SOMEWHERE IN THE RUSSIAN INTERIOR….
"Harm, does that sound mean what I think it means?" Mac's voice was full of alarm.
"It sure does, we're going to have to eject, put your mask on and hold on tight!" Harm put the plane into a dive to try and outrun the missiles a little longer before pulled the ejection lever and sending the canopy flying off the plane and sending the two of them into the air.
KOSOVO: TWENTY FIVE MILES FROM ALBANIAN BORDER….
The Recon team was inserted two miles from the bunker and was tasked with making their way through the dark of night to bunker without being detected. Night-time insertions through heavy boreal forest meant silence and speed were of the essence. Adrenaline coursed like a raging river through the Marine's veins as he led the team toward their mark
Night missions always carried with them a sort of grim reaper kind of feeling. One was moving swiftly through the night as though you were an angel of death and your sole task and purpose was to bring death and destruction to some pour souls. Boreal forest was much harder on the Marines than jungle could ever hope to be. Jungle meant regular rain which washed away any chances of being tracked. In a forest, you could have weeks of dry weather and your tracks would be visible to anyone who looked hard enough.
The team fanned out and made their way to the bunker in three groupings of two so that they could cover both flanks and the straight away. Jim and Angela were each leading a Corporal through the flanks of the bush while the Gunny and Sergeant Hill took the straight on approach.
The bunker came into view as a large concrete mass with an imposing steel door built as a structure that was meant to be contained entirely under the surface of the earth. The team crept up to the door. "You got the key, Corporal Dupree?" Jim whispered when he saw the young man produce some plastic explosive and a fuse. "Good, now, Gunny, you'll lead the team through this entrance and remember if it ain't in Marine green and it doesn't look like a captive, it dies. The Lieutenant and I have to go to our own entrance. Godspeed, gentlemen." Jim gave the Gunny a pat on the shoulder before he and Angela headed away from the door.
"Now, according to the Intel, the sky-light should be right about here." She knelt down and brushed away some leaves from the forest floor to reveal to panes of glass. Jim opened his pack to reveal the two harnesses that they were going to need for this part of the mission and they slipped them on over their cammies.
"You've got the glass cutters and the gloves right?" Jim looked over at her. She tossed him an annoyed look before producing the very equipment he had inquired about. She cut two holes, three and a half feet in diameter into the panes of glass and lifted the glass out of its place. "You're amazing, you know that?" He tossed her a smile and he got one in return, finding himself captivated that her teeth could glow the way that they did in the moonlight.
"Alright stud, just stick your grapple in that tree and fix the wire to your harness. We got us some SEALs to save." She smiled and shot her grappling hook into a nearby oak tree, Jim followed suit with his own wire and after testing it they made ready to lower themselves through the holes. Before they were about to enter, Angela reached over and grabbed Jim by the collar and pulled his face to hers and brought their lips together in a searing kiss one bourn more of adrenaline than passion or sexual tension. Angela licked her lips seductively afterward. "For good luck." She whispered.
"I'll take all of that luck I can get." Jim replied, the woman was fast taking his breath away.
FALLS CHURCH….
The news reports were coming in fast and thick over the ZNN wire. ZNN was reporting that two American military aviators went down after a joyride in a MiG, somewhere in the Russian interior. All action at JAG stopped to watch the reports as they came in over the TV in the bullpen. "It couldn't be them, could it, sir?" A very weary Bud Roberts looked up at Admiral Chegwidden who was watching the news with great interest.
"No, no, of course not, Lieutenant." To those who knew him it was clear that the Admiral hadn't believed his attempted reassurance of Lieutenant Roberts. The Admiral was torn between some kind of sorrow and a raging anger. ZNN was reporting that two of his closest friends were dead and no one was telling him anything. When he saw Secretary Nelson and Agent Webb come walking into JAG. "You two, my office, now!" Hell, he figured that if the direct approach for his buddy the Marine Colonel, his two stars would have an even greater effect.
