Cold Blood. Alex Shaw

did you know that Kyiv is the birthplace of modern Russia?’

      ‘No.’ Arnaud turned in his seat.

      ‘Kyiv-Rus was the original capital of Russia almost a thousand years ago, long, long before the Tsars, the Bolsheviks and the Communists popped up. Back then it was populated by nomadic tribes.’

      Arnaud was impressed. ‘Did you study Russian history at uni?’

      Middleton smiled. ‘No. I saw it on the Discovery Channel.’

      Odessa Oblast, Ukraine, near the Transdniester border

      Bull looked through the kite sight. Nothing yet. He and his Brigada were watching and waiting. If all went to plan, this would be the first step. He shivered in the cold of the pre-dawn. It brought back memories of a lifetime ago…

      The chill of the Afghan night had all but disappeared, to be replaced by the weak warmth of dawn. In the half-light, the poppy field stretched ahead of them and west on the valley floor. A beautiful flower to some, but to others as deadly as any bomb. To the east, the unnamed village with its ramshackle huts. Bull lowered his binos and rubbed his eyes.

      His Spetsnaz assault group had been given specific orders: attack the village, eliminate all Mujahedeen, burn the poppy crop. His men, the true elite of the Red Army, were ready. They lay prone on the ridge, waiting. To Bull’s left and hidden in a dip, Captain Lesukov’s fire-support team had their mortars ready; to his right were Lieutenant Gorodetski, Sergeant Zukauskas and the rest of the Brigada. The plan was simple, brutal and effective. Lesukov’s men would commence shelling of the village, and then Bull’s team would move from house to house, picking off anyone and everyone who survived. Intelligence supplied by a local informant had said the village was a sham, nothing more than a base for Mujahedeen fighters and Arab Islamic mercenaries to grow and distribute the death that came from the poppy in the field. The Red Army could not let this continue in a ‘partner state’. Hence the unequivocal orders. Bull looked at Lesukov. ‘Start firing your mortars in two minutes.’

      Lesukov nodded. ‘Good luck.’

      Bull smiled. ‘Ivan, we are Spetsnaz. We make our own luck.’

      Bull’s men moved silently over the ridge and into the valley. Thumph. Thumph. Mortar shells whistled through the sky. There was sudden movement from the village. A robed figure appeared and looked directly at the ridge. He yelled, raised his rifle and fired into the sky. As he did so, an explosion tore the very earth from under his feet. More shells landed, flattening the Afghan houses and destroying the beauty of the new day. Then, as abruptly as they had started, they stopped.

      Bull’s men now swept through the carnage before them. The dead and dying littered the village; many had been asleep, others in the process of grabbing weapons. Several had fled to the fields and were chased down by rounds not even the fastest could outrun. Bull reached the building he knew housed the village elder. The roof was intact even though part of one wall was now missing. The old man was sitting on a crimson rug in the corner, his henna-red beard specked with dust. His eyes angry, he showed no fear. He waited until Lieutenant Gorodetski had entered the room behind Bull before speaking words of venom.

      ‘He says it is a trap; that we have all been tricked,’ Gorodetski translated. The old man jabbed at them with a bony finger. Gorodetski continued. ‘He says we are infidels, not men of our word, not men of honour.’

      ‘Enough.’ Bull stepped forward and crouched. ‘We are men of honour. We did not break our agreement.’ Drawing his revolver, Bull shot the elder in the face.

      Shocked, Gorodetski looked down at his captain. ‘Why?’

      Pashinski stared at the young officer. ‘He was Mujahedeen; that is all you need know.’

      An explosion behind, then another. Bull turned as Gorodetski backed out of the house. On the ridge above, the fire-support team were under attack. Gathering up his Brigada, Bull charged back towards Lesukov’s team. Reaching the ridge, wild rounds whistled past them. Lesukov’s men had been taken by surprise; a group of fighters numbering more than twenty had flanked them from the west. Lesukov fired controlled bursts from his Kalashnikov at the Afghan hordes. Of the team of eight, only he and two others were left.

      Zukauskas grabbed a mortar and turned it around to face the oncoming threat; one-handed, he dropped a mortar into the tube and fired. Unsighted, the bomb flew over the Mujahedeen and landed harmlessly, save for an explosion. Securing the tube on the ground, he sighted it while Gorodetski dropped in a new shell. This time the explosion landed just to the left of the advancing fighters. Some stopped, others carried on.

      Bull joined Lesukov. There was a grin on Lesukov’s face. ‘We make our own luck!’

      ‘No. We make it unlucky for them!’

      A sound from below brought Bull very much back to the present. He raised the kite sight and saw three trucks moving slowly along the rural road. Shifting his weight slightly he looked to his left and could make out the hunched figures of the militia’s SOCOL Eagle unit further down the incline in front of him. His lips formed a serpent-like smile as he depressed the switch on his covert transmitter twice. Seconds later, his ready signal was acknowledged by three bursts of static in his earpiece.

      On the valley floor the lead truck slowed and stopped. The driver stepped out and made a show of kicking the tyre in disgust. The two remaining trucks concertinaed and also stopped. Soon all three drivers were inspecting the ‘guilty tyre’. In the green haze of the night scope there was movement again as a larger but solitary truck appeared on the horizon, heading directly towards the convoy from the opposite direction. It joined them and the driver greeted his fellow truckers warmly and offered his help and advice.

      As Bull had hoped, the stationary convoy made too good a target to pass up. The armed members of the SOCOL appeared on the road below and advanced towards the drivers, weapons up. The second SOCOL group on the hill now stood and started down the incline on a ninety-degree approach to the target. Bull pressed his switch again. SOCOL’s ‘plan’ was going to plan. Here, twenty kilometres inside the Ukrainian border, they would intercept the latest arms shipment and punch a hole in this smuggling route. That was, until…

      Bull’s sign was met this time by two short, static bursts. From above and to the right, his men opened fire. A tracer flew towards the descending SOCOL ‘cut off’ group. Four fell without even knowing where their executioners were. The remaining two flung themselves down on the barren hillside and scrambled for the smallest piece of cover. On the road, the intercept team had just enough time to train their weapons. The lieutenant, whose reactions had been surprisingly rapid, managed to get off a single, low-velocity round from his pistol, which struck Driver Two square in his concealed Kevlar breastplate. Staggering back, he had fallen as Drivers One and Three let rip with armour-piercing rounds from short-barrelled AKs, all but cutting the officer in half. Further shots sought out the two attackers on the hill and the engagement was over within a minute. Like the Poznan anti-terrorist police a decade before, the Ukrainian SOCOL had met the Soviet Red Army Spetsnaz and lost. Bull stood, walked down the hill and joined his Brigada. The first part of his business deal had just gone through. He exchanged congratulatory glances with his men and retrieved a satellite phone from a padded pocket.

      Tiraspol, Transdniester

      Ivan Lesukov sat in the sauna and sweated. ‘You have done well, my friend. And the other half of the bargain? You are a real man of your word, Bull.’ He shut his flip phone and placed it on the wooden plank next to him.

      ‘They have done it?’ Arkadi Cheban was anxious to know.

      Lesukov beamed. ‘Yes, they have. The shipments will no longer be hampered by those Ukrainian “heroes”.’

      ‘That is great news, Uncle.’ Cheban used the term as a sign of respect. Lesukov was actually the uncle of his wife. He had married into the business, leaving his days of being an interpreter behind.

      Lesukov wiped his brow and looked at the younger man. He was ready. ‘We are expanding on all fronts, Arkadi, and I have a job for you.’ He