The Sniper and the Wolf (25 page)

65

BETHESDA NAVAL HOSPITAL,
Bethesda, Maryland

Pope kept one eye on the satellite feed while he spoke on the phone with Mark Vance, ex–Delta Force operator and CEO of the private military company Obsidian Optio. Obsidian deployed private mercenaries around the world, protecting various governmental and corporate interests. Chief among those interests were some of the world’s most vulnerable petroleum processing facilities. Gil was on Obsidian’s books as an employee but only as cover for a double hit he had carried out on two Al Qaeda terrorists in Morocco the year before.

“You say he’s where?” Vance asked.

“Just over the Georgian border into Russia,” Pope replied. “The Georgians are refusing to violate Russian airspace to pull him and his Spetsnaz partner out. So I need your people to fly in there and get them.”

“What about the Russians?” Vance said. “If the other guy is Spetsnaz, why don’t they pull them out?”

“It’s political,” Pope said. “Putin is making a point that I don’t have time to explain.”

“Well, Christ, Bob, we can’t violate Russian airspace.”

“You’ve got your own helos in Georgia that you’re using to patrol the BTC pipeline,” Pope said. “All you have to do is send a couple of them north for an hour or so and pull my guys out. Keep them close to the ground, and Russian radar will never even know they’re there.”

“Bob, that’s just not something we can do,” Vance insisted. “We can’t violate a country’s airspace like that.”

“You violated Brazilian airspace six months ago when your op to eliminate Joaquín Silva went bad.”

“That wasn’t us!” Vance said, obviously shocked by Pope’s knowledge of the operation. “And I resent the implication, Bob! Goddamnit! We’re on a telephone here!”

“It was you,” Pope said, his voice rising, “and I have the proof. Now, are you going to help me out, or I am going to share that proof with Brasília? I understand you’re about to sign one hell of an account with Telemar communications.” Telemar Participações, a $48 billion Brazilian telecommunications company, was the country’s third largest corporation. “It’d be a shame,” Pope said, “if the Brazilian government prevented that deal from going through.”

“Damn you, that’s blackmail!” Vance growled.

“It’s business,” Pope said icily. “And in case you haven’t gotten the news yet, I’ve just been appointed director of the CIA. So if you plan on continuing to do business with me, you’d better find a couple of pilots who know something about flying snake-and-nape, because I’ve got two men in the Valley of the Shadow badly in need of extraction!”

Vance was quiet for a long moment. “So you’re the head motherfucker in charge now,” he grumbled.

“That’s right,” Pope said. “And I understand you’ve got a Killer Egg stashed east of Tbilisi. You’d better send that along in support of the evac. It’s likely to be a hot EZ.” Killer Egg was the nickname
for a Boeing AH-6 Little Bird helicopter, heavily armed with rockets and Gatling guns.

“You know entirely too much about our operations,” Vance said. “How many of your people do you having working on the inside?”

“Are you going to get on the phone to your people in Tbilisi or not?” Pope said. “Time is running out for my men.”

“I’ll pull them out,” Vance growled, “but you can bet your ass I’ll be expecting a quid pro quo one day. This could cost us a helluva lot if it goes bad.”

“That’s why it’s so important,” Pope said. “I’ll have Midori call you immediately with the coordinates and the rest of the particulars.”

Pope hung up and called Midori, telling her what he wanted. Then he called the president at the Pentagon. “Mr. President, I’ve arranged for evac. You don’t have to bother with the Georgians anymore.”

“Who the hell did you get, Bob?”

“Obsidian Optio.”

“Obsidian! How in hell did you get Vance to agree to it?”

“I twisted his arm, Mr. President.”

“How’d you—never mind!” the president said. “I don’t want to know. Let’s just hope they get there in time.”

66

THE CAUCASUS MOUNTAINS

After agreeing to separate, Gil left Dragunov and moved carefully from cover to cover toward the south, allowing Kovalenko to catch glimpses of him but not enough to risk getting shot. He knew the Chechen was in the tree line on the far side of the valley, so, relatively speaking, the bullet would take a little bit longer to reach him. This extra bit of time would be measured in tenths of a second, but it was enough for Gil to leap between rocks or trees without having to worry about Kovalenko forcing a shot that could potentially expose his position. The biggest risk was that he might anticipate Gil’s movement, firing a split second before he made his dash, thus delivering the round in time to intercept him. For this reason, Gil had to be very careful to keep his movements jerky and unpredictable. It was a dangerous game, and if he played it too long, he would certainly be killed.

