Cold East. Alex Shaw

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       Prologue

       Donetsk Region, Ukraine

      ‘I can’t see them yet.’

      ‘They’ll be here soon, he said so.’ Vitaly Blazhevich peered into the distance towards the besieged city of Donetsk. Smoke rose from tower blocks on the outskirts, the result of early-morning shelling by Russian-supplied Grad rockets. The ceasefire agreement between the Ukrainian government and the Russian-backed insurgent organisations of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) and the Lugansk People’s Republic (LNR) had been in operation for several months, yet attacks continued. The men around Blazhevich were a mixture of regular Ukrainian infantry and young, hastily trained members of a volunteer battalion. Despite the cold, the Ukrainians kept their spirits high as they rotated manning the vehicle checkpoint, cooking, and resting. Blazhevich had nothing but respect for the volunteers who, until recently, had been carrying on normal lives as university students, mechanics, bus drivers, doctors, and businessmen. Every now and then the group would spontaneously start singing Ukrainian folk songs or old Soviet tunes in Russian. They were Ukrainian and what mattered to them most was one country, not one language. The checkpoint was to the north of the small town of Marinka and straddled the road towards Donetsk. The adjacent flat fields of fertile black earth had been left barren in the conflict zone. A click away, the road forked and the treeline started.

      ‘Here.’ Nedilko handed Blazhevich a mug.

      ‘We should be doing more to help him,’ Blazhevich replied to his SBU colleague before sipping the bitter-tasting army coffee.

      ‘He likes pretending to be Russian.’

      ‘That’s true.’

      Blazhevich saw movement ahead. He put his drink on the ground, raised his field glasses, and focused on the road. A white Toyota Land Cruiser appeared from the treeline. As it neared, the blue flag and markings of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) became visible on its paintwork. The Ukrainian soldiers manned their weapons, ever wary of a surprise attack. The checkpoint had changed hands several times so far; the men were taking no chances.

      Nedilko’s phone rang. ‘Hello? OK.’ He pointed at the SUV. ‘It’s him, or at least he’s is in the vehicle.’

      ‘It’s four-up,’ Blazhevich replied.

      Nedilko removed his Glock from its holster. ‘What’s the saying? “Plan for the best, prepare for the worst”?’

      ‘Something like that.’

      As the Land Cruiser came to a halt, just short of the checkpoint, a series of rumbles rolled across the fields. The DNR were shelling again. A thin man, wearing a blue OSCE vest over a grey, three-quarter-length jacket, stepped slowly from the front passenger door. He held his arms aloft as a pair of Ukrainian soldiers advanced, weapons up. The rear door now opened and out climbed an Asian man followed by someone both SBU agents couldn’t mistake: Aidan Snow.

      ‘“Who Dares Wins”,’ Blazhevich said with a smile.

      Snow led the trio towards the checkpoint. The man in the OSCE vest held out his hand to Blazhevich. ‘Gordon Ward, OSCE monitor. You must be from the Security Service of Ukraine?’

      ‘That’s correct, the SBU,’ Blazhevich confirmed, shaking hands. ‘Things getting busy back there?’

      ‘Hairy is the word for it. The DNR are systematically violating the ceasefire!’

      ‘We heard,’ Nedilko stated.

      ‘Well, here they are, safe and sound.’ Ward turned to Snow. ‘Don’t make a habit of this, will you?’

      ‘I’ll try not to.’

      Ward flashed a swift smile, turned on his heels, and got into the Land Cruiser. The Toyota crabbed across the road before quickly heading back towards Donetsk and the rest of the OSCE monitors.

      ‘Vitaly Blazhevich, Ivan Nedilko, may I present Mohammed Iqbal,’ Snow said.

      ‘It’s Mo, to my friends,’ Iqbal added.

      Snow was in Ukraine to facilitate the repatriation of Iqbal, a British citizen held captive for several months in Donetsk. Iqbal was one of many foreign students studying medicine at Donetsk University, but unlike the others he had been kidnapped by the DNR, who took exception to the colour of his skin. The news of Iqbal’s plight had come from a bizarre post on the DNR’s ‘VKontakte’ page. They used the Slavic copy of Facebook to inform the Russian-speaking world of their latest proclamations and ‘successes’ against the Ukrainian forces. Via VKontakte, Iqbal had been labelled ‘a black mercenary’ and ‘a spy’ by the self-appointed Prime Minster of the DNR. Iqbal was subjected to intimidation, beatings, and starvation by his captors. It was only after much negotiation that his release had been brokered and an agreement reached to hand him over to the OSCE. At least that was the official story, and the one that made the DNR look like humanitarians, but Snow knew otherwise. He still had the bruises and an empty magazine to prove it.

      ‘Incoming!’ A shout went up as a shell whistled overhead.

      Snow grabbed Iqbal and threw him into the ditch at the side of the road as another shell flew past them to land with a thunderous cacophony further down the road.

      ‘Bloody twats!’ Iqbal’s Brummie accent grew thicker with his annoyance, as he spat out a mouthful of cold mud.

      ‘Stay down!’ Snow ordered. He looked up and saw the source of the shells. What he took to be a Russian armoured vehicle, possibly a BMP-2, had appeared from the fork in the road. Too far away to return fire, the Ukrainians took cover as best they could. Still visible, Snow watched the OSCE Land Cruiser skid around the tracked vehicle and take the fork in the other direction. Then, just as quickly as it had started, the shooting stopped. The BMP-2 turned and followed the Toyota towards Donetsk.

      ‘Nice of them to give you a sendoff,’ Snow said as he pulled Iqbal to his feet.

      ‘I’d have preferred a box of chocolates.’

      Snow smirked. ‘Come on. We need to catch a ride back to Kyiv.’