Kremlin Storm, page 13
part #4 of Sokolov Series
“How large is the land plot?”
“Seventy-five hectares.”
“Do you know if there was any structure built there previously?”
“Well, yes. The Soviets constructed quite a few of those. A Cold War era bunker is located there, but it must have been neglected for decades.”
“There’s your answer,” Sokolov said.
“What do you mean? What could Rotfeuer have to do with GRU operation planned years in advance?”
“I’d wager this is where they’re keeping Ivanov. It’s their hideout.”
“It certainly fits the criteria,” Werner agreed. As the files finished copying, he clicked open several documents in the Rotfeuer folder. They contained maps of East Germany and detailed plans of a military installation. “Yes,” Werner continued, “it must be the same site. Everything is falling into place now.”
“A bunker is the safest place during a storm, isn’t it. But there’s only one way to find out,” Sokolov said. “I must get there.”
“Are you mad?” Asiyah said. “What if you’re caught by the police? What if you get hit by another storm?”
“That’s the whole point. Think about it. Right now, the police are too busy dealing with the storm’s aftermath than hunting terrorists. Panin definitely coordinated his getaway with the Woodpecker attack, it’s the perfect cover. I must stop him before another storm hits. What if this hailstorm was just a warm-up before the main event? A blizzard or a hurricane. Whatever it may be, the next weather attack will wreak such havoc that we’ll have no chance of escaping Berlin. Or it might kill us on the way to Poland. My brother and Magda may never be able to reach us, or if they do, we don’t know what the next target is for a weather strike. I need to act before we’re trapped for good.”
“You’re right,” she said.
“And another thing. Don’t forget, if this is the kind of technology they already have, I’d hate to think about the capability of Mercury-18 they will obtain with Ivanov’s aid. I must rescue him.”
“I’m coming with you,” Asiyah said.
“No, I’m going in alone. This is as far as I’ve taken you. You’ll be in relative safety here.”
“That’s not fair. You can’t leave me here,” she argued. “Panin must have a getaway procedure in place. If we bust Panin, we can use his pre-arranged escape route to flee from Germany.”
“It’s too dangerous. I can’t risk your life. You need to get some sleep after what you’ve been through. Depending on how things pan out, I’ll either come back for you in the morning, or you’ll leave for Poland on your own. Make the most of your time until then. Rest your mind and body. You still have plenty to chat about with Simon.”
Besides, there’s no telling how Ivanov might react if he saw you again after you set him up, Sokolov didn’t add.
“Okay, agreed,” she conceded with a touch of bitterness. “No goodbye kisses?”
“No goodbyes,” he said marching out the door. “I’ll see you again. I promise.”
“I thought you didn’t make promises you couldn’t keep.”
31
Darkness swallowed Dmitry Ivanov.
It was the effect of the drug administered to him in the van. He had no idea in which direction they’d been driving him, or for how long.
He was hurled off the edge of consciousness into a deep psychedelic abyss. A kaleidoscope of horror images played out in an infinite loop. Time and again he saw the bloodied remains of the Brandenburgers. Like before, he tried to scream, but the sound was muted by the drug-induced numbness that he floated in. A yawing blackness enveloped him, and the last tokens of perception faded away.
Then, a thousand bright spots clashed and burst into a white flash. Ivanov felt blood rush to his head. A stimulant ejected into his system was forcefully accelerating his metabolism and reversing the artificial sleep. The first sensation that he experienced after the heavy sedative had worn off was a skull-splitting headache. It was as if someone had used his head as an anvil for a gigantic sledgehammer. He opened his eyes with a moan.
He could not focus his vision at first. Light and color were blurred in the eye-stabbing rays of a single overhead lamp, but as his mind cleared, Ivanov tried to make out his surroundings.
He found himself strapped to a chair in some cellar, lit by an overhead lamp. The nylon rope that kept him tied was digging into his flesh around his wrists and ankles. The chair was bolted to the floor, preventing it from falling over.
