One Killer Force: A Delta Force Novel (17 page)

“Sir, if the trigger is a call from Alfa, he won’t be heading toward us,” John said. “Probably looking to make Volgograd.”

“I agree,” Kolt said. “We’re irrelevant this far away.”

“Racer, it’s daylight, man. Marzban knows he is being hunted. He won’t risk a move until nightfall,” Slapshot said, reaching for the overhead photo of the hospital Kolt was holding.

Kolt watched Slapshot look it over, stoked that he was at least engaging. He knew Slapshot’s opinion was better than most. Sure, Kolt knew, it was simple gut instinct and operator intuition, nothing that could be proven, but Slapshot was rarely wrong.

“We need a squadron-plus for this,” Slapshot said, passing the photo back to Kolt. “Even with the SEALs, it will take hours to clear that thing.”

“Okay, we all need to get out of these filthy uniforms and clean the blood off before we get sick,” Kolt said. “Let’s huddle up with the boys for a minute and I’ll issue some planning guidance.”

Digger and Slapshot turned to head through the same door that Trip had used, entering the large open area.

Kolt handed the photo and message back to John and looked at Olga. “You need to clean up, too.”

Before Olga could answer, Kolt heard Slapshot barking from the other room. “Noble! Get everyone in here.”

Kolt led John and Olga through the door and into the middle of a crowded room. It was tight, all of his operators upright on the concrete floor, a few standing on some crates in the two opposite corners. Kit bags lay about in small groupings, each team having found a place of their own.

Kolt looked around, measuring each man’s mettle, wondering if he could pick out the guys that weren’t fans. He knew many of them, but definitely not all. To an outside observer, they would look like just one more group of militia and Ukrainian troops, but looks could be deceiving. While many of his men carried AK-47s and the smaller-caliber AK-74s, others had stuck to their own weapons, the tried-and-true HK416, based on the older AR-15 rifle.

“Slapshot and I don’t give a shit what you have done in the past,” Kolt said, scanning the room for raised eyebrows or unbelieving smirks, and setting the standard early that he considered the new squadron sergeant major, Slapshot, his peer in everything.

“We all have demons. We all have to answer to a higher authority one day,” Kolt said, pausing for effect. “Right now, tonight, we will turn another target, without Max, Philly, and Carson. If you are in here you have a clean slate as far as we are concerned.”

Kolt looked at Slapshot. “Slap?”

“Roger, a new day.”

“Men, it’s behind us. Make sure it’s behind you,” Kolt said, knowing he didn’t need to dwell on it anymore. He knew the boys would understand the implication. They’d understand that their new squadron commander was treating them like adults, being careful not to sound too threatening or condescending.

Kolt turned around to see if anyone behind him had anything to say. He spotted Navy SEAL Tim Kleinsmith, and immediately rewound his every word, concerned he’d screwed up and shared Unit business with their sister Tier One unit.

“Good to have you guys here, Dealer,” Kolt said, approaching the SEAL and shaking his hand. “How many do you have?”

“A dozen plus me,” Dealer said. “Nice duds.”

Kolt offered a quick smile and turned back around. They all looked tired, some still in the Ukrainian uniforms, some having stripped down to tees, others now topless. He was pleased to see he still held everyone’s attention. Either they were all standing around with breacher brain, not caring what the new squadron commander had to say, or they were willing to give him some rope.

“We’re turning the hospital in Donetsk after dark. Let’s stay with the Ukrainian uniforms you have on. We have a few hours to knock out a solid assault plan. Get some re—”

From behind, a booming voice interrupted Kolt. It was John, the intel analyst, with Olga in tow again.

“Sir, Marzban is moving!” John said. “Can I talk to you offline?”

“Just put it out, John,” Kolt said, turning to the squadron. “Listen up!”

John didn’t waste any time. “Alfa is monitoring the local police radio frequency. Marzban, both big brains, and his squeeze are leaving the hospital.”

Kolt turned around. “We have good intel that they are at the hospital in Donetsk. You guys must have hit him on the assault.”

“The intel vetted?” a voice from the crowd asked.

Kolt turned to Olga, then back to his men. “This is Olga. She’s with Alfa. She got us here. Her mates are monitoring Marzban’s comms.”

“We must go,” Olga said, loud enough for the entire room to hear her.

“It’s frickin’ daylight, lady,” Trip said, deep in the crowd.

