Pro A.
12-22-2004, 02:42 AM
Not related in any way to the dance, but here's a short story for your reading pleasure.
November 14, 1980 Turnabout By: Chris Vavra
Jason Reinhardt shot the Russian through the throat. Settled him in the water. He climbed up the hill and looked around. Two guards standing to his left. Both carrying 47’s. He didn’t see them as a threat. He ran up the incline. His boat was underground. It wouldn’t do him any good from here on out. He holstered his gun and ran towards the fence. It was chain-linked and triple-spiked at the very top. Jason had been trained on how to climb these fences, but he knew that it wouldn’t do him any good. He started snipping at the wires with the cutters. When he had a decent enough hole he squeezed through and he checked the surroundings.
Just as he expected. The forest up ahead looked like it had a path. If his map was right he would be pretty close to the target. He checked for guards and cameras. None in the area. The Russians really did seem to take their security for granted if they were making it this easy. Made a quick check on his watch. Half past five. The deal was almost ready to go through.
There wasn’t a lot of wildlife in this part of Russia, much to his relief. He didn’t want to have to worry about leeches or anything like that. He hated reptiles, especially snakes. Thought they were the most disgusting creatures on the planet. He wasn’t sure why people thought they were so popular. He was willing to harbor a guess because they were finding something that they could look down on with contempt because they were uglier than them.
Reinhardt was nervous. This was his first mission for the NSA. The training ground, they called it. Reinhardt had been with the Rangers from 1977-1979. He was recruited by Brown late in 1979 and he had gone through a lot of training. This was the end result. He hoped that he could live up to their high standards.
As a physical specimen, he seemed to be perfect for them. 6’4, 195, brown hair, blue eyes, powerful build, and remarkable speed and agility. He had a good mind to go with it. Everyone in the ops branch believed he could be the new big thing with the NSA. That and this other guy that had joined the agency not long before him. He didn’t know his name. Jack or John something. Names that were unimportant to him had no relevance.
He moved through the field with no problems. He did see a couple of guards all bundled up. They were wearing heavy jackets that had fur linings on the napes of their necks. He preferred to avoid them. When he got into a small ditch that was protected by dirt on all sides he touched the earpiece and tapped it twice.
“Go ahead,” Colonel Brown said.
“I’m inside.”
“Any problems so far?”
“None yet, sir,” Reinhardt said. “One poor bastard didn’t make it, though.”
“Cover the body?”
“In the water.”
“Good. The two men have already met. They’re inside the NE building. Our contact with the Spetznaz is also at the meeting. He’s doing his best to stay out of the way.”
“Okay. Has he confirmed that our man has the contents?”
“He’s got them,” Brown said.
“Copy. I’m going in. I’m about a quarter-mile out.”
“Roger that. Over and out.”
He disconnected and he got out from his little ditch. He ran through the fields, taking the more scenic route. He zigzagged from one tree to another, his legs moving in perfect strafes. He avoided the guards the entire way. He nearly got spotted by one guard, but he was fast enough to avoid getting spotted. Sweat rolled down his cheeks and some of the perspiration got into his eyes. It burned a little bit, but it didn’t bother him much. He made his way to the abandoned military barrack.
At one time, this had been a special ops center for the Spetznaz unit, but the Soviets abandoned it in 1973 because it was not getting very much use and there were better training outposts throughout much of Siberia and Southern Russia. This one little outpost in the middle of NW Russia, five hundred miles from Moscow, didn’t seem to have much value in the eyes of people like Brezhnev. Some of the more radical Soviet leaders still found something useful in the facility, but not in the way that the government could have anticipated.
It was often used as a place to make deals under the table with radical militant groups and other Russian revolutionaries that were looking to go complete hard-line on Communism, much in the way that the North Koreans had done after the Korean War ended in a stalemate in 1953.
Today, a Russian General named Stojaknov was preparing to hand off a briefcase nuclear weapon to a contact with the North Koreans. He was planning to, according to their Spetznaz contact, detonate the weapon at the 38th parallel on the U.S. side and give the North Koreans the chance to go around the blast and rout the rest of the country. Stojaknov was also promising to send some of his best men to help with the incursion and accelerate the violence. Once the attacks started to happen, the PRC and Russia would have to give their support to their communist brethren and they would go to war.
