Fatal Thunder: A Jerry Mitchell Novel (22 page)

He forced himself to keep his pace casual. If he looked confident, perhaps that would deter a would-be attacker. Besides, walking slowly meant he made less noise, and that gave him a better chance of hearing someone approaching him. It didn’t take long to pass by the first intersection, although to Petrov it seemed like an unbearably slow process. Soon he was more than halfway to the hostel, and he started to think that maybe he was just imagining things, his nerves rattled by the stress he was under.

Suddenly, there was the sound of gravel crunching underfoot behind him and to his left. As he turned, there was a hard jab on his left rib cage; he heard the fabric of his overalls being ripped. The blow pushed him toward the building to his right; struggling to keep his footing, Petrov pivoted and tried to run, but his assailant grabbed his left shoulder and spun him about. The man’s face was hidden in the shadows, and he was totally silent. Petrov could barely hear him breathing. He struck again, this time landing a solid thrust to Petrov’s rib cage by his heart. The pain was intense and Petrov thought he heard a cracking sound, but the protective stab vest held and the blade was deflected.

Surprised, the assailant hesitated, momentarily confused that his victim hadn’t fallen to the ground. Petrov took advantage of the delay, raised the can of Mace and blasted the contents into the attacker’s eyes just a few inches away. The man only grunted in agony, but the shock caused him to lift his hands, allowing Petrov to break loose. Despite the pain, the attacker doggedly continued his assault. But with his eyesight impaired, and in the darkness, his attacks became undisciplined—wild, slashing wherever he thought his target might be. Petrov was able to dodge or deflect these less-precise thrusts, and after a particularly wide swing, he turned again to try and escape. Unfortunately, the man got hold of Petrov’s left arm and bodily yanked him closer. And even though Petrov was about the same size as his attacker, the latter was far stronger, and Petrov just couldn’t get away.

As he was spun around, Petrov tried to use momentum to his advantage, and threw a vicious right hook at the man’s face. The blow connected on his assailant’s jaw, but it seemed to have little effect. Once again, the man only grunted. But between the assailant’s forceful yank and Petrov’s swing, the Russian engineer’s left foot slipped out from underneath him. Both men were already badly off balance and fell, with Petrov slamming into the asphalt on his left side. The badly bruised areas of his rib cage screamed their displeasure as he bounced. The attacker, being above him at the start of the fall, flew over Petrov and hit the curb. Petrov heard a dull thwack, like a coconut hitting a hard surface, followed by a raspy gurgling sound.

Staggering to his feet, Petrov had no intention of seeing if his attacker was alive, and he took off down the street toward the hostel’s entrance. He slowed to a fast walk as he rounded the corner into the light and slowly pushed the lobby door open. The night manager was busy looking at his computer screen and hardly noticed a thing as Petrov walked to the stairwell. Once inside his room, Petrov locked and bolted the door. His heart was beating like a scared rabbit’s and he found himself struggling to breathe normally; his body shook uncontrollably.

Slowly, painfully, he took off his shredded overalls and the protective vest. There were deep gouges in two of the left panels, and he had two huge bruises on his left chest and side. Petrov then opened the refrigerator and grabbed the bottle of vodka. Sitting down on his bed, he took several deep swigs and tried to make sense of what had just happened. That someone wanted him dead was beyond doubt, but who? His assailant wasn’t an Indian; the man was white and large. Petrov suspected he was a Russian, or possibly Eastern European, but that didn’t answer the fundamental question of who wanted him dead. Could it have been the SVR agent, Ruchkin? He certainly would’ve been trained in hand-to-hand fighting. Petrov desperately tried to remember how big Ruchkin had been, and whether or not that vague memory matched the shadowy image of his attacker. Nothing made sense.

He fished his cell phone from his pocket and hit the speed dial for Samant. The phone rang several times before a sleepy voice answered in Hindi, “Hello?”

“Girish, it’s me, Aleksey, I was just attacked near the Russian Hostel. I think it was the same man that tried yesterday.”

Petrov heard bedding being pulled rapidly aside. “Are you all right, Aleks?”

“I’ve got some ugly bruises, but otherwise in one piece. And thank you. The protective vest you gave me saved my life.” Petrov paused as he took another sip. “Girish, I think I may have killed a man tonight.”

