Operation Siberia Read online

  William Meikle

  OPERATION: SIBERIA

  - 1 -

  Private Wiggins was first to respond to Captain Banks’ news.

  “Siberia? Come on, Cap, you’re having a laugh, aren’t you? Fucking Siberia? You said it was a milk run.”

  “And it is,” Banks replied. “We’re babysitting a UN inspection team as they make an inspection of a lab. It’s a cushy number. There’s no creepy drifting boat, no empty Nazi UFO bases, none of that weird shite from the last couple of missions.”

  “Cushy, maybe,” Wiggins said, “but you promised us somewhere warmer. I was hoping for Barbados. But we’ll be freezing our bollocks off again. My knob’s only just warmed up from that last trip.”

  “You should use it more often,” Hynd replied.

  “Aye, that’s what your wife says too.”

  Wiggins had to roll out of his chair to avoid a cuff on the ear, and Banks had to catch the private’s beer to avoid it falling off the table, but at least the team was all in good spirits, despite his news. He waited until Wiggins was settled back at the table, and McCally returned with another round of beers from the mess bar before continuing.

  “Besides,” he continued, “maybe it won’t be all that cold. It’s summer over there, same as it is here.”

  “Aye,” Wiggins muttered. “Like Largs on a wet August Bank Holiday, and just about as much fun. I’ll pack my trunks and sunscreen.”

  “Babysitting, did you say?” Hynd asked.

  “Aye. Three English scientists—they’re coming up tonight from London.”

  “And what kind of lab is it?” Wiggins asked. “It’s no’ nuclear, is it? I won’t need the lead-lined Y-fronts, will I?”

  “Not nuclear or chemical. Biological,” Banks replied. “The colonel says that the word is it’s more in the line of a rich man’s zoo—exotic animals and such. Some Russian oilman’s plaything is what I was told. Why it warrants a UN inspection is above our pay grade. The job’s as simple as fuck. We look after the boffins, we keep our noses clean, and we’re in and out in forty-eight hours and back here for the weekend. You’ll like this bit though—no rickety transport planes for us this time. We’re traveling in style. The wee rich zookeeper is sending his private jet for us.”

  “I’ll pack my tuxedo as well,” Wiggins replied.

  Hynd laughed.

  “Fucking James Bond, that’s all I need.”

  “Aye,” Wiggins replied, already moving away from the slap he knew was coming. “Your wife says that too.”

  *

  The squad’s introduction to the trio of scientists in the morning was awkward. They all met over a full cooked breakfast in the mess, and it became immediately obvious that the ‘boffins’ knew more than the squad about what they’d be walking in to—and equally obvious that they weren’t prepared to talk about it.

  Waterston, a stocky, bearded Englishman in his sixties, appeared to be the most senior of the three and did most of the talking, what little there was of it.

  “What part of ‘classified’ are you having trouble with, Private?” he said when Wiggins pushed, not for the first time, for more information about the zoo.

  Wiggins bristled—the toxic combination of Waterston’s tone and the cut-glass of his accent bringing the Scotsman’s anger front and center.

  “How about the bit where we’re supposed to save your arse when you get into bother? Let’s start there, shall we, before you start looking down your nose at me?”

  Banks waved to McCally to take Wiggins aside—any further conversation the private had with the scientist from that point on wasn’t going to go anywhere pretty for either of them. He turned back to Waterston.

  “Wiggins has a point though. We generally have some idea what we’re going to be up against,” he said, realizing as he said it that it was mostly a lie.

  Waterston’s stare lost some of its ice.

  “Look, it’s a zoo, okay? Volkov’s put together a strange collection of exotics, and he wants to show it to the world. Our job is to evaluate if that would be safe.”

  “Safe? What the hell’s he got—venomous snakes, big spiders, crocodiles the size of a bus… what?”

  But the scientist refused to be drawn, and by the time they were packed, prepped, and called out to the runway for their flight, Banks and his squad were none the wiser.