The SECNAV and the CIA man practically sprinted to the Admiral's office with the ex-SEAL hot on their heels. Chegwidden slammed the door behind him as he entered the office. "The two of you have exactly five minutes to give me a complete explanation of what you know before I turn this office into a crime scene, now, hop to!"
"Their plane was intercepted by Russian MiGs and it went down in a lake. There's very little chance they survived and the Russians are, at this moment, combing that lake for their bodies. To be quite honest, Admiral, it could be months before they find them." Webb sounded so cold about the whole thing.
"I know there's something that you're not telling me, Webb. And I'm going with you to Russia to find out exactly what that is." The Admiral grabbed his cover and started to head for the door.
"Now hold on there, Admiral…" The SECNAV started but AJ cut him off.
"No offence intended, Mr. Secretary but there isn't a force in this world that's going to stop me from heading to Russia to ensure that Harm and Mac get home in one piece. Now, you can either get out of the way or I can go through you if you're in my way, now which is it going to be?" The Admiral's imposing form and red-faced dwarfed the politician.
"I'm going to tell you exactly what I told Rabb and Grant when they went after MacKenzie in Syria. Just, don't get yourself killed." The Admiral went storming out of the office and the Secretary tossed a disappointed look at Clayton Webb.
"What do you expect when you make an Admiral out of a SEAL?" Webb laughed sardonically before heading out of the room himself.
The Admiral walked through the bullpen and made a bee-line for Ensign Sims' desk. "Ensign, I know this may be a lot to ask of you but I was supposed to be taking care of David Grant while the Colonel is out on assignment but I have to leave the country for a few days, so, could you and the Lieutenant do it?" The Admiral was going for a kind of forceful delicacy in approaching the subject.
"Absolutely, Admiral, I'll pick him up after school and we'll take care of him until either you or the Colonel return." The Ensign nodded and Admiral Chegwidden sprinted out of the bullpen with Clayton Webb right behind him.
IN THE RUSSIAN TAIGA….
"I'll bet he's Russian." The man said.
"You're crazy, Pitcha, he's too handsome to be Russian." The woman replied. "Besides, think of what I could make from the parachute silk." The man drew his knife and prepared to cut away Harm's parachute and let him down from the tree he was hanging in. Harm's eyes widened when he saw the knife come toward him and he swung back in the tree to kick the man away from him before pulling the chord and releasing his parachute, sending him to the ground beneath him.
Mac was soon at Harm's side when he came to the ground and she was able to translate whatever it was that the woman was shouting at Harm after he had kicked the man. "She says her brother was trying to help you down from the tree and that you shouldn't have kicked him." Mac supplied and Harm nodded.
"Sorry, but my first instinct when someone comes toward me with a knife is to protect myself." Harm replied in English.
"You are not Russians." The man said as he recovered from Harm's kick.
"Americans." Harm replied.
"American spy pilots?" The man inquired.
"US Navy and Marines." Mac drew herself closer to Harm's side.
"Pity, American spy pilots carry gold coins for those who help them." The man stated as he gathered up Harm's parachute in his arms.
"We have hundred dollar bills, will that do?" Mac shot back as she unzipped a pocket on her flight suit to reveal the money stashed inside.
"I am Pitcha, this is my sister Rusza, and we will help you, where are you trying to go?" Pitcha asked.
"Buloika, is that far from here?" Harm seemed to be warming up to this help they were offering.
"A month's ride by wagon." Pitcha replied as he motioned for Harm and Mac to climb into the wagon.
"We don't have that kind of time, is there a faster route?" Mac asked as she and Harm climbed into the back of the wagon.