The primary targets were Stojaknov and the North Korean militant. His name was Sook Ma. He was well-known for having operated in both China and Russia. He was a hard-right fanatic and his policies were said to be too radical for even the North Korean government. His alliances extended to most of Asia and he did have contacts in Russia, which was how this deal came about. Reinhardt hoped to take the case without causing too much of a ruckus. He knew that Stojaknov would have a few platoons with him. He wasn’t sure what Ma would have. He was guessing that a few of his private guard would be with him, but outside of that he wasn’t too sure. He was only playing on conjecture.
When he got to the compound, he saw four guards protecting the front gate. All of them Stojaknov’s men. He looked for another way. He found one. There was an opening in the wall in the NW corner. He went through the opening and he looked for the barracks building. He spotted it. It was about eighty yards away. Five guards surrounding it. He didn’t see any alternate way inside. It seemed that he was going to have to do this the hard way.
Fyodor Stojaknov looked at Sook Ma at the other end of the table. Ma was wearing a brown leather jacket that had some of his old military insignias on it, back in the day when he used to be part of the North Korean Army. For Ma, that seemed like a lifetime ago. Stojaknov was about twenty-five years older than Ma and he had the gray hair to prove it. His face was also worn and it felt like it had as much leather as that jacket. Part of his face was also paralyzed because of frostbite he had endured during a mission in Siberia ten years ago. It didn’t impede his speech, but it made it difficult to eat sometimes.
Sook Ma was a young, handsome North Korean that was only in his late 20’s. He was wearing the jacket and he had a black shirt underneath it. The jacket was heavy enough to endure the harsh cold for this short period of time. Ma looked at the men that were behind him. He had only been formally introduced to one of them. The man said his name was Ian Kimina. Ma didn’t give a fuck what his name was. As far as he was concerned, he was just some stupid guard. He had two of his own with him.
“The money?”
“Right here,” he said.
He handed him the briefcase. Stojaknov opened it up and he saw the American treasury notes. He smiled and he closed it up. He snapped his fingers. The man called Kimina handed him the steel briefcase and Fyodor placed it on the desk. He glanced at Ma, who opened it up.
He looked inside and he analyzed the bomb with a radioactivity sensor. When he saw that it was okay, he closed the briefcase and he smiled at Stojaknov. “I’m glad we could come to this agreement.”
“Me too. It’s not often that we get to do a deal like this. My contact in the Siberian lab is the one that you should be thanking, quite frankly. He was the one that managed to get this whole deal to work,” he said.
“Well, give him my regards. Now, if you will excuse me, it is a very long trip back to Pyongyang.”
He opened the door and stepped outside.
Reinhardt was within fifty yards of the target. He saw Sook Ma. He was carrying the steel briefcase in his right hand. He told Brown over the radio that he had the bomb in his sights. Brown told him to make the move. Ma was the more important target. If he killed him, Stojaknov would certainly come running. Jason nodded and he turned the radio off. He pointed his .45 and he shot the bodyguard standing behind Ma. Ma froze and so did his second bodyguard. The second bodyguard tried to move in front of Ma. Reinhardt shot the second guard before he could escort Ma a single inch. He shot Ma with two rounds through the sternum. Ma screamed and he fell to the frozen tundra.
The scream got the attention of everyone else inside the compound. Reinhardt ran out from behind the petrol tanks that had been abandoned with the base and he grabbed the briefcase. He slid the handle around his left arm and he grabbed an Uzi from one of the dead North Koreans.
He ran through the courtyard. He fired simultaneous rounds from both guns at two guards that were in his path. He shot the one on the left with two direct hits from his forty-five. The second guard was hit through the head with his Uzi. He saw a truck moving towards him on his left. He pointed the Uzi at the windshield and he shot the driver four times. The driver screamed and the truck swerved out of control. It slammed into two of the petrol tanks. Reinhardt moved back and he fired another burst from his Uzi, setting off the tanks and taking out the truck with it.
Kimina heard the explosion and he ran outside with Stojaknov not far behind him. He saw the intruder. He was wearing a black jumpsuit and he was holding the steel briefcase around his arm. He was carrying two guns. One was an Uzi. The second gun was at too obscure of an angle for him to tell, but he knew at least it was an automatic pistol. He drew out his .357 revolver and he pointed the gun towards the target. He was moving too much for him to get an accurate shot. One of the guards next to him started firing bursts from his 47. He missed to the left.