Kolt knew it was time. If they hesitated now, Marzban would soon be free and clear into Russia. They had no hot pursuit authority to venture into Russian territory and really no external assets or combat multipliers to speak of. They’d have to be vigilant not to get overextended, knowing the Russians had been massing troops on their side of the border for weeks now, but they had to act.

“All right, disregard my last. We don’t have time to debate this. We are going,” Kolt said. “Get it on and load up.”

“That’s crazy, boss,” Trip said. “This isn’t Syria. There’s pro-Russian separatists all over the area.”

“They know what we’re driving,” another voice said. “We’re sitting ducks in the daytime.”

Kolt knew they were right. It was suicide, at least going with the same assault plan they’d used early that morning. They had the cover of darkness on their side then, and launching now, without the advantage of their night vision goggles, leveled the playing field. But, Kolt thought back to the days when they hunted Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and al Qaeda in Iraq, to the several hundred missions they conducted in the heat of the day. Saying the sunlight was a disadvantage was fine; saying they couldn’t figure it out to increase their odds was blasphemy. Kolt turned to John.

“We have the cell phone sniffer?”

“No, sir,” John said, slipping his hands in his jeans pockets, obviously embarrassed.

Without the ability to locate and track Marzban’s cell phone, and geolocate it down to ten meters inside the hospital, they had no ability to focus an assault plan on even a specific wing of the hospital, much less the exact floor or room.

“Boss,” Slapshot said, “we have the Russian truck. These three uniforms, too.”

Kolt looked at Slapshot, barely able to contain his excitement that the squadron sergeant major was providing options. Using a different vehicle, one the Ukrainian separatists wouldn’t spike on as it approached, made perfect sense. It would likely get them close to the hospital without any drama. Once they were on the ground, the Spetsnaz uniforms, soiled and bloodstained or not, would provide enough cover for action to enter the hospital, possibly get to Marzban.

“Dealer, I need you guys to take one of the hospital wings. We’ll take the other two,” Kolt said.

“Yes, sir,” Dealer said, not offering any open resistance to what Kolt knew most thought was a wacky plan.

Kolt addressed his men. “Plan B is Digger, Slap, and I will stay in these uniforms. These are Spetsnaz. This orange-and-black ribbon is their recognized friend or foe unit symbol. We’ll enter the hospital with Olga. She can run verbal interference for us, help us figure out where Marzban’s room is. Once we know, we’ll direct everyone else to the crisis point and free-flow it from there.”

“What’s plan A?” Trip asked.

“If we get better intel on the drive, we’ll develop one,” Kolt said.

“What’s the big hurry?” someone asked. “We have been chasing this clown for a long time. Why don’t we let it play out for a while, see what develops?”

Kolt appreciated the challenge, immediately recognizing he needed to use kid gloves here.

“Look, no guarantee the intel will get any better than this. Hasty security at the hospital won’t expect anything like us. We’ll look like Spetsnaz. The separatists think they are heroes of the Motherland.”

Kolt looked around the room. Maybe they were gun-shy after the revealing of the money-for-kills scheme? Maybe just torn about their lost mates?

“What the hell, sir,” another voice said. “What about a concept of operation here? How about a sync matrix?”

“No time for that,” Kolt said, looking at the operator across the room. He couldn’t place his name at the moment, but he knew he had been around awhile.

“How are we going to sync our assets?”

Kolt was losing his patience, realizing it was much more difficult to get a squadron to throw caution to the wind than it was his Mike assault troop.

“What assets?” Kolt asked. “We’re about it, don’t you think?”

“We’ll never get approval that fast.”

“At ease!” Slapshot barked. “Damn it! You just got approval. Your squadron commander just ordered the hit. You either kit up and load, or drop kit and let me know what line unit you want to go to when we get home.”

TWELVE

Squadron commander Kolt Raynor leaned against the door, his right elbow chicken-winged outside the window of the Russian truck. He muttered something about giving Olga a little more room in the center jump seat between him and Slapshot, but the real reason was the stench.

Kolt kept sticking his head out into the wind stream, filling his nostrils with fresh air to kill the aromas emanating from his and Slapshot’s bloodstained Spetsnaz uniforms, and Olga’s body odor.

“We’re getting close,” Olga said. “A few more turns. About five minutes.”