"We can take you to the train station at Perm and you can catch the train that runs from Moscow to Vladivostok. That should take a few days." Rusza looked back and saw Harm and Mac lying down in the back of the wagon. The sound of helicopter tore into the conversation and Harm could barely fix his eyes through an awkward opening at the front of the wagon. From what Harm could make out, Falcon or Sokol or whoever the hell he was, was looking for them. Harm could hear the sound of something being said over a megaphone or some kind of projection system built into the helicopter. Harm could tell that Sokol was addressing Pitcha and Rusza and he could only hold his breath and hope that the fair-weather alliance he'd made with the travellers held up against whatever Sokol was offering. When he saw Pitcha wave the helicopter off he took a deep breath and felt his heart kick-start again.
"We're going to be okay?" Mac asked her loving eyes full of hope.
"We will always be okay, but we're going to get to live a little longer if that's what you're asking." The two of them exchanged a smile.
KOSOVO: TWENTY-TWO MILES FROM THE ALBANIAN BORDER….
"What have we got, Gunny?" Jim Grant's urgent voice brought the Marine team's focus to him.
"No one wounded, sir. Seven dead guards." The Gunny's reply was succinct.
"Lieutenant Harris and the rest of the team are with the SEALs, it's up to you and me to find the operative and that engineer." The two men worked their way through the cement hallways of the bunker. Jim picked up on voices coming from further in, toward the main control room on the second sub-level. "What were the chances this was going to be the only wooden door in the whole damn place?"
"Maybe it's your lucky day, sir?" The Gunny replied with a smile.
"Every day in the Corps is a lucky day, Gunny." Jim replied as he brought his boot down through the door. The sound of his Beretta finding its mark filled the room as the limp form of a guard fell to the floor. Dispensing with the remaining two guards, the two Marines walked over to the gagged and bound man in the corner. The Gunny untied the gag in the man's mouth to allow the man to identify himself.
"Vince Meyer, CIA." The man introduced himself.
"Colonel Jim Grant, USMC. Let's get you the hell out of here." Jim indicated for the Gunny to hoist the man over his shoulders. "Where's the engineer?" Jim asked as they left the main room.
"He's two doors down. I should warn you, Colonel, it's not pretty, they've been trying to torture information out of him for days." Meyer replied. "If your Gunnery Sergeant would just cut these binds on my arms and legs I could get myself out of here and you two could rescue him."
"I'm not some wet-behind-the-ears PFC, Meyer, until I'm sure who you are I'm not risking you turning on us. Gunny, only cut his feet, leave his hands tied together behind his back. Meyer, go and try and find the others, they should be making their exit." Jim ordered. The two Marines headed down the hall until they could hear anguished screams coming from when they got to the door Jim took out a grenade and dropped it in front of the door before taking a few steps and throwing himself to the floor and taking cover.
The door blew open and the Marines got to their feet as they saw two guards coming out to confront them. This time it was their M-16s inflicting the damage. Soon all that remained of the confrontation were the bullet-riddled bodies of the two guards. The two Marines barged into the room only to find a third guard standing with a straight-razor over a man who looked like he'd been cut close to a hundred times, there were strips of his skin that had been taken clean off. Jim drew his Beretta and rushed the last guard.
Jim jammed the barrel of his gun into the man's mouth breaking two of the guard's teeth as the gun pressed against the roof of his mouth. "Say hello to Satan." Jim pulled back on the trigger and ended the man's life right there on the spot.
"It never ceases to amaze me how rage can take over a man." The Gunny rushed over and unbound the engineer who was semi-conscious in the corner of the room. "He's alive, but just barely."
"Let's get him the hell out of here. You carry him and I'll cover your six." Jim and the Gunny rushed out of the chamber.
"You've been hanging out with pilots too long, Colonel. You're starting to pick up their lingo." The Gunny stated as he took off at a jog back toward the rendezvous point with the rest of the team.
MOSCOW, RUSSIA….
AJ Chegwidden climbed into a cab outside of Moscow International Airport. The Cab driver looked like some stereotype out of a Russian sitcom. "Where to, boss?" The driver asked.
"American embassy." The Admiral was focused only on one thing and that was getting Harm and Mac safely back to JAG.
