Cold War Reprise

She gathered her nerves, then walked into Batroykin’s office. The bald, pasty gnome glanced up at her, his beady eyes looking at how her skirt hugged her athletic but still curvaceous hips, eyes lingering down to her feet clad in short-heeled pumps.

Laserka cleared her throat. “You called me, sir?”

“Have a seat, Kaya,” Batroykin offered, waving his hand to a chair in front of his desk. He made no bones about the leer he directed at her toned, muscular calves.

Laserka took the offered seat, in no mood to raise a fuss over his obvious sexual harassment. In fact, she was hoping to capitalize on it to keep her out of trouble. For the man-blob’s sake, she even crossed her legs to give him a good show. It was callous to appeal to Batroykin’s lechery to lessen any harsh punishment she may have incurred by snooping online for news about Vitaly Alexandronin and his wife, but surviving in a Russian bureaucracy was a deadly chess game. “You sent a warning to me about a news article I looked up? The murder of Vitaly Alexandronin?”

“Actually, it was the article about the brutal attack on a defected reporter in London,” Batroykin said. “A hyperlink in an e-mail you opened today.”

“Oh, because I had done a little digging. Alexandronin was found dead earlier this morning,” Laserka replied.

Batroykin showed interest in the form of a worm-like white eyebrow arching on his puttylike brow. “So you weren’t contacted by the traitor? He didn’t try to ask for your help in determining the assassination of his wife? After all, you had been his partner for the first year of your career.”

“My training officer, not my partner, sir,” she lied. “How would you like being condescended to every day for eight hours?”

“How am I sure you’re not talking down to me right now?” Batroykin asked.

Laserka sighed, letting her so-called superior get a look at the low neckline of her blouse, purposefully unbuttoned to reveal her freckled cleavage. She caught a glint of delight in the old gnome’s eye, his pink, slug-like tongue glistening as he licked his lips. She spoke again, drawing his attention back to her face. “Because, sir, we have always had a good relationship. Or your approval of my performance has lead me to believe.”

She threw in her best seductive smile, then gave her lower lip a light bite.

Batroykin watched her with rapt appreciation, then cleared his throat. “So, do you know who had sent you the article about Catherine Rozuika?”

“I had asked when he first started these updates, but he evaded the question,” Laserka continued to lie. Having had over a decade and a half to develop a good cover story for the mystery e-mails, should they have been discovered, gave her more than sufficient practice to let the misinformation roll off her tongue. She hated to be duplicitous about her connection to Alexandronin and his wife, but the truth might cost her more than a paycheck.

She could always get another job, but she only had one brain for an irate hard-liner to put a bullet into.

“Any suspicions?” Laserka asked.

“Many loyal agents were purged from Russian Intelligence in the wake of Alexandronin’s exile,” Laserka said. “I have a list of four possible former operatives who would rightfully bear a grudge against him. It’s on my computer.”

“You mean this list, Kaya?” Batroykin asked, handing her a slip of paper. He had likely hoped to surprise her into revealing any inconsistencies in her story, but Laserka had purposefully constructed the list and her notes to maintain her secrecy with Alexandronin. “It is a very thorough research on your part.”

“I wanted to be able to present the bona fides of these e-mails if they resulted in something important,” Laserka explained. “I know how you prefer to have solid intelligence from reliable sources. Your thoroughness is legendary, sir.”

Batroykin showed a flash of ego gratification at her statement. “You are an excellent agent, my dear. I’m certain that I can make your inappropriate Internet usage into some vital information that I required. After all, what is your job?”

“Intelligence agent, sir,” Laserka answered, putting a small tinge of bubbliness into her voice.

Batroykin nodded, the magnanimous king of this particular cubicle farm, passing his approval down to a loyal serf. “Precisely, my dear.”

He got up, waddling around the desk to rest his plump hands on her shoulders. Laserka tried not to laugh at the similarity of this situation to western “sexual harassment training” videos. He gave her shoulders a squeeze that was likely meant to be soothing and seductive, but it was more like a mentally challenged farm boy trying to cuddle a kitten and crushing it inadvertently to death. She winced and restrained the urge to rake his face with her fingernails. For all his apparent softness, the squat gnome of a man had a grip like a vise.

