"No, you're going to grab all the teams except Padrek's and Yosif's, keep them on security, and go back down the road," Mike said. "There you are going to do some good SEAL s.h.i.t and slow the Chechens down."

"SEAL s.h.i.t."

"Yeah. SEAL s.h.i.t. You know. Blow s.h.i.t up. Kill people. s.h.i.t like that."

"And what are you going to be doing while I'm doing 'SEAL s.h.i.t'?"

"I'm going to be standing right here, worrying like h.e.l.l."

"I hate destroying all these weapons."

While Padrek's team pulled security, Yosif's was sweeping the battlefield, collecting the weapons and any doc.u.ments they could find. The haul was pretty good and normally they would have carried them back to the Keldara, arms for the second line defenders of the valley.

In this case, however, s.p.a.ce and weight were going to be at a premium. They had vehicles, now, but didn't know for how long. So the weapons were being collected into piles and before they left they would be set on fire with thermite grenades. There might be a few left useable, but not many.

The ammunition was being put in a different pile, a b.o.o.by-trapped one. A kilo of C-4 would go off thirty minutes after the trigger was set or, if anything was moved, immediately. One of Padrek's team was preparing the trap while Yosif's men made the pile.

"Grab those packs," Yosif replied, gesturing to four of the dead Islamics. The four had apparently been close in guards for the main terrorist, who was now wrapped up in rigger tape like a mummy. The guards had not survived the attack. "They've probably got ammo but check them for doc.u.ments."

Edvin Kulcyanov bent down and started tugging the bags off. They were heavy but...something told him the weight wasn't ammo.

Yosif continued down the line ofToyota pickups, making sure everything was being swept. You never knew where something would turn up. And intel was intel.

"Yosif," Dima Mahona said, pulling his body out of the back of one of the pickups. "Laptop."

"Keep it," Yosif replied. "Vanner might be able to get something off of it."

"Yosif!" Edvin called. "You had better take a look at this!"

Yosif walked back to where the cl.u.s.ter of dead guards lay on the ground and looked at what Edvin held in his hands. It was a bundle of large sheets of paper printed in a language he didn't recognize. They were hard to see in the NVGs so he pulled up the monocular and turned on a blue lens flashlight. They still didn't make any sense to him but he could see now that there was a person's face on them. They looked something like money but they were far to large to be conventional bills.

"What are those?" Yosif asked.

"I don't know," Edvin said. "I hoped you might. There are a bunch of them."

Edvin continued taking the bundles out and stacking them in the mud of the road. At the very bottom there was a cloth bag with a drawstring tie.

Edvin untied it and spilled some of the contents into his hands, a few of the rocks falling into the mud.

"Father of All," Yosif whispered. He wasn't sure what all of the gemswere , but he recognized gems when he saw them. His mouth opened and closed but he couldn't think of anything to say.

"I think we just found the payroll for whatever we captured," Edvin said.

"Yes," Yosif replied, then keyed his throat mike. "Kildar? I think you need to see this."

"Bearer bonds," Mike said, squatting down and picking up one of the bundles. "Ten thousand euro bearer bonds. Deutsch issue. Each of these sheets of paper is worth ten thousand euros." He riffled one of the bundles. "Half a million euros, right here. I'd been told that the price for what we captured was sixty million euros. Ihadn't expected the money to be on delivery."

"There are four bags, Kildar," Edvin said. He'd gotten up to check one of the others. "There are more of those...bonds in here. And some euros as well."

"Break it up among the Keldara," Mike said. "Give the gems to Vanner. If the money weighs us down too much, we'll dump the cash and burn it."

"Burn it?" Yosif asked. "But Kildar...there isvery much money here."

"Do you fight for money, Yosif?" Mike asked, straightening up with a grimace. The weather was being h.e.l.l on his knees. "I don't. Oh, I like it. Just about anyone does. And it has certainly helped the Keldara, yes? But the reason we're here, the reason that I am here, is in that tent over there. And I would not have come if it weren't for that s.h.i.t. Not for a billion euros. We're getting paid for this op, paid well. This is just more weight to carry. If we have to run, on foot, then we'll have the entire Chechen force on our a.s.s. We may end up in a battle with ten, twenty, forty times our number. Now, which would you rather have if that happens, another two hundred rounds or a half a million euros?"

"Two hundred rounds," Yosif admitted. He didn't even have to think about it.

"Just so. But I can actually think of something very important to do with it. Distribute it among the teams when they get back. Make up bundles of appropriate size. But tell them to put it somewhere they can dump it. Because if it comes down to ammo or money, we're going for ammo. And hurry. As soon as Dr. Arensky is done, we areout of here."