"Oh you are American that is good, boss. Americans tip well. They are not like the British, French or Germans, for whom a tip is merely advice." The cab driver's comment caused the Admiral to laugh slightly.
"I don't tip." The Admiral replied without removing his eyes from their focal point outside of the car window.
"You are kidding, right, boss?" The cab driver asked as he pulled up to the front of the American embassy. The Admiral got out of the car and walked into the embassy after tossing a few bills into the front seat next to the cab driver. The Admiral stormed into the embassy with all the subtlety of a bull in a china shop and found himself eventually coming face to face with Webb and his contact.
"Alright, I want the truth and the whole truth this time." The Admiral demanded as he walked into the room.
"The truth is just what I told you in DC." Webb responded. The Admiral remembered seeing DePalma reporting on the incident before he left DC; he knew who he had to chase down if he wanted to get answers because trying to get anything out of the CIA was like getting a blind man's help to do a word-find. The Admiral went back downstairs and got into his cab to enlist the help of a reporter.
SOMWHERE IN THE RUSSIAN TAIGA….
The wagon had stopped to make camp for the night. Harm and Pitcha sat around the fire after getting Harm some new clothes to get him out of his flight-suit. "Our parents went to England after Stalin came to power. We returned here after the Soviet Union collapsed."
"Well, that explains why you can speak English." Harm looked over at his host.
"We can speak English, Russian and Romany." Pitcha replied with somewhat smug look.
"Ro –what?" Harm replied trying to understand.
"Romany, it means, 'the people'." Pitcha replied.
"In America, the Navajo Indians call themselves 'the People'." Harm looked almost wise as he gazed into the fire.
"Indians? Perhaps there is some connection?" Pitcha suggested as the two then proceeded to sit in silence. Mac and Rusza had been in the wagon trying to find something for Mac to wear instead of her flight suit. She was sure that the two of them had found something that would give Harm a whole new realm of fantasies for a good year.
"Tell your fortune, sailor?" Mac's voice carried a slight Russian accent. Harm's eyes widened when he saw what Mac was wearing.
"How much do I have to pay you to let her keep what she's wearing right now?" Harm turned to Rusza.
"Her lover likes?" Rusza smiled and she saw Mac smiling widely as well.
"Her lover likes very much." Harm replied still slightly awe-struck. Mac laughed at his comment. "What, what did I say?"
"Nothing, it's just, I've never heard you referred to as my lover before." She stated in between giggles. "It makes it sound like we're having this hot, torrid, love affair."
"Well, I don't know about the 'affair' part but the rest of it sounds incredibly true." He smiled and she took a seat in between his legs and leaned against his chest.
"How long have the two of you been lovers?" Rusza tried to sound like she was genuinely curious rather than intruding.
"Four months." Mac replied tiredly as she positioned herself against his body.
"And you are still very much in love?" Rusza's questions were almost entertaining.
"More with each passing day." Harm idly stroked Mac's hair as she slowly drifted into sleep.
"And you have not made her your wife?" Pitcha asked with his disbelief evident.
"Not yet." Harm could tell that Mac had drifted off to sleep and he decided it seemed like a good idea for him as well. He scooped her up in his arms and carried her over to the wagon. "Do we all just sleep in here?"
Pitcha nodded as he put out the fire.
MOSCOW, RUSSIA….
The Admiral could see DePalma standing in front of a gate at the airfield where the MiG with Harm and Mac was supposed to have taken off a few days earlier. "There he is."
"There who is, boss?" The cab driver asked.
"The man who stole my wife." The Admiral replied trying to keep the prying cabbie out of his business.
"You are not going to do something rash, are you, boss?" The cabbie looked worried about being an accessory to a crime. The Admiral laughed under his breath and walked over to DePalma. After the camera stopped rolling, the Admiral confronted the reporter in an attempt to get information.
"AJ Chegwidden, what can I do for you?" DePalma went to shake his hand.
"Don't try and shake my hand, I told my cabbie that you ran off with my wife." The Admiral said with his patented stoicism. The Admiral nodded over at the cab driver who was looking on at the scene with great interest.