Kimina grabbed one of the nearby trucks and he started the ignition with the universal key set. Two guards got in and they started to move. This was an open jeep so they could get plenty of fire going. Ian knew that they could stop him before he got to his RV point. He wondered if he even had one. He doubted it. This had to be some kind of suicide mission. His first guess was the British were responsible for this. They loved their suicide missions. It was all that MI6 was good for these days.
He drove through the compound with Russian soldiers looking about in confusion. They saw the truck in flames and the three dead North Koreans and they weren’t sure what to make of this. Kimina knew all too well. This is what he had been trained for. He drove out into the open road and he sent the radio transmission to all outside guards that they were under attack and that the intruder would probably be heading their way. He cut the line and he looked around while staying at a steady rate of speed. There was nothing yet. He would have to come out, though.
It was inevitable.
Reinhardt told Brown that he had killed Ma and that he had the briefcase. Stojaknov was still alive, but he was still inside the base. He asked if there was any chance of a covert air strike. Brown said that it was impossible for the time being. They would have to do with what they had right now. Reinhardt ran through the heavy foliage, keeping out of any guard’s sights. He saw the truck coming up and he made sure that his back was against one of the heavier trees. He kept the briefcase in front of him and waited for the vehicle to pass.
Reinhardt kept his pace most of the way. He had to kill one guard that he bumped into. He had been too focused on the truck and that ended up happening. He shot the guard once through the face and he went down. When he reached the shoreline he saw the speedboat coming up. It was a standard escape route for the NSA. He ran to the boat and he got inside. They were about to leave when the truck arrived. There were three Russian men inside. The driver looked older than the other two. He also looked a little out of place in a military uniform. He was carrying a nickel-plated revolver, as well. The other two had 47’s on them.
He got into the boat, which was turned sideways and he shot at the truck with his Uzi. His pistol was close to out of ammo. He also finished the clip on that, as well. He hut the soldier in the passenger seat through the windshield. The rounds hit him right through the stomach and he slumped over. The man with the revolver ducked, getting one round off that hit the frame of the boat. The driver of the boat hit the gas and they were away. Reinhardt finished the clip on the Uzi, knocking out one of the tires on the truck and he turned away.
Ian Kimina got out of the truck and he surveyed the damage. Not too good. The truck would have to go through extensive repairs before they would be able to leave. A tire had been destroyed and the windshield was shot to pieces. The engine also appeared to have taken some damage along the way. His mind wasn’t just on that, though. He was thinking about the spy he had just encountered. He was good, very good. He was a little younger than Kimina, judging from his face. He didn’t look British, either. No, this was an American. The rugged features seemed to suit someone of that nationality better.
He thought that this spy would be a good target for an assassination later on. He would make a report to his superiors in Moscow. First, though, he would have to finish this job right now and put up with Fyodor’s ranting and raving for a little while longer. He was going to be pissed and he was going to take the blame.
Kimina knew it wasn’t his fault. The old bastard’s security was terrible. Small wonder this spy was able to get through so easily. It didn’t matter. Once he reported his findings to his superiors at KGB, everything would work out again for him. He would be out of the woods and back to a more suitable position for someone like him.
Fort Meade, Maryland; November 20, 1980
It took four days just to get back to America and then Reinhardt got another day to relax. He dropped off the nuclear weapon with the DOD contact at Rammstein Air Force Base in West Berlin. He spent his day off getting wasted at one of the local Irish pubs. He didn’t get a chance to do any drinking while he was in Germany. There wasn’t even a chance to check out the girls in the city, which was a mild disappointment.
The killings didn’t leave him shaken. He knew what they were and who they were. To him, they were trash that needed to be eliminated and that was exactly what he did. There was nothing wrong with that, in his eyes. He did a job and he did it well. He didn’t kill the Russian General, but that was no big deal. After today, he would have much to answer for. With any luck, he would become the commander of a Siberian prison.
Reinhardt walked into the NSA office bright and early at seven in the morning. He flashed his ID card to the secretary. She nodded and he walked all the way to the North end of the building. The NSA, known only to a small percentage of the U.S. population, was involved in cryptography and hacking. That was all that they were known for to those people. The NSA, however, serves a secondary purpose as a black operations center. It was started in the 1950’s when the agency was underway. The agency director continued to get strong funding from the DOD for operations. The black ops center was located at the basement of the compound. He slid his ID through the slot to open the elevator.
