He stood quietly for a moment, listening for signs of movement in the cottage. Hearing nothing, he stepped inside, sweeping the rifle left to right to ensure that the attackers hadn’t left a wounded man behind. The attack had progressed so quickly from his perspective that he couldn’t rely on what they had momentarily seen on the camera feeds. He had counted six men approaching the fence, but his count had been quickly interrupted by automatic fire directed against his Quick Reaction force.
His hopes of finding Berg alive were crushed when he caught sight of the ceiling to his left. Bullet holes riddled the entire surface, leaving very few areas intact. Combined with the damage he’d seen on the exterior of the house, he couldn’t imagine any scenario in which Berg had survived. The assault team had made a concerted effort, inside and outside of the house, to take him down.
“Berg! Karl Berg! You in there?” he said, walking toward the kitchen.
No response.
“Karl. It’s Gary Sheffield!”
Glancing through the kitchen, he noticed several bullet holes in the far wall, which caused him to point his rifle toward the staircase to his left. He spotted a dark red stain on the wall at the top of the stairs.
“Berg! Answer me, damn it!” Sheffield said.
“I’m up here,” a weak voice responded.
“Are you alone?”
“Yes,” Berg said.
Sheffield slung his rifle and mounted the stairs, expecting to find him lying in the hallway. The hardwood floor in the hallway was cracked and splintered from wall to wall, covered in a fine dust from the damage to the ceiling above.
“Where are you?” Sheffield said.
“Taking a bath,” Berg said.
He peered into the bathroom just off the hallway and found himself staring directly at the business end of the suppressed pistol he had given Berg less than fifteen minutes ago. The top of Berg’s head protruded just far enough over the top of the cast-iron, claw-foot tub to effectively aim the pistol. The pistol disappeared into the tub, along with the rest of Berg’s head.
“Reznikov?”
“He escaped by helicopter. They had us pinned down from the start,” Sheffield said, stepping into the bathroom.
Like the hallway, the bathroom had been effectively obliterated. Most of the white tile floor had been shattered, along with the toilet, sink and mirror. The shower stall’s glass door lay in pieces within the bullet-perforated fiberglass enclosure. Karl Berg lay crumpled inside the only safe location on the second floor, bloodied and pale. Sheffield extended a hand to Berg and pulled him out of the tub, helping him to the floor in the hallway.
“Your team?” Berg said.
“I lost most of them in the house.”
“Shit, Gary. I don’t know what to say. I have no idea how this happened. Mountain Glenn is off the grid. Way off the grid,” Berg said.
“Can you move?” Sheffield said.
“Yeah. Just grazed me,” Berg said, touching his shoulder.
“Looks more like a through and through. You got lucky,” he said, examining the floor and looking toward the bathtub.
The tub’s white porcelain coating was chipped in at least five places that displayed minor denting from the shallow angle of impact along the side. Since the tub was located against the outer wall of the bathroom, it probably didn’t take more than one or two deeper angle hits against its bottom, which was fortunate. Contrary to popular belief, a cast iron tub wasn’t bullet proof. Repeated, high-velocity direct hits could shatter the brittle metal, penetrating the steel curtain and peppering the occupant with metal shards from the inside.
“For the first time ever, I’m glad they didn’t spare any expense building this place,” Berg said.
“I can think of a few improvements,” Sheffield said.
“Surface-to-air missiles would be a good start,” Berg said.
“I don’t know if that would have helped. Between the machine gun and .50 caliber sniper rifle, we couldn’t do shit. What now?”
“The border is less than fifty miles away. If they get him over the border, he’s gone,” Berg added.
“Then he’s gone. You know the protocols for this place,” Sheffield said.
“Unfortunately, I know them entirely too well. I updated them three years ago to enhance the agency’s deniability. Reznikov is definitely lost…for now,” Berg said.
Chapter 73
Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Philip Regan accepted Minister-Counselor Leonid Novikov’s hand in a warmly enthusiastic embrace before gesturing toward the decorative coffee table adorned with a tea service set and a small but opulent selection of bite-sized pastries. Once the two diplomats settled into the two luxurious red leather high-back wing chairs, the dance began, starting with tea and a mid-morning snack.
“Can I offer you some tea?” Regan said.
“Thank you. That would be wonderful,” Novikov said in polished, Russian-accented English.
Regan poured him a cup of black tea from a polished bronze samovar presented in the early eighties by the Russian ambassador to George P. Shultz, President Ronald Reagan’s secretary of state. Novikov took a sip from the glass teacup and smiled in approval. They both indulged in a few pastries and traded pleasantries about family for the required amount of time before Philip Regan placed his teacup onto a shiny bronze tea service tray and leaned back in the chair.
“I know for a fact that the tea and pastila at your embassy puts this humble offering to shame, so I assume that something important brings you here during the morning tea hour,” Regan said.
“I’m afraid so,” Novikov said, putting his cup down. “This is a delicate matter,” he added.
“You have my undivided attention and discretion,” Regan said.
“Last night, we had an incident at the State Research Center for Virology and Biotechnology in Novosibirsk,” he said.
Regan pondered the Russian’s words for a moment, slowly furrowing his brow in a controlled, deliberate effort to look concerned.
“What kind of an incident?” he said.
“Terrorists attacked the biocontainment facility at Vektor Laboratories,” Novikov said.
“Dear heavens. What were they trying to accomplish?” Regan said.
“We don’t know very much at this point, but the attack put the entire Novosibirsk region on alert. We lost two helicopters in an unfortunate collision near the Kazakhstan border.”
“I’m very sorry to hear that. Please let me know if you need our Centers for Disease Control to help in any way. As Vektor’s sister facility, I’m sure they would be eager to lend a hand. Were there casualties at the facility?”
“Several, including a scientific team that was working late over the weekend on a special project,” Novikov said, reaching for his cup on the tray.
Regan poured each of them another cup. They were about to broach the matter at hand.
“Their CDC and World Health Organization counterparts will be heartbroken. Such a loss is sure to be profound among such an elite group of dedicated scientists. Do preliminary investigative reports indicate a possible threat to other facilities worldwide?”