"His name's Alexei. He's my next interview; he drove Rabb and MacKenzie around Moscow." DePalma informed Chegwidden who ran back to his cab. Alexei climbed into the driver's seat.
"Where to now, boss?" Alexei asked.
"Back to the embassy." Chegwidden said as though he'd been re-energized with a new vigour and determination.
KOSOVO: TWENTY-TWO MILES FROM THE ALBANIAN BORDER….
"We got everyone, Lieutenant?" Jim Grant hurried with the Gunny up to a point in the bush a few hundred yards from the bunker.
"A little worse for wear, Colonel, but everyone's here." Angela replied as she counted everyone off.
"Sergeant Hill, radio in and get that chopper to the LZ." Jim Grant tried to catch his breath, until he heard an alarm come from the bunker. "Tell them that the LZ is going to be hot, Sergeant." The leader of the rescued SEAL team walked over to Jim.
"I'm Lieutenant Carson, thanks for the help, Colonel, me and my SEALs appreciate it, now let us help you get us out of here." The two men shook hands.
"You got it, Lieutenant, I hope you picked up some AKs on your way out of the bunker." Jim got everyone ready to pull back to the LZ where hopefully the Helo would be waiting for them.
MOSCOW, RUSSIA….
Rear Admiral AJ Chegwidden was in full SEAL mode as he stormed into the American embassy. This time Clayton Webb wasn't getting away with giving any half answers and part truths. "Alright which one of you wants to be the first to tell me why my cab driver is being interviewed by ZNN for his knowledge of the story? Or perhaps you can tell me how it might be possible that he knows more than you do?"
"Listen, Admiral, I told you all I could." Clayton Webb started but the Admiral cut him off.
"But you didn't tell me all you know. Believe me, Mr. Webb, you're going to do that now or so help me God, I will break every bone in your face. As it is, you've already earned yourself a broken nose." The Admiral was red-faced and he looked like he was about to drop Webb on the spot.
"Alright, Admiral, there's a good chance they're alive. We have reason to believe that they're on their way to the train station at Perm." Webb was, for the first time since finding out that Harm and Mac went down, being honest.
RUSSIAN TAIGA, SOMWHERE NEAR PERM…
Rusza awoke from her sleep, it had been most troubling. The visions were back, they showed the American dying to protect her. There was an odd part of the dream though. Pitcha tried to stop the American from saving her. She knew that Pitcha would die to save her.
Pitcha awoke next to her, he could tell that something was troubling her. Rusza often had dreams while she slept, that was nothing new but it was rare that she was so withdrawn afterward. "You had a vision, didn't you?" He asked cautiously. She merely nodded at him.
Mac and Harm were awake soon after Pitcha and Rusza and they found the gypsy woman in a tirade. She was throwing things about and screaming at her brother in Romany. She was screaming at Harm and Mac to leave them in peace, to get out of camp. She ranted on and said things that neither Harm nor Mac could understand, something about soldiers coming to rape her. This of course, caused an immediate reaction from her brother.
"What's going on here?" Harm had eventually had enough of not understanding something that obviously had to do with them.
"My sister had a vision." Pitcha's honesty had earned him a glare from Rusza. "They deserve to know, Rusza." The man stated firmly. The gypsy woman sat firm before eventually relenting and divulging what was in her vision.
"In my vision, I was bathing in a stream when I heard a rustling in the bushes. I got dressed but I was soon attacked by Russian soldiers. You heard me screaming and you ran to protect me even though Pitcha tried to stop you…" She was cut off by her brother.
"I would die to protect you, Rusza, you know that!" There was an almost primal intensity to his voice.
"I know, Pitcha, I know. That's what was so strange. But he came to save me and he shot three of the soldiers, before the last one shot him." As Rusza finished her story, Harm could see Mac looked worriedly up at him.
"Well, can we get going now?" Harm stood next to the wagon.
