Stephenie Meyer owns Twilight. I'm borrowing her characters, dressing them up in MARPAT, and giving them some guns (again).
Unbeta'd, unedited. Anyagal graciously fixed my Russian.
Jan 24
Undisclosed Location in the Caucasus Mountains,
Somewhere along the border of Georgia and Southern Russia
"Dr. Swan, you good?"
Thin clouds of gray-white steam swirled up into the inky sky as Bella low-crawled through the layer of fresh dry powder. Hidden beneath the pristine snow, gnarled roots and gravel dug into her knees and elbows. Her cheeks, bare above her balaclava, stung, too, and every frigid breath she took felt like razor blades slicing up her lungs.
"Fine," she whispered, amplified by her throat mike. She winced as the jagged edge of a larger rock found her thigh. With a muttered curse, she gritted her teeth, swung her carbine across her back, and dragged herself through the fence break and across the remaining yards to the stand of low evergreen shrubs ringing Tarkhan Ali-Basayev's compound. "I'm fine. It's good."
About the time she dropped behind the waist-high hedge, a quiet snicker hit her earpiece, followed by Emmett's low, baritone rumble. "What Doc means to say is this sucks. I'm freezin' my balls off!"
Bella's eyes rolled behind her NVGs. "First Somalia, now here. I'm beginning to think you just don't like working."
There was a beat of silence, then a half dozen coughs of muffled laughter broke the stillness. "10 to Doc!"
"That's some bullshit, and you know it!"
A slow, amused drawl cut in before Bella could open her mouth. "She's not wrong. You whine like a fuckin' titty-baby."
The staff sergeant uttered a volley of grumbled curses and thumped his mike. "Why don't you shut the fuck up… Jazzy."
Jasper laughed. "Why don't you come up here and make me, Teddy Bear?"
Another eardrum-bursting mike thump answered them both. "I swear, if you two don't stop, I'm going to bury your dumb asses in the goddamned snow."
Despite the jack-rabbit hammer of her heart, Bella's cheeks creased at the gunnery sergeant's pissed-off growl. Shaking her head when Emmett whined something unintelligible – proving the point – she shoved up on her elbows, sucked in a deep breath of icy air, and eased her way to the end of the hedge row.
Floodlights flared to life, bouncing off the snow and instantly blinding her optics.
"Holy crap." Wheezing, Bella collapsed behind the shrub and blinked back stars. Her breathing stuttered, and ice-cold sweat slicked the inside of her gloves as she fumbled for the toggle on her NVGs. "Yeah, yeah, I know, I know. Just a program." She mumbled it as much to herself as the others. "Thirty seconds until they cycle."
"Just keep your head down, B," Alice whispered. For once, the pilot's perpetual cheerfulness was absent, replaced by a gruff, no-nonsense tone closer to her commander's. In the background, Bella picked up the telltale shriek of duct tape. "They're not paying attention tonight."
"I will, I promise." Not wanting to distract their pilot from her task, Bella swallowed and shored up her spine. "Don't worry about me."
Precisely thirty seconds later, the northern yard went black. Once more, Bella rose to her elbows. Slowly – ever so slowly – she peered around her cover.
Parked dead in the center of a vast, open estate, a sprawling, three-story limestone and stucco affair greeted her. Complete with extravagant arches, columns, and fountains topped by gaudy Italianate statues, the overbuilt monstrosity belonged somewhere on the coast of the Mediterranean instead of the highlands of southern Russia. A long, tree-lined drive entered from the east. At the south end of the property, there was a massive horse stable and matching guest house. Less than thirty feet away from her position, a modern helicopter pad occupied the north. Billowing steam, a softly glowing, heated lap pool sat behind the villa and looked out across an intricate labyrinth of evergreens and whimsically shaped topiaries.
It was a far cry from the small family farms and modestly appointed block houses dotting the surrounding countryside.
Bella spared the fanciful gardens a final glance and followed the sloping red-orange tile roof to the mouth of the uppermost northern terrace. Hiding in the dark, haloed by the dim light from a lone lamp deep within the house, a pair of bored, black-clad soldiers meandered back and forth between a pair of statues. Her stomach dipped when the taller one leaned over the railing to spit, and for just a second, as he stared out across the yard to the moonlit woods beyond, she could have sworn he looked directly at her.
"Ghost, I'm in position," she murmured, gulping back a flurry of nerves as she watched the first soldier lazily shrug before finally turning back around. The other one – a shorter, rounder thirty-something with bushy brows and a thick, sheepskin hat – lit a cigarette. The butt blazed in the dark, a bright punch of neon green in her NVGs. His hand slipped inside his coat, only to extract a slim flask. With a quick peek back into the house, he took a long drink, laughed at something the first guard said, and then tossed it over to share. "Two tangoes on the upper terrace. Waiting for Jazz's confirmation."
A hundred yards away, tucked behind a concrete slab fence foundation, Edward's gaze swung left. When his optics picked up the slim, feminine silhouette he'd have known in his sleep, a faint, barely-there smile tugged at his lips, even as his gut tightened. Beneath the armor and layers of insulated winter-white MARPAT, the long scar that ran diagonally across his chest tingled and itched.
"Copy that," he said, low and commanding. "Don't move until my signal. We approach just like we planned. Clear?"
There was a quiet pulse of static. "Got it."
