shadows and blind corners. At the east side of the hill, he came to a
broken wall, with blast-broken crenellations like gray dragon’s teeth
rising from a bleached and monstrous lower jawbone. From there he was
able to look down into the Kola Inlet itself.
His hilltop actually rose above the head of a smaller inlet opening into
the broader waters of the Kola, which measured a good three miles across
at this point. Across this smaller inlet to the southeast was the town
of Polyamyy itself, an ugly, dismal-looking clutter of buildings that
immediately reminded Rivera of some military or industrial towns he’d
known, all smokestacks and crane gantries and warehouses, stained gray
to black by decades of pollution and neglect. Several hundred meters
below Rivera’s position, the slopes overlooking the water flattened out
enough to shelter a waterfront town, smaller than Polyamyy, but
identical in its ramshackle-looking collection of warehouses, factory
chimneys, and blocks of military apartments with dingy, neo-Stalinist
facades. Moles reached out from the hillside to enclose a rectangle of
dirty gray water directly below Rivera’s OP. Piers and docks extended
from the shore into the inlet on both sides of the moles and across the
inlet in Polyamyy itself, and he could see a number of vessels tied to
the quays.
Most were submarines. Rivera easily identified the enormous,
broad-beamed bulk of an Oscar SSGN; two of the oddly humpbacked Delta IV
PLARBs; a half-dozen smaller, sleeker attack subs, Alfas and Victors;
and three diesel-electric Kilos, conventional attack subs with anti-air
missile-defense systems hidden in the long, squared-off sail. A few
larger surface ships were tied up there as well, frigates and corvettes
and a single Udaloy-class destroyer.
The majority of those ships and submarines showed damage from air
attacks, though as he watched, white smoke spouted from the bow of the
Udaloy destroyer, then unraveled into a knife-edged contrail arrowing
straight up into the sky, then rapidly curving off toward the north.
Udaloys, Rivera knew, were equipped with SA-N-9 missiles as their
primary surface-to-air armament, advanced missiles similar to the
American Sea Sparrow.
There appeared to be some sort of large, concrete structure built onto
the hillside Rivera was crouching on, but from his position he couldn’t
see what it was. Still, this was an ideal Forward Observer’s eyrie,
with a smorgasbord of targets that gave new meaning to the expression
“target-rich environment.”
A rippling, fluttering sound shivered through the air. An instant
later, part of Rivera’s hillside erupted in a geysering column of black
smoke, mud, and debris. Clutching helmet and rifle, Rivera dropped for
cover, tumbling into a shallow hole behind the wall, knee- and
elbow-deep in mingled mud and snow. The first blast was followed by
another, a savage thump that jarred Rivera through the ground and sent
loose concrete blocks clattering down the hill in front of him. The
next explosion was closer still … then another passed overhead,
exploding behind him.
Raising his head just enough to peer between the dragon’s teeth of the
shattered wall, Rivera brought his binoculars to his eyes and studied
the slopes across the narrow inlet rising just to the west of Polyamyy.
He thought he could see the source of the arty there, several low-slung
vehicles that might be 2S3 or 2S5 self-propelled guns. As he watched,
he saw a silent flash among the squat shapes; seconds later, he heard
the ripping-cloth sound of an incoming round and ducked for cover. The
blast shook the ground.
His company radio man was crouched behind the rubble ten meters away.
“Larson! Get your ass over here!”
Another explosion showered both men with grit and broken gravel, but
Larson crawled up to Rivera, who took the radio handset. “King Three!
King Three!” he called. “This is White Knight Five! Over!”
“White Knight Five, this is King Three. Go ahead.”
He took another sighting on the far hilltop, comparing it with a small
map he’d carried folded up in his breast pocket. “King Three, immediate
suppression, grid Charlie Delta Three-five-niner-one-one-two. Tracked
vehicles, believe two-Sierra-five mounted artillery, Hill Eight-nine.
Authenticate Sierra. Over!”
“White Knight Five, King Three, immediate suppression, grid Charlie
Delta Three-five-niner-one-one-two, tracked vehicles …”
As the voice at the other end repeated back the message, Rivera marveled