"You don't believe her?" Pitcha's voice was marked with disbelief.
"I believe she had a dream and even if she didn't all we have to do is ensure that she stays away from the water, right?" Harm suggested. The other three moved toward the wagon and set off for the Perm train station.
KOSOVO: TWENTY MILES FROM THE ALBANIAN BORDER….
"Alright, looks like our ride's here!" The Gunny shouted over the propellers as the Huey came down to the ground. Bullets could be heard nearing them as they all started to climb on to the chopper.
"Get the engineer and the Agency man on there first, they're the most in need of medical attention than get the SEALs on next! We'll try and hold off whatever adversaries are headed our way!" Angela was taking charge which caused Jim to smile. As the SEALs were being loaded on to the Huey, a cry came from off in the bush. "That sounded like a woman!"
There was a pause in the loading of the helicopter as they waited and soon there came another cry. "And that was most definitely an infant." Jim added. "Gunny, Sergeant Hill, with me!" The three men headed away from the clearing and the LZ and over into a nearby cluster of trees. They came upon a sight that broke the Colonel's heart, a mother with a broken leg clinging desperately to a child that was evidently suffering from malnutrition; they were a common scene in war, the innocent bystanders that the media called 'refugees'. The fatherly part of him took over and he crept down to the banks of the stream where the woman was laying, crying out in pain. He scooped her and her child up in his arms and hurried back up from the bank of the stream, through the bush and into the clearing.
"We've got a female, early twenties with multiple contusions and abrasions along with a broken leg and an infant, no more than eighteen months, suffering severe malnutrition." Jim loaded them on to the Helo along with the Gunny and Sergeant Hill. Just as he was preparing to load himself into the Helo he could hear the gunfire and then he heard the woman scream again.
"Sacha!" She cried and reached for a little boy of no more than five who came running out of the brush just as Serbian soldiers started to come into view. Jim's paternal instinct kicked in once again, this boy wasn't Sacha or whoever he was to the young woman waiting in the Helo, this was David and this child needed saving. Jim kicked himself down off the Helo's runners and broke into a full gallop as he ran over to the child. He wrapped a protective arm around the young man as he scooped him off the ground.
Jim was almost to the Helo when he felt it. A bullet entered his right calf just below the knee. It didn't stop him; 'hell, Grandpa O'Grady's been hurt worse rolling cigarettes back home', Jim told himself as he made it to the Helo and loaded the young man aboard.
"Colonel! We'll be overweight if you get on, we're going to need to leave someone behind and come back later!" The pilot shouted.
"I'll stay! Never send anyone else to do what you won't do yourself!" Jim shouted and before the pilot could get the Helo off the ground, Angela Harris planted herself on the ground next to him. She motioned for the chopper to take off.
"When I say, 'leave no man behind', I mean it, sir!" She smiled at him and the two of them turned their M-16s on the oncoming soldiers.
PERM, RUSSIA….
The wagon pulled up to the Perm Train Station to scowls from the crowd. "What are they so upset about?" Harm asked Pitcha who was still steering the wagon.
"They think we are here to steal their women." Pitcha replied and the two men shared a laugh. At the back of the wagon, Rusza was filling Mac in on what to do when you 'told a fortune' for one of the people who approached them. The wagon came to a halt on the middle of the platform and Harm and Pitcha left to go and get the tickets for the train. There were Russian soldiers at the far end of the platform, fully armed and looking, less than pleasant.
"Are they always here or are they our welcoming party?" Harm's trepidation was showing very openly as they neared the ticket vendor in the proximity of the soldiers.
"Could be either." Pitcha replied as he picked up the tickets after Harm handed him the money. With the tickets in hand, the two men headed back to the back of the wagon where Mac and Rusza were reading palms.
"We've got the tickets!" Harm announced as Mac finished her last palm reading.
"What about when we get on the train, will they check for our papers?" Mac was starting to get apprehensive about the limits they might be pushing on this trip. "You're being driven by emotions and those emotions are going to get us killed."