"Now that we have containment," Dr. Arensky said, his voice m.u.f.fled by the gas mask, "we pour the material into the beaker. Normally, it is best to pour the acid into a material. But in this case, it risks explosive exga.s.sing. That would not be good."

"I understand," Padrek replied, calmly. "Whatever this is, it is very bad, no?"

"Very bad," Dr. Arensky admitted. "If any gets on us, I have asked your boss, Mr. Jenkins, to just shoot us through the tent and then pour all the acid on the result."

"That's bad," Padrek admitted. The Keldara team leader was the best of the Keldara when it came to mechanisms and, as the Kildar put it, "fiddly stuff." Which he supposed was why he was in this tent, breathing through a gas mask, covered in a rubber suit and helping this Russian destroy this white powder. Mostly he was holding the flashlight. Occasionally he poured some of the acid, what the Russian called "high molar sulfuric", into one of the beakers or test-tubes.

The Russian had poured some of the acid into a flask, several of which the Keldara had carried on the mission, carefully packed in wooden boxes. Then he had wrapped a plastic bag around one of the test tubes in the strange metal containers. The bag had been taped to the flask top with the test tube contained in the whole arrangement. Only then did he remove the screw-stopper, working from the outside of the bag, and carefully pour the white powder into the flask. As it fell the stuff melted, releasing gases that puffed up the bag like a balloon. But well before it was ready to burst all the powder except a very small dusting was gone.

"Now it's done?" Padrek asked.

"No," the Russian said. "That dusting could kill the world, young man. Now it gets tricky."

The Russian carefully raised the flask and, with Padrek holding the plastic out of the way, poured some of the liquid into the test tube. This time the effect was almost impossible to notice. Last, he swirled the liquid around, poured it back into the flask, back again, getting every trace of the white powder.

"Now we are done," the Russian said. "How many flasks do we have?"

"Seven," Padrek said, pointing to the pile of wooden boxes in the corner of the tent.

"Good, then we don't have to disa.s.semble this and risk contamination," the Russian said.

"Dr. Arensky?" the Kildar called from outside the tent. Well outside from the sound of it.

"Yes?"

"How's it coming?"

"We have successfully neutralized one of the samples. There are four."

"Oh. Thought you should know. We've got most of the Chechen army bearing down on us. They're really p.i.s.sed about something or another. Just an FYI."

"Then I shall endeavor to hurry," the Russian said. "Mr. Padrek, if you could get me another flask, please?"

"Just Padrek," Padrek corrected. "Padrek Ferani. But Mr. Ferani doesn't work either so... Just Padrek."

"Then if you could please give me a flask, Padrek," Dr. Arensky said. "And you may call me Victor since we're such good friends."

SEAL s.h.i.t. SEALs.h.i.t .SEEEAL s.h.i.t.

Adamswas blanked. All he could do was look down the road towards the town. He'd pulled the teams down about a klick from the intersection, dispersed them on both sides of the road and at that point his mind had just gone f.u.c.kingblank .

"Do some SEAL s.h.i.t," he muttered. Oh, f.u.c.k, he was starting to think like a f.u.c.king officer, or worse a trainer , but it just might work.

"Oleg!"

"Master Chief!" the team leader called from the side of the road.

"We got about five hundred Chechens approaching this position,"Adams said as the sound of vehicles started to penetrate through the rain. "You are required to delay them for twenty minutes and then retreat, preferably without any engagement. What is your answer to this test question?"

Mike looked over his shoulder at a series of cracks. But the sound of trees falling indicated thatAdams was just putting in a roadblock. Good oldAdams , he always came through.

"Is it well, Mr. Jenkins?" Dr. Arensky called from in the tent.

"Yeah, no problem," Mike yelled. "Just putting in a roadblock to slow the Chechens down. Where we at?"

"Down to the last sample," Dr. Arensky called back, cheerfully. "Padrek has been most helpful."

"He's a helpful lad," Mike replied. "What are we going to do when you're done? Anything else?"

"I would suggest burning this tent and our containment gear. Most thoroughly."

"Antoniya..." Mike said to Padrek's a.s.sistant team leader. He was personally blanking on starting a fire in the pouring rain.

"I'll go find some gas cans," the Keldara said. "Diesel rather. We have thermite grenades to start them.

That should work even in this mess."

"Exactly," Mike said. "Vanner?" he said, touching his throat mike.

"Right here, sir," Vanner said from behind him.

"Jesus!" Mike said as he jumped. "I think that's the first time in fifteen years someone's snuck up behind me."

"I didn't exactly sneak, sir," Vanner replied. "I've been standing here for ten minutes."

"What's the update?"

"According to the girls," Vanner said, referring to the intel section back at the caravanserai, "there is one Chechen battalion moving in from the north. That's one of their heavier batts, about four to five hundred.