Kolt turned toward Olga, leaned over until his face was inches from hers, and grabbed a quick study of the satellite imagery showing on the Toughbook laptop sitting on Olga’s lap. He tapped the Down arrow, zooming in two levels to focus on the last few miles to the hospital.

Kolt reached up to key his hand mike. He noticed his hand shaking and paused. He looked at Olga, certain she noticed too, as her eyes were locked on Kolt’s.

“All elements, this is Noble Zero-One. Five minutes.”

Kolt heard six reply transmissions in sequence, one from each of the other vehicles tactically spread out to lower their signature and, just in case, to ensure an IED wouldn’t take out more than one vehicle.

“Noble Zero-One, this is Satan Seven-One,” Navy SEAL Dealer said. “Any plan A yet?”

Kolt looked at Olga, knowing she hadn’t received an update since they left the farmhouse. If she had, she would have shared it.

“Negative.”

“Turn left at the next intersection,” Olga said, speaking to Slapshot behind the wheel.

Kolt wished he could provide an update to his men. He’d hoped he would have been able to issue some better guidance on the assault plan, but had nothing so far.

Kolt leaned back toward Olga, realizing he was holding his breath, and exhaled heavily.

“All elements, we are looking for the black side,” Kolt said. “Digger, Olga, and I will enter the back door and look for Marzban. Dealer has the white side. Golf One take the red side, Fox One has green.”

Kolt let his teams acknowledge his last order before transmitting again.

“Hold in the vehicles until we can identify the correct wing.”

“That it?” Slapshot asked, pointing to the roofline of the four-story hospital through a series of trees in full bloom, fronting thirty- to forty-foot Italian poplars.

“Yes,” Olga said. “Turn right up ahead, past the Jaguar billboard.”

Kolt rubbed his AKMS, mentally rehearsing the steps to clear a malfunction and how to drop a magazine. He’d prefer his trusted HK416, but the cover demanded the Russian rifle.

“Thirty seconds.”

Kolt took in the industrial city’s high-rise apartment buildings, most easily twenty stories high. Looking back at street level, he was surprised by the colorful buildings. Even more jarring were the modern billboards advertising high-end foreign automobiles or pints of expensive vodka, mounted above abandoned sandbagged positions with coiled razor wire stretched about. The scene reminded him of one of those zombie movies. Empty bright green and yellow mini-buses sat idle, hiding a few of the shops that lined both sides of the street. The scene told any visitor that on normal days, when people weren’t in the middle of a nationalist struggle, these streets were popular with the residents of Donetsk.

“Nothing like Sarajevo,” Kolt said. “Hard to believe there is a war going on here.”

“It’s crowded, boss,” Slapshot said, as he pulled the truck into the hospital’s back parking lot.

Kolt looked around, rolled his window up quickly, and tried to look like he belonged there. He didn’t need to count the bodies, intuitively knowing they were looking at three, maybe four dozen separatists standing around in the parking lot in small groups.

“Probably smart for the locals to stay home today after all,” Kolt said.

Dressed in a mix of civilian clothes with random camouflage, some pulled hard on cigarettes, expertly sending mini smoke signals into the atmosphere. Behind them, their weapons were stacked muzzle up, five to six to a group. Some AK-47s were leaning up against the redbrick building under the first-floor windows. Several of the fighters had turned to eyeball the Russian truck as soon as it had pulled into the parking lot.

“Looks like the boys will stand out around here,” Slapshot said. “We should be good.”

Slapshot hugged the curb and slowed to a stop.

“The door!” Olga said.

Kolt spotted the movement too, confirming at least two thugs just inside the front entrance.

“Stay cool,” Kolt said. “Remember, we are supposed to be here. Act the part.”

“Yes,” Olga said. “I’m okay.”

Kolt stepped down from the passenger seat and slung his rifle as if he were on a mission from Putin himself. He helped Olga down from the cab, immediately wondering if overt politeness was smart, and handed her her rifle. Kolt turned and spit on the ground, hoping that would counter any perceived weakness on his part.

Kolt keyed his mike. “Foxtrot at this time.”

“Lead the way,” Kolt said without looking at Olga, realizing he truly was making it up as they went.

Kolt heard Digger drop from the back of the truck, the racket telling him his master breacher wasn’t as worried about noise as he had been back at the truck headlight standoff with the three Spetsnaz troops. No, Kolt knew Digger knew the deal. Live the cover, until living might be fleeting.