Free ARISEN, Book Eleven - Deathmatch by Michael Stephen Fuchs

Zero’.”
    Misha squinted in thought, then tapped his pistol. While he did so, the Runt appeared again. “Colonel—” he said.
    “You again,” Misha barked. “Get off our penises! The geniuses are thinking. We don’t need your negatons right now.”
    “I’m sorry. But there’s an urgent radio call for you. It’s Akela. In Moscow.”
    Hearing this, Misha rose from his tree-trunk throne and strode over to the tent with their long-range radio set, Vasily following. Their radio telephone operator (RTO) was already holding out a phone handset for him. He snatched it and stuck it up to his gigantic head.
    “ Da .” He listened for five seconds. “ Menya? I’m on a boat, bitch! Ha ha ha ha!!” This last he said in English, before roaring with laughter. When he regained control of himself, he straightened up and said, “Okay. Chto u vas yest’ dlya menya? ”
    Then he listened for another thirty seconds, nodding occasionally – then made a vague and increasingly violent scribbling motion in the air, until someone handed him writing materials. He took them and began scribbling.
    “ Da. Ponyal. Fantastika! Molodtsy, volk .” He tossed the phone back to the RTO, and stuck the sheet of paper in Vasily’s face, writing side out. Vasily pulled back far enough to focus and read the page, which contained twenty two-digit numbers.
    “The radio encryption key of the American and British asshats. Now we don’t have to read lips.” He handed the sheet to the RTO. “Get this keyed in. And start scanning every frequency. Twenty-four hours, day and night, up and running five minutes ago, we never sleep.”
    “ Da, boss. ”
    “And now,” Misha said, grunting and stalking back toward his stump, “we shall see if those dickasses actually know anything…”

Live By the Sword
    Clearing Outside Camp Davis
    The air between Handon and Henno rippled with imminent violence, nothing moving in that clearing. Both still had their hands on their knives. They were like two freight trains racing toward each other at full speed, set to meet at the center of a trestle bridge over a deep canyon.
    One that had been destroyed by air strikes.
    But then an unfamiliar voice spoke out. It said:
    “Wait – there’s another way.”
    Faces blank, both Handon and Henno turned their heads to look at the newcomer.
    “What?” Handon said.
    Through the red mist that had descended over his vision, he recognized Baxter, driver of the gun truck that had extracted them. And, after their eight-hour overnight drive, Handon also knew he was a 25-year-old Georgetown grad, junior CIA analyst, and operator fanboy. Now, he was for some reason taking his life in his hands by venturing into the middle of the slow-motion collision between two truly fearsome operators, both with murder on their minds.
    First clearing his throat, Baxter repeated himself. “I said, there’s another way to get Patient Zero. One that doesn’t get a bunch of kids killed – or sacrifice your irreplaceable Marines and sailors.”
    “Oh, yeah?” Henno said. “And what’s that?”
    “The Sword.”
    * * *
    Back in camp, as the rain tailed off, the others had slipped back out of the team tent, and were already around the fire pit when these three returned from the dripping forest. As they circled around again, Baxter caught the eyes of Kate and Jake – but particularly Zack. He realized Handon and Henno were watching him and waiting.
    “Look,” he said, finally. “I think we all know Godane is dead. We saw Zack blow him back into his own fortress with the minigun.”
    “We never saw a body,” Jake said, his face neutral.
    Baxter nodded. “No. But we also never saw him alive again. Not once in all our surveillance and patrols since then. I say he’s gone.”
    Kate said, “I think Baxter’s right.”
    “And if I am right, and Godane is an ex-Sheik, then that leaves al-Sîf in charge.”
    Handon said, “Who’s al-Sîf?”
    “The previously mentioned unkillable