The Soviet Comeback by Jamie Smith (best ereader for academics TXT) 📕

only the barrel of his gun giving any indication of his whereabouts. He followed the line of the gun and saw two men approaching from the left. They were also clad in white, but were armed also with AK-47s, the staple weapon of every mercenary.

That accounted for the approach team, but neither of them carried a sniper. Where was the man who had taken down his mother?

For a moment, Nikita’s thoughts flashed to Klitchkov, but quickly dismissed them. There would be no point in his warning them if he was the shooter.

Scanning around as best as he could without revealing himself, he located the sniper, about forty feet further up the hill, almost directly above Klitchkov. The shooter was squatting, hood down, peering intently through the scope upon a rocky outcrop. Nikita saw that it wasn’t a man, but a woman with a sheet of white-blond hair falling down one side of her face, the other side shaven. Even from here, Nikita could see the tattoo on her neck just above the grey puff jacket she wore. He couldn’t make it out, but didn’t need to see it to know it was a swastika. He ground his teeth, desperate to take her down.

Not yet, he thought to himself grimly as he shuffled back across the room. As he passed Milena and his father, he put his finger to his lips and signalled to them to stay where they were. He padded into Milena’s room at the rear of the house and followed the same procedure to check for anybody approaching from the back. He identified three of Pamyat’s henchmen making their way towards them before making his way back to the main bedroom where he squatted down beside Milena and his father.

Fear was plastered across Milena’s tear-stained face and Gabriel was holding her tightly, whispering that it would be all right. He covered her ears as Nikita began whispering to him.

“We need to hide her, Father. Is there anywhere you can think of?”

“There is an attic which is probably the best option,” his father responded. Nikita nodded and picked up Milena who squirmed in his arms, her face pale and her nose running.

“Come, Milena, we are going to play hide and seek.”

“I am not an idiot, Nikita,” she said angrily. Gabriel led the way down a corridor to where there was an enclave in the ceiling. Standing on a chair he had carried down the corridor with him, he pushed open the wooden slat covering the square. Nikita passed him Milena, to whom he gave a big kiss before lifting her with ease into the attic.

“Milena, you must be absolutely silent no matter what you hear, OK?”

She nodded, looking younger than her years. “Papa, I want to stay with you,” she said, sobbing.

“Do not fear, my child, I will be back to pick you up very soon!” he said as cheerfully as he could manage. “Hold onto those tears and we can let them all out together later on, OK?”

She wiped her small face and nodded as Gabriel lifted the wooden slat back into place.

He and Nikita turned to face each other.

“Tell me,” said Gabriel.

“Yes, Father. As far as I can tell we have five of the enemy approaching. There is one I expect to be here whom I cannot see, so I would say there are at least six, in addition to a sniper further up the hill. We have Chairman Klitchkov on the mountainside who can give us covering fire, but as soon as he takes out one of the intruders, he will reveal his location will be a sitting duck and we will lose our only advantage. He will not know where the sniper is as she is above and behind him.”

“What is your plan, son?”

“First of all, we need to get rid of the sniper, and fast. The approaching teams are all within two hundred yards, but we have no chance of escape with a sniper able to take us out at any point. I will go now and eliminate that threat.”

“What will I do?”

“I do not want to give you blood on your hands, Father.”

Gabriel said nothing but stepped back into his bedroom and reappeared carrying a pair of old shotguns. “You forget I endured the Biafran War. Nobody escaped that without blood on their hands. I will have my revenge for what these people have taken from us.”

Nikita nodded. “I do not have time to argue with you. Cover the rear. If you can take any of those approaching out, all the better. Do what you can to at least keep them at some distance until I am able to tackle them head on.” He looked at his father’s weapon. “Do those rust buckets still work?”

“You want to be the one to find out?” his father asked with the hint of a smile.

Nikita smiled grimly in return, before setting his jaw and clasping his father’s arm momentarily.

Returning to the bedroom, he looked around the room and scoped his angles. He discovered that if he lay on the bed, he would be almost impossible for the woman to spot, but could see her by just widening the crack between the curtains by an inch or two. Dropping to the floor, he began easing the curtain apart, expecting to hear the crack of a weapon firing again, but to his relief none came.

He climbed back onto the bed and lay flat at an angle, gazing through the scope to find the shooter again. He saw her once more. Her crouched position made it a small target, but one he knew he must hit first time.

The gun felt cold and clinical in his hands. Such a small thing that could cause so much hurt. For a moment he despised the sight of it, before shaking himself slightly and refocusing.

She