Edward studied his scientist for a moment more, tempted to press her for a more solid affirmative – or better yet, to send her back to the vehicles. Instead, with a grimace and a sharp internal rebuke, he angled west to where his sniper sat high above, perched within the bowed branches of an ancient fir with his wrapped, newly acquired M110A2 trained on the scene below. With the heavy camo and elevation, the man might as well have been invisible. "What you see, Jazz?"
"Got Doc's two, easy as cake." Now all-business, Jasper paused as he swung his barrel right. "Two more, second floor at your one o'clock. Lahav, can you see 'em?"
"Barur." There was the distinct note of eagerness – the kind of predatory anticipation Edward knew oh-so-well – in the Israeli's chuckle. "Sergeant, it will be our pleasure to manage those two."
"Then they're all yours."
El'azar let out another quiet laugh. "Todah al Ha'shituf, Be'emet."
Snorting when his commander offered a drily delivered translation, Jasper swept his rifle back around and scanned the icy pathways looping the villa. On his second pass, a darker, oblong shadow stretched beneath a covered awning, and the Marine cursed. "Ghost, be aware we got another one on the ground. He's currently at the southwest corner between the house and the gardens. Patrol of some sort. I suspect he's on his way north to you."
"Details," Edward ordered. Without wasting time, he edged around the cover of the concrete slab and scanned the fence's ornate iron pickets for the deep, camouflaged cuts Emmett had made hours before, right as the sun sank below the nearby ridge, muffled by the echoing evening call to prayer.
"Gimme a sec. He's out of my line, behind one of those dumb swirly bushes." Jasper tsked under his breath. "Come on, you asshole. Why don't you come out and play…"
As soon as he located the cut – a nearly invisible raised line – Edward gripped the first fence picket. Shoving his weight into the slab, he twisted until it let out a staccato snap and then carefully extracted a two-foot section of metal rod. As he reached for the second, he glanced up to the tree line.
"Anything?"
Almost on cue, the shadow stepped out from behind the foliage. With a few quick adjustments of his high-end Leupold scope, Jasper tweaked the elevation and zeroed in his reticle. When the man's face came into focus, he could count his beard hairs, along with the tiny specks of white frost clinging to the wiry mass. Darkly inked Cyrillic lettering peaked from his collar, crawling up the side of his neck to his ear.
"There you are." Jasper grinned a blacked-out grin, and as the soldier took a long drag off a shrinking cigarette, his finger tapped against his rifle receiver. "Tall, lean fucker in mismatched winter camo. Forty or so. Bushy-ass beard, so guessin' a local. Got a fucked-up nose and some heavy scarring on his forehead. Definitely an ex-soldier of some kind."
"Weapons?" Edward asked as he simultaneously popped the section out of the second picket, creating just enough of a gap for him to slip through.
"SOB's rockin' a wicked-lookin' serrated blade on his hip. Sunzha Machines rifle strapped across his back like the rest of 'em." Jasper clucked his tongue. "Brand-spankin' new Vityaz sub slung across his chest. Looks like full armor under his parka."
A quiet sound of annoyance cut in, followed by Rosalie's bone-dry commentary. "Well, they're certainly better armed than the last ones, eh?"
Jasper grunted as the soldier flicked his cigarette into a nearby metal bin and began a leisurely patrol. As he walked along the side of the pool, steam rolled off the glowing, turquoise water, curling up into the sky and blurring his outline. "Yeah, definitely not dealin' with amateurs. This motherfucker moves like he knows what he's doin'. Ghost, you want me to take 'em out?"
"Negative, I got Mr. Vityaz."
Rifle in the lead, Edward slid through the open pickets. As soon as he cleared the gap, he raced across the open yard, targeting a small outbuilding twenty yards away. As soon as he hit the decorative stucco wall, he dropped to one knee and slowly pivoted around the corner in a move he'd done a thousand times.
"Once you take out those two on the terrace, monitor the roofline and the exits," Edward said, tracking the grizzled soldier on the ground as he ambled into view. Jazz was right. The man moved like a pro. "No one leaves here tonight. Understood?"
There was a beat of resounding silence, and in the background, Edward picked up the subtle click-clack of the sergeant chambering his first round. "Ooh-rah."
Jan 24
Sunzha Machines Manufacturing Complex
20 kilometers southwest of Grozny, Chechnya, Southern Russia
"Captain, you need to see this shit."
With a quick, wordless command to the near-twin sergeants positioned by the entry, Captain Jacob Black – call sign Wolf – stepped over the lifeless, sprawled-out body on the concrete floor and targeted the olive-drab metal crates stacked along the warehouse wall. "What you got, Scooby-doo?"
Motioning to a pried-open crate and the dozen or so black, disc-like objects cushioned in eggshell foam, Seth grimaced. "What's that look like to you?"
Jake swore a blue streak.
"That's what I said."
Rolling his eyes, Jacob ripped the stapled manifest off the side. The document was littered with columns and rows of indecipherable Cyrillic text, but he didn't need a translator – or Dayan's prickly, dark-headed staff sergeant – to recognize the familiar combination of letters and numbers indicating the weapons inside.
ПМН-5Г
"They all the same?" he asked, glaring at the stacks of crates as he passed the paperwork to his pilot.
Behind the grease paint, Seth's baby-faced features pinched, and then he nodded. "Just like the prototype Cullen's team found under that dead DARPA guy in Algeria. Looks like they've modified the design to accept sealed cartridges, though. Makes them much safer to transport and a hell of a lot faster to deploy."