The plan was for Gil to draw Umarov’s men southeast of Dragunov’s position. This would put their backs to Dragunov and allow him to start picking them off without immediate danger from Kova
lenko. And this would force Kovalenko to make a choice: either let them escape or begin maneuvering against two different sniper positions at the same time. Gil had no doubt he would choose the latter.

The bulk of Umarov’s men had reached the stream by this time, and it was apparent from the size of the force that additional reinforcements had arrived. There were at least a hundred men maneuvering through the trees and around the boulders. The fighters at the front of the advance had spotted Gil’s movement, and they took the occasional potshot at him as he darted from cover to cover.

After traveling a few hundred meters around the eastern rim of the valley, Gil was forced to pause, having arrived at a particularly wide gap in the trees, where a large fissure cut down through the slope like a firebreak. The fissure was four feet across and five feet deep. He could leap across it easily, but the jump would give Kovalenko time enough to blow him away. He crouched with his back to the rock and thought about the Chechen sitting in his hide across the valley, undoubtedly licking his chops as he waited for Gil to make the obligatory leap of faith.

He envisioned himself in Kovalenko’s position, eye to the scope, watching the left side of the fissure for the first hint of movement, then squeezing the trigger, delivering the bullet at the same instant Gil landed on the far side.

Gil darted halfway from behind the rock and pulled back quickly. A bullet struck the rocky ground on the far side of the fissure, kicking up dust, and Gil lunged forward again, throwing himself across the fissure and diving onto his belly behind another rock. A second bullet nicked the heel of his boot as he pulled his legs to safety.

Kovalenko would be cursing him now, and Gil stuck his middle finger up over the rock for a half second and pulled it back. A third round stuck the rock and ricocheted with a whine.

“Good, you’re pissed,” Gil muttered. “Wait till you find out Ivan’s still alive.”

The first group of Umarov’s men had arrived within effective AK-47 range about a hundred yards down the slope, and it wasn’t
more than ten seconds before Dragunov’s first shot rang out across the valley, cutting down a man in the midst of shouting orders to pick up the pace.

Gil scrambled from behind the rock into the trees, where the cover was more substantial. Dragunov fired again, and another Chechen toppled over about seventy yards downhill, shot in the small of the back.

Gil hunkered in with his own SVD. He placed the PSO-1’s unique T-shaped reticle on the face of the next Chechen in line and squeezed the trigger. The bullet struck the man in the left eye and blew out the back of his head. The body spun a tight pirouette to the ground, and the sight had a chilling effect on the rest of the skirmishers, sending them scrambling for cover behind rocks and in shallow depressions. Nothing demoralized infantry like sniper fire.

Gil now had a good estimate of the angle from which Kovalenko was firing, and he knew he would be safe behind the tree until Kovalenko could displace for a better shot. He concerned himself with a pair of Chechens who’d taken cover in a shallow defilade a hundred yards downslope. The two men were pouring AK-47 fire into the trees off to the left. He placed the reticle on the forehead of the first guy, allowing for the drop of the bullet, and squeezed the trigger, blowing off the top of his head. Then Gil shifted a hair to the right and shot the second one through the center of the face. The head snapped back and then forward again, smacking against the ground.

Another, braver pair of Chechens attempted to maneuver uphill through a dense copse of trees, and Gil was about to squeeze the trigger when Dragunov—who must have worried that Gil couldn’t see them—shot one through the pelvis. The Chechen went down screaming, and Gil shot him through the head.

The other guy panicked and darted from the trees on the far left side, where Dragunov would not have a shot at him. Gil led him six inches and squeezed the trigger, hitting him in the left temple and blowing out his eyes. He swung back to the right and shot another man in the face just as he was stealing a peek from behind a boulder.
The body fell from behind the rock, and an arm reached out to grab him. Gil shot it off at the elbow.