"You can quit, I can't, my father is out there somewhere and I'm going to find him." Harm replied looking deeply into her eyes.
"Or die trying?" She inquired, hoping there was some limit to what he was doing.
"Or die trying, but you shouldn't, you've come farther with me than anyone I know, I'll never forget that and I will certainly never forget you." He sensed that maybe this would be the impasse that might tear them from one another. She brought her hand to the back of his head and pulled him in for a quick, passionate kiss.
"You'll never forget me because I'm coming with you." She stated as she looked at her stunned boyfriend.
"You know, I called Tom Boone before we left the hotel and I told him where we were, what we were doing and that you were with me." Harm smiled as they headed into the crowd.
"What did he say?" Mac inquired.
"That I ought to marry you." Harm replied as he placed his hand on the small of her back to guider her.
"That's the second time someone's talked about that with us." She looked back over her shoulder at him.
"It sounds like a better idea every time." Harm shot back leaving Mac with a surprised look on her face. The sound of gunfire came from behind them and the two of them took cover off of the platform and behind a packing crate.
"Sarah! Commander Rabb! I know you're here." The voice was the very familiar but hardly welcomed one of Major Sokol.
"Well, if it isn't your buddy Falcon." Harm whispered snidely and was promptly slapped upside the head. "Ouch, what was that for?"
"Behaving your shoe size instead of your age." Mac replied as they stopped bickering long enough to hear Sokol continue talking.
"I will take you to Buloika!" Sokol's voice shouted. Harm and Mac looked at each other wondering whether or not to believe him. They cautiously stepped out from behind the packing crate and started walking over toward Sokol.
MOSCOW, RUSSIA….
Clayton Webb, Admiral Chegwidden and Alexei all sat in a cab on the outside of a fence that bordered the airfield from which a now illustrious MiG had taken off days earlier. "Admiral, what we know is that someone, high up in the Russian military power structure is trying to sell of nuclear-tipped missiles to the highest bidder. Now we've been able to trace it back to a Major Nikolai. The problem is that Nikolai doesn't exist, but we know that's it's either Parlovsky or Sokol and which ever one it is, depends on whether or not Mac and Harm are on that incoming Helo."
"Care to explain that, Webb?" The Admiral inquired obviously still unused to CIA double-talk.
"Well, if Parlovsky is Nikolai, than Harm and Mac are safe and are coming in on that Helo with Sokol to meet him. If Sokol is Nikolai, Harm and Mac are lying dead in the Russian taiga." Webb stated rather bluntly.
"Webb, have I reminded you that I already owe you a broken nose for getting my people involved in this major Charlie-Foxtrot you've cooked up here." The Admiral looked through his binoculars at the incoming helicopter.
"Actually, you had, I was hoping you'd forgot." Webb ran a subconscious hand up the bridge of his nose. The Helo came down and landed and Sokol stepped off of it, toward a car that had pulled on to the tarmac moments before. "There's Sokol, where are Harm and Mac?" The Helo pulled back up off the ground to reveal Harm and Mac who had been standing on the opposite side of it.
"Right there." The Admiral said, caught in a calm before the storm moment. He saw Parlovsky draw a gun and all bets were off. The Admiral's foot stomped down on to Alexei's and sent the car through the fence. The sound of the raging automobile shifted Parlovsky's focus and opened him up for the Admiral to shoot. Parlovsky was able to bury a slug in Sokol's shoulder before four slugs were buried in him, sending him to the ground.
Harm rushed over to the old man, hoping that on his death-bed he might reveal the full truth about what he really knew about Harm's father. "Colonel, where is my father?" Harm's voice sounded as that of a desperate man asking one last favour. He knelt close to the old dying man hoping for something, anything that might aid him in his search and he heard only one word; 'Svischevo'.
KOSOVO: NINETEEN MILES FROM ALBANIAN BORDER….