“Why don’t you take the rest of the day off, Kaya?” he suggested softly. “Perhaps go shopping for something nice to wear this weekend.”

“Why? What’s happening then?” Laserka asked, genuinely curious.

“I have to attend a formal gala for a ranking party member,” Batroykin replied. “It’s mostly an official invitation. I’d prefer to have a winsome, but skilled operative with me than my wife. In case the Chechens decide to cause unnecessary drama at the event.”

Laserka resisted the urge to roll her eyes. She and other female agents had been on these “escort missions” before, and they always ended up with skimpy dresses and unwanted gropes under their skirts. “I’m honored, sir. But my paycheck has already been spent.”

Batroykin returned to his seat behind the desk, pulling out a small plastic card. “Since this is an official sortie, you can use an agency purchase card.”

Laserka raised an eyebrow, taking the plastic.

“Dismissed, Kaya,” Batroykin said. “Oh, and my preference is for red, backless dresses. And make it a good one. These are important people, and they’ll know cheap off-the-rack crap at first blush.”

“Thank you, sir,” Laserka replied, wondering how she could get out of attending the function.

T RYING TO FIND A TRENDY and affordable backless dress in Moscow was hardly something that Kaya Laserka was familiar with. She would have had better luck locating a five kilogram package of Afghan Black Tar heroin or a cache of smuggled Heckler & Koch submachine guns. She sent out a few calls to friends on her cell phone, but the circles she ran in on the few brief moments she spent off the job were equally clueless about where to find something scarlet, slinky and fashionable. Finally, her friend Bertie gave her a suggestion that bordered on life saving.

“Why not give one of your informants a call? They should know where to find at least knockoffs of big-name dresses,” Bertie said. “Your boss wants skin and curves, not a label. He wouldn’t know Dior if the designer himself bit him and sang a chorus of ‘I’m a fancy dress I am!’”

“My hero,” Laserka said.

So here Laserka was, standing outside a warehouse that was a covert marketplace for smuggled goods from outside of Russia. Though capitalism and western retail had invaded Moscow with a vengeance, despite the political backslide of the current administration, the black market was still prosperous, usually having better prices than the state-and foreign-owned department stores, as well as a better selection. Laserka had changed out of her office wear, which would have labeled her as a government official of some sort. Instead, she wore a black turtleneck, a hooded sweatshirt with an unauthorized rhinoceros logo on one lapel, and a pair of knockoff jeans that hugged her long, athletic legs. She kept her pistol on hand, in a small black leather purse just large enough to hold the compact weapon and two spare magazines.

There were a couple of burly men at the side door to the warehouse, their build and alertness pegging them as former Russian army, probably hired as much for their size as for their military training to serve this particular clandestine market. Laserka walked up to the pair as they glowered at her. “Is the store open?”

One man’s eyes narrowed as if rusted gears struggled to motivate in his primitive skull. “Are you police?”

It was a standard challenge. If a buyer entered, denying his or her law-enforcement status, any evidence gathered on such an excursion was considered inadmissible to the well-bribed Russian judiciary. If Laserka did admit she was a cop, any purchase she made would be used against her by proprietors if she had to testify against them.

Since Laserka’s department dealt mainly with narcotics and military-grade weaponry, not jeans or watches, she grinned. “Off duty. I need a dress.”

The two hulking goons looked at each other, then chuckled. “Come on in, Off-duty.”

“Make sure you give us a good look when you try your dress on,” the other said with a leer.

Laserka winked and squeezed past the two hired muscle and entered the warehouse.

Inside, all she found were empty tables. Confusion seized Laserka for a moment. Certainly the proprietors toured a series of abandoned buildings to keep ahead of the Moscow police, but her informant, Vladimir, had said that the bazaar would be at this location today. It took only a few heartbeats to scan the empty warehouse for signs of life, and she whirled toward the doorway she’d just entered. She saw one of the six foot ex-Army hulks blocking the doorway, a wicked spring-blade knife locked in his hand.

Laserka leaped over an empty table, knowing she couldn’t get to her concealed Makarov in time. The sound of the knife spring echoed in the old warehouse as a four inch spear-point blade rocketed out of the handle. The razor-sharp tip plucked at the hood of her sweatshirt as she dropped out of sight.