“Looks like you’re gonna need some help with those ketchup bottles from now on, partner.”

Bullets splintered the tree limbs just above him, and he marked the shooter two hundred yards downslope behind another rock. The rock wasn’t very large, but Gil could see only the barrel of the rifle and the top of the shooter’s camouflaged cap. He squeezed the trigger. The round hit the forestock of the AK-47 and ricocheted into the Chechen’s eye.

The wounded man jumped up and ran away downhill.

Gil let him go, knowing his bloody retreat would have a detrimental effect on the morale of the men farther downslope.

“Okay,” he muttered. “Two more rounds before I take this show back on the road.”

A bullet passed through a two-inch gap in the rocks to Gil’s right, tearing a chunk from the tree just beyond his nose. It was a round that could have come only from Kovalenko. “Fuck me!” he said, pulling back. “Time to go!”

67

THE CAUCASUS MOUNTAINS

Scanning the tree line to the west in search of Kovalenko, Dragunov spotted Dokka Umarov instead, more than four hundred meters away. The Chechen rebel leader was watching the hunt for the American through a pair of binoculars, with only three men for security. Dragunov knew him from the long beard, and he couldn’t believe his luck at suddenly having Russia’s most hated enemy in his crosshairs.

Eye to the scope, he placed the crossbar of the T slightly above Umarov’s head to allow for the drop of the bullet, expecting a solid torso shot. He was about to squeeze off the round when a .338 Lapua Magnum slammed into his right side, penetrating the side panel of his armor and tumbling as it tore through his abdominal muscles. Dragunov recoiled from the impact, throwing himself downhill to avoid being hit again, rolling into a cleft between the rocks, and gripping his abdomen.

In agony, he dug a fentanyl “lollipop” from his aid kit and stuck
it into his mouth for the pain. The fentanyl, seventy-five times more potent than morphine, would take effect within five minutes. Until then he would be a sitting duck for anyone who came to finish him off, so he drew his pistol and waited.

KOVALENKO KNEW THAT
Dragunov was severely wounded this time and would die soon. He picked up the ORSIS rifle and pulled back into the forest, where he could maneuver freely without having to worry about the American. He hadn’t been able to get a clear sight picture on Gil, so he had fired through a tiny gap in the rocks at five hundred meters, knowing that he would hit close enough to scare the American into displacing. Then he had taken out Dragunov by easily hitting a six-inch gap in the trees from two hundred meters.

Now, with only one sniper to worry about, Kovalenko was free to maneuver south and wait for Gil to expose himself. Since he had forced the American out of his sniper’s nest, the Chechen infantry had gained the high ground to Gil’s rear. Soon it would be in the trees, where he would no longer enjoy the advantage of firing over hundreds of meters of open killing ground. All Kovalenko had to do was get into position by the time Gil was forced from the trees on the south end of the woods. He picked up the pace until he came to Umarov’s position and took cover behind a large pine.

“You shouldn’t stand out there exposed like that, Dokka.”

“I’ve told him,” said Basayev. “It doesn’t do any good.”

Umarov took his eyes away from the binoculars and glanced over his shoulder at Kovalenko. “Where have you been?”

“Killing Dragunov.”

“Good. Now get ready to kill the American. The wolves are in the trees with him now, and he’ll soon be flushed out the other end.”

The firing on the far side of the valley picked up, and they could hear the chatter of Gil’s AN-94 answering that of numerous AK-47s and RPKs.

“He’s falling back fast now,” Basayev said. “Running out of cover.”

Kovalenko emerged from the trees, shrugging out of the hot ghillie suit down to the waist. He took up a firing position on his belly beside a fallen tree and popped the lens caps on the scope. He was able to catch glimpses of Gil falling back through the trees, but it was obvious that even now Gil was conscious of being under a sniper’s watchful eye. He never stopped on the downhill side of a tree or a rock to leave himself exposed but was always careful to keep something between him and the west side of the valley.

“Do you have a shot?” Umarov asked.

“No,” Kovalenko said. “He’s very good . . . but another sixty seconds, and that won’t matter.”

“Do you hear that?” Basayev said suddenly, looking up into the sky.

