The Trade of Kings Read online

  The Trade of

  Kings

  Surviving the Fall Series

  Book 10

  By

  Mike Kraus

  © 2018 Mike Kraus

  www.MikeKrausBooks.com

  [email protected]

  www.facebook.com/MikeKrausBooks

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, or by any electronic, mechanical or other means, without the permission in writing from the author.

  Table of Contents

  Preface

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Author’s Notes

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  Special Thanks

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  Preface

  Last time, on Surviving the Fall….

  After arriving in Blacksburg, Dianne had to dodge a pair of pursuers that she suspected were connected to the group at the gas station. Once she reached the Long-Term Acute Care facility in the city she had to leave her truck and go in on foot where she found that an unimaginable massacre had taken place. Her problems quickly compounded with the arrival of a dozen men who hunted her through the facility, though she was able to escape—killing a few of them along the way—and make her way home with the medicine needed to cure Jason’s infection. Fearing that she was followed, though, she and the others made ready for a confrontation that she was sure wouldn’t take long to occur.

  In Washington, Rick, Jane and Dr. Evans were making their way forward into the city, searching for the command and control center for Damocles in an effort to crack open the systems and find a way to shut the weapon down. Before they could cross the river, though, they ran into a group of Capitol Police who were moving south toward Mount Weather. Though initially suspicious of the intentions of Rick’s group, the officers provided more than a little bit of assistance before moving on to try and free the group trapped in the bunker. Rick’s group continued deeper into the city, heading for the old Naval Observatory, not knowing that a group of MS-13 gang members were nearby, along with four mysterious strangers from far, far away.

  And now, Surviving the Fall Episode 10.

  Chapter 1

  The Waters’ Homestead

  Outside Ellisville, VA

  The first attack came three days later.

  After Dianne arrived with the much-needed medication for Jason, she heard the distant sound of vehicles roaring closer and was positive that they would be arriving at her home at any moment. Hours ticked by as she and Mark sat inside near the windows, watching and listening as they tracked the vehicle locations. They had to make do with audio cues only, though, since none of the vehicles were visible through the dense rows of trees surrounding the property. Based on everything they heard, it sounded like the cars had split up and were combing the surrounding area, a fact that did not sit well with Dianne.

  For three days she, Mark, Tina and—to some extent, Sarah—planned out what they would do if and when the gang ever arrived at their doorstep. Weapons were cleaned, checked and re-checked, vital supplies were hastily brought into the basement and tunnel from the barns and the driveway, house and outbuildings were further reinforced to hopefully prevent anyone from breaking in. It was the early afternoon of the third day that Dianne, Tina and Mark sat out on the front porch together, all of them armed with pistols and rifles. They spoke in low voices, listening to the sound of the distant vehicles fading in and out of earshot.

  “Maybe they’re not coming.” Tina Carson took a deep slurp from her coffee cup before setting it down on the ground and idly rubbing at the handle of her pistol. “Maybe they’re just racing or something.”

  Dianne looked at Tina with a tired expression and sighed. “You know that’s not true. They’re searching for us.”

  “I don’t see why it’s so hard for them to find us,” she replied. “We’re right off the side road leading into town.”

  “There are a lot of side roads. They’ve been going virtually nonstop for three days, though. At some point they’re going to start searching around here.”

  “You did kind of set them off, mom, what with killing a few of them and rescuing Mrs. Carson and destroying their camp.” Mark looked at her and smiled as Dianne rolled her eyes.

  “I’m pretty sure that if these guys had gotten Tina here in good light they would have thrown her out of the camp—ow! Hey!” Dianne laughed as Tina punched her in the arm, growling good-naturedly at the comment.

  “Watch it, Waters! Some of that stuff you brought back’ll give you quite the runs if someone happens to slip it into your coffee.”

  Dianne chuckled and then sighed, staring down at her empty cup. “I wish I had put coffee on the list. Blacksburg had a lot of buildings still intact and no one seemed to be there.”

  The door behind them creaked open and they heard the shuffle of feet before another voice replied, sounding as though the person behind it was fighting to talk over an immense amount of pain. “Just you wait till I’m all recovered and we’ll head out there and bring back all the coffee we need. Along with everything else.”

  Dianne turned, stood up and took Jason’s right arm, guiding him to a chair out on the porch. On his left was Jacob, with Josie trailing behind. “Jason!” Dianne shook her head at him. “You shouldn’t be up and about. Should he?” She looked at Tina, who shrugged her shoulders.

  “Eh. Let him get out. He needs the fresh air.” Though her words and demeanor were casual, Mark noticed that Tina’s eyes were sharply trained on Jason’s every move, watching him as he went across the porch and sat down on a nearby chair.

  “Fwah. Thanks, you three.” He smiled at Jacob, Josie and Dianne.

  “How’s the pain?” Tina asked, still with an air of slight disinterest. “Feeling any better than it was this morning?”

  “It is, yes.” Jason nodded. “You’ve been marvelous.”

  “Nothing to it,” Tina replied as she pointed at Dianne. “She did all the hard work.”

  “You did a wonderful job, dear.” Jason smiled at Dianne and she patted him on the arm as she sat down on the porch next to his chair.

  “I’m afraid that I stirred up more trouble than we need in doing it, though.”

  “What’s that all about, now?” Jason tried to turn in his seat but winced and clutched at his wound. “I’ve been so out of it with all the drug’s pumping through me that I feel like I’ve missed most of what you’ve all been talking about.”

