Suka

A door at the back of the dacha hung open with a torn screen, suggesting that this was the intruders’ point of entry. With gun in hand, Murdock rolled into a room with a washer, dryer, and shelves of cleaning supplies. The stone floor was speckled with reddish/purple spots, which formed a trail into the kitchen. Before Murdock could investigate this any further, a rustling to his right caused him to turn towards a wooden door with iron fittings. He brought his weapon up to fire, and froze. Murdock wasn’t sure at first what made him remove his index finger from the Uzi’s trigger until he again heard a brief, high-pitched squeak coming from the other side of the door. With his free hand, Murdock yanked open the door and found himself staring into a closest filled with coats. Then he looked at the floor.

A small pair of blue eyes shone from out of the closet’s gloom, eyes that were set in a round, ashen face that was streaked with tears. The rest of the tiny body shook as if from an electrical shock and gave off a strong odor of urine. Murdock leaned down towards the child, and smiled as warmly as possible, considering he still had a gun in his hand and a killing light in his eyes. “Hi,” he whispered. “You’re a very brave girl, to find such a great hiding place.”

“Sasha…” the girl—Olga—whimpered. Her lips began to tremble, and a cry that could build into a wail started in her throat.

Wanting to defuse this potential alarm but unable to speak Russian, Murdock tried to infuse a reassuring tone into his voice. “I know you’re scared, sweetheart,” he said. “So am I. But I need you to be brave just a little while longer, because I have to go help your sister, help Sasha. Can you do that for me? Can you stay here and be brave?”

Olga squinted, then blinked as if recognizing Murdock for the first time. “Paul?” This time, the name was pronounced with greater precision.

“Just stay here and be real quiet, Olga. I’ll go get Sasha.” Murdock kissed the tip of a finger and tapped Olga on the cheek. “Love you. Be right back.” Murdock put the same finger to his lips and said, “Shhhhh…” then shut the closet door before any protests could be voiced.

Any traces of warmth or tenderness Murdock might’ve displayed towards Olga now vanished as he pushed himself further into the dacha. If anyone had seem him, they would’ve sworn that even the bone structure of his face went through a metamorphosis, becoming something harder, more predatory. He pushed himself along using only his left hand, while his right hand gripped the micro-Uzi like an extension of his arm. He was a 21^st century primitive armed with a rapid-fire club.

The first thing Murdock noticed upon entering the kitchen was the babushka, slumped against the wall. The top part of her skull had been blown away in a red/gray splatter, but her boney fingers still gripped the hilt of a butcher knife. The serrated blade dripped crimson, indicating that the old Russian at least hadn’t gone down without a fight. The further Murdock moved towards the hallway, the more evidence he saw of the day’s slaughter. Bodies of Dubrynin’s security people, in their trademark dark clothing, were intermingled with the intruders in the blue coveralls. One of the dead attackers lay facedown, exposing the logo on the back of his coveralls: a flat-screen TV with a cable connected to a sun. Murdock filed this detail away for future scrutiny, then wove his way around the fleshy obstacles until he had a direct view down the hall to his target.

The last surviving attacker stood at the front door with his back to Murdock, shouting what were probably demands out to Lana and the remaining bodyguards. Since his weapon was not visible, Murdock could only assume that it was pointed at Sasha’s head. The child herself was hidden from view. Sasha was probably too terrified to move or make a sound, but her captor suddenly flew into a screaming rage; punctuating each of his words by thrusting the muzzle of his weapon up towards the ceiling.

Murdock knew that there would no better opportunity to end this thing.

In one, fluid motion, Murdock flipped the micro-Uzi’s fire selection switch to single shot, raised the weapon until the sights were trained on the nape of the thug’s neck, just above his collar, and just below the fringe of his longish, blonde hair.

Murdock fired.