and pockets.
“No papers of any sort. He had a satchel full of explosives, mostly booby-trap ingredients. Otherwise his equipment was pretty near standard, apart from the silencer for his pistol and sufficient ammunition to start a war of his own.”
His search complete, and apparently confirming the sergeant's findings, Revell began to wipe the blood from his fingers, when for some reason his attention was attracted to the man's helmet.
The strap had been almost severed during his fall, and a hard tug parted it completely. Revell ran his fingers over its greasy interior padding. The hunch paid off, and he pulled out two neatly folded squares of flimsy paper.
Both sides of the sheet were covered with indecipherable Cyrillic scrawl. The smattering of spoken Russian he could understand was of no use to Revell.
“Where's Boris?”
“I am here, Major. Are we going now, please. I am told that everyone in the city is to be evacuated through the subway. Shouldn't we start moving?”
“What do these say?” Ignoring the Russian's hopefully phrased question, Revell thrust the papers at him.
Squinting in the poor light provided by a shaded flashlight, Boris put on his glasses and skimmed the text.
“There is nothing of importance, Major. It is trivia, an unfinished letter to a girl.” “I'll make the judgments. What does it say?”
“Of course, Major, right away.” Turning back to the top of the first sheet, Boris reread more slowly. He stopped often to resettle his glasses on his broad Slavic features.
“Actually he writes obscenities about their last time together, and his plans for the next ... he hopes the drugs he sent have arrived safely, and that she gets a good price on the black market. As I said, Major, it is all idle chatter, gossip ...”
“Just fucking tell the Major what it says.” Hyde shone the torch in the translator's face.
Boris did as he was told, hurriedly.
“He goes on to say that he will send her photographs they took in a refugee camp... they had used flamethrowers ... he thinks she will find some of them funny. Here he says that he has not written for a while, as he was in detention for being drunk. He has been transferred from the naval brigade to an independent company... that is all there is, it ends there.”
“So now we know what we're up against.” Revell accepted the return of the scraps and crushed them into his pocket. “Only Spetsnaz forces in the Warsaw Pact have naval brigades as well as independent companies.”
“We had to come up against them sometime. The wonder is it hasn't occurred before this.” Hyde could see that the information had upset Boris, but then any prospect of his falling back into the hands of the army he had deserted had that effect. For himself, he was well aware of the Russian elite forces reputation, but you could be just as dead from a bullet fired by a shit-scared dolt of an in- fantryman, as by a highly trained commando.
Unclipping his radio from his belt, Revell broadcast his call sign. As he waited for an acknowledgement, he looked again at the corpse on the tiled floor.
An outstretched hand seemed to reach towards the bundle of torn panels and rigging in a corner. It appeared almost a gesture of accusation, aimed at the chute that had failed him.
Briefly, Revell passed to control the information they had obtained. He signed off without waiting to hear their reaction. Not that there could be any doubt as to what it would be. At that very moment, the communication room in the bunker would have gone very quiet, as the news sank in.
Spetsnaz troops had an appalling record of atrocity, even gauged against the horrors that were everyday events in the Zone. This time though it was not helpless prisoners or even wretched refugees, this time they held a whole city in their bloodstained hands.
The police HQ had to be retaken quickly. Every weapon and every round the Special Combat Company could lay hands on was going to be needed in this
“No papers of any sort. He had a satchel full of explosives, mostly booby-trap ingredients. Otherwise his equipment was pretty near standard, apart from the silencer for his pistol and sufficient ammunition to start a war of his own.”
His search complete, and apparently confirming the sergeant's findings, Revell began to wipe the blood from his fingers, when for some reason his attention was attracted to the man's helmet.
The strap had been almost severed during his fall, and a hard tug parted it completely. Revell ran his fingers over its greasy interior padding. The hunch paid off, and he pulled out two neatly folded squares of flimsy paper.
Both sides of the sheet were covered with indecipherable Cyrillic scrawl. The smattering of spoken Russian he could understand was of no use to Revell.
“Where's Boris?”
“I am here, Major. Are we going now, please. I am told that everyone in the city is to be evacuated through the subway. Shouldn't we start moving?”
“What do these say?” Ignoring the Russian's hopefully phrased question, Revell thrust the papers at him.
Squinting in the poor light provided by a shaded flashlight, Boris put on his glasses and skimmed the text.
“There is nothing of importance, Major. It is trivia, an unfinished letter to a girl.” “I'll make the judgments. What does it say?”
“Of course, Major, right away.” Turning back to the top of the first sheet, Boris reread more slowly. He stopped often to resettle his glasses on his broad Slavic features.
“Actually he writes obscenities about their last time together, and his plans for the next ... he hopes the drugs he sent have arrived safely, and that she gets a good price on the black market. As I said, Major, it is all idle chatter, gossip ...”
“Just fucking tell the Major what it says.” Hyde shone the torch in the translator's face.
Boris did as he was told, hurriedly.
“He goes on to say that he will send her photographs they took in a refugee camp... they had used flamethrowers ... he thinks she will find some of them funny. Here he says that he has not written for a while, as he was in detention for being drunk. He has been transferred from the naval brigade to an independent company... that is all there is, it ends there.”
“So now we know what we're up against.” Revell accepted the return of the scraps and crushed them into his pocket. “Only Spetsnaz forces in the Warsaw Pact have naval brigades as well as independent companies.”
“We had to come up against them sometime. The wonder is it hasn't occurred before this.” Hyde could see that the information had upset Boris, but then any prospect of his falling back into the hands of the army he had deserted had that effect. For himself, he was well aware of the Russian elite forces reputation, but you could be just as dead from a bullet fired by a shit-scared dolt of an in- fantryman, as by a highly trained commando.
Unclipping his radio from his belt, Revell broadcast his call sign. As he waited for an acknowledgement, he looked again at the corpse on the tiled floor.
An outstretched hand seemed to reach towards the bundle of torn panels and rigging in a corner. It appeared almost a gesture of accusation, aimed at the chute that had failed him.
Briefly, Revell passed to control the information they had obtained. He signed off without waiting to hear their reaction. Not that there could be any doubt as to what it would be. At that very moment, the communication room in the bunker would have gone very quiet, as the news sank in.
Spetsnaz troops had an appalling record of atrocity, even gauged against the horrors that were everyday events in the Zone. This time though it was not helpless prisoners or even wretched refugees, this time they held a whole city in their bloodstained hands.
The police HQ had to be retaken quickly. Every weapon and every round the Special Combat Company could lay hands on was going to be needed in this
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