Gil had run out of room to retreat. He took to one knee, his back to the open spaces, and fired the last of his 40 mm grenades. The grenade exploded and took out three men as they maneuvered beneath a jutting rock formation. He assumed that Dragunov must be dead—otherwise the men now chasing him through the trees would never have gained the high ground so quickly—and he assumed equally that Kovalenko would be waiting on the far side of the valley to shoot him the second he broke from the trees. A look over his shoulder told him the closest possible cover was a blunt outcropping of rock more than fifty yards away. The outcrop would barely conceal him from Kovalenko, much less from the Chechens now pursuing him at such close range.

“End of the fuckin’ line,” he muttered, smacking a magazine into the AN-94 and flipping the weapon over in his hands. He plucked his only smoke grenade from his harness and pulled the pin, tossing it out in front of him. A thick cloud of green smoke formed quickly and concealed his position from the enemy.

Believing that Gil was using the smoke to cover his retreat over open country, the Chechens charged after him pell-mell and were met by withering fire from Gil’s AN-94. He lobbed his last hand grenade into their midst and blew them off their feet. Those who
survived fell back through the smoke and continued to fire blindly in his direction.

Gil slapped in his last magazine and readied himself for the smoke to clear, deciding that no way in hell was he going to allow Kovalenko the privilege of delivering the coup de grâce. He would die with the infantry.

THE SKY OVERHEAD
was suddenly filled with the whine of a T63-A turboshaft engine. A fast moving black OH-6 Cayuse attack helicopter—the vaunted Killer Egg—swooped in over his position and fired a spread of 70 mm Hydra rockets, decimating the advancing Chechens.

Ex–New Zealand Special Air Service pilot Kip Walker then yanked the stick left, rolling out west over the valley. “That should buy ’im a minute while we ’andle this bloody sniper,” he grunted. “I don’t want the bloke shooting us in the bloody ass.”

“He’s up and moving!” said the copilot, watching Kovalenko on the infrared monitor.

The FLIR scope mounted beneath the front of the Killer Egg had picked up the prone sniper as they swept in over the ridge, and Walker had poured on the speed to avoid being hit as they flew across Kovalenko’s field of vision. Now they were flying directly at him.

Walker lined up the helo and fired the twin GAU-19 Gatling guns hanging off either side of the aircraft.

Anzor Basayev’s body exploded from the hydrostatic shock of the .50 caliber rounds, splattering Umarov with gore as he scrambled into the trees hot on the heels of the fleeing Kovalenko. Another burst from the Gatling guns, and both of Umarov’s security men exploded on either side of him. He fell forward onto his face as the Killer Egg swept overhead and banked hard to the south.

Kovalenko stopped short and ran back to help Umarov to his feet. “They have infrared. We have to keep running!”

Walker banked the helo over the valley, checking the infrared to
make sure that Gil was still alive and in the same position before firing another spread of rockets into the trees in order to flush dozens of Chechens out into the open. He pulled the stick back and to the left, working the foot pedals to slew the helo around and bring his guns immediately to bear on the enemy below. The adrenaline rush of operating over Russian territory was greater than any he’d ever experienced.

He put the helo down on the deck and squeezed the triggers as he swooped in on the scattered enemy, cutting them apart like a buzz saw.

“Get on the talker to Mason!” he shouted into the headset. “Get the Pum’er in ’ere! We don’t wanna be around if the damn Russians show up.”

The copilot got on the radio and called in the Puma transport helicopter that was holding station on the far side of the ridge.

Walker dropped the helo back to the deck for a final attack run.

Gil watched the helo mow down the rest of the enemy. Then he ran to grab an AK-47. A lone Chechen stood up from behind a rock, firing an RPK at almost point-blank range. Gil jumped inside the horizontal arch of fire and grabbed the long barrel of the machine gun under his arm, slugging the Chechen in the face and jerking the weapon from his hands.

The Chechen fell back a step and pulled a knife. Gil charged and smashed him over the head with the barrel of the RPK, splitting his skull as another Chechen stepped from behind a tree and shot him in the back. Gil fell forward, catching himself with his hands and grabbed the dead Chechen’s knife. He spun around and hurled it. The gunner ducked and fired again, missing as Gil sprang to his feet and rushed him, pulling his own knife.