"We made it through that one alright, Colonel." A very winded Lieutenant Angela Harris through herself down on the banks of a nearby stream next to Colonel Grant. "Here, let me try something." She pulled the sleeve off of his cammies and tied it around the part of the calf where the bullet had entered, ensuring to tie it tightly so that constant pressure was applied. "What do we do from here, sir?"
"Well, first; if we're going to wonder around some bush, you're going to give me first aid and I'm going to hit on you, I think you should call me Jim, Angie." Jim said with a smile as he tried to catch his breath. "We ditch everything that isn't edible or light-weight. We can't go back to the LZ because there will be scouts out looking for us, so we have to push on for a good twenty miles in that direction." Jim pointed off into the west.
"Albania?" Angela asked as she looked over at him.
"Yeah, we should be safe once we cross the border. We better make a camp for the night. Take the clips out of the M-16s and throw them into that current, it should take them a few miles downstream, which should be enough to throw our trail." Jim let out a heavy breath. "There's a small cave in the bank of the stream under that tree. Seems the ideal place to spend the night."
"Well it's no room at the Ritz, but I suppose I can let you get away with this for a first date." She smiled as he broke a few branches off a nearby pine tree to cover the opening to the cave.
"So, is that what this is? Our first date?" He smiled as she crawled into the cave and he finished draping the branches over the entrance.
"Only if I get a goodnight kiss." Angela responded as she gave a not so subtle pat to the cave floor next to her. Jim stepped back and took a breath. Sure, he'd done some dating in the last year but it was shallow, meaningless and none of the women held a candle to Angie. She was smart, beautiful, funny and a Marine but she was also twenty-six. Age was only supposed to be a number, sure, but at forty-one the numbers were getting awful high in his mind.
"I hope I remember how to share a sleeping space." Jim whispered under his breath before lowering himself next to her.
"See, I don't bite, unless I'm asked nicely." She smiled as she looked into his eyes. Those walls of his had been built up high in the last two years; she was trying to find the man behind them. They were a brilliant hazel and deep enough for her to get lost. They were hard from years of seeing combat but softened by the wisdom that age brought with it.
"How is it, you can be beautiful with camouflage paint on your face?" Jim smiled and his teeth shone in the moonlight that peeked in through the pine branches covering the cave entrance. She leaned up and captured his lips in a slow, soft kiss. This one, unlike the earlier one, was passionate. Her lips parted after a few seconds allowing his tongue the chance to explore her mouth. Her tongue gently yet nimbly, massaging his. They slowly, almost reluctantly broke apart. "That was…wow! They teach that at OCS now?"
"No, that was something I picked up on my own." She snuggled close into his chest. "Now, you can't take a girl out without ensuring that she stays warm for the night can you, soldier-boy?"
"No, I suppose that wouldn't be remarkably chivalrous of me." He closed his arms in around her and brought her in tight to him, her head fitting in to his neck under his chin. Here she was, a Marine, a trained soldier, the tomboy you grew up on a ranch in west Texas with eight brothers, falling in love, in the middle of a war-zone with a man whom she'd only known for four days. Life never was predictable in the Corps.
SVISCHEVO, RUSSIA
Harm and Mac stood on a point high in the steppes of the Urals looking out into the Russian taiga. The old woman had told him that his father had died in a valiant attempt to save her life. His quest of eighteen years had come to an end in a small town in the Russian interior; far away from La Jolla, California or Vietnam. Mac was at his side, her arms wrapped firmly around his rib cage and his arm around her shoulders.
"He'd be proud of you, you know that? You've accomplished a lot in your life and you never gave up hope." She looked every bit as sombre as he did as she tried to comfort him.
"There's only one thing he wouldn't have liked about what I've done. There was one thing I almost gave up." Harm responded as his eyes went from scanning the taiga to fixed on her. "I almost gave up you at the Perm Train Station, and I think if my dad wanted anything for me, it would be for me to be happy and I'm only happy with you, Sarah." He pressed a kiss into her hair. "Let's go home."