“You and that spring knife!” the other thug snarled, shoving his way into the warehouse. He held a suppressed pistol.

“Mine makes less noise,” Spring-blade said, but he traded his empty handle for a more standard blade, a wickedly curved jambiya Arab-style knife.

The gunman grunted and triggered his handgun, bullets chasing after Laserka as she kept low, scrambling along the aisle of abandoned tables. “Stand still, Off-duty! It won’t hurt so much!”

The off-duty RIA agent flipped a table on its side as a barricade against the pistol-toting killer. Robbed of power by the suppressor they passed through, the slowed bullets plunked limply against the aluminum tabletop. The shield gave her the time to pull her Makarov from her purse. With a flick of her thumb, the pistol was live and ready to fire. She rolled out into the open and sighted on the gun-toting assassin. The gunman hadn’t expected Laserka to take the low road, firing from prone. He had been waiting for her to pop over the top of her barricade.

The Makarov barked twice, bullets punching into the would-be murderer’s center of mass. The hot little 9 mm rounds cracked the big man’s sternum, but their impact only seemed to stagger him. Laserka swung her aim up to the middle of the stunned thug’s face and cranked off two more shots that obliterated the goon’s face.

The table barricade rattled loudly as it was slapped aside by the burly knife man.

“You’re supposed to die, bitch!” the thug roared, lunging at her.

Laserka rolled, firing one shot at the blade-wielding killer as her Makarov passed across him. She was rewarded by a cry of pain from the raging slasher. The big killer landed on the concrete floor, the jambiya jarred from his fingers as he landed. Laserka was struggling to her feet when a massive paw wrapped around her gun hand.

Training took over and Laserka let herself be pulled in closer to her large opponent. With his strength adding to her momentum, she powered an elbow into the hollow of the burly assassin’s throat. The jolt was enough to shock him into releasing her arm. Laserka stumbled back, raising the Makarov again.

The pistol barked three times, recoil trying to wrest her off target, but Laserka held on tightly, punching the last of her magazine through her opponent’s face.

Panting, Laserka denied a wave of relief that wanted to pass through her. She reloaded her gun quickly.

Batroykin and Vladimir had set her up to be murdered.

CHAPTER FOUR

Bolan slapped the cheek of his prisoner, trying to get him to wake up. It was a relatively gentle action, but the assassination team leader bit down hard. The head killer had only started to blink with returning consciousness when something crunched in his back teeth. The sound of the breaking capsule, combined with a sudden fit of convulsions had Bolan rushing to pry the man’s mouth open. It was too late, almond-smelling foam bubbling out of the dead man’s mouth.

The corpse’s eyes rolled up in his head, and Bolan cursed that he didn’t have time to retrieve the other unconscious death squad member that he had left behind the bar. Taking a paper towel, Bolan cleaned up the dead man’s mouth, wiping bubbling drool from his lips. Pulling out his PDA, Bolan clicked a picture of the lifeless face. As an afterthought, he took the dead fingers and dipped them into ink from a broken pen and used a sheet of complimentary stationery to record the corpse’s fingerprints.

Bolan looked over the Uzi and the magazines he’d confiscated in the assassination attempt. He took some clear adhesive tape and laid it along the bodies of the magazines, then laid out the strips on more plain white paper. Close examination of the tape picked up three or four good, readable fingerprints. The warrior took a moment to compare the results with the prints taken off the corpse sitting limply in the chair. To his sharp eyes, they appeared different enough to be worth copying and transmitting back to Stony Man Farm. Thanks to the science of forensics, Bolan was able to disprove the adage, “dead men tell no tales.”

Bolan linked up with Aaron Kurtzman at Stony Man Farm in the electronic ether utilizing his wireless secured broadband connection from his laptop.

“I thought you told Hal that you were going on vacation,” Kurtzman said without preamble.

“It turned into a busman’s holiday,” Bolan confessed. “A friend of mine ended up on the receiving end of a Russian-speaking murder team.”

“Russian speaking? That will narrow down the database to compare these faces to,” Kurtzman replied. “Oh, you’ve got fingerprints, too?”