He walked inside and he closed the door after hitting the button for the basement.
“Not a total success, I will admit, but one that we can go through the rest of our days without hanging our heads in defeat, wondering what we were thinking,” Paul Brown, the head of black ops, said. Reinhardt shrugged. His fingertips relaxed on the sofa and he looked at his superior, wondering what he was going to add to this fun little excursion. His XO, Lt. Commander Alan Ricks, was writing some notes down on a small pad of paper.
“Well, who would’ve guessed that the Russians would have shown that kind of resilience? Besides, Stojaknov isn’t going to be going anywhere.”
“Granted. Our contact with his unit has already told me that he is rattling his brain over the fiasco. He’s going to have to report this to the Kremlin and the KGB. I guess one of the men there was KGB.”
“Doesn’t surprise me. Do we have an ID on him?”
“Just came in,” Ricks said. He slid the folder across the table. He looked at the name and the photo. He recognized it right away. He nodded and said that this was the soldier that was driving the truck that had been in pursuit of him.
“Are you sure?”
Reinhardt nodded. He took a puff of his cigarette. “I’m sure.”
“You know we don’t allow smoking in here.”
“Fuck that. I need my fix.”
Brown took the cigarette from his mouth and he tossed it to a nearby dustbin. “There. You had your fucking fix.”
Reinhardt glared at him, but he didn’t say anything.
Ricks motioned to Brown. He whispered a comment into Brown’s ear and Brown nodded.
“We think you should stay out of Russia for a little while, and that might as well go for the rest of Eastern Europe. Our friend from the KGB might be spreading your name through the halls,” he said.
“Fine by me,” he said. “Where does that leave me?”
They checked the map that was sprawled on the table. Ricks took out his knife and he pointed it towards the countries of West Europe. “I think that these countries will serve you well. This sector of the world is just as dangerous and carnivorous as Eastern Europe. I think you’ll fit in quite well there,” he said.
Reinhardt nodded.
Ricks closed the folder and he shoved it into a black briefcase. He closed the caches and he said, “Turnabout is dead now. Thank you for your services, Mr. Reinhardt, and welcome to the NSA crew.”
He extended his hand. There was a pause for hesitation, but Reinhardt grasped the hand and they shook on the deal. He had a home now.
November 14, 1980 Turnabout By: Chris Vavra
Jason Reinhardt shot the Russian through the throat. Settled him in the water. He climbed up the hill and looked around. Two guards standing to his left. Both carrying 47’s. He didn’t see them as a threat. He ran up the incline. His boat was underground. It wouldn’t do him any good from here on out. He holstered his gun and ran towards the fence. It was chain-linked and triple-spiked at the very top. Jason had been trained on how to climb these fences, but he knew that it wouldn’t do him any good. He started snipping at the wires with the cutters. When he had a decent enough hole he squeezed through and he checked the surroundings.
Just as he expected. The forest up ahead looked like it had a path. If his map was right he would be pretty close to the target. He checked for guards and cameras. None in the area. The Russians really did seem to take their security for granted if they were making it this easy. Made a quick check on his watch. Half past five. The deal was almost ready to go through.
There wasn’t a lot of wildlife in this part of Russia, much to his relief. He didn’t want to have to worry about leeches or anything like that. He hated reptiles, especially snakes. Thought they were the most disgusting creatures on the planet. He wasn’t sure why people thought they were so popular. He was willing to harbor a guess because they were finding something that they could look down on with contempt because they were uglier than them.
Reinhardt was nervous. This was his first mission for the NSA. The training ground, they called it. Reinhardt had been with the Rangers from 1977-1979. He was recruited by Brown late in 1979 and he had gone through a lot of training. This was the end result. He hoped that he could live up to their high standards.
As a physical specimen, he seemed to be perfect for them. 6’4, 195, brown hair, blue eyes, powerful build, and remarkable speed and agility. He had a good mind to go with it. Everyone in the ops branch believed he could be the new big thing with the NSA. That and this other guy that had joined the agency not long before him. He didn’t know his name. Jack or John something. Names that were unimportant to him had no relevance.
He moved through the field with no problems. He did see a couple of guards all bundled up. They were wearing heavy jackets that had fur linings on the napes of their necks. He preferred to avoid them. When he got into a small ditch that was protected by dirt on all sides he touched the earpiece and tapped it twice.
“Go ahead,” Colonel Brown said.