  Wiggins perked up when he saw their ride—a sleek, white Lear jet that looked too new, too clean for their small R.A.F. base in Northern Scotland.

  “Caviar and champagne it is then,” he said. “I knew I should have worn the tux.”

  Once Banks ensured their gear was securely stowed and locked in the jet’s hold, he joined the others inside, and found that his private hadn’t been too far wrong about the fare on offer to them.

  A buffet table took pride of place in a cabin area as opulent as any hotel Banks could imagine. The leather chairs looked capable of swallowing a man, there was a bar stocked with all manner of single-malt scotch and expensive vodka, and the buffet itself did indeed include caviar, along with a bewildering mix of cold meats, fancy chocolates, breads, and exotic pickles.

  “Somebody’s trying a wee bit too hard to impress us,” Hynd said as Banks joined him at the table.

  “Not us; them,” Banks said, nodding to where the three scientists were already piling their plates as high as they could manage. “There’s obviously a lot at stake here for somebody. Eyes open, and game heads on, okay? Don’t let the lads near the booze.”

  *

  The order to stay off the free drink didn’t go down too well with Wiggins and McCally, but Banks knew Hynd would keep them in order—and that the richness of the other fare on hand would do much to mollify them. The scientists, in the meantime, had no qualms about partaking, and were already on their way to sampling a scotch from every bottle at the bar while they were still over the North Sea. By the time they reached Moscow and landed to refuel, the three men from London were dozing drunkenly in their seats at the rear of the plane.

  Wiggins looked at them ruefully.

  “See, Cap, that could be us right now. It’s not as if there’s anything for us to protect them from up here, apart from the threat of a hangover.”

  “We’ll see about relaxing a bit on the return journey,” Banks said. “But I need more info yet before I’m ready for that.”

  Banks knew he wouldn’t get anything from Waterston, even drunk, but he waited until one of the younger men, Smithson, woke blearily and came forward again. Banks bearded him at the buffet table as the man, rather clumsily in his drunkenness, tried to prepare a sandwich.

  “Come on then, Steve—it is Steve, isn’t it—what’s the story? I know your boss has a pole up his arse and is a stickler for regs, but you strike me as a decent chap. Talk to me. We’re all in this together here, and I don’t know what we’re walking into. My lads deserve to know the score.”

  Smithson put a finger to his lips and whispered theatrically.

  “Hush-hush stuff. Not allowed.”

  “Come on. All this free booze, the best quality of tucker too. This Ruskie’s buttering you up, you’re letting him, yet you won’t tell your own people what’s going on? And I thought you were decent.”

  The appeal to decency, helped along by the booze, got through the man’s filters, just for a few seconds, but long enough for it to worry Banks for a while after the scientist went unsteadily back to his seat.

  “Let’s just say it’s not going to be like any zoo you’ve ever seen. Not like one that anyone has ever seen—not for ten thousand years at least.”

  *

  Banks was amused to see that all three of the scientists were green around the gills on wakening as the pilot announced their descent to their
destination. Smithson, in particular, was particularly bad, and had to avail himself twice of a sick bag before they landed with a hop and a bump. Banks tried to get a look out at the terrain, but there was only gray beyond the window, a thick fog obscuring the view that was still too thick to see through as they taxied to a halt and were allowed to disembark.

  His squad had all got some sleep on the flight from Moscow, and although it was dawn when their bodies expected it to be nearer midnight, Banks knew from experience that he could trust them to be on their toes. So he was surprised when he turned after supervising the unloading of their bags and kit onto the tarmac to see Wiggins standing, open-mouthed, gaping into the fog.

  “Get your arse in gear, Private,” Banks said. “This kit won’t shift itself.”

  “Shift did you say? I thought you said shit, for I think I just did.”

  Banks turned to follow Wiggin’s gaze. At first, the fog confused his sense of distance and scale, and he thought he was looking at a small shaggy, russet-colored animal, a highland cow beyond a high fence. Then he saw that the fence must be thirty feet or more high, with the animal a third as tall as the barbed top wire—and realized that highland cows were much smaller, did not have tusks… nor did they have long trunks.