  “Mom killed three or more of the gang who followed her into Blacksburg,” Mark replied before anyone else could, and his brother and sister stood quietly nearby, enraptured yet again by the summation of their mother’s activities. “That plus you and her rescuing Mrs. Carson set them off. Now they’re combing the area trying to find us.”

  “You know that for certain?” Jason raised an eyebrow at Dianne.

  “Logical assumption,” she shrugged. “We’ve been h
earing engines on and off for three days, driving all over the place. They were chasing me out of Blacksburg and they know we’re somewhere east of their gas station compound based on the direction we drove when we got Tina back. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to put all of that together.”

  “Hm.” Jason frowned, furrowed his brow and scratched at his chin. Even that slight movement made him wince. “Then we should be getting ready for an attack, shouldn’t we?”

  “We are, old man.” Tina replied with a slight smile. “While you’ve been lazing about we’ve been getting everything ready.”

  “Well, come on then. Fill an old man in on what you’ve been doing.”

  Dianne looked at Tina. “You suggested it, you get to show him what we’ve been getting up to.”

  Tina gave an exaggerated groan as she stood to her feet. She walked across the porch and held out a hand to Jason, helping him out of the chair and toward the door. Dianne and Mark got up as well, and together with Jacob and Josie they started following Tina and Jason inside. Before they got to the door, though, Sarah was at it, pulling it open with her face as white as a sheet.

  “Sarah?” Dianne looked at her in concern. “What’s going on?” Sarah’s response was whispered and frantic, full of fear that turned Dianne’s blood to ice.

  “There’s someone out back, down by the lake.”

  Chapter 2

  Washington, D.C.

  “Are you certain the facility was clear? There were more buildings to check.”

  Oles Belov, technician and all-around genius, sighed in exasperation as he turned to look at the man speaking to him, deliberately not calling him by any rank or honorific. “Ostap. You and Carl are the guns. Jacob and I are the brains. If we say that the facility was clear, it was clear, understand?”

  Spetsnaz officer and expedition leader Ostap Isayev grunted and picked up his pace to catch up with his companion, a fellow Spetsnaz officer by the name of Carl Aliyev. “Do you think they’re lying?” He asks the question in a hushed tone so that the pair of technicians won’t overhear.

  “Why would they lie?” Carl raised an eyebrow at Ostap. “You’re far too suspicious. If they said it was clear, then it’s clear.”

  “Command told us that was the most likely location of the control room, though.”

  Carl shrugged. “Since when has command ever been accurate about anything like that? We have two more locations to check so don’t worry about it. Why are you acting so odd anyway, Ostap? You’ve been jittery since we landed.”

  Ostap glanced up at the towering buildings around them, adjusting his gloved grip on his AK-47. “I don’t like this place one bit. I can’t shake the feeling that there’s someone here just… watching us.”

  “Thermals showed that the only people here are those thugs driving around.” Carl grinned and slapped his friend on the back. “Are you scared of some American criminals, Ostap?”

  “Hey.” The voice came from Jacob Yermakov, the second technician. He and Oles had caught up with Ostap and Carl. “Shouldn’t we be quiet? What if there are people nearby? The Americans might get a little bit agitated if they hear four Russians with weapons talking loudly in the streets of their capital.”

  “Hm.” Ostap grunted and nodded. “Yes. We should. How much longer to the next facility?”

  “A couple hours, probably, if we don’t stop.”

  “Then we will not stop.”

  ***

  “Motorbikes. There, on the road.”

  “The Americans usually call them motorcycles, Ostap.”

  Commander Ostap turned and glared at the technician. “If I wanted to know the correct terminology then I’d go find someone less annoying than you. Now shut up and let us focus!” The words came out in a hissing stream, and Oles backed up, raising his hands and turning his head away in surrender. Jacob shrugged and rolled his eyes as Oles glanced at him, and together the pair of technicians sat down on the sidewalk a few feet away.

  “How many do you count?” Carl had a pair of binoculars up to his eyes, studying the windows of the nearby buildings for any signs of movement. Ostap still had his gaze fixated on a location a block and a half down the street, where a collection of motorcycles were sitting in the middle of the road. Their engines made no sound and no one appeared to be nearby, but Ostap could see that the bodies of the motorcycles were red-hot in the thermal scope, an indication that they had only recently been turned off.

  “Seven in the street, but there could be more that we can’t see from this position. Anyone in the buildings?”

  “Nyet. Buildings are clear, but this angle is terrible. We need elevation.”

  “The second site is just past those bikes, off to the right in those buildings on the hill. That’s the priority.”

  “Can we go around?”

  “No.” Ostap shook his head. “There’s a collapse across the street to the north, and my guess is that most of that group went to the south—no, wait.” Ostap pulled out his own pair of binoculars and dropped into a crouch. “I see them. A trio, in the complex where we need to go.”

  “Only three? Should be easy.”

  “Indeed. Two men, one woman. One of the men is older, and they all have just basic rifles.”

  Behind the two Spetsnaz officers, the technicians had their binoculars out and were focusing in on the trio outside the buildings at the facility on the hill. While they tried to locate the three individuals, Ostap and Carl were busy unslinging their rifles and adjusting their scopes. There was no verbal communication between the pair. After years of working independently and together on countless missions requiring absolute silence and stealth, both men were well-versed in performing their duties in complete silence. The technicians, however, were another matter.

  “What are they looking at?” Oles spoke to Jacob as they knelt a few feet behind the