Andy McNab - Battlefield 3 - The Russian

They kept to the mountains until they were well clear of the Americans, then dropped down to the Tehran — Tabriz road they had taken two days before. Apart from several vehicles abandoned during the exodus from Tehran, it was deserted. They came across a bus that had come off the road and slid down a bank. But there was no sign of the passengers, or the rest of the multitude who had left their homes and livelihoods behind in the shattered capital.

At Miyaneh, southeast of Tabriz, Kroll said,

‘We’re almost out of juice.’

It was three a.m.

‘I guess the fun had to end sometime,’ said Dima. ‘They’ve got gas coming out of their ears in these bloody places, but can you find any when you need it?’

The entire town was shuttered, but a vast impromptu camp had sprung up in the parking lot of a shopping mall, with hundreds sleeping in their cars. They woke a few of them up and offered cash for whatever was left in their tanks, but all swore they were as good as empty. They sputtered on a little further, then the tank ran dry. They found a plastic can in the trunk, and leaving Kroll with Amara, Vladimir and Dima walked on until they came to a gas station.

‘Nice and quiet,’ said Vladimir.

But they were not alone. A gang of raw-looking PLR recruits appeared out of the shadows and raised their AKs. One look at them and you could see the lack of experience, the volatile combination of fear and the lack of impulse control.

‘You’d think just one thing could be straightforward, wouldn’t you,’ said Dima as he identified the leader, a jittery youth in cheap Adidas knock-offs and a red and white scarf round his face. He must have copied his look from an Al Qaeda training video.

‘No gas!’ they shouted, firing their weapons in the air.

Then why guard it, if there was nothing to guard?

‘Hi lads,’ said Vladimir. ‘Just going to fill up, then be on our way.’ He held up the can and waggled it.

‘Come on, grandad, if you want some!’ shouted one.

‘Let’s cut his prick off: he won’t be needing it,’ said another.

‘The youth of today really are growing up too fast,’ said Dima.

‘Bollocks to this,’ said Vladimir.

Somewhat the worse for the dodgy Azerbaijani vodka he’d found in the Land Cruiser, he lifted his Makarov and fired upwards, hitting the leader in the arm.

‘Was that your idea of a warning shot?’ said Dima.

‘You know I shoot better when I’m drunk.’

The youths fled and they pushed the Land Cruiser the last few metres, Amara still snoring peacefully as they filled up.

As they pulled back on to the Tabriz road, Dima called Darwish. At least he had good news for someone: his daughter was okay and was coming home, and her evil husband was no more. Which was about the sum total of their achievements over the last forty-eight hours.

Darwish took a long time to answer. When he did he sounded bleary. It was five a.m, after all.

‘ Your little girl is on her way back to you .’

That woke him up. For a few seconds he didn’t speak. Then he said,

‘ I am forever in your debt .’

‘ Story of your life. Where are you? ’

‘ I must make arrangements. I shall call you right back .’

Five minutes passed. Dima’s phone rang.

‘ Okay. I am taking Anara away for a few days. I need to give her a break after her ordeal .’ Darwish gave him details of an airstrip outside Tabriz. ‘ How long till you are there? ’

Dima glanced at the map.

‘ About an hour .’

‘ And is my Anara truly okay? ’

‘ Truly, ’ said Dima. ‘ Are you all right? ’

‘ Yes, yes: just tired .’

56

Alborz Mountains, North of Tehran

Blackburn made it to the apex of the ridge which separated the valley to the north and the Tehran basin to the south. All the way up they had watched him go. He looked back for the last time at the now almost invisible Russians and hesitated.

There are points in your life, he thought, where one decision changes the whole course of it. Enlisting had been one. He could have stayed home, gone to grad school, got a job and settled down, maybe even married Charlene. But that decision now seemed insignificant compared to the one he had made an hour ago. He had shot and killed his own CO, an unimaginable act. How had he come to that? Had he let his emotions get the better of him, going against all his training, or was he standing up for what was right? He had prevented Cole from killing Dima after all, and in cold blood. He had killed his superior officer to save the life of a man he had known for less than two hours. An enemy combatant who had saved him only moments before.

And what really counted now was what Dima Mayakovsky had told him about Solomon. What it added up to — the consequences for the world — were too terrifying to contemplate.

Could Dima and his rough band of brothers stop a nuclear apocalypse? Would anyone believe Blackburn if he told them New York was a target? His own authorities seemed determined to mistrust him, to ascribe the worst possible motives to whatever he did. If he looked honestly deep into himself, he was glad there’d been a reason to kill Cole.

Standing on the ridge, he took one last look into the northern valley. By now Dima and his men were just specks. Were they still watching him? He couldn’t tell. Then he turned to the south where Tehran, the ruined city, stretched out in the distance. And much nearer, the chalet and his comrades — what was left of them.

He was fantastically tired, hungry and thirsty, the afternoon sun sucking up all his moisture and energy. He kept moving, one foot in front of the other, until he eventually dropped down off the mountain and what was visible of the front of the chalet. Which wasn’t much at all. As he approached, he felt as though he was going back to the beginning of the day, to when he was a different man. Would they be able to tell?

‘Well, will you look at that!’ Montes ran forward.

Blackburn looked at him as an alien might look on his first human. He embraced his old buddy, but it was as if their entire shared past had been erased by what had happened in the bunker. All their reminiscing about home, the banter and the horseplay, their sharing of their plans for the future when they got out, all gone — vanished under the rubble and the secret buried beneath. He could tell no one about Cole.

Looking at Montes, Blackburn knew then that he would never be the same. He had enlisted in a bid to get closer to understanding his father and the great weight he carried around with him after Vietnam. But Blackburn had got something else he never bargained for: his own terrible burden.

Matkovic came towards them.

‘Man, we so thought you were gone.’

‘So did I,’ said Blackburn.

‘You know what happened to Cole?’

Just like that. This would be the question that would haunt him from now onwards. He knew it would be put to him a hundred times more to come. Eyes watching him as he gave his response. He knew then that the idea that they would take him at his word and that somehow it would never be investigated, was hopeless.

The site around the chalet was being cleared. The casualties from the crash-landed Osprey had all been Medevac’d. The place was crawling with recovery crew. A requisitioned excavator was clawing at the rubble.

‘Over here, Blackburn! We need your help.’

Over the hood of a Humvee, Major Johnson, Cole’s CO, spread out a copy of the chalet plans Blackburn had seen at Firefly. ‘Got to figure out where Lieutenant Cole could be.’

Blackburn hadn’t expected this.