torture was amateurish, lightweight, Western. But as fighters these men were unbeatable.”

“You say you escaped?”

“I got myself out of that situation and made it across border. It beat being handcuffed to truck and waiting for Polish police.”

“I am a middleman, Nika, but I have been informed that certain parties would like to know much more about what happened in Poland. It was suggested that perhaps I scoop you up and bring you to them, or perhaps even show up with can of gasoline. I suggested I talk to you first.”

“Thank you.”

Gaz glanced at McCarter and Manning. “I am thinking I made correct choice. Tell me, Nika. These men who captured you and interrogated you… You think you can find them again? It will be worth great deal of money.”

“Perhaps. But if I can’t?” It was Propenko’s turn to glance at McCarter and Manning. “These men can.”

* * *

War Room, Stony Man Farm

“SO WE’RE BAIT,” Carl Lyons concluded.

It was a simple plan, but from where Lyons sat it sucked. Able Team was to go to Europe, to essentially pose as Phoenix Force to fool the enemy, while the real Phoenix Force led the enemy straight to Able Team.

“That’s about it,” Price confirmed. “I discussed it with Hal, and he agrees we’re boxed in.” Price was referring to Hal Brognola, Director of the Special Operations Group. Brognola was fully engaged running interference in Washington, DC, but was in constant touch with his mission controller. “Risky, yes, but it’s our best bet. And he’s got the President’s go-ahead.”

Rosario Blancanales shrugged and looked at Schwarz. “Wouldn’t be the first time we’re the cheese in the mousetrap.”

All three members of Able Team were seated at the War Room conference table with Price and Kurtzman.

Price outlined the plan. “When the bad guys went after Phoenix the first time, they had eyes in the sky. We think they will again, and we think they are going to make one hell of an attempt at capturing you. Whoever is behind all this is extremely well-funded, has access to the absolute latest technology and seems to be up to something. The good news is we are as much a mystery to them as they are to us. And, after Gdansk and Karmal, the first two rounds go to the Farm. Whoever these people are, they must be in pretty desperate need to find out who we are and fast. The flip side of that is we have to expect the next fight to get real nasty.”

Schwarz considered the technology he had been examining for the past twenty-four hours. “This sure stinks like a trap.”

“A trap within a trap within a trap,” Kurtzman agreed. “It’s very Russian. The advantage we have is that it is a trap on both sides, and Phoenix Force will be sort of a reverse Trojan horse on the inside. I think the most likely scenario is that Phoenix and whomever the bad guys send along with them will be cannon fodder and a diversion. You need to expect to get hit by a second force, and expect them to come in with overwhelming force. Given the tech they put in their UAVs, we have to expect they have access to satellite imaging and absolutely top-notch ground surveillance. So will we. It will be a question of who catches who watching who first.”

Blancanales thought it was the worst plan in the world except that no one was coming up with anything better. He turned to his mission controller. “What is Phoenix’s disposition going to be?”

Price started laying out details. “David is sticking with a three-man team of him, Manning and Propenko going in. The good news for you is that Cal and Hawk will be seconded to Able Team.”

Schwarz pumped his fist. “Yes!”

“Jack will involve Dragonslayer and he will be armed. The bad guys must think we are some sort of clandestine operation—they probably won’t be expecting a gunship. Of course, given what happened in Karmal, we have to expect they may have air power, as well.”

Blancanales perked up hopefully.

“Does that mean we get Rafe, as well?” Lyons asked.

“You do. We have reason to suspect the Russian force they give Propenko will be considered expendable. When it hits the fan, we think there is a good chance they will follow Propenko wherever he leads. So you and Phoenix may end up with a small army of your own. And, yes, Encizo will be on your team.”

Lyons brought up the question of the day. “There was already a mysterious battle on the Polish-Kaliningrad border. Don’t you think the Polish police and border patrol are pretty stirred up as it is?”

“If it comes down to a pitched battle, you will have to expect Polish security forces to come in fast and hard,” Price admitted.

Blancanales spoke for himself and the team. “This sucks.”

“This is our best shot to get something real on the bad guys—on the ground, eyes in the sky or in cyber space. The good news is we are positioning you absolutely primo gear. The bad news?” Barbara Price stared fondly at her boys. “You need to be in Poland in twelve hours.”