“Grabbed some enemy weapons. The prints came along with the spare ammunition,” Bolan explained. “Scotland Yard have anything yet on the bodies I left at the docks?”

“The dead are at the morgue at the East Metropolitan Police crime laboratory,” Kurtzman said. “Eight, including your friend. You said you left another behind? There aren’t any reports of suspects in custody.”

“Run the latent prints first, then,” Bolan requested. “The magazine came from his harness. It might help me track him down.”

“Running them through both IAFIS and its Interpol counterpart,” Kurtzman replied, referring to the Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System maintained by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. “Think of any other databases to check them against?”

“These people were well-trained, so try to hack into the Russian Defense Department,” Bolan suggested. “All records, even the closed files.”

“That would take a lot more time,” Kurtzman said. “We’re not dealing with a state-of-the-art U.S. agency’s computer system.”

“I figured as much,” Bolan answered. “I’m going to check with a few friends I have here in the Metropolitan Police. Maybe they have some suggestions for London’s Russian immigrant crime problem.”

“Hal won’t be particularly pleased with you hitting up old contacts. You’re not supposed to exist, Striker,” Kurtzman warned.

“Then don’t tell Hal. I’ve been around the globe hundreds of times. The folks I’ve met are the same people who make me seem almost omniscient,” Bolan said. “Computer hacking and satellite photography aren’t the only ways for someone to gather information.”

“What about your prisoner?” Kurtzman asked. “Is he doing any talking?”

“Only if Hell has its own version of Saint Peter as a receptionist,” Bolan replied. “He bit down on a cyanide capsule.”

“That’s old-school,” Kurtzman commented. “Haven’t seen a Russian bite down on one of those in ages.”

“He woke up as my prisoner, wrists tied. Plus, we were in a dark garage,” Bolan pointed out. “He probably thought I was going to hook his nipples or testicles up to a live battery.”

“Water boarding is the new vogue,” Kurtzman said. “Less painful and less chance of death.”

“Neither way is my style,” Bolan countered. “But how was he to know that?”

“Truth told,” Kurtzman said. “The Russian defense records are a garbled mess. I doubt the programmers have even heard of indexing software. That even presumes all of those fingerprints are stored electronically and not in metal filing cabinets.”

“What about IAFIS and Interpol?” Bolan asked.

“Scan’s still running,” Kurtzman replied. “This is real life. These checks don’t happen as quickly as a commercial break, Striker.”

“Give me a call on my PDA, then. I’ve got people to run down,” Bolan said.

“Keep your powder dry, Striker,” Kurtzman said, logging off.

Bolan went to the car and took out his standard concealed carry harness, replacing the Storm with his familiar Beretta 93R machine pistol and the rifle-accurate and powerful .44 Magnum Desert Edge. With a death squad on the loose in the streets of London, informed of his interference, the Executioner knew that it was time to load up for bear.

In this particular case, the ursine was a breed Bolan had hunted before, a ghost species he’d hoped had disappeared with the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Unfortunately, the Soviet Bear was still a living, vital threat, and its predatory hunger had claimed the lives of two of Bolan’s old allies.

Hunting season was on again.

T HE LADY DETECTIVE was still pretty, Bolan reflected as he folded his tall frame into the passenger seat of the compact car she’d driven to the rendezvous.

“Gunfight at night, then you ring me up. There’s got to be a better way to arrange a date with me,” she said.

Bolan smiled. “I missed you, too, detective. How’s your partner?”

“Back at the station. Care to mention anything about the bodies you piled up?” the detective inquired.

“Russian speakers. Well-armed and coordinated,” Bolan said. “They were skilled, too.”

The detective shrugged, brushing back her golden hair. “Not skilled enough. You’re alive.”

“They hit their intended target,” Bolan confessed. “Vitaly Alexandronin.”

“Familiar name. I didn’t catch that particular case, but his wife was a reporter who ended up beaten into a coma,” the lady cop replied. “Case ended up with dead ends, but it stunk like a pile of rotted fish.”

“Vitaly told me he felt she was assassinated because she was snooping into Chechen refugees, picking up stories about the government’s crackdown on the rebels,” Bolan told her. “I didn’t leave too much behind, but you examine those guys. There might be links between them and Catherine.”