“I’m inside.”
“Any problems so far?”
“None yet, sir,” Reinhardt said. “One poor bastard didn’t make it, though.”
“Cover the body?”
“In the water.”
“Good. The two men have already met. They’re inside the NE building. Our contact with the Spetznaz is also at the meeting. He’s doing his best to stay out of the way.”
“Okay. Has he confirmed that our man has the contents?”
“He’s got them,” Brown said.
“Copy. I’m going in. I’m about a quarter-mile out.”
“Roger that. Over and out.”
He disconnected and he got out from his little ditch. He ran through the fields, taking the more scenic route. He zigzagged from one tree to another, his legs moving in perfect strafes. He avoided the guards the entire way. He nearly got spotted by one guard, but he was fast enough to avoid getting spotted. Sweat rolled down his cheeks and some of the perspiration got into his eyes. It burned a little bit, but it didn’t bother him much. He made his way to the abandoned military barrack.
At one time, this had been a special ops center for the Spetznaz unit, but the Soviets abandoned it in 1973 because it was not getting very much use and there were better training outposts throughout much of Siberia and Southern Russia. This one little outpost in the middle of NW Russia, five hundred miles from Moscow, didn’t seem to have much value in the eyes of people like Brezhnev. Some of the more radical Soviet leaders still found something useful in the facility, but not in the way that the government could have anticipated.
It was often used as a place to make deals under the table with radical militant groups and other Russian revolutionaries that were looking to go complete hard-line on Communism, much in the way that the North Koreans had done after the Korean War ended in a stalemate in 1953.
Today, a Russian General named Stojaknov was preparing to hand off a briefcase nuclear weapon to a contact with the North Koreans. He was planning to, according to their Spetznaz contact, detonate the weapon at the 38th parallel on the U.S. side and give the North Koreans the chance to go around the blast and rout the rest of the country. Stojaknov was also promising to send some of his best men to help with the incursion and accelerate the violence. Once the attacks started to happen, the PRC and Russia would have to give their support to their communist brethren and they would go to war.
The primary targets were Stojaknov and the North Korean militant. His name was Sook Ma. He was well-known for having operated in both China and Russia. He was a hard-right fanatic and his policies were said to be too radical for even the North Korean government. His alliances extended to most of Asia and he did have contacts in Russia, which was how this deal came about. Reinhardt hoped to take the case without causing too much of a ruckus. He knew that Stojaknov would have a few platoons with him. He wasn’t sure what Ma would have. He was guessing that a few of his private guard would be with him, but outside of that he wasn’t too sure. He was only playing on conjecture.
When he got to the compound, he saw four guards protecting the front gate. All of them Stojaknov’s men. He looked for another way. He found one. There was an opening in the wall in the NW corner. He went through the opening and he looked for the barracks building. He spotted it. It was about eighty yards away. Five guards surrounding it. He didn’t see any alternate way inside. It seemed that he was going to have to do this the hard way.
Fyodor Stojaknov looked at Sook Ma at the other end of the table. Ma was wearing a brown leather jacket that had some of his old military insignias on it, back in the day when he used to be part of the North Korean Army. For Ma, that seemed like a lifetime ago. Stojaknov was about twenty-five years older than Ma and he had the gray hair to prove it. His face was also worn and it felt like it had as much leather as that jacket. Part of his face was also paralyzed because of frostbite he had endured during a mission in Siberia ten years ago. It didn’t impede his speech, but it made it difficult to eat sometimes.
Sook Ma was a young, handsome North Korean that was only in his late 20’s. He was wearing the jacket and he had a black shirt underneath it. The jacket was heavy enough to endure the harsh cold for this short period of time. Ma looked at the men that were behind him. He had only been formally introduced to one of them. The man said his name was Ian Kimina. Ma didn’t give a fuck what his name was. As far as he was concerned, he was just some stupid guard. He had two of his own with him.
“The money?”
“Right here,” he said.
He handed him the briefcase. Stojaknov opened it up and he saw the American treasury notes. He smiled and he closed it up. He snapped his fingers. The man called Kimina handed him the steel briefcase and Fyodor placed it on the desk. He glanced at Ma, who opened it up.
He looked inside and he analyzed the bomb with a radioactivity sensor. When he saw that it was okay, he closed the briefcase and he smiled at Stojaknov. “I’m glad we could come to this agreement.”