Two men wearing green fatigues crossed the length of the chamber and loomed above Ivanov. He identified them as the Schlosshotel attackers. Both had Kalashnikovs slung over their shoulders. Without their gas masks, he could see the faces of his kidnappers. Cold, savage stares. Twisted scowls. Heavy-set features. Thinning hair. The older of the two stroked his goatee as he studied Ivanov like a hunter eyeing his trophy.
“Who are you?” Ivanov croaked, his mouth dry.
“You may call me Panin,” said the senior terrorist. “It’s not my real name, anyway. Who am I? A Russian patriot. Unlike you.”
Panin’s boot lashed out in a kick that connected with Ivanov’s cheekbone, the thick sole smashing into his face and opening a gruesome gash under the left eye. He sagged in the chair, a purple swelling already disfiguring his face. Panin hawked and spat a blob of slime on the Nobel Prize winner before getting on with the speech.
“You traitor! You thought you could hide from us in America? Wrong, you old scumbag. There’s no safe place from the Motherland. Isn’t that right, Umar?”
His jihadi-looking companion nodded.
“Mother Russia will get you anywhere.”
To back up his words, Umar struck Ivanov on the mouth, splitting his lip.
Panin seemed to enjoy watching human suffering and hearing his own musings. “She can be merciful to her prodigal sons, though, and offer them a second chance. Consider yourself lucky that you can be useful to your country. You hear me, Ivanov?”
“How can you expect me to cooperate after such atrocious treatment?” Ivanov mumbled through the pain.
“Oh no, old man. I don’t want your cooperation. I want your obedience. And I will keep breaking your body and your will until I get it. That’s my job. The science part is best left to the pros back in Moscow. But if you try to trick them, you’ll be dealing with me.”
“This is insane!”
“Is it, really? I’m following the tried and true methods laid out by Comrade Beria. He was a great man, was Lavrenti. He built the bomb, with lots of scientists like you working for him, so his methods are valid. And our great President Frolov is building something bigger than the bomb. Something that will make the world fear and respect us.”
Ivanov’s blood wasn’t only tricking down from his mouth onto his shirt. It was boiling. The anger somewhat numbed the intense throbbing that was shearing off half of his face.
“At my age I’ve got nothing to lose. I’d rather die than agree to serve Frolov. But I want to see you die first. We’re still in Germany, aren’t we? Sooner or later, the police will find you. They have to, after what you did at the hotel. They know I’ve been kidnapped. You’re on borrowed time.”
Panin laughed. “I have all the time in the world, you old fool. I can keep you here forever. This place is one hundred percent secure. We’ve got a direct data link to Moscow. You can work from here, for the rest of your life. Either that, or you will join Abrikosov in Kaliningrad. It’s your choice. Nobody is looking for you. And nobody will find you. Everybody will forget about you quickly. As for me, I’m a small man. Unimportant compared to the pressing matters that the damned Nazis will have on their hands very soon. A series of storms, floods, tornadoes, you name it.”
“You’re a monster!”
“I see where your loyalty lies. Certainly not with Russia. Your lack of commitment to the country’s cause is disappointing. We’ll fix that. It’ll take some work. Umar, carry on from here.”
Umar approached his job meticulously.
World-renowned physicist Dmitry L. Ivanov was bleeding from multiple lacerations inflicted upon him by repeated blows to his head and face. It all felt so unreal, but Ivanov’s sense of disbelief and detachment was dispelled each time he received another blow. The pain brought him back to reality that was more terrifying than any nightmare.