“They took out the wife in a beating, but brought machine guns and rockets for the husband?” the detective asked. Her lips pursed in disbelief.

“Vitaly was KGB and Russian Intelligence. He spent time doing all manner of dangerous things for his country before he offended the old guard,” Bolan explained.

“That begins to make sense,” the cop said. She sighed. “I remember when I got involved in one of your operations. My sister ended up dead and we had to drop my partner off at an emergency room. I still feel the ache in my ribs when it gets rainy and cold.”

“Rainy and cold in London? Ever think of moving to Jamaica?” Bolan asked.

“Sure, and then you show up down there hunting heroin smugglers, and zombie lords pop out of the woodwork,” the detective mused out loud. “Running afoul of Bloody Jack was enough horror movie for one lifetime, thank you.”

Bolan shrugged. “Is the coroner still our old friend from that case?”

“No, he retired,” the lady cop confessed. “It’d be a new guy who might actually be fooled by your identification.”

“Is he skilled, though? I’d hate to run a wild-goose chase because I couldn’t get the right info from forensics,” Bolan replied.

“Metro Homicide’s medical examiners aren’t complete primates in comparison to your flashy American crime solvers,” the woman quipped. She took a deep breath, looking out the windshield at the alley they were parked in. “I’m sorry I exploded all over you that night, Cooper.”

Bolan rested a comforting hand on her shoulder. “I know exactly how you felt. Remember, I had my sister murdered, as well.”

“Do you need any hands-on help with this?” she asked.

Bolan shook his head. “I don’t have any support on this one. It’s a personal mission.”

“So then you do need an extra gun hand,” she offered.

“I appreciate it, but I’ve seen enough friends die in the past few hours. The next time I blow through London, I promise if it’s a quiet trip…”

“We’ll have tea together?” the detective asked. She drew Bolan in for a tight hug. She felt the bulk of Bolan’s gun under his jacket. “Your life never works out that way, Cooper. Even if you do make it back here, you won’t have quiet time to spare.”

Bolan nodded. “True. Just take care of yourself, Mel.”

“I’d say the same for you, but…” She handed a small notebook to the warrior. “This is everything our Russian mob expert had on the local families. Might want to check out the Borscht Bolt. It’s a restaurant-turned-club for the Slavic set.”

Bolan smiled. “This won’t get back to your superiors?”

“After our last dance through this town, I’m bulletproof.” She started the car as Bolan climbed out.

She sighed. “Don’t make too much of a mess for me, Cooper.”

Bolan waved to the woman as she drove off. She was one hell of a good cop. He wished her safe travels until they met again.

T HE E XECUTIONER PULLED UP to the London Metropolitan Police Crime Laboratory and Forensic Science center. He secured his car and slipped his identification from his war bag. The badge identified him as Special Agent Matt Cooper of the FBI. Brognola would be put out to know that Kurtzman and Stony Man coordinator Barbara Price had set him up as being an interested party in the deaths of suspected Russian organized crime figures in London. His cover was that he was part of an Interopol task force tracking mafiya activity across Europe and the British Isles.

There was indeed such a task force. Price meticulously kept abreast of major organized investigations around the globe, thanks to her liaisons with the international intelligence community. Fostering an encyclopedic knowledge of national and international events allowed her to slip Bolan, Able Team and Phoenix Force into operational positions with a minimum of intrusive appearance. Stony Man Farm was able to place its operations teams quietly and efficiently with the establishment of such a road map.

Bolan doffed the Beretta 93R machine pistol and its shoulder holster. While it was hard to imagine a federal agency approving a mammoth handgun like the Desert Eagle, it was still not outside of the ordinary. Contrarily, an extended-magazine, suppressed machine pistol was over the top for even the most paranoid of gunslingers. Bolan solved the dilemma of a backup pistol with the Compact Px4, supplemented by three spare 20-round magazines.

Ready for action, Bolan entered the crime laboratory. The Metro cops waved him through after a thorough examination of his credentials and a frisk that revealed Bolan’s personal arsenal. Given that he was an American FBI agent, and their familiarity with the Bureau’s mandate of two service pistols at all times, the London cops cleared him through the medical examination wing.

“Just let us know if you need a rocket launcher down there,” the bobby at the desk told him.