“Me too. It’s not often that we get to do a deal like this. My contact in the Siberian lab is the one that you should be thanking, quite frankly. He was the one that managed to get this whole deal to work,” he said.
“Well, give him my regards. Now, if you will excuse me, it is a very long trip back to Pyongyang.”
He opened the door and stepped outside.
Reinhardt was within fifty yards of the target. He saw Sook Ma. He was carrying the steel briefcase in his right hand. He told Brown over the radio that he had the bomb in his sights. Brown told him to make the move. Ma was the more important target. If he killed him, Stojaknov would certainly come running. Jason nodded and he turned the radio off. He pointed his .45 and he shot the bodyguard standing behind Ma. Ma froze and so did his second bodyguard. The second bodyguard tried to move in front of Ma. Reinhardt shot the second guard before he could escort Ma a single inch. He shot Ma with two rounds through the sternum. Ma screamed and he fell to the frozen tundra.
The scream got the attention of everyone else inside the compound. Reinhardt ran out from behind the petrol tanks that had been abandoned with the base and he grabbed the briefcase. He slid the handle around his left arm and he grabbed an Uzi from one of the dead North Koreans.
He ran through the courtyard. He fired simultaneous rounds from both guns at two guards that were in his path. He shot the one on the left with two direct hits from his forty-five. The second guard was hit through the head with his Uzi. He saw a truck moving towards him on his left. He pointed the Uzi at the windshield and he shot the driver four times. The driver screamed and the truck swerved out of control. It slammed into two of the petrol tanks. Reinhardt moved back and he fired another burst from his Uzi, setting off the tanks and taking out the truck with it.
Kimina heard the explosion and he ran outside with Stojaknov not far behind him. He saw the intruder. He was wearing a black jumpsuit and he was holding the steel briefcase around his arm. He was carrying two guns. One was an Uzi. The second gun was at too obscure of an angle for him to tell, but he knew at least it was an automatic pistol. He drew out his .357 revolver and he pointed the gun towards the target. He was moving too much for him to get an accurate shot. One of the guards next to him started firing bursts from his 47. He missed to the left.
Kimina grabbed one of the nearby trucks and he started the ignition with the universal key set. Two guards got in and they started to move. This was an open jeep so they could get plenty of fire going. Ian knew that they could stop him before he got to his RV point. He wondered if he even had one. He doubted it. This had to be some kind of suicide mission. His first guess was the British were responsible for this. They loved their suicide missions. It was all that MI6 was good for these days.
He drove through the compound with Russian soldiers looking about in confusion. They saw the truck in flames and the three dead North Koreans and they weren’t sure what to make of this. Kimina knew all too well. This is what he had been trained for. He drove out into the open road and he sent the radio transmission to all outside guards that they were under attack and that the intruder would probably be heading their way. He cut the line and he looked around while staying at a steady rate of speed. There was nothing yet. He would have to come out, though.
It was inevitable.
Reinhardt told Brown that he had killed Ma and that he had the briefcase. Stojaknov was still alive, but he was still inside the base. He asked if there was any chance of a covert air strike. Brown said that it was impossible for the time being. They would have to do with what they had right now. Reinhardt ran through the heavy foliage, keeping out of any guard’s sights. He saw the truck coming up and he made sure that his back was against one of the heavier trees. He kept the briefcase in front of him and waited for the vehicle to pass.
Reinhardt kept his pace most of the way. He had to kill one guard that he bumped into. He had been too focused on the truck and that ended up happening. He shot the guard once through the face and he went down. When he reached the shoreline he saw the speedboat coming up. It was a standard escape route for the NSA. He ran to the boat and he got inside. They were about to leave when the truck arrived. There were three Russian men inside. The driver looked older than the other two. He also looked a little out of place in a military uniform. He was carrying a nickel-plated revolver, as well. The other two had 47’s on them.
He got into the boat, which was turned sideways and he shot at the truck with his Uzi. His pistol was close to out of ammo. He also finished the clip on that, as well. He hut the soldier in the passenger seat through the windshield. The rounds hit him right through the stomach and he slumped over. The man with the revolver ducked, getting one round off that hit the frame of the boat. The driver of the boat hit the gas and they were away. Reinhardt finished the clip on the Uzi, knocking out one of the tires on the truck and he turned away.