"Fuck." Jake scrubbed his scruffy chin before plucking a slim, black sat phone from his chest pocket. He yanked his glove off with his teeth and – as much as it pained him – began tapping out an update to the Marine commander sitting in the snow outside Basayev's compound a hundred klicks to the south. Without looking up from the dimly lit screen, he asked, "They already loaded?"
"None that I've seen." Despite having already checked, Seth carefully extracted one of the discs and slowly tilted it to reveal the empty slot in its side. "Empty. Best I figure, they're waiting on delivery." His nose scrunched. "That is… unless there's a stash of cartridges somewhere here in the complex and they're planning to transport them separately."
The captain punched send and shoved his phone back into his vest. "Can you tell where they're headed?"
Placing the modified mine back into its foam, the younger man jabbed a finger at the manifest. "I checked a few. Pretty sure I saw two towns on there, Boguchar and Novocherkassk, or however you pronounce it. Sent it in a few minutes ago. Analyst came back and said there's mechanized and artillery units parked there, along with a few of Basayev's adjacent Borz units." Seth spat. "Think we can guess what they plan to do with these."
A deep furrow bisected the captain's forehead. His dark eyes narrowed, and his chin dipped in quick, curt agreement. "After that little detour last fall, we don't need to guess."
Grabbing the matte black 416 carbine propped against a nearby steel shelf, Seth motioned to the crates again. "That stack at the very end is chock full of Sunzha's next-gen MROs. Pretty sure they've been modified for XR-5, too, but I couldn't locate the warheads to confirm." His lips mashed into a hard line, and his blue eyes sparked with uncharacteristic fury as he looked back to his commander. "Captain, I really don't want this shit out there. You heard what Dr. Swan said… the kind of damage and chaos it can cause."
Jacob remembered every bone-chilling word that woman had said, and like the dozens of other atrocities he'd witnessed over the years, those images from Paris and Davos were burned into his retinas. For a long, still moment, the two men stared at each other before the captain abruptly straightened, clapped his lieutenant on the shoulder, and smiled. "Understood. Let's see what we can do about that."
At the opposite end of the complex, sixty yards from a squat, rectangular building with blast-proof doors and a heavy-duty badge lock, Jared stilled.
Behind them sat a dark parking lot full of olive-drab gun mortars and howitzers, fresh off the assembly line and ready to deploy. A cylindrical water tower and red brick boiler house rose to the east. A wall of stacked pallets with empty artillery shells, waiting to be loaded, blocked off the west. Neat rows of rusty cargo containers and truck trailers, stamped in half a dozen languages and topped by a thin layer of white, littered the yard before them.
A frisson of awareness ghosted down Jared's spine.
He threw up a fist, signaling the man behind him. Not making a sound, they slid to the left, instinctively moving deeper into the shadows and away from the handful of dim flickering pole lights, and they waited.
An eerie second passed, then another, and then finally, a low, off-key whistling floated along the breeze.
With a quick glance over his shoulder, Jared flashed Paul a rapid-fire hand gesture. The big man signed back, shooting him a feral, toothy grin he'd seen a thousand times. In perfect, practiced unison, rifles in the lead, the two operators abruptly split off, each targeting one of the narrow, graveled walkways between the rows of shipping containers.
About the time Jared passed by the faded Maersk logo in the center of the first container, boots crunched. The whistling grew louder, and as the icy wind bent around the corner, it carried with it the faint scents of tobacco and cheap, musky cologne.
Twenty yards, he calculated, tapping his throat mike twice.
Two taps answered him.
At the end of the container, Jared halted, plastering himself against the cold corrugated metal. Almost on cue, the whistling stopped. The crunching gravel slowed. A man cleared his throat, hawking a wet mass of mucous and phlegm.
Three rows down, easing his way between an ancient cargo container and a ratty, soft-shell truck trailer, Paul stepped over a span of old, half-rotten railroad ties. He hit the end of the row in no time, and as the security guard continued his hacking and snorting, Paul flipped out a slim, extendable mirror and peeked around the corner.
He clocked the guy at somewhere around average height, with wide shoulders and the beginnings of a middle-aged paunch hanging over his beltline. His near-black hair was shoved under an old wool beanie. Dark eyes, bruised with sickness or fatigue, stared out of a once-angular, pock-marked face. The ring and little fingers on his left ended in stubs. This one had seen action at some point in time, Paul thought, but like the two they'd already taken out back at the warehouse, the poor fucker didn't stand a chance.
Static barked out of a radio. "Arbi, gde tebya cherti nosyat?"
The security guard – Arbi or something like that – stopped hacking long enough to spit. When he didn't answer fast enough, the question repeated, loud and incessant. Growling in obvious annoyance, he stomped over to a shaft of dull, muted light from one of the pole lamps, yanked his radio off his shoulder, and snapped, "Da, poshol ty!"
The guy on the radio just laughed. "Mudak, gde ty?"
The guard fumed and kicked at the gravel. "Ya seychas v pyatom sektore, gde i dolzhen byt'!"
Paul didn't catch any of that, other than the always useful "fuck you" and something about a sector.
Before he could check with Jared, the radio bleated again. "Ty uzhe dolzhen byl zakonchit'. Khvatit vyyobyvat'sya tam, zakruglyaysya i bystro syuda… Chto-to ne tak."
"Chto sluchilos'?" Arbi asked, and a distinct note of unease curled through the man's annoyance. He slowly turned in place, scanning the shadows. As though some part of him registered the operators' presence, the security guard's shoulders unconsciously straightened. His hand dropped to the wooden grip of the 9mm sitting on his hip.
