Shadow War (22 page)

“It's a go,” I said into my headset, as I watched Maltov walk away from the club. I had hoped the payment would work. Truly, it was the best option. But luck wasn't on our side. At least we had given them a chance.

I started humming Verdi's
Requiem
as I moved into position. It was an instinct, a desire to find something that calmed me. For some guys, it was heavy metal. For others, the Lord's Prayer. For me, today, it was the terrifying “Dies Irae” from Verdi's death mass, a work that defined the relationship between man and his mortality, and thus his maker. This music, like so many classical works from my violin playing days, was etched into my soul. It made me feel like death incarnate.

I lifted my SCAR rifle and prepared to run. On the eighth note, the garbage truck accelerated past Maltov, who was a block from the club and still walking away, and then past my position in the alley, one of Maltov's boys at the wheel. The guards had their eyes on Maltov; by the time they realized the garbage truck wasn't stopping, it was too late. Twelve seconds into the
Requiem,
the truck smashed the club like a battering ram, collapsing half the front wall.

We were shock and awe before the dust could settle, throwing flashbangs and smoke grenades of various colors as we poured into the breech. Charro pounded a guard in the head, Boon high-kicked the second in the solar plexus, and we leapt inside
as the music frenzied at thirty seconds, our gas masks on and laser scopes dancing in the smoke.
Pop. Pop. Pop.
I could hear precision shooting, incapacitating the guards.

I looked for the black tracksuit, my laser scope flashing through the smoke, the violent music in my head focusing my mind. I found the Russian on his back behind an overturned table and put a bullet in his shoulder, close enough that the muzzle flash would sear. I stomped his shoulder, snapping his clavicle, and he shrieked in pain. Killing the leader would incite the pack; hearing him screaming in pain would terrify them. I dropped a playing card on his chest. The King of Hearts. It didn't mean anything; it was just meant to confuse. And it was some badass shit.

“
Nastupnoho razu,
” I said. Next time. The only two words I knew in Ukrainian, taught to me by Sirko an hour ago.

I stepped past the Russian. The smoke was thick, the music in my head winding down. It was time to go. I looked for my team, found them, and fired one more shot at a bodyguard moving in the smoke. Then I was in the back hallway and out the back door and running down the street, following my evac route.

Two minutes, and everything was finished. Death had passed, the shadow moving on. The entire team was at the rally point, safe and accounted for. I nodded to Miles; he nodded back. We moved out in formation, silently, down the alley and out of sight, and before anyone could figure out what had happened, we were gone.

Winters picked up the phone. “Yes,” he said.

It was Wolcott. It was 1000 EST, so Wolcott was in. That was a rule at Apollo: Wolcott was always in. “It's getting ragged,” Wolcott said. “Extracurricular activity a few blocks south.”

“Is everything on schedule?”

“For now.”

“Let me know.”

Winters hung up. That was another rule of the company. Winters hung up whenever he felt like it.

1500 London time,
two hours until the meeting,
he thought, instinctively straightening his tie, cobalt blue with yellow parachutes, in honor of this club. He had flown overnight from New York to London, five hours' time difference, and he was feeling the lack of adequate rest. He should be napping. But he couldn't sleep, not with this much on the line, so he had fallen back on his familiar routine, and that meant a drink at the Special Forces Club.

There was a time when gaining admittance to this redbrick row house on a quiet street in central London was an honor. It was the social hub of the international mercenary community, and at that time, he had enjoyed the exclusivity. The history. Now he could see how shabby it was: threadbare furniture, a stain on the carpet. Imperial decrepitude.

He looked up. There on the wall, staring down from his por
trait, was Sir David Stirling, the father of them all. The founder of the SAS in 1941 and, more important, Watchguard, the first modern mercenary company. Under the portrait was the SAS motto: “Who Dares Wins.” It was catchy, but he preferred the photo in the entry lobby of Churchill giving his famous “set Europe on fire” speech. As the Navy SEALs said: “The only easy day was yesterday.”

1800 Ukrainian time,
Winters thought, counting time zones. Ten hours until the Donbas Battalion arrived. Eleven until the press junket flew in.

Eleven hours,
he thought. Eleven hours until Karpenko's victory speech, and then he could leave this fraying place behind. For a higher place. A more powerful place. Or maybe he should say, a deeper state.

It wasn't hard to find Kramatorsk, since it was only about twenty kilometers from the little town with the police station. Alie had expected roadblocks and soldiers, but the road was empty, the farmland punctured by two rusty factories with grasping pipes and defiant smokestacks, like south Alabama without the mosquitos. Actually, she wasn't sure about the mosquitos.

She rubbed her temples, fighting the headache. She felt cotton in her mouth, and she wondered about the last time she'd eaten. Early morning at the elementary school, she remembered, long before Hargrove had gone cowboy in the park. He was a good guy. Smart. A true believer. He wanted to work his way up in his country's service: recruit spies, defeat enemies, and defend the flag in the pat way history books and novels portrayed.

But he was impatient, as young men often are. He wanted to be Bill Donovan, the legendary head of the OSS during World War II, but act like Tom Locke, the mercenary, because he thought Locke was changing the world.
Maybe he is,
Alie thought, although she wasn't so sure.

