EndWar

Robert Emerson, Prime Minister

“Khaki,” chopper pilot and ex-Canadian Special Forces

TERRORIST

Green Vox (symbolic head of the Green Brigade Transnational)

MAPS

^{Map concept by James Ide Graphic design by Carole McDaniel}

^{Map by Carole McDaniel}

^{Map by Carole McDaniel}

ONE

“He’s coming around! Everybody get—”

Team Sergeant Nathan Vatz never finished his sentence. The Russian T-100 main battle tank on the opposite end of the intersection finished it for him.

Vatz slammed onto his gut, sliding across the rain-slick pavement as the office building fifty meters ahead exploded with a thunderous boom.

Shards of concrete, glass, and mangled metal arced into the cold night and fell in a hailstorm on the blackened remains of the HMMWVs and a pair of eight-wheeled Stryker infantry combat vehicles, behind which Vatz’s special forces team had taken cover. A black rose of smoke backlit by fire bloomed across the intersection, driven by a wind thick with the stench of cordite.

With a sudden lurch, the fifty-ton tank rumbled closer, its 152mm smoothbore main gun swiveling menacingly, tracks grinding over the bodies of the rifle squad — the tank’s first victims — who’d been hit as they’d dismounted from one of the Strykers.

Vatz wiped sweat from his eyes, cleared his throat, and spoke into the tiny voice-activated boom mike at his lips: “Victor Six, this is Vortex, over?”

His voice had cracked. Calm down. They just had to get the hell out of here. That was it.

But now their exfiltration had gone to hell. No bird to swoop in, land on the rooftop helipad, and whisk them to safety. No nothing.

And that tank wasn’t operating alone. The rest of that platoon had to be nearby, with dismounted forces from the BMP-3 infantry fighting vehicles parked outside the gate.

“Victor Six, this is Vortex, over?”

Where was the rest of his twelve-man team? They’d been right behind him, and the captain had been holding up in that doorway, which was now empty.

Vatz bolted to his feet, darted back behind the still-burning hulk of a Mercedes SUV, and suddenly raised his pistol, about to fire—

When he realized the men down the alley were friendlies, his team, easy to mistake because of their Russian Spetsnaz uniforms.

Weapons Sergeant Zack Murrow had already shouldered the Javelin antitank missile they had recovered from one of the dead infantrymen and was moving toward the street, about to lie prone and get a bead on that tank.

Vatz rushed toward Zack; never breaking cover, he said in perfect Russian, “Don’t miss.”

The sergeant answered in English. “Right. But forget the Russian, Nathan. Our cover’s been seriously blown.”

Vatz and his colleagues were Joint Strike Force soldiers wearing enemy uniforms. They would be considered spies. They would not be taken prisoner. There would be no diplomatic negotiation for their release.

Hurrying farther along the wall, Vatz found the detachment commander, Captain Tom Gerard, and the assistant detachment commander, Chief Warrant Officer 3 Douglas Barnes, speaking softly, Gerard working an index finger over his pocket PC. Next to them were the team’s two commo guys, and farther back were the two engineers and assistant weapons sergeant, Russian Varjag heavy pistols drawn as they covered the end of the alley. One of the two medics was positioned at the near side.

Somewhere in the distance voices lifted. The Spetsnaz dismounted forces were drawing closer. And the drizzle was beginning to get heavier, promising a downpour.

“Hey, Vatz,” grunted the captain. “Heard you calling, but I was on the Shadowfire with higher.”

“Bad news?”

Barnes, a round-faced man with more than twenty years of service, smiled broadly. “We have to fall back another half klick. Our friends across the street have pushed too far forward, and our bird can’t get in here. She’s already found a secure spot behind a parking garage near the old municipal airport.”

“Couldn’t be easy, huh?”

“Vatz, we’re a Joint Strike Force team in the middle of Moscow. Operational Detachment Alpha. Special Forces. The world is at war. Damn. If you wanted easy, you should’ve joined the—”

“My cousin’s in the Air Force.”

“I was going to say the circus.”

“We got one right here. What the hell happened? They were waiting for us.”

Gerard and Barnes just shrugged.

Vatz swore under his breath. “Let’s move.”

As team sergeant, Vatz was responsible for the fighting men during combat situations, which freed up Barnes and Gerard to maintain close contact with their company commander and coordinate team movements within the larger battle plan.

At the moment, Vatz was all about giving one order: Run!

He called the others out of the alley, just as Zack announced that his missile was locked, his eye pressed tightly against the command launch unit’s night-vision sight. A heartbeat later, he fired.