War with Russia

The Americans were aghast, shock taking over their faces as they began to absorb what was happening. With their eyes locked onto his, they did not see the four men who were now emerging from the ground floor of the apartment block.

Vronsky motioned to them to surround the cars. In moments the Americans were being hauled out of the vehicles, arms locked behind their backs, mouths gagged with gaffer tape, heads covered with blankets, and then dragged toward the building.

All but one.

Master Sergeant Scott Trapnell was a man apart. Not for him the interminable muscle building in the gym favored by most American soldiers; small, wiry, seemingly the most unobtrusive of men, he was an Aikido sensei and black belt and trained obsessively. Instinctively, in the face of an attack, the long hours of Aikido practice kicked in. A quiet calm came over him as his assailant yanked him out of the car. Then, using the other man’s weight, the American dropped a shoulder and swung his assailant, applying the classic bent-armlock technique to turn his arm at the elbow and throw him onto his back and onto the road. As the man fell, his head snapped back against the tarmac with an audible crunch and he was silent.

The next man whirled to face him, hands up, ready for another such move. From his stance he was obviously well trained in martial arts.

Trapnell, wearing a sharp pair of leather cowboy boots for his big trip downtown, instead kicked him full force between the legs. Nothing subtle, nothing ninja, just a good, old-fashioned kick for goal, with all the force of his anger and betrayal that he could put behind it. “Fuck you!” Trapnell screamed, as his boot connected with his balls.

The man dropped. Gasping. Eyes bulging in speechless agony.

Satisfied that the man was staying down, Trapnell looked around him and saw his fellows already being bundled away. For a moment, and with two men down, there was nobody to hold him on his side of the car. He ran. Hard and fast. And he was a good runner. Half-marathon was his specialty, but he was still very useful at a full sprint.

“Get him!” Vronsky yelled from the other side of the car. But there was no one to get him.

The tower blocks around them were full of their enemies. In a few more seconds the American was going to start yelling for help. And that would bring people out onto the street, some with guns, who might help. The American would get away and the whole plan would be blown.

Without hesitation or remorse, Major Anatoly Nikolayevich Vronsky of the 45th Guards Spetsnaz Regiment reached under his jacket and, with the practiced coolness of a Special Forces soldier, pulled out a PSS silenced pistol, issued only to Russian Special Forces, KGB, FSB and MVD. He took careful aim at the center of the sprinting Trapnell’s back and fired two successive bursts of two rounds in quick succession at twenty-five meters.

Trapnell was bowled forward and over like a shot rabbit. He twitched a couple of times and then lay still.

Vronsky turned, no emotion on his face. There would be ample time for blame and punishment once they were safely across the border. “You two, fetch the body.” He indicated behind him with his thumb. “Clear up any blood.”

“Praporshchik Volochka.” He pointed to the woman who had called herself Anna Brezhneva. “We are moving straight to extraction. Get the vans here now.”

0800 hours, Wednesday, May 10, 2017

The President’s weekly defense and foreign policy meeting, The Kremlin, Moscow

FYODOR FYODOROVICH KOMAROV, the President’s Chief of Staff and regular judo partner, was below average height, stocky with the pale blue eyes and fair hair of a northern Russian. He was usually the most unruffled of men but he was troubled that morning. In line with his KGB training he was systematic, paid careful attention to detail, and took nothing for granted. He was also utterly single-minded, whether in his service to the President, or as a key player in the group of St. Petersburg-based former KGB officers—known as siloviki—who had effectively taken over Russia from the reformers after Boris Yeltsin’s demise; men who bitterly regretted and resented what had happened to their beloved country ever since.

Komarov knew only one way: ruthless control. That was the old Soviet way. He also knew that the price of failure was high and that morning he had to manage the President’s reaction to yesterday’s kidnap of the Americans in Kharkov and the unanticipated death of Master Sergeant Trapnell.

Clutching his briefing papers and notebook to his chest, he knocked twice on the ornate, gilded double doors of the President’s office.