Angling the mirror to follow the guard's now-nervous ambling, Paul cursed under his breath.
"Yeshche ne znayu," the guy on the radio replied. "Ty videl Movsara?"
At that, Paul's cheeks creased, cracking his grease paint because he was pretty sure Movsar was that ugly, crooked-nosed SOB Jake took out when they breached the warehouse. At least, that's what the ID badge sitting in Jared's pocket said.
"Net." Arbi did another slow 360, lingering on a dark niche at the base of the distant water tower. His eyes climbed to the empty catwalk circling the tank. "On dolzhen byl sovershat' obkhod sklada."
"On ne otvechayet na radio."
Before Paul could work it out himself, Jared's quiet whisper came through his headset. "Says Movsar's not answering the radio."
Paul whispered back, "How the fuck you know that?"
Unsurprisingly, Jared didn't bother replying, and before Paul could give him any shit about it, the security guard belted out a loud, unexpected laugh. Through the mirror, Paul watched the man's posture abruptly relax. His hand fell away from his weapon, only to fish a crushed packet of cigarettes out of his back pocket.
"Skoreye vsego on prosto drochit ili sryot, kak obychno," Arbi said, shoving a bent cigarette between his teeth. He struck a match and took a deep drag that reeked of relief. "Ostav' yego v pokoye." He chuckled. "Yego i tak zhena uzhe zadolbala."
"Thinks he's probably somewhere jerking off," Jared said, dry as the Sahara. "No clue about the rest."
Paul snickered into his elbow.
A long silence answered the guard, followed by a tired, resigned sigh. "Ladno, na obratnom puti poprobuy nayti etogo lenivogo zasrantsa."
"Da, da, kak skazhesh'…" Arbi just snorted when the dispatcher cursed in return, and after another long drag off his cigarette, he resumed his slow patrol.
Ten yards from the first container, a quiet tap hit Paul's earpiece, followed by Trick's near-silent, one-word command.
Still monitoring the guard's approach through the mirror, Paul plucked a quarter-sized chunk of gravel off the ground. He timed it just right. As the man passed Jared's row, he chucked the rock high overhead, aiming at the chemical storage building in front of them.
The ricochet off the cement wall cracked like a shot.
The security guard went ramrod straight, then jerked toward the building and the sound, away from the dark, shadowy path between the containers. His hand twitched, again sliding down toward his hip. After a heartbeat of hesitation, he took a single step.
A strong, muscled arm in black Multicam shot out of the darkness, striking like a viper, and Paul smiled as the guard called Arbi disappeared from sight.
Quick as lightning, Jared clamped his glove over the man's mouth. Every muscle in his body froze on contact, and his eyes boggled, wild and gleaming in the dark.
Before the guard's mind could catch up, Jared kicked his ankles out from under him. Yanking him backward, he dragged him into the narrow, pitch-black alley between the containers. In a single fluid motion, the hand covering his mouth tilted the security guard's chin toward the stars while the other reached down to his thigh sheath and extracted the worn, matte-black MK3 Jared had carried for years.
Not exactly Jared's preferred route, but a split-second assessment said the thick fill of the guard's winter coat and the heavy layers of the wool beneath it made a rear choke too risky.
A hoarse, unintelligible scream spilled out, muffled against suede. Blood vessels burst, staining the whites of his eyes. There was a rip in the man's jacket as panicked arms flailed, reaching over his head in a vain, uncoordinated grab for his attacker. A fist glanced off Jared's bicep while another brushed his Kevlar.
The man stilled when he felt Jared shift, and a high-pitched nasal whine spilled out when the sharp tip of Jared's knife dipped beneath his coat and began to slide between his ribs. Without warning, he jerked, kicking backward and aiming his heel for Jared's shin as his left elbow rammed against Jared's armor. Panting and twisting, the guard threw another elbow, then again and again, each time banging against the unforgiving ceramic plates covering the operator's ribcage.
Jared didn't budge. He didn't even flinch. Instead, the Delta's knee rammed into the back of the man's thigh as his blade dug deeper, slicing into his liver as Jared simultaneously cut off his air. With a final twist, shredding the organ, the thrashing slowed. The guard's limbs went limp, and as his head fell to the side, a trickle of blood seeped out of the corner of his mouth and darkened the suede of Jared's glove.
A low whistle came from behind them. "Fuck me, dude."
Jared angled toward the big man approaching from the opposite end of the containers. He leveled his partner a flat, unamused glare and grunted. "You workin' tonight, or are you just fuckin' off?"
Grinning – like usual – Paul flipped him off. First swiping the guard's ID, then his radio, he grabbed the man's boots as Jared hauled him up by the armpits. In a single quick move, they lifted the body like it was nothing and stowed it inside the rusted Maersk cargo container to their right.
As Jared latched the rusty door, a quiet burst of static hit his earpiece. "Trick, this is Wolf. Come in."
Jared glanced over to Paul. "Copy that, Wolf."
"You and Howler find any signs of Dr. Swan's magic elixir?"
"Nope." Jared wiped his blade against his utility pants, leaving a macabre dark-on-dark stain. He flashed the other operator a hand signal, motioning him again toward the flat, rectangular building, where a bold yellow sign stamped with the universal symbols for highly toxic and poisonous materials hung by the badge reader. Jared's mouth flattened into a hard line. "Least not yet."