To be like Locke, though, you had to understand where he came from. You had to know the scars, the bullet hole in the back of his left shoulder and the cut across his ribs, and all those fucked-up places in his soul. Hargrove was too fresh and innocent. His only scar was the tooth he'd chipped doing a keg stand in college, and even that had been immaculately repaired.

She hated leaving him behind. It felt like Locke and innocent Alie in Burundi, with the roles reversed. But she knew that wasn't true. She'd see Hargrove again, probably tonight, after he'd gotten his cowboy fix and rejoined the main body of the Donbas Battalion.

She could have waited with the milita for whatever was coming. She could have found Locke that way, she was sure of it. But she had a feeling the militiamen were on the outside of whatever was really happening here, and she wanted to be inside. She wanted to find Locke before the action went down. It was the only way to get the real story, and that was what she was here for, right?

Maybe she was impatient, too. Maybe she should have waited. After all, Hargrove knew where Locke was. He had him triangulated to within a hundred meters. But he had refused to tell her the location, even on their long drive together. Maybe Hargrove suspected that, with enough information, Alie would take the car and run.

Funny, because she didn't realize that herself, until it was already done.

She pulled into a bar. Bars were a good place to collect information, but this one was mostly empty, even at 5:30 on a Friday afternoon. It was tidy, with strings of yellow flags advertising Obolon, a local beer. There was an unused Obolon dartboard, and two pensioners drinking out of Obolon glasses. The bartender cheerfully wiped a spot with an Obolon towel, chatting in rapid Ukrainian, but his smile didn't diminish the depression that hung over the place.

She ordered a pint of Obolon with a
horilka
back. When in Ukraine, drink as the locals drink. She drank. The bartender had lost his enthusiasm when he realized she didn't speak Ukrainian, but she called him over for a second round.

“Food?” she said, miming the act of eating.

The bartender pointed to a display of Lay's potato chips.

“Ukrainian?” She moved her hands like she was holding an assault rifle. “Militia?”

He didn't understand. Some people, when they don't know a language, don't even try. The formerly cheerful bartender was one of them.

She made the motion of a gun again. “Kiev?”

He shook his head. “Donetsk.”

She showed him the picture of Locke on her phone, taken in the Kiev hotel bar two days ago.

“American?” she said, motioning to ask if he had seen him.

The bartender shook his head no.

Alie drank her second round of local beer and liquor and ate the bag of chips. She left hryvnias on the counter along with her contact information—in case he saw “the Americain”—and got back in her car.

She drove, trusting her instincts. Kramatorsk was a midsize city of five-story apartment blocks, but off to the west she could see larger apartments, and off to the east, a bristling black factory. The train station bridge, crossing ten tracks and several abandoned red and green engines, afforded a perfect view of the smoking colossus. No pedestrians, the town was quiet, the billowing smoke the closest thing to a social life.

Beyond the train station, the pavement was scorched and windows blown out. At the river, she turned north. The trees were yellow and white, the green grass broken up with black mud. Monet would have loved the waterlillies, but Alie could see slag in their tendrils. She imagined the fish, nibbling at the corners of plastic bottles. The river made her sad for the people who lived here, although she couldn't say why, it just made her feel like nothing would change, like this would go on and on until it
was forgotten. But the white church with the gold metal onion domes, the one she caught only in glimpses—that was lovely.

A few blocks later, she saw a mortared building, the front sloughing off like a rockslide. She passed a burned bus left in the street, the electric wires cut or blown off their supports. More shattered windows, more scorch marks, more metal hanging perilously off façades.

She pulled off the road near a makeshift memorial, dying flowers and a photo of a young man. The damage here was extensive. Three burned buses were flopped down on their bellies, their melted tires stolen. A block ahead, she saw a barricade, mostly tires held in place by barbed wire. The two men at the barricade were wearing skeleton ski masks.

She turned into a package store and bought a bottle of vodka in a brown plastic bag. It was the only open store on the block. She showed the photo of Locke as she paid. “Americain?” No. She left the man her card.

Outside, she turned back the way she had come and went down a side street, avoiding the barricade. There was a barricade on the next street as well. She saw the handle of a baseball bat sticking up from the pile—how strange, did they play baseball here?—and men in masks, mostly stocky, with bushy beards. They were wearing camouflage, as if they were in a forest, even though they were standing in front of a coffee shop. It seemed to be open. She wondered if the Cossacks paid for their coffee.

There was a small park, like the one Hargrove had charged across. There was a flagpole flying the colors of the Donetsk Republic and a statue of Stalin, which was surprising—she thought they had all been torn down decades ago. An armored troop carrier was sitting on the far edge, no doubt stolen by separatists from the Ukrainian army, and men were wandering around
with guns. A young woman was sitting against Stalin's pedestal, a sandwich in her hand, a handheld video camera beside her.

“Reporter?” Alie asked, handing her the brown paper bag.

“Doing my best,” she said. Alie had thought she was American, but she was European, Dutch or a Scandi probably, judging by the accent and glasses. “Who do you work for?”

“Independent,” Alie replied.