  The wooly mammoth beyond the fence lifted its trunk high and hooted, a trumpet call to start the day.

  Out in the fog, more trumpets answered the first, a whole chorus of them.

  Smithson came up to Banks’ side and clapped him on the shoulder.

  “Told you, Captain, didn’t I? Like no zoo anybody has ever seen.”

  - 2 -

  “Welcome, welcome,” a voice called from the other side of the plane.

  A squat, almost round, little man strode through the fog towards them. He had a full head of bushy black hair going gray at the temples, a beard to match, and wore a fur coat—more of a cloak—that covered him from neck to ankles and gave him the appearance of a small, friendly bear. When the newcomer shook Banks’ hand, the captain noted a smell coming off the fur, of damp and sweat, a thick animalistic musk that would make him gag if he had to spend too much time with it. The Russian didn’t seem to notice it, but Banks was thankful when the man had moved on to address the scientists.

  “I am Volkov,” he said in thick-accented English that spoke of an educated Russian. “Welcome to my home.”

  It did not look much of a home; all that could be seen from where they stood was tarmac and the impossible to ignore wooly mammoth drifting in and out of sight in the shifting fog.

  “Come, come,” Volkov said, taking Waterston by the arm and almost dragging him away. “All has been prepared. You will see that I have nothing to hide. You will see wonders.”

  The other two scientists followed behind and Banks turned to his squad.

  “Okay, lads, get your kit, and let’s see what’s so fucking important to drag us all this way.”

  He said it loud enough to ensure that the Russian Volkov would hear him but the squat man, if he heard, paid no attention, merely dragged Waterston away to their left into the fog.

  Banks hefted a heavy kit bag over his shoulder and led his men after the scientists. He had one look back at the Lear Jet, and saw it, and the impossible mammoth beyond the runway, get swallowed by the fog.

  *

  As the fog thickened behind them, so it thinned before them, and within ten yards, they got a clearer view of the facility. It certainly looked more like a zoo than a laboratory. The nearest building was a low two-storey affair; modernistic, metal, and large expanses of glass that could almost be an airport terminal, but beyond that, looming in the shifting fog, were a series of tall glass and metal domes of various sizes, like vast eggs dropped into the landscape. Banks had seen their like before, at a huge indoor garden in Cornwall, but this was even larger than that, and if it was a zoo, it looked like it had been built for much larger animals than even the mammoth they’d seen already.

  What are we into here?

  He was given little time to consider it, for the Russian had already led the scientists into the main building. Banks led the squad in after them, and was immediately hit by a blast of warm air that smelled like Volkov’s fur coat, only stronger still, an almost meaty odor, cloying and musky.

  “Christ, what a stink,” Wiggins muttered at his side, and Banks could only agree.

  Volkov led them through an empty, wide reception area, up a flight of stairs, and into a corridor behind a long, well-stocked bar overlooking a wide window that showed only fog beyond. They were shown to rooms that felt more like a hotel than a zoo—Banks had a well-appointed double room all to himself, a room that was almost as opulent as the main cabin area of the Lear they had just left. He knew better than to let himself be distracted by its seductive softness

  “Five minutes,” he said to his men. “Freshen up, then meet me back at that bar. And remember—we’re staying dry on this one until we know what’s what.”

  Wiggins still didn’t look happy at the command, but Banks trusted the other two to keep him in line. He spent his five minutes having a quick shower—as hot as he could have liked, and with water pressure that put his captain’s room back in Lossiemouth to shame—then dressed again quickly. He stowed his kit bag, mostly unpacked, in the large wardrobe, holstered a pistol at his shoulder under his jacket, and went back out to the bar.

  *

  Breakfast arrived on a succession of trolleys wheeled in by three burly Russian men who looked more like soldiers than hostesses. They eyed Banks and his squad warily, and Banks gave them the courtesy of giving them a once over in return, one professional to another. It didn’t look like they wore holsters under their scullery whites, but it wouldn’t have surprised him to be proven wrong.