Jan 24
Undisclosed Location in the Caucasus Mountains,
Somewhere along the border of Georgia and Southern Russia
Still eyeballing the slow approach of the grizzled patrol – Jazz's Mr. Vityaz – Edward wiped the fine layer of gray-white frost off his carbine and checked his suppressor one last time. "Tink, you and Rivkin ready to hit the lights?"
On the opposite side of the estate, inside a small shed hidden behind an evergreen wall, Alice carefully inserted the detcord into the brick of C-4 she'd taped to the junction box. She took all of a second to admire her handiwork before exiting the utility shed and darting to the stand of nearby pines, where the Israeli staff sergeant waited. A backpack-sized olive drab case with a dome-like top and a half dozen antennae sat at Leah's feet.
"You ready?" Alice mouthed as she took position.
With a quick nod, Leah squatted and opened the small panel on the side of the compact, localized signal jammer, revealing an array of keys, switches, and LEDs, all blinking faint green. She tapped in a code on the keypad and flipped one of the switches while muttering under her breath. "Khamuda, noladeti mukhana."
When El'azar's irreverent laugh came through the radio, Leah rolled her eyes and gave the diminutive Marine helo pilot a small, almost apologetic smile. "I meant to say, of course, Captain Brandon."
Alice's eyes glittered at the dry, sardonic smile on the other woman's face. With a quick flash of teeth, she tapped her throat mike, hit the ready switch on her remote, and said to her commander, "Fuck, yeah. Let's get this party started."
"Remember," Edward said over Em's snickering. Still watching the soldier on the ground, he patiently waited for his opening. "The second that switch is thrown, it's lights out. Coms'll come down. Do not – and I repeat, do not – deviate from the plan unless there is a very good reason." He shot a final, lingering glance at Bella's row of hedges. "Are we clear?"
A chorus of "Yes, sirs" answered him.
As he edged forward, Edward's wrist buzzed, signaling an update from the Delta captain to the north: Target acquired. Modified weapons present. Agent present. Limited quantity on site but positive ID. Intended destination: front lines.
"Fuck," Edward muttered as another buzz followed on its heels: Team 2 requests permission to neutralize target.
An icy wind swept across the dark estate. The hair on the back of Edward's neck rose at the angry, frigid reminder, and when he blinked, he saw the rows of bloody, lifeless bodies that had lined the sidewalks of Paris after the attack on the cathedral. Bella's helpless fury echoed in his ears. He could feel her fists balled into his shirt as she'd tried her damnedest not to cry. Edward's jaw ticked. His eyes narrowed, and then he punched out a single, one-word response: Granted.
He'd deal with the fall out after, if and when it came.
A moment later, Mr. Vityaz turned. Without hesitating, Edward shot out from behind the building. Carbine up and ready, he loped across the snow-covered grass to a meticulously arranged stack of logs, already split and dried for the nearby birch sauna.
"On three," he whispered, toggling the controls on his NVGs. Shades of black and neon green flooded his vision, and at the familiar ritual, his heartbeat automatically slowed. His breathing lined out, and the ghost of an anticipatory smile touched his lips.
"One… two… Go!"
Back behind her hedge, Bella sucked in a shaky breath. A soft click echoed in her earpiece, and for a single, hair-raising moment, time seemed to slow.
The wind stilled. The tiny flecks of flurrying snow stopped swirling. The heavily loaded pine boughs above went silent, ceasing their eerie creaking as if the world itself stood waiting.
An explosion fractured the air, shattering the silence.
Even though she'd been ready for it, Bella flinched, and her arms immediately flew to shield her head. As the boom reverberated through the estate, white-noise static burst through her radio as Leah's jammer simultaneously cut out all radio frequencies and communications, just like the major had warned.
The shockwave stilled, and Bella's head shot up. Vaguely, she registered the villa and its surroundings had gone pitch black. As if called, visible only in bright, neon night vision green, a dozen Marines and soldiers poured out of the surroundings, centering on the villa in eerie synchrony.
It took no more than a second for instinct and Emmett's beaten-in training to take over. Wide-eyed and panting, Bella scrambled to her feet, rifle in the lead, just like she'd been taught. She paused long enough to suck in another lungful of frigid, pine-tinged air, tugged her chinstrap, and darted out into the open yard.
As soon as Bella's boots hit the open lawn, the air thumped overhead.
A split-second later, a high-pitched male scream answered, and Jazz's second shot thumped the air again, cutting him off mid-shout.
As she passed, bullets strafed a pair of marble statues, but Bella didn't stop. Trusting the man overhead watching their backs, she raced across the unblemished snow. Halfway there, she peeked left, just in time to catch the rounder thirtysomething guard she'd flagged earlier topple over the railing of the uppermost terrace. Little more than a dark, misshapen mass, he slammed into the ground with a sickening crunch. Jasper fired again, and the taller guard fell a beat later. When this one hit, crimson sprayed the pristine white at her feet.
"Jesus Christ," she muttered, waving over her shoulder at their sniper as she targeted the massive wooden double-door entry.
As soon as Bella reached the covered entry, her boots skidded across the tile. Her back slammed into the stucco wall, banging her SAPI plates into her ribs. She was alone at the heavy, ornate, double wooden door, but then she blinked, and Emmett appeared at her shoulder.
"Good fuckin' job, Baby Captain!" the big man whisper-yelled, grinning like a crazy man behind his NVGs as he slid into position in front of her. Like usual, Emmett was a wall of weapons, muscle, and menace waiting to happen, and that eager blacked-out grin somehow made him all the more intimidating. "Next time, I'm gonna have to kick it in gear!"