Ian Kimina got out of the truck and he surveyed the damage. Not too good. The truck would have to go through extensive repairs before they would be able to leave. A tire had been destroyed and the windshield was shot to pieces. The engine also appeared to have taken some damage along the way. His mind wasn’t just on that, though. He was thinking about the spy he had just encountered. He was good, very good. He was a little younger than Kimina, judging from his face. He didn’t look British, either. No, this was an American. The rugged features seemed to suit someone of that nationality better.
He thought that this spy would be a good target for an assassination later on. He would make a report to his superiors in Moscow. First, though, he would have to finish this job right now and put up with Fyodor’s ranting and raving for a little while longer. He was going to be pissed and he was going to take the blame.
Kimina knew it wasn’t his fault. The old bastard’s security was terrible. Small wonder this spy was able to get through so easily. It didn’t matter. Once he reported his findings to his superiors at KGB, everything would work out again for him. He would be out of the woods and back to a more suitable position for someone like him.
Fort Meade, Maryland; November 20, 1980
It took four days just to get back to America and then Reinhardt got another day to relax. He dropped off the nuclear weapon with the DOD contact at Rammstein Air Force Base in West Berlin. He spent his day off getting wasted at one of the local Irish pubs. He didn’t get a chance to do any drinking while he was in Germany. There wasn’t even a chance to check out the girls in the city, which was a mild disappointment.
The killings didn’t leave him shaken. He knew what they were and who they were. To him, they were trash that needed to be eliminated and that was exactly what he did. There was nothing wrong with that, in his eyes. He did a job and he did it well. He didn’t kill the Russian General, but that was no big deal. After today, he would have much to answer for. With any luck, he would become the commander of a Siberian prison.
Reinhardt walked into the NSA office bright and early at seven in the morning. He flashed his ID card to the secretary. She nodded and he walked all the way to the North end of the building. The NSA, known only to a small percentage of the U.S. population, was involved in cryptography and hacking. That was all that they were known for to those people. The NSA, however, serves a secondary purpose as a black operations center. It was started in the 1950’s when the agency was underway. The agency director continued to get strong funding from the DOD for operations. The black ops center was located at the basement of the compound. He slid his ID through the slot to open the elevator.
He walked inside and he closed the door after hitting the button for the basement.
“Not a total success, I will admit, but one that we can go through the rest of our days without hanging our heads in defeat, wondering what we were thinking,” Paul Brown, the head of black ops, said. Reinhardt shrugged. His fingertips relaxed on the sofa and he looked at his superior, wondering what he was going to add to this fun little excursion. His XO, Lt. Commander Alan Ricks, was writing some notes down on a small pad of paper.
“Well, who would’ve guessed that the Russians would have shown that kind of resilience? Besides, Stojaknov isn’t going to be going anywhere.”
“Granted. Our contact with his unit has already told me that he is rattling his brain over the fiasco. He’s going to have to report this to the Kremlin and the KGB. I guess one of the men there was KGB.”
“Doesn’t surprise me. Do we have an ID on him?”
“Just came in,” Ricks said. He slid the folder across the table. He looked at the name and the photo. He recognized it right away. He nodded and said that this was the soldier that was driving the truck that had been in pursuit of him.
“Are you sure?”
Reinhardt nodded. He took a puff of his cigarette. “I’m sure.”
“You know we don’t allow smoking in here.”
“Fuck that. I need my fix.”
Brown took the cigarette from his mouth and he tossed it to a nearby dustbin. “There. You had your fucking fix.”
Reinhardt glared at him, but he didn’t say anything.
Ricks motioned to Brown. He whispered a comment into Brown’s ear and Brown nodded.
“We think you should stay out of Russia for a little while, and that might as well go for the rest of Eastern Europe. Our friend from the KGB might be spreading your name through the halls,” he said.
“Fine by me,” he said. “Where does that leave me?”
They checked the map that was sprawled on the table. Ricks took out his knife and he pointed it towards the countries of West Europe. “I think that these countries will serve you well. This sector of the world is just as dangerous and carnivorous as Eastern Europe. I think you’ll fit in quite well there,” he said.
Reinhardt nodded.
Ricks closed the folder and he shoved it into a black briefcase. He closed the caches and he said, “Turnabout is dead now. Thank you for your services, Mr. Reinhardt, and welcome to the NSA crew.”
He extended his hand. There was a pause for hesitation, but Reinhardt grasped the hand and they shook on the deal. He had a home now.