  The food proved to be as rich and varied as the buffet on the plane, with more caviar, warm bread, cold meats, and some milk that tasted fresh, but also carried the same musky odor that Banks was already coming to hate.

  “Cap,” Wiggins said after he had eaten. “Can we have a fag in here do you think? I’m gasping here, and I need something to kill this fucking stink.”

  The scientists still hadn’t emerged from their rooms, and there seemed to be no imminent danger to anybody, so Banks took his team away from the bar itself and over to the big viewing window, looking out over the foggy tarmac.

  “Smoke them if you’ve got them, lads. This is one time I wish I hadn’t given up.”

  Wiggins passed smokes to McCally and Hynd, and lit all three of them up—the other two first, then striking a fresh flame for his own, an old Army superstition that all of them still followed. It was only after all three had sucked in a deep draw that Wiggins spoke up.

  “So, are we going to talk about this or what, Cap?”

  “Talk about what?”

  “The fucking huge, hairy, ginger elephant in the room, that’s what. Those things went extinct, like ten thousand years ago, right?”

  “Nearer five than ten I think, but aye. They’re extinct. Or rather, they were.”

  “And now they’re not?” Hynd said. “Some relict population, a lost world?”

  Banks shook his head.

  “This is a lab, remember. And it’s a UN inspection. I’m guessing cloning, or genetic manipulation at least.”

  “Fucking Jurassic Park. That’s all I need,” Wiggins said.

  “Holocene Park, more like,” Hynd said. “I’m betting the wee Russian bawbag even has it trademarked. I wonder what else he’s got in this wee zoo of his.”

  “That’s what I’m wondering too,” Banks said. He looked out the window, trying to gaze through the fog, but couldn’t even see the Lear Jet, never mind into the fenced area beyond it. He was also all too aware of the huge, high glass domes they’d seen on their way in. They were big enough to hold a multitude of sins. A previous thought kept coming back to him.

  What are we into here?

  - 3 -

  They got their answer after the scientists had their bre
akfast. The small stout Russian, now divested of his fur and showing off a Saville Row suit that would cost more than Banks made in a year, climbed up on top of the long bar to address them. He clapped his hands, twice, calling for silence, and waited until all eyes were on him before starting to speak.

  “Fifteen years ago, the ground you stand on now was an icy bog of tundra and melting permafrost, an ancient river valley and raised beach long abandoned by humans as being too inhospitable for life. Yuri Gregorov was the only person in a forty-mile circle, a hunter from the closest village to the north, having ventured to the limit of his range in what passes for summer here, in search of beaver pelts. He thought he had struck lucky when he saw crows fighting over a carcass, but when he shooed them away, he found, not a fresh kill, but an ancient one. The ginger hair did not belong to any animal Yuri was familiar with, but he pried the pelt out of the thawing ice and took it home with him.

  “It was almost winter again before anyone took serious note of Yuri’s find, but word finally came to me of a great wonder, for the pelt was of a young mammoth, almost perfectly preserved, even including some intact internal organs. I had to have it, and I used every ounce of my persuasion and leverage with the powers that be to be allowed free agency in its use.

  “That next summer, our work here started in earnest. The scientists here know of my enthusiasms in this area; I may have become rich on the spoils of the Russian shipping fleet, but I like to think of myself as a philanthropist. I have been instrumental in saving populations of several endangered species in these wilds, and there are still tigers in the forests in the south that owe their existence to my diligence. But as soon as I saw the mammoth pelt, I knew—there could be something even more magnificent in my future.

  “Over the intervening years, I have made use of that pelt—you have seen the results of that for yourself. But there are other, even greater wonders that have emerged, or been brought forth, from the frozen plain, and I, and my team here, have been busy.

  “It is the results of these endeavors that you have been brought here to witness. You should think yourselves most fortunate, my friends, for you will see things that none apart from my own people have yet seen; you will be the first, and you will take my vision to the world.”