"Yeah."
"You sound nervous. I would be, too. First real mission as a Splinter Cell."
Hansen took another long breath and nodded.
"All right, Murdoch has just pulled up to the pub," Grim said. "You'd better move!"
Hansen gave the order to Sergei, who tugged off his goggles and returned them to Hansen. They pulled behind the petrol station, a very modest-sized building with a long red awning and two ancient-looking pumps. The place was closed. Hansen gave himself the once-over, slid on his goggles, then said, "Here goes nothing."
Sergei smiled weakly. "Good luck."
In one quick motion, Hansen was out of the car and running down the long alley between the first row of buildings. If Korfovka had a downtown district, this was it: perhaps fifteen structures in all, with a small water tower to the northeast. A private airport lay out in that direction as well, with several Quonset hangars and a helipad lying adjacent to the single airstrip.
With the night vision switched on, Hansen kept to the deep shadows, working his way north toward the pub. To his west lay small clusters of old houses, with every third or so looking boarded up and abandoned. Most of the roofs sagged under the weight of heavy snow. Only then did he realize how cold it was getting, but the suit began to compensate. An electric current ran through his senses as he remembered who he was, what he was doing, and what this moment meant to him. All he had to do was get the information and get out. No footprints.
He reached the corner of the next building, and, on his haunches, peered around the side to the main street. In the distance came the sound of car engines, and he hoped Sergei was still hiding behind the petrol station and watching those cars go by. Hansen darted off, running now with some impunity, the alley still clear. One more side street to cross before he reached the pub. He had to guard his steps, though, as his boot hit a patch of ice and he nearly went down. To fall and break his leg en route to the location would not only ruin the mission, it would make him the laughing-stock of Third Echelon. The others would spend long nights inventing nicknames for him. There would be no living it down.
Another car engine resounded, this one from in front of the pub. Hansen hazarded a peek around the next corner and spotted a dilapidated old pickup truck parked across the street. Two old Russians got out, both wearing parkas and caps, their faces doughy, cheeks red. The older one waved to his partner, and they lit cigarettes and walked across the street toward the pub.
Hansen hadn't just run out of time; the clock was now running positive, and the meeting had quite obviously started. He cursed and took off, gritting his teeth as he reached the pub's back door. For the sake of argument he tried the lock. He lost the argument.
Ignoring the tremor in his hands, he gave himself five seconds with his picking tool, counting each one until on exactly five he had the door open and, keeping low, gingerly stepped inside.
The air smelled of something delicious, fresh-baked bread perhaps, but that heavenly scent was tinged by cigarette smoke and beer. Hansen came into a small storage room, its shelves stocked high with boxes of spirits. Light from a small fixture shone overhead. A pair of folding shutter doors about half the length of a normal-sized door separated the storage room from the front. Abruptly, those doors pushed open and a heavyset woman in her sixties pushed into the room. She had a badly stained apron folded over her considerable girth, and a thick scarf held back her shock of silver hair.
Hansen hunkered down, drawing his SC pistol with an anesthetic dart already loaded.
As she lumbered toward the back, toward him, he slowly stood. She took one look at him--a dark alien with three eyes--and opened her mouth.
Even as he imagined her scream, Hansen fired the dart into her neck and dashed forward to catch her. Indeed, she'd had time to scream, but he realized that she hadn't because she'd fainted even before the anesthetic took hold.
Welcome to Real- Life Spy Work 101,he told himself, where you're not hanging inverted from the rafters, completely obscured and cleverly firing Sticky Cams to eavesdrop on the bad guys while you remain fully undetected.
No, this was a lot less glamorous, clutching a fat Russian woman and lowering her to the ground as he considered how long it would take before someone else came into the back room, looking for her--and how long after that Murdoch and the rest would become aware that something was wrong.
He was not ten seconds into the mission and it had already gone to hell. . . .
But it wasn't over yet. Hansen stood, withdrew the laser microphone from his breast pocket, and, keeping tight behind the doors, stole a quick glance over the tops of them. The decor seemed borrowed from an old Bavarian inn, with paneling and beams spanning the rafters. Candles at the half dozen tables, and more positioned along the broad wooden counter, created a warm and hypnotic atmosphere, perfect for drinking on a cold night. An old chandelier hung from the ceiling, but three of its four bulbs had burned out.
Off to Hansen's left was the bartender: a slightly hunched-back man with a wiry white beard, serving a drink to one of the two men who had just entered. They were the only ones at the bar. Behind them, seated at a table near the wall, were Murdoch, Zhao, and Bratus, all nursing drinks.
Hansen tucked himself back a little farther behind the doors and aimed the laser microphone (officially the LM7: laser microphone, seventh generation) at one of the glasses near Bratus. Any object that could resonate or vibrate, like a glass or a picture on the wall, would do so because of pressure waves created by noises. The invisible NIR, or near-infrared, laser was able to detect the tiny difference in the distance traveled by the light to pick up resonance and reproduce the sound causing it. Sure, any Joe could go to YouTube and learn to build a rudimentary laser microphone, but to build one the size of a ballpoint pen with NIR technology and a range in excess of a thousand meters was better left to Third Echelon and its subcontractors. The LM7 operated according to Snell's law, which required sharp alignment and correct aiming of both the transmitted and received laser beams, so Hansen needed to aim the beam and remain perfectly still while the conversation was picked up and automatically transferred to his OPSAT, where it would be heard through his subdermal, recorded, and later sent to Grim.
All of which was to verify that he did, indeed, have his ear on the conversation, as all three men spoke in Russian:
"I don't understand what the problem is," said Murdoch.
"The problem is money," answered Zhao. "Kovac promised me twice what he's now offering."
"But you can't stop now," Bratus said. "Because if you do, I don't know what to tell my people. We will all die."
"Look, I'll go back to Kovac. I'll tell him what you said. I'll tell him that if he wants the rest of the names on that list, he's got to pay the full amount."
"Just like I did," said Bratus. "See the difference between the Russians and the Americans, my friend? The Russians know how to keep a promise."
"That's not fair," snapped Murdoch. "The initial data was corrupt. We don't pay for something we don't get."
Hansen was trembling. He was getting it all. They had implicated Kovac. They'd even mentioned him by name! This was the real deal, his first mission, and he was kicking ass and taking names . . . or, rather, getting names, thename. Grim would not only thank him, she would rip off her glasses and--
He shuddered, forced calm back into his thoughts as Zhao went on: "I have a little surprise for you, but we'll have to go to the airport." Zhao checked his watch. "He should be arriving soon."