Gray Matter Splatter (A Deckard Novel Book 4) (39 page)

* * *

Twin lines ran through the snow, a trail made by two feet
dragging their way forward. Fresh snow crunched as it compacted under
each footstep. The lone figure limped across Greenland’s expanse,
hugging himself with both arms to try to contain the pain as well as
to stay warm. He was broken, bruised, and expended, but still alive.

Deckard tripped, stumbled, but regained his footing—before
continuing to stagger some more. He had been sleeping on his feet.
Cresting the top of a gentle slope, he looked down and breathed a
sigh of relief as he saw his men. Two platoons of mercenaries stood
assembled below, having evacuated the ice base before it collapsed.
Fedorchenko and Shatayeva were organizing the men, but there were no
high fives or celebrations. A lot of good soldiers had died on this
mission. Too many.

In the skies above, the Northern Lights flared. The
fluttering green streaks were created by light bouncing off the gases
of the upper atmosphere. Deckard stood and watched the lights, cast
in the ethereal awe of reality. The Arctic was beautiful and deadly
in some of the same ways as other parts of the world he had visited,
but none of those places combined beauty and desolation the way the
Arctic Circle did.

It was the emptiness, the lack of human presence that made the
Arctic so different. It was so quiet, just the sound of wind in his
ears. Without any artificial light sources, the stars in the sky were
brilliant, bold in a way that could never be observed in most parts
of the world. Craning his neck, Deckard looked straight up into the
sky. Above the Northern Lights, the Milky Way could be seen bubbling
amongst the stars.

Deckard smiled.

It was a good night to be alive.

Epilogue

Three days later

In a faraway land, a dark castle sat at the summit of a mountain.
Circular clouds the color of coal slowly spun in concentric circles
above, the occasional burst of lightning making the heavens glow.
Inside the castle, long halls made of fieldstone stretched into the
darkness, only illuminated by a few flickering torches.

The mage waited in one of the antechambers, breathing slowly,
waiting with his back turned toward the door. Soft footsteps
approached, only audible once they grew near, just inside the chamber
itself.

“I have been waiting for you,” the mage said.

“And I you,” the blade master replied.

The mage turned to face the blade master. The intruder stood
before him, bristling with weapons, blades, swords, knives, and
projectile weapons stashed in pouches and sheaths spread across his
entire body.

“You asked the weight of the cauldrons,” the mage said. “You
have my respect.”

“Did you really expect otherwise?”

The mage considered this for a moment.

“No, I did not.”

The blade master circled around the portal in the center of the
room.

“Jiahao mentioned you.”

The mage paused. “You faced him in combat?”

“Yes. You were close to Jiahao?” the blade master asked,
noting the mage’s hesitation.

“Yes.”

“Your son?”

“My grandson.”

“If it means anything to you, we fought in hand-to-hand
combat.”

The mage's eyes burned.

“Impossible.”

“It is true. He died a warrior’s death.”

The mage began to say something but stopped himself, forcing
restraint upon his words.

“Thank you.”

The blade master nodded his head slightly. “And now?”
he asked the mage.

“Now I must rearrange the pieces on the game board, reposition
my assets and judge their credibility against your own.”

“The game is the game.”

The mage smiled. “Then we play another round.” The mage
opened his mouth to speak, but the blade master dropped something on
the floor. It exploded into a cloud of smoke that filled the chamber
for an instant. By the time it cleared, the mage stood in his
antechamber alone. “So be it.”

Casting a spell, fog rose from the stone floor, quickly engulfing
the mage. Just as soon as the fog appeared, it dissipated, and the
stone chamber in the dark castle at the top of the mountain sat empty
and hollow.

There the castle remained quiet, waiting for another game.

Acknowledgements

Gray Matter Splatter
probably involved more research than
the past three Deckard novels combined. In the past I was able to
rely on a lot of personal experience, do some brushing up on certain
subjects, and make the plot work. In other cases, I was carrying out
other investigations that fed into the plot. But for this book, I had
to hit the books and ask a lot of friends for their help because of
the simple fact that I have never been to the Arctic and have no
experience in winter warfare.

I want to thank Dan and Matthew for their advice and guidance in
tightening up the tactics and equipment featured in
Gray Matter
Splatter
. I also want to thank my Ranger buddy, Isaiah Burkhart,
who helped me select the right types of skis, ice axes, and other
kit. Kevin Doherty’s advice was also immensely valuable on Arctic
and maritime matters. The great Chuck Rogers had some terrific advice
for me in regards to the plot and pacing of the novel—no easy task
for a book set in the high Arctic. I also owe a special thanks to
Jussi for sending me a handful of Finnish Arctic warfare manuals and
helping me translate parts of them.