“What!? How!?”

Petrov gave a quick summation of the attack, how well the vest worked, the Mace, and the lucky fall that allowed him to escape, and possibly killed his assailant. “… it sounded like his head hit something very hard, and then there was a nasty gurgling sound. I didn’t stay to see how badly he was hurt, or if he was even alive. I just ran for my life.”

“By the gods, you are a fortunate man!” said Samant, sounding shocked. “Where are you now?”

“I’m in my room at the Russian Hostel. Do you think I’m safe here?”

“I don’t know what to think anymore, Aleks, but it’s clear they know where to find you. And your attacker was able to get on the base.” Samant paused briefly as he considered their options. The situation was beginning to spiral out of control. Finally, he broke the silence and said, “I’m coming over now to pick you up. You should be safer here in my flat. Pack all the things you wore tonight into a bag, and don’t forget the Mace spray. I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”

3 April 2017

0830 Local Time

INS
Circars
, Eastern Naval Command Headquarters

Visakhapatnam, India

An angry sigh hissed past Dhankhar’s lips as he paged through the security report. Two bodies had been found within the base’s perimeter earlier that morning. Both were white males, probably Russian, and both had serious knife wounds to the chest. One was found over by the graving dock, facedown in a shallow basin, the other by the Russian Hostel. Neither body had any identification, but the second one had nearly fifteen thousand rupees in his pocket. There were photos of the dead men’s faces attached to the back of the report. One man had a particularly horrid gash on his forehead. Shaking his head in frustration, he whispered a single word, “Kirichenko!”

The admiral grabbed his cell phone and punched up the Russian’s number, grumbling that the man had better answer this time. Remarkably, Dhankhar heard Kirichenko’s voice after the third ring. “Yes.”

“Mr. Kirichenko, this is Vice Admiral Dhankhar. Just what manner of mischief are you raising on my naval base?”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand, Admiral, has there been some trouble?”

“Trouble?” Dhankhar asked incredulously. “I would call the discovery of two dead men, very likely Russian nationals, within the base perimeter trouble. Is this the work of your man, Churkin?”

“Quite possibly,” replied Kirichenko coolly. “Jascha told me yesterday that he had been following a Russian national that was poking his nose into places where he shouldn’t. Do you have any identifying information on these men? Photos perhaps?”

Dhankhar was amazed at how calm Kirichenko’s voice was; the news was nothing more than a trivial incident to him, a matter of course in his business marketing death. “Yes, there are photos of the two individuals. Stand by while I send them to you.”

The admiral pulled up the electronic copy of the report, deleted all the text and sent the photos to Kirichenko’s anonymous e-mail account. “There, you should have them shortly. According to the security report, both men probably died from a single knife wound to the chest.”

“Well, that certainly sounds like Churkin,” admitted Kirichenko. “He prefers using a blade over any type of firearm. Ah, there is the e-mail.”

There was a brief silence over the phone as Kirichenko looked over the photographs. After a few seconds, Dhankhar heard him take a deep breath, followed by a hushed, “Well, that represents an unfortunate complication.”

“What? What is it?”

“The second photo is Churkin,” replied Kirichenko flatly.

“Churkin? How is this possible? Wasn’t he a commando?”

“Yes, Spetsnaz, and quite skilled at hand-to-hand combat. He was convinced that Petrov was getting too close to our operation, asking too many questions. Jascha was planning on taking him out, making it look like a mugging.”

“Could this Petrov have defeated Churkin?”

“Ridiculous!” Kirichenko exclaimed. There was a hint of insult in his voice. “Captain Petrov was a submariner, not a special operations soldier. There is nothing that I know of in his past that even suggests he had anything but a rudimentary knowledge of self-defense. It’s far more likely Churkin misidentified someone he thought was Petrov who possessed the skills to kill him.”

“What about the other man?” questioned Dhankhar. “The photo doesn’t match Petrov’s security badge picture.”

“I don’t know who it is. But it would be prudent to run the photo through your database of Russian nationals working on
Chakra
’s refit.”

Dhankhar bristled at the obvious suggestion. “I’m sure the naval police are working on that as we speak. I’ll be sure to keep you apprised of their findings. What do we do about Petrov?”