Still panting, not quite capable of speech, Bella nodded.
Emmett chuckled when she gulped. With a quick rap of his knuckles against her Kevlar, he motioned to Rosalie and covered her as she almost lazily jogged across the yard from the south. Like it was any other day, the gunnery sergeant took position on the opposite side of the entry, aiming her favorite matte black combat shotgun at the lock.
"Sup, Dollface," Emmett purred, still wearing that crazy-man grin.
Shaking her head, the gunny muttered under her breath. "Fucking moron."
When Emmett let out a petulant protest, Bella glanced back at the yard, automatically scanning the snow for the last member of their four-person entry team.
The second she clocked Edward, Bella's heart climbed her esophagus.
Not bothering to mask his approach, the major headed directly toward Jazz's Mr. Vityaz. Sensing the Marine's approach, the grizzled, tattooed soldier spun around and whipped his 9mm up with the speed and dexterity of a seasoned pro. For a hair-raising moment, he took aim at the man barreling toward him.
Without slowing, Edward feinted left, drawing his aim, before immediately dodging right and hurdling a line of low decorative grasses. Mid-stride, he fired off a tight triplet of silenced rounds straight into Mr. Vityaz's armored chest.
On impact, the guard staggered, knocked backward but not down. Bellowing a stream of curses, he took aim and fired, managing to get off a pair of shots. The first went sky high, the second just wide, and then suddenly, Edward was there, shouldering into him and forcing him to the ground. Without hesitating, in a lithe, fluid move, Edward flipped his rifle 180 degrees and slammed the butt straight into the man's skull, killing him instantly.
As Edward hit the porch and slipped in behind Rosalie, the gunnery sergeant grunted something akin to appreciation. "Well, that was effective. I'll give you that, at least."
Behind the NVGs, Edward leveled the woman a flat, bored stare. "Glad to know you approve, Gunny."
Stepping toward the door, Rosalie shrugged. "Should have just shot him in the head to start with."
"While running…" the major said, breathing just a little harder than he was used to. "Think my aim's that's good, huh?"
Rosalie grunted again. "Mine is."
Edward rolled his eyes. But then his gaze automatically skated over to the silent, petite woman across the doorway, and he instantly despised the small, surprised "O" that shaped her too-pretty lips. That perpetual fist in his gut squeezed even tighter because no matter Somalia, no matter her expertise, and no matter the fucking arrangement that she and his asshole uncle had come to that placed her on his team permanently, she still wasn't supposed to see this shit – to see him like this.
"Are you good, Dr. Swan?" he mouthed, cataloging the rapid rise and fall of her chest, the too-tight grip on her rifle, and the dozen other small tells that gave her nerves away.
"I'm fine," Bella whispered back, almost hoarse, as her heart continued its jackrabbit thudding against her sternum. Without realizing what she was doing, she scanned Edward from head to toe, searching for any hint of injury. Finding absolutely nothing, not entirely understanding the careful, almost hesitant tone that had colored his question, she cocked her head to the side. "But are you alright? That jerk didn't hit you, did he?"
Edward shook his head, and despite where they were and why, one corner of his mouth pulled up into an involuntary, wry, lopsided smile. For an all-too-brief moment, they mutely stared at each other across the porch. As Edward watched Bella's shoulders finally relax, something uncurled inside his ribcage before he dipped his chin in a single curt affirmative. He checked his watch, then angled to Rosalie, still sporting that bored, put-out expression of hers, and issued a wordless command.
Like every other time they danced this particular dance, everything moved in a sickening whir of color, speed, and sound.
As soon as the gunnery sergeant blew out the lock, Emmett's big boot kicked in the door. The thing banged against the wall behind it, and without hesitating for a second, Edward and Rosalie filed in, crouching low. Emmett immediately followed, then Bella ducked in, and the four Marines spread out in a loose fan formation.
Four laser lines sliced up the dark, sweeping back and forth as they entered Basayev's vast marbled foyer. Unsurprisingly, the space was empty and eerily silent. Fanciful oil paintings covered ornately wallpapered walls, an enormous Persian rug blanketed their footfalls, and a massive gold and crystal chandelier hung overhead. A grand double staircase draped in rich red carpeting curved its way up to an open second floor overlooking the entry.
"Looks like Liberace puked all over this place," Emmett muttered as he crept past a plush brocade chair and loveseat. The man with the babied post-War Falls Church bungalow and crisscrossed lawn wrinkled his nose at a series of gaudy bearded marble busts.
Despite the knots in her stomach, Bella almost laughed. "Guess money can't buy taste."
"That's for fuckin' sure."
Muted yells came from somewhere in the back of the villa where Alice and El'azar's Sayeret Matkal team was mid-insertion, along with the telltale rat-tat-tat! of answering gunfire from Basayev's security force. Almost on cue, somewhere above, rubber-soled shoes squeaked. Hushed male whispers filtered down to the first floor, tight and angry, and Edward flashed a quick hand signal to Rosalie. With a clipped nod, she peeled left, targeting the lefthand staircase as he took the right. In unison, hugging the walls and barrels up, they began a slow, steady ascent.
Without warning, a dark figure materialized on the second-floor landing.
Before Bella could even blink, Edward reacted. His laser line pinned its target, and a triplet of suppressed rounds broke the silence. There was a muffled groan of misery, then a rifle clattered against marble, and a black-clad guard tumbled down the stairs. Blood poured out of his throat and chest, blackening the carpeting under her night vision.