They are a.s.sembling vehicles and sending forward groups as they get transportation. In addition, we're getting heavy signal traffic across the area. They know the op went down, we've been ID'd as Spetznaz, Delta and, worst, Keldara. General consensus is coming down on Keldara and they seriously want our a.s.s. There are indications that a blocking force is going in on the road toGeorgia . We can make it part of the way, but I'm not sure we'll have the correlation of forces to force our way through. Right now it's a small force, but there's a short battalion, about a hundred, making their way to the blocking point."

He'd pulled out a large pad with a plasma screen and now cycled it on. The screen was about the size of a sheet of 8x11 paper and had a map of the area. On it the friendly units were designated by blue icons and enemies were marked with red. Where either were off the screen their direction and distance was marked with karats pointed to the sides. Mike took the pad, scrolled out for a look around and shook his head. Red icons were popping up all over the map. Most of them were already showing movement symbols towards their position. The main threat, though, was the Chechen battalion approaching from the north. However, the defenses to the south showed heavy weapons capability and dug in defenses.

And none of that covered units that signal intercepthadn't picked up. Some units could have been contacted and told to move but didn't respond. The girls might have missed an intercept.

Mike hadn't planned on the destruction of the smallpox taking so long and he'd always known the mission was on a knife-edge. Currently, the situation was headed towards true military FUBAR. f.u.c.ked up beyond all recognition.

"How very good," Mike said. "We still in contact with higher?"

"Affirmative," Vanner replied. "There's a Predator up, not that it can see or do anything. But we're looking at clearing in about six hours. I got a note that there was a satellite pa.s.s but I don't have that, yet."

"I'd like to be out of here in six hours," Mike pointed out.

"Unlikely, sir," Vanner pointed out. "The blocking force is weapons heavy. We'd be trying to fight our way past bunkers blocking the road. And, sir, we have very limited heavy weapons, no air support..."

"I'm aware of the issues, Vanner," Mike said. "Okay, what's our secondary?"

"Guerrmo Pa.s.s," Vanner said. "We take the road up about five klicks then una.s.s and head up through the hills. Unfortunately, we have recent reports from the Rangers that the Chechensalso have a heavy weapons position, three bunkers ID'd, in the pa.s.s. On the backside, admittedly, oriented to prevent entry from the Georgian side. But there are forces there."

"Saw that," Mike said as sporadic firing started to the north. "Cross that pa.s.s when we come to it. Dr.

Arensky?"

"Just done," Arensky replied. "Preparing to come out. I would suggest that you set two more sets of environment suits outside the tent. We will exit and change into those. Then we will torch the entire a.s.sembly, after breaking the flasks through the tent fabric. Padrek and I will remain in the suits for a few days as quarantine in case we have not been as successful in containment as I have hoped."

"Sucks to be you," Mike muttered. "Works. We've got cans of diesel and thermite grenades on the ground outside the tent. We'll just back off, shall we?"

"Please."

"Right, Vanner, call in the dogs. By the time they get here, it'll be time to run."

"Hold your fire,"Adams said.

The Chechens had apparently sent out vehicles as fast as they could find them. Given that Adams had stolen most of their dedicated trucks, the lead group was oneToyota pickup, the mujaheddin vehicle of choice, and a motley collection of Ladas, Paykans and various other small sedans. TheToyota was in the lead and one of the mujaheddin in the bed had a light machine-gun across the top of the truck.

That would have been a bright move if the driver had actually seen the first tree in time.

TheToyota slammed on its brakes but it was far too close to do anything other than cause it to slew sideways. Before it could start to roll from the turn, the right front wheel hit the poplar in the road. The vehicle launched upwards and over, doing a flip in the air before landing amongst the larger trees that made up the bulk of the roadblock.

"Now open fire," Adams said as the mujaheddin who had been standing up holding the machine gun slammed across one of the trees with an audible "crack" as his back broke. It really didn't matter since his head hit another log at the same time, splashing brains and blood across the road in a spray.

The teams had loaded fairly light for this mission so most of the machine-gun teams, who usually carried NATO 7.62 M240s, were armed with M249 Squad Automatic Weapons which fired the lighter 5.56 round.

That didn't help the Chechens much. Before they could even begin to bail out of their vehicles the four teams opened up with a withering storm of gunfire, st.i.tching the vehicles with rounds. The Keldara carrying rifles fired in controlled three round bursts, aiming for the shadows of men in the vehicles, the rounds cracking through windscreens and doors. The SAWs sounded very much like chainsaws, ripping off five round bursts that st.i.tched the vehicles with small, neat, lines of bullet holes.

Two of the Chechens made it out into that hail of lead, trying to reach the cover of the nearby stream, but they didn't even make it three steps before falling into the road. The movement had attracted several of the Keldara's fire and the two did a dance as the dozens of rounds st.i.tched them.