Kirichenko sighed. “If you can find a way to arrest him, or even detain him, that would be helpful. Unfortunately, I can’t think of a good reason to justify his arrest without drawing unwanted attention to Churkin. He had access to the naval base under an alias that was approved by your office.”

“I can revoke Petrov’s access to the base. Claim he’s under investigation for fraud or some other petty crime.”

“Which would only have the effect of confirming some of his suspicions and pushing him to blather what he knows to the Russian embassy. No, he hasn’t said anything because he’s either unsure of what he knows, or he lacks enough proof to get anyone to listen to him. It would be better if you just overload his schedule with administrative meetings and reports—keep him busy. How soon before
Chakra
leaves the graving dock?”

“We are to float her out in two days,” responded Dhankhar.

“You may want to think about moving your deployment date up a bit,” Kirichenko suggested. “You may be running out of time.”

“I’ll consider your recommendation, but I find it hard to believe that you are all that concerned about my mission. I think you’re just worried about being paid, Mr. Kirichenko.”

“That too, Admiral. But it’s considered bad business practice to leave behind unhappy customers. I have a contract to keep, and you have my word that I shall fulfill all the requirements.”

“Very well, then. Besides moving up the departure date, what do you suggest we do now?”

“Keep on course, and see if Orlav can speed things up a bit. I was planning on coming out to the base tomorrow to check in on his work. But given these recent events, I’ll be there this afternoon.”

After hanging up, Dhankhar sat quietly contemplating his options—there weren’t many. While his scheme hadn’t been exposed, yet, the chances of this happening were growing, all because of a curious Russian. But his problems weren’t due to just a single Russian. No, this whole debacle was because Kirichenko and his people were sloppy. First, they lost control of a nuclear weapon that the fools in Pakistan accidentally set off, and now Kirichenko’s right-hand man, a Spetsnaz commando, lay dead in the base morgue.

Every misstep caused more eyes to look his way, and yet Operation Vajra depended on absolute stealth. Dhankhar finally admitted to himself that he needed outside assistance if he was to successfully contain this latest disaster. He also had to find a way to rein in this Petrov, who appeared to suspect what was going on. Perhaps Churkin was correct. Petrov was getting too close and in the name of stealth, he had to disappear, one way or another.

Dhankhar grabbed his cell phone again and looked up the number to the Vajra contact at the Central Bureau of Investigation. He hit the call button and waited impatiently while the phone rang.

“Deputy Director Thapar,” answered the voice.

“Ijay, Badu Dhankhar, I have a serious situation at Vizag and I need your assistance.”

3 April 2017

1100 Local Time

Torpedo Shop 2

Naval Shipyard

Visakhapatnam, India

Dhankhar marched past the sentry, slowing just enough to return the guard’s salute. After punching in the five-digit access code, the admiral yanked on the door and went inside. It was dark in the workshop, but he could see Orlav working under bright lights at the far end. As Dhankhar approached, it was clear that Orlav hadn’t left the building since that first night after he’d been restricted to the base. The man was disheveled and looked like he hadn’t showered in a few days. Orlav saw the Indian admiral enter and didn’t even bother to wait for his routine question.

“I’m just about finished with this weapon, Admiral. I have a few things left to install, then I can program the date and that’ll be it. I still have those two weapons to modify, but I don’t see any problems having all five torpedoes ready by April tenth.”

“Very good, Mr. Orlav. I’m pleased to hear your task is progressing well.”

Orlav smiled slightly, then looked down into the torpedo’s innards, away from Dhankhar’s gaze. “Sir, I would really like to get a good night’s sleep in my own bed, and a shower. It’s getting tiresome being cooped up here in the workshop every day. And I still need to do the final control console installation on board
Chakra
.”

“I understand your discomfort, Mr. Orlav. But your safety is of greater importance to me. Churkin is dead,” announced Dhankhar bluntly.

Stunned, Orlav dropped the screwdriver he was holding and staggered away from the torpedo. “D … dead!? How!?”

“He was stabbed. His body was found this morning over by the Russian Hostel. We have no idea who killed him, so I think it’s best that you stay here for the time being. However, I’m concerned about the combat system consoles. How much time do you need to finish the installation?”