A second appeared – a young twenty-something in dark fatigues wielding a Sunzha Machines carbine – and Rosalie's shotgun instantly went off, earsplitting in the open space. The guard's eyes shot wide as he slammed against the curlicued railing. Rosalie fired a second time, and his mouth opened in a silent scream. Teetering at the top of the stairs, he glanced down. Glassy and confused, his dark eyes locked on Bella for a single beat, and then he collapsed, sliding down in a lifeless heap.
Without sparing the young man another look, Rosalie continued to ascend. As soon as she and Edward hit the landing, Edward signaled Emmett and Bella to follow as they covered from above.
Ears still ringing from Rosalie's blasts, Bella slinked up the stairs. As she climbed, deeper inside the house, gunfire continued as the Israeli team blasted through and cleared the first floor. A flashbang went off, then more yelling and gunfire. By the time her boots touched the landing, hazy smoke and the acrid stench of sulfur and gunpowder was already seeping through the house.
"Intel says he'll be up one more," Edward said, simultaneously taking out yet another guard with a lightning-fast volley. "We need this asshole alive. Clear?"
With a quick swap to her carbine, Rosalie swept the hall. "Clear. Bear-man, you cover the rear." In a rare display, she lifted her NVGs and threw him an almost flirtatious wink. "We'll call when we need you, big boy."
"Yes, ma'am." Emmet snorted, but then he eyed his commander, and the two men shared a single, too-long look before Edward wordlessly pivoted, targeting the short, dark hall to their right, where a second curving staircase led to Basayev's private quarters on the third floor.
As the other two Marines began to climb, the staff sergeant peered down at Bella. "You stay your ass behind me."
Bella's cheek sucked between her teeth, and her brows slammed down. "What?"
"Don't argue with me," he said, sharper than usual. His grin vanished. "You're doin' awesome, but there'll be a shit ton more of these fuckers up there. Need you to shoot anyone that comes at you, no hesitating. Got it?"
Air sawed in and out of Bella's lungs. "Got it."
Thirty seconds later, right as Bella hit the steps, a barrage of small arms fire erupted on the third floor. Another flashbang went off, deafening in the enclosed space, and for a moment, the strobes lighting up the stairwell blinded her optics. As soon as she could see and hear again, Bella picked up repeating volleys from Edward's and Rosalie's M4A1s, along with the gunnery sergeant's angry, growled-out curse.
"Let's go, let's go, Doc!" Emmett yelled, climbing faster. "That's our signal!"
The third floor looked like a slaughterhouse. Broken glass and spent brass littered the rugs. Chips, pockmarks, and blood spray decorated the finely adorned plaster walls. A trio of guards lay sprawled out and lifeless in the middle of the wide hall. Two more were piled in an open doorway. Further down, gunfire continued, along with a man furiously yelling in a language Bella couldn't make out.
"Kto ty, blyad', takoy?" a baritone bellowed. "Kak ty smeyesh' prikhodit' v moy dom!"
There was the muffled thud of flesh being struck, then Rosalie barked out a very angry command. "Motherfucker, I told you to get on your goddamned knees!" There was another fleshy thwack. "Don't make me put you there."
That was when Bella felt it.
Halfway down the long hall, as Emmett rounded a corner ahead to clear an adjacent bedroom, the hair on the back of Bella's neck stood on end. A tingle raced down her spine, turning her blood to ice.
Bella jerked around, and the scream that sat on the tip of her tongue came out in a choked wheeze.
A slight, feminine figure with loose, long black hair stepped through a curtain of smoke on bare, silent feet. Early twenties – at most – she had a delicately pretty heart-shaped face, and her eyes were wet and as wide as saucers. Twin gray streaks ran down her cheeks, and a smeared bloody handprint stained the front of her pale robe.
The woman let out a keening wail of both fury and terror. As if in slow motion, Bella watched in horror as Basayev's wife or lover or whatever raised an ancient, banged-up AK.
"No!" Bella commanded, loud and frantic, as she tracked the woman behind her carbine. Her finger curled around her trigger and trembled as her stomach took a sharp, nauseating nosedive. "Net! Don't you do it! Don't you dare!" Bella motioned to the woman's weapon. "Down! Put it down!"
Flinching, the young woman hesitated. Fresh tears streaked down her face, dripping off her chin, and her slender shoulders quietly shook. A second later, Basayev's wife shuddered, then stilled. Her barrel slowly angled toward the floor.
"That's it," Bella said, softer, gently cajoling. Her laser line slipped from the woman's chest.
Another trio of shots – these from Emmett's heavier round 240 – abruptly rang out from somewhere down the hall. The sound echoed off the marble and the high trayed ceilings overhead, and in the background, Bella heard Edward let out a low, pissed-off curse and fire off his own rounds.
Without warning, Basayev's wife launched forward. Baring her teeth, she shrieked something unintelligible and whipped her AK to her shoulder.
Time, along with Bella's heart, stopped.
Her lips parted in stunned surprise as a high-powered round rocked the room.
And then there was silence.
.
.
.
Notes:
Apparently, Fanfiction is messing up with notifications again... *sigh*. I hope you find this update somehow. I would really love to hear from you!