32
Sokolov rode the Vespa out of Berlin, maneuvering along the quieter streets in quick, short bursts. The autobahns were inaccessible, congested by continuous car crashes. Even the small alleys were flooded or filled with piles of hailstones and battered vehicles that Sokolov had to squeeze between. He witnessed the destruction brought upon the façades, windows, store signs, kiosks, and trees lining the streets. The city looked as though it had survived an air raid. Sirens wailed and ambulance lights flashed as the injured were taken off to hospitals. He resisted the urge to assist those in need. Berlin’s emergency services were more than capable of handling the situation. The best way he could help—and nobody else but him could—was preventing the next attack. Besides, the territory he was wading through wasn’t exactly friendly. He survived a few nerve-tingling moments as he passed Polizei vehicles, but remained unnoticed.
Finally breaking out of the capital, he hit a rural road which led nowhere but the dying eastern German countryside, the derelict, isolated villages abandoned for larger, more comfortable cities. Thirty kilometers away lay the large swathe of land owned by the shadowy Rotfeuer GmbH. He navigated by memory, the tiny headlight of the Vespa shining a path through the outback of the federal state of Brandenburg.
He turned off and continued down a dirt road. The Vespa’s wheels spewed mud. He managed only a few hundred meters along the unpaved track when the scooter stopped suddenly, the front wheel jerking sharply. The Vespa got caught in the mud. Cursing under his breath, Sokolov checked his GPS coordinates. He wasn’t far away. Instead of trying to pull the Vespa clear, he left the mud-stuck scooter and proceeded on foot. The soft, wet, cloggy soil squished under his sneakers. The light from the forsaken Vespa faded as he went farther. He stumbled upon a thicket and wormed his way through until he reached a clearing.
It was the edge of a hill. It had to overlook the vast estate of Rotfeuer, but the impregnable blackness made it impossible to know if this was the right place.
He pulled out his night-vision binoculars and zoomed in.
All he saw was an empty field surrounded by forest. Nothing to look at.
Then he gathered his bearings and adjusted the zoom.
Finally, he spotted it. A soaring barbed-wire fence that stretched in either direction.
From his position, he got a decent view of the enclosed area, enough to know that this was it.
The casual observer would still find nothing to see there. Or so it might seem.
Beyond the fence a road cut through the expanse of the privately-owned land. It led to a structure made of concrete, a large garage partially obscured by trees and undergrowth. A gravel pathway ran from the garage for a few hundred meters to another, much smaller building.
A wooden shed.
There was more than met the eye.
No ordinary shed came equipped with a blast-resistant steel door. The outward appearance—from the door’s rust stains to the degrading wooden exterior—was deceptive.
It was a stronghold. An invisible one, though.
The shed served as the bunker entrance.
Concealed below was a subterranean fortress. Tens of thousands of tons of reinforced concrete, built twenty meters deep. Two-meter-thick walls and a four-meter-thick protective shield that comprised the ceiling. A ground area of 2,000 to 3,000 square meters. It would consist of a decontamination chamber, living quarters, an operations center, and a separate communications room for Stasi or KGB officers. Sokolov had a general idea of the layout from his NBC (Nuclear, Biological, Chemical) Defense training for EMERCOM, and the drills he remembered as a kid at the Soviet Air Force base in Magdeburg.
There had been 1,200 Cold War-era nuclear bunkers strewn around the former East Germany, most of them neglected now in distant forests. Not this one, which was rebuilt, improved, and fully operational. Confirmed by a couple of AK-toting sentries prowling the vicinity of the garage building. Most likely Islamic Levant or GRU grunts.
Once the enemy presence had been established, Sokolov continued scanning the landscape through the binoculars.
The gigantic area surrounding the bunker served mainly to camouflage its existence. But as he swept his gaze, he noticed something else encompassed within the premises, a few hundred meters away from fortified structure.
An antenna array. Rows upon rows of masts with dipole antennas mounted crosswise on top of each.
The original location of the bunker’s tropospheric radio station was placed under the ground, not above it. Those arrays didn’t belong to a communications network.
There must have been at least a hundred elements in the system. Sokolov knew exactly what it was.
The Cold War bunker hadn’t merely become a terrorist hideout. It was a Woodpecker facility.