Once again, Marc Lee came through with a bang-up amazing job on
the cover artwork and design. Marc’s talents go a long way to
making each of these books something different and special, at least
in my eyes. Thanks to Nate Granzow for his copy-editing skills,
something I’m much in need of. This book would be a shell of what
it is without his help.

Last, but certainly not least, I want to thank Benni for
supporting my work as a writer, tolerating me chipping away at this
book, even on weekends and so-called vacations.

Glossary

ACE: ammunition, casualties, equipment

ADM: Anti-personnel round for the 84mm Carl Gustav recoilless
rifle. The round expels 1,100 flechettes via gas pressure when fired.

AGS30: Russian 30mm automatic grenade launcher

AIS: Automatic Identification System

AK: Kalashnikov

AK-103: An updated form of the AK-47 rifle that can be fitted
with a variety of different optics

AK-47: Avtomat Kalashnikova-1947, following the standard Soviet
weapons naming convention. Avtomat means the type of rifle:
automatic. Kalashnikov comes from the last name of the inventor,
Mikhail Kalashnikov, and the year, 1947, is when the rifle went into
production. The AK-47 is the world’s most ubiquitous battle rifle,
having been used in virtually every conflict since the Cold War.

An-125: Large Russian-made cargo airplane

AO: area of operations

AT: anti-tank

BMEWS: the Ballistic Missile Early Warning System

C17: the C130’s big brother, can carry more equipment and
personnel

C27J: a smaller version of the C-130 transport aircraft

CANSOF: Canadian Special Operations Forces

CANSOFCOM: Canadian Special Operations Forces Command

CIA: Central Intelligence Agency

CIF: Commander’s In-Extremis Force

CNO: computer network operations

CONUS: continental United States

CP: control point

D&D: Dungeons and Dragons

Derna Bridge: MARSOC’s answer to Robin Sage, final cumulative
exercise

DOD: Department of Defense

DOE: Department of Energy

DShK: Soviet-era 12.7mm machine gun

EENT: End of Evening Nautical Twilight

ETA: estimated time of arrival

FBI: Federal Bureau of Investigation

FSB: Russian intelligence service

FSK: Norwegian special operations unit

GPS: Global Positioning System

GRU: Russian military intelligence

GSG-9: German police anti-terrorism unit

HE: high explosive

HF: high frequency

IED: improvised explosive device

IRGC: Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, elite unit of Iran

ISA: Intelligence Support Activity

ISIS: Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant

ISR: intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance

JDAM: Joint Direct Attack Munition

JSOC: Joint Special Operations Command

JTF2: Joint Task Force 2, Canadian special operations unit

JWICS: The Joint Worldwide Intelligence Communications System

KIA: killed in action

KSK: German Army special operations unit

LMV: Light Multi-role Vehicle

MARSOC: Marine Corps Special Operations Command

MBITR: Multiband Inter/Intra Team Radio

MIA: missing in action

Mk14: Six-shot 40mm grenade launcher

MMORPG: massive multiplayer online role-playing game

MRE: Meal Ready to Eat

MSS: Ministry of State Security, primary intelligence service
of China

MTSC: Marine Technical Surveillance Course

NATO: North Atlantic Treaty Organization

NORTHCOM: Northern Command

NRO: National Reconnaissance Office

NSA: National Security Agency

NVG: night vision goggles

OD: olive drab

PKM: Russian light machine gun

PMC: private military company

PT: physical training

PvP: player versus player

PVS-14: night vision monocular

Quds Force: a covert action unit within Iran’s Revolutionary
Guard Corps

RPG: rocket-propelled grenade

SCOPE: JSOC think tank

SEAL: SEa, Air, and Land. U.S. naval commandos.

SEAL Team Six: The U.S. Navy's elite counterterrorism unit

SITREP: situation report

SLLS: stop, look, listen, smell

SMVIED: suicide merchant vessel improvised explosive device.

SOG: Swedish Special Operations Task Group

SPG-9: 73mm recoilless rifle

SSE: sensitive site exploitation

Task Force 45: Italian special operations task force in
Afghanistan

UAV: unmanned aerial vehicle

UNS: universal night sight

VTC: video teleconference

XO: executive officer

Jack Murphy is an eight-year Army special operations veteran who
served as a sniper and team leader in 3rd Ranger Battalion, and as a
senior weapons sergeant on a military free fall team in 5th Special
Forces Group. Having left the military in 2010, he graduated from
Columbia with a BA in political science. Murphy is the author of
Reflexive Fire
,
Target Deck
,
Direct Action
, and
numerous non-fiction articles about weapons, tactics, special
operations, terrorism, and counterterrorism. He has appeared in
documentaries, national television, and syndicated radio.