The Chechen swung his AK like a ball bat and struck Gil a glancing blow across the top of the helmet. Gil slammed into him and drove the knife deep into the guy’s side. The Chechen screamed in Gil’s face, trying to wrestle free of his grasp. The two fell over as
one and rolled downhill, slugging away at each other. They came to a stop against a tree. The Chechen clawed for Gil’s eyes, and Gil caught a finger in his teeth and bit down, pulling the knife free and stabbing the man over and over again until he quit moving.

Smelling that the Chechen had soiled himself in death, Gil rolled off and drew his pistol, waiting to see if there were any more holdouts. When he felt confident there were none, he staggered out into the sun to see an all-black twin-engine Puma helicopter setting down on a level patch of ground halfway between him and where he had left Dragunov. Six heavily armed men jumped out of the helo and formed a defensive perimeter, two of them armed with sniper rifles.

The Killer Egg remained on station five hundred feet above, its infrared-detecting eyeball keeping a careful watch on the surrounding terrain.

Gil was trotting toward the Puma when he saw a green cloud of smoke forming in the trees at the north end of the valley.

One of the snipers ran out to meet him. “Chief Shannon? I’m Doug Mason. I was with SEAL Team I from 2010 to 2013.”

Gil saw the helo had no markings of any kind, not even a tail number. “Who the hell are you guys?”

“Obsidian Optio. Better load up, Chief. We don’t have permission to be here.”

Gil pointed north. “That green smoke yonder is my man. He’s wounded.”

Mason glanced over at the smoke two hundred yards off. “Okay, Chief. We’ll get him.”

They loaded up, and the Puma flew along the ground, getting as close at it could to Dragunov’s position before setting down again. Gil and three other men dismounted and climbed up through the rocks to where Dragunov lay in the sun, soaked in his own blood. He had managed to crawl from the cleft in the rocks, but he hadn’t made it very far.

The Russian managed a weak smile. “You’re alive.”

“So are you.” Gil checked his wound and saw that his abdomen was torn open from left to right. “We gotta get you outta here, Ivan.”

The four of them lifted him up and carried him down to the helo.

“What about Kovalenko?” Dragunov asked as they hurried along.

“He got away,” Gil said. “Unless the helo got him.”

They set Dragunov down on the deck of the Puma and climbed in after him. Dragunov grabbed Gil’s arm. “Kovalenko wouldn’t be killed by a helicopter.”

“I know it.” Gil saw a pack on the bench seat with a SEAL Team trident sewn to the side of it. “This your kit?” he asked Mason.

“Yeah. Why?”

“Gimme your rifle,” he said, grabbing up the pack. “I have a mission to complete.”

“What are you talking about? They sent us in to pull you guys outta the fire.”

“Well, the fire’s out now,” Gil said. “And the last thing that fucker will expect is me coming after him.”

“What fucker? Chief, you’re bleeding!”

“Call Pope and tell him to have me picked up at the bridge crossing into Georgia as originally planned.”

Mason was confounded. “What the fuck are you talking about? Who the hell is Pope?”

“Your superiors will know.” Gil took the McMillan TAC-338 sniper rifle from Mason’s hands.

“That’s my personal weapon.”

“Good. It should already be sighted in, then. If I get whacked, tell Pope I said to buy you a new one.”

“What the fuck?”

“Let’s go!” shouted the helo pilot. “We’re here too long! We gotta go!”

Gil jumped out, shouldering the pack. “How much food I got in this thing?”

“Three days’ rations,” Mason said. “You’re insane, you know that?”

“We gotta go!” the pilot shouted again, terrified of being caught on the ground by a Russian Hind.

Gil placed a bloody hand on Dragunov’s forehead. “I think Putin wants Kovalenko to get away. How about you?”

Dragunov smiled. “Watch yourself. I’m pretty sure he’s wearing a leshy suit.” A leshy was a mythical Russian beast capable of changing its shape to blend in with the forest.

Gil winked and stepped back from the helo with a wave to Mason, and the Puma lifted into the air. Within sixty seconds, he was all alone in the valley and running up through the rocks to retrieve Dragunov’s AN-94, along with his ammo and grenades.