“The
Independent
?”

“No, I'm independent. I work for myself. I've had some stuff in the
Guardian
.” Three years ago.

“A liberal,” the woman said crookedly. She took a sip from the vodka bottle and grimaced, handing back the bag.

“I publish anywhere that will take me. What about you?”

“
Vice
.”

“The website?”

“YouTube channel. More traffic that way. We file dispatches under the heading Russian Roulette.”

Alie took a long pull and settled in beside her. “Anybody else around?”

“A couple Germans. One Brit. Locals, of course, they have a thriving press here. Professional and independent.” She smiled at the word. In this context an independent meant anyone with a cell phone and the ability to upload to the Internet.

“Any Americans?”

“You're the first I've seen.”

Alie wasn't surprised. The American news agencies never came this deep. They were barely even in Kiev.

She showed the girl the picture of Locke. “How about him?”

The kid shook her head no. “Is he in town?”

Alie took a drink. “Probably.” The bearded Cossacks were intimidating, but they weren't even looking at her. It was tough to stay on alert. “If he is, he doesn't want to be found. I figure
if I make enough noise, show his picture around, he'll have to find me.”

Silence me,
in other words. It wasn't much of a plan, and it had its risks, but it had worked before, in much worse places and with much worse men.

The young woman understood. Maybe. She didn't ask any questions.

“It's quiet,” Alie said, taking another drink.

“The fighting has moved on. The separatists have held this part of town for a week. The battle is out at the airport and the television tower.”

She had read about the Ukrainian army offensive at the airport. The one runway had been rendered useless by the first mortar attack last month. It was purely symbolism now. Not Locke's type of gig.

“Television tower?” she said.

“I know,” the young woman said. “Crazy, right? But television still matters here.”

“Military or militias?”

“Official Ukrainian military,” she said. “We're going this afternoon, if you want a lift.”

Alie drank and handed back the bottle. That didn't sound like Locke's spot, either. The U.S. wouldn't send a merc for a television tower, would it? There must be something else. “What about local militia?”

“Which side?”

“Ukrainian.”

The vice reporter shrugged. “There's the Donbas Battalion about twenty minutes away, if you have a car.”

Alie shook her head. “I want something here, in Kramatorsk.”

“Well, it's mostly Donetsk.”

“What do you mean?”

“Most people are for the separatists. I'd say 75 percent.”

“Seriously?” Kiev was running 90 percent the other way, from what she could tell.

The young woman pointed across the street. “See the holes in that building? And the apartments with the front blown off? That was the Ukrainian military firing mortars toward these barricades.” Poor propaganda. Bad for winning hearts and minds. “I doubt the support lasts long, though. It's going to get worse for these people before it gets better.”

The young woman was maybe twenty-two, younger than Hargrove, but she knew what she was talking about. The idea of an insurrection was easy to support, especially in a poor region, because there were always legitimate grievances, and nothing bad had happened yet, and the future was sunshine and lollipops. The reality of an insurrection was usually hell.

“If you want pro-Ukraine,” the kid said, pointing to her left, “take that road. Keep going until you see the flags. It's about a kilometer.” She took a long drink of the vodka and wiped her mouth. “Or you could try that,” she said, pointing in the other direction.

Alie looked behind her. Smoke was rising from the west. “When did that happen?”

“About an hour ago.” The young woman smiled. She looked exhausted, filthy, but convinced this was her calling, because it was the greatest experience of her life. Alie envied her youth.

“Be careful,” the young woman said. “The separatists kidnapped a female reporter a few days ago. They let her go,
untouched
”—an emphasis on the word Alie understood too well—“but she was local, so it's not necessarily a precedent.”

“Don't worry. I've done this before.”

“In Ukraine?”

“In Africa.”

“I knew it,” the young woman said. “You're Alie MacFarlane, right?”

Alie looked at her. Who was this girl?

“I saw you speak at a refugee conference in the Hague a few years back. You're a legend. Sort of. To a few of us diehards anyway.” Okay kid,
legend
was nice. Quit qualifying it. “That refugee series, when you traveled with those women from Burundi to Bosaso. . . . It's obscure, sure. You have to take a deep dive to find it. But that's where the good stuff is, right? Down in the depths.”

It's not down there to be cool,
Alie thought.
It's down there because I couldn't verify it. Because I didn't organize my sources, some of whom might have killed me. Because I lost my subjects and lost the ending and didn't bring it home with a bang.

“That series was brilliant,” the young woman continued. “I read it when I was a junior in upper school. It changed my life.”

That series was a failure, in every way.

“How is Magdelena?” The young woman sat up even straighter. “Is she here? In Ukraine?”

Alie felt the lump in her throat. She couldn't say it. Magdelena is missing. It hurt for her to even think it: Magdelena is almost surely dead.

“I'm working on a bigger story,” Alie said, and she wished she hadn't. Why did she need to impress this kid?

“About Ukraine?”

“Nobody cares about Ukraine. This is about the USA.”

She knocked back another gulp of vodka, then handed the young woman the last of the bottle. She felt tired. “I'm going to check on that smoke,” she said.

It wasn't even a decision. At this point in her life, what else could she do?