uploaded the plates to Corrigan to check. Still, he cursed; the agent was obviously going to interview Daruyev in prison. The analysts had told Corrigan that the FSB didn’t trust the security system at the prison — like most Russian jails, it was essentially run by the prisoners and could best be described as ridiculously lax — and so routinely took people outside to talk to them.
“Fuckin’ Corrigan owes me one,” said Ferg.
“So now what?”
“Plan B.”
“Which is what?”
“I make a few phone calls, then get out the laptop and see if the printer I’ve used twice in its life will actually work. Then we talk about how safe it is to cut up the explosives in a mine.”
Conners whistled.
“And in the meantime,” added Ferguson, “you teach me more Irish drinking songs.”
The Russian inspector completed his interview around 7:00 p.m. and passed them on the road shortly afterward, alone as Ferguson had guessed he would be. The CIA officer immediately began setting up plan B. Shortly after midnight, he dialed a number Corrigan had set up so that calls from his sat phone would appear to originate from the FSB headquarters in Groznyy. He then dialed the prison, reporting to the half-asleep desk sergeant that Daruyev was wanted for additional questioning first thing in the morning back in the capital; he hung up before the sergeant could reach for his coffee and think of any questions to ask.
At five minutes after six, with the sun poking its nose at the red mist around the hills, a small car carrying a pair of Russian FSB officers turned onto the main road to the Brown Fortress. As it came within sight of the prison, it struck a mine apparently placed during the night.
Fortunately, the guerrillas had not set their ambush very well. Instead of obliterating the car as intended, the explosion managed only to take out the trunk. Still, the explosion compressed the vehicle’s gas tank, setting it on fire with an impressive flare of red and orange that could be seen over the nearby hills — and, most importantly, at the fortress itself. The flare and flash were accompanied by several other explosions, as several other nearby mines cooked off. One of the explosions took out the phone line south; while not entirely cutting communications out of the prison, it did complicate them.
The lights inside the fortress blinked on and off several times; before the blinking stopped, the watch commander had ordered a team of soldiers to respond to the disaster, and in the meantime locked down his facility and called all guards to action stations.
When the team of soldiers traveling up the road in an armored car arrived at the site of the rebel ambush, they found the two Russian FSB agents lying near their destroyed vehicle, their clothes singed. One of the men appeared to have had a concussion and spoke incoherently. The other, though his face and body were bruised and his clothes smeared with blood, managed to gain coherence in a few minutes. Some medicinal vodka carried for emergencies by the captain helped clear his senses. Like any good FSB man, he insisted that they must carry out their orders, adamantly cursing the bastard rebels and swearing that they would not keep him from doing his duty.
Which duty he documented with slightly burned and bloodied papers, copied via fax from Moscow, directing that the prisoner known as Jabril Daruyev be taken to Groznyy and reinterviewed by Commander Kruknokov, with a view toward removing him to Moscow for further interrogation.
The two Russian FSB officers — Conners and Ferguson in disguise — were piled into the back of the armored car and taken to the fortress. The nurse on duty at the dispensary marveled at their luck — both men were bruised and scraped, but nonetheless intact.
Officer Androv — Ferguson — said between his swollen lips that this was thanks to his mother’s offering prayers for him every day in Izveska. This was supposed to win him points with the nurse, who according to Corrigan’s research came from Izveska and was a devout member of the Orthodox Church. Either the information was wrong or Ferg’s puffy-mouthed mumbles sounded foreign to her, however; she frowned and started speaking to him quickly about why he had been out on the road when it was still dark. Ferg rubbed his forehead and mumbled again about his orders. The nurse then asked about some of the bruises, which looked a little less than fresh. He shrugged, and insisted God had saved him so he could squeeze the guerrilla rabble by the short hairs.
When they were taken up to see the watch commander, Ferg dropped the connection to Russia’s heartland, instead answering that he had been born in Georgia “before the cataclysm” when the commander asked about his background. Ferguson noticed their orders sitting on the desk and gestured toward them; the commander asked why Kruknokov hadn’t taken the prisoner back with him on his own the day before.
Embarrassed silence had no accent, and the inference that his fellow FSB officer had made a mistake was readily believed by the commander, who did not in fact like the FSB nosing around his domain. As far as he was concerned, the sooner the officers were away, the better. A car was found and the prisoner produced, wearing sets of chains on his hands and feet and a dark hood that made it impossible for him to see.
“Very dangerous,” said the commander, after checking his identity and entering the proper notes in his log and other paperwork.
Ferguson nodded grimly. Two men were assigned to drive them to town.
They were back in the front reception area when the nurse appeared at the end of the hallway, walking with the sort of grim step that could only foretell trouble. Ferg slid his hand into his coat, fingering his Glock. He kept it there as they entered the gate area, ushering the prisoner and their escorts through as the nurse reached the desk.
The guard at the desk called to them, but by now Ferguson had the door to the car open. He pulled at the prisoner and in the same motion jerked back, as if the man had hit him; he pushed the Chechen inside the car, cursing loudly.
One of the guards pulled down his rifle, ready to fire. Ferguson held his hand up, swearing that he would not let the vermin keep him from doing his duty.
“Slide over,” he told the driver, pushing him from behind the wheel. The man started to protest, but Ferguson was well into his act, lathering on anger; the man moved quickly, not wanting to get into trouble with a crazed intelligence officer.
As the guard and the nurse reached the doorway, Ferg turned over the ignition and jabbed the gas pedal. The vehicle stuttered forward through the courtyard, toward the first of the two gates they needed to pass to exit. The guards at the first gate pulled away the metal bars as Ferg approached; he fished into his pocket and waved a piece of paper as he sped through. But the second set of guards were not so easily flummoxed. They made Ferg stop and one took the papers from him, going over to the phone at the station next to the wall.
As he picked up the phone, Ferguson launched into a fresh tirade. It was vintage madman: He was fed up with the bureaucratic bullshit that had nearly cost him his life that morning and was undoubtedly responsible for his two brothers going home in bags three years before. Conners and one of the escorts jumped out of the car to calm him down.
As he did, something exploded beyond the wall of the courtyard. It was a grenade, tossed by Conners as the others stared at Ferguson.
Conners grabbed the rifle from the guard closest to him as the others ducked. He fired a burst at the wall, then ran to the gate, burning the clip at an imaginary group of rebels. Ferguson, yelling all the Russian curses he knew — a considerable collection — pushed the barrier aside.
“Get the bastards! Get the bastards!” yelled Ferguson, as if he’d spotted a pack of them.
The others shouted at him to get down; instead, he turned and vowed that no bearded shithead would ever drive him into the ground. The guerrillas outside answered with another grenade; as the others ducked, Ferguson jumped into the car and whipped forward through the gate.
Yet another grenade went off, this one in the courtyard, though a good distance away. Conners just barely managed to grab on to the car, brandishing the AK-47 — which suddenly had a fresh clip in it — as they zipped away.
“That was close,” said Conners, as they sped around the first bend. The turnoff for the truck was about a half mile away.
“Nah.”
“I thought you were going to shoot the guard with your Glock,” said Conners.