Sokolov marveled at the audacity of the Kremlin, setting up a weather-manipulation base right in the middle of Europe.
He put the binoculars away.
The lume of his dive watch glowed, showing the hands vividly. Pre-dawn, the ideal time to strike.
A mad idea, given the chance of success.
Without any plan or preparation, he was about to mount a bare-handed assault on a modernized military bunker capable of withstanding nuclear, biological, and chemical attacks. Alone against heavily-armed guards, total number unknown. He also had a vital hostage to rescue.
All of those factors suggested that he was foolish to even consider it.
He made the only possible decision, and nothing could sway it.
He was going in.
Life was not just a numbers game. In the end, it all came down to right and wrong, good and evil.
Sokolov was a rescuer. He’d faced impossible odds in his profession as an Extra-Risk Team leader. Attacking enemy strongholds wasn’t his specialty, and he’d never done it before without support, but he’d give it his best shot.
He had no right to back down.
33
Every fortress had a weak spot, and an upgraded Soviet-era doomsday shelter was no exception.
The first line of defense he had to breach was the outer perimeter. The barbed-wire fencing acted mainly as a deterrent against wildlife and livestock, or accidental human trespassers. It hadn’t been intended to fight off a determined invasion. None had been expected. The barrier was more of a part of the facility’s camouflage. Erecting a tall metal fence would have immediately drawn attention and suspicion that something big was going on. Basic protection made the property of Rotfeuer GmbH appear like yet another area of farmland.
At three meters in height, penetrating it hardly presented an easy task, though. Far from it. Climbing over the fence carried the risk of getting caught in the barbed wire, possibly resulting in serious injuries. By Sokolov’s calculations, the perimeter measured roughly six kilometers. An awfully long stretch of barbed wire to maintain. There had to be a chink somewhere.
He followed along the fence and soon enough found a section where the barbed wire wasn’t strung tightly enough. There was the danger of motion sensors detecting his unauthorized entry, but he failed to see any placed around the fence posts. Again, the sheer size of the area that had to be covered played to his advantage. He took the chance that even if he tripped a sensor, it might be written off as another intrusion by a stray animal, not a one-man army.
He tugged at the loose wire, grabbing it between the barbs. He stretched it forcefully until the wire sagged, creating a gap large enough for his backpack to go through, which he threw into the grass on other side. Then he pulled himself through the opening, swinging one leg, then the other. He’d managed to clear the fence without ripping his clothes, skin, or crotch. Tackling fences and walls was an essential emergency service skill, and he’d really mastered the art.
No time for celebration. Sokolov focused on the next hurdle.
The garage.
The drab, concrete, barn-like structure presented a more vulnerable access point than the bunker itself.
A duo of sentries guarded the garage entrance, exchanging occasional small talk to combat the mind-numbing boredom. One of them was as thick as a wardrobe, muttering in a small voice. The smaller man, sporting a black beard, nodded profusely.
The steel door was unlocked, Sokolov saw, as it opened and light spilled from within. A third man emerged, wearing paint-stained coveralls. The big guy offered him a cigarette, and while they shared a smoke, the bearded guard departed. AK dangling, he rounded the corner to take a leak on the building’s wall.
Now.
Sokolov dashed to the garage building, covering ground in a few seconds, and approached the weak-bladdered guard from behind as he unzipped his trousers.
Sokolov cut his bathroom break short, slamming his head against the wall. The guy’s face met reinforced concrete with an uncompromising result. The only stain he left on the side of the building was a splotch of blood that trailed him down the wall as he slid to the ground.
Sokolov picked up the unconscious guard’s AK, and checked the magazine, making sure it was full.
In the stillness of the night, his hearing picked out a foot stomp out a cigarette butt prematurely and the hinges creak as the coveralled worker returned inside the garage.
“Mahmoud? Mahmoud!” the smoking guard called out. “You taking a dump over there as well?” he said in Russian.