Also, if the villains are a bit confusing, there is a cheat sheet at the top of Chap 9
Hebrew [transliterated:
Lahav: recall this is El'azar's call sign, meaning Blade
Barur: of course
Todah al Ha'shituf, Be'emet: thank you, truly, for sharing
Samal Rishon: rank in the Israeli military, equivalent to staff sergeant
Khamuda, noladeti mukhana: basically, sweetie, I was born ready
Sayeret Matkal: recall, this is an Israeli special forces unit
Russian [transliterated:
Protivopekhotnaya mina nazhimnaya (ПМН-5Г): antipersonnel pressure mine, 5G
Arbi, gde tebya cherti nosyat: Arbi, where the hell are you?
Da poshel ty: Yeah, fuck you!
Mudak, gde ty: Asshole, where are you?
Ya seychas v pyatom sektore, gde i dolzhen byt': I'm in sector 5 right now, just like I'm supposed to be
Ty uzhe dolzhen byl zakonchit'. Khvatit vyyobyvat'sya tam, zakruglyaysya i bystro syuda. Chto-to ne tak: You should be done by now. Stop fucking around, hurry up and get back here. Something isn't right
Chto sluchilos': What's wrong / what's happened?
Yeshche ne znayu. Ty videl Movsara: I don't know yet. Have you seen Movsar?
Net, on dolzhen byl sovershat' obkhod sklada: No, he's supposed to be doing his rounds at the warehouse
On ne otvechayet na radio: He's not answering the radio
Skoreye vsego on prosto drochit ili sryot, kak obychno: He's probably just jerking off or taking a shit, like usual
Ostav' yego v pokoye. Yego i tak zhena uzhe zadolbala: Give him a break. His wife's already had enough of him
Ladno, na obratnom puti poprobuy nayti etogo lenivogo zasrantsa: Fine, see if you can find that lazy asshole on your way back
Da, da, kak skazhesh': Yeah, yeah, whatever you say
Kto ty, blyad', takoy… Kak ty smeyesh' prikhodit' v moy dom: Who the fuck are you? You dare to come to my house?
Glossary:
416: refers to the Heckler Koch HK416, a gas-operated, short-stroke assault rifle/carbine chambered for the 5.5645mm NATO cartridge. It's used by a number of US JSOC units, including Navy SEALs and the Army SFOD-D (Delta Force). It's similar to the M4A1
Boguchar, Novocherkassk: Boguchar is a town in Voronezh Oblast, Russia. Novocherkassk is a city in Rostov Oblast, Russia. Both are located very close to Ukraine's eastern border with Russia and currently house Russian military installations for mechanized, artillery, and tank units
C-4: or Composition C-4, is a handy dandy variety of plastic explosive. It has a texture similar to modeling clay and can be molded into any desired shape. It is relatively insensitive and can be detonated only by the shock wave from a detonator or blasting cap
Detcord: aka detonating cord or primer cord, is a thin, flexible plastic tube usually filled with pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN, pentrite). It is a high-speed fuse that explodes rather than burns and is suitable for detonating high explosives such as C-4
Gun mortar: is a breech-loaded mortar, usually equipped with a hydraulic recoil mechanism, and sometimes equipped with an autoloader. They are usually mounted on an armored vehicle and are capable of direct fire. Mortar is a type of simple artillery that fires shells (bombs). Russian field gun mortars range from around 82mm to 120 mm.
Howitzer: is an artillery weapon that falls between a cannon and a mortar. Russian field howitzers range from around 122mm to 152mm
Leupold: Leupold Stevens is an American manufacturer of telescopic sights, red dot sights, binoculars, rangefinders, spotting scopes, and eyewear. Their riflescopes are used by the US Navy Seals, Secret Service, US Army, and USMC. The Mark 5HD model is specified for the M110 sniper rifle.
M110A2: the M110 is a gas-operated, semi-automatic sniper rifle chambered for the 7.6251mm NATO round. It's used by US Army and Marine snipers. The M110A2 is a recently issued improved version of the original M110 rifle with M-LOK rails, an improved gas system, a new suppressor, and an adjustable stock. It has an effective range of around 1000 meters
MK3: or the Ontario Mark III knife, which is the standard knife issued to Navy SEALs. It's one of many popular knives used by special operations. It has a 6.5" 440 stainless steel fixed blade, saw tooth back, and black oxide finish
MRO: or the MRO Borodach, a Russian self-contained, disposable single-shot 72.5 mm rocket launcher manufactured by NPO Bazalt. It can be configured to fire thermobaric, smoke, or incendiary warheads
Multicam: is the pattern of camouflage currently used by the U.S. Army and Special Operations Command. It was designed and is manufactured by Crye Precision. It's similar to MARPAT, which is what the USMC uses
Signal jammer: this is a general term referencing various electronic warfare technologies that disrupt electronic signals. It's meant to disable communications, whether person-to-person, e.g. cell, radio, Wifi, or to/from weapons, e.g. radar, drone or missile guidance, etc. These devices can run from permanent, building-sized installations to truck-mounted stations to portable backpacks, depending on the purpose and desired range of impact. I'm taking some liberties here, but the technology definitely exists and it's in use on battlefields
Receiver: this is the center part of a rifle. It provides housing for the internal action and has threaded interfaces for externally attaching components such as the barrel, stock, trigger mechanism, etc
Tango: in the NATO alphabet, the letter T is Tango. It's military slang for target or enemy.
Vityaz:refers to the PP-19 Vityaz 9x19mm Parabellum submachine gun developed by Russian arms manufacturer, JSC Kalashnikov Concern. It's used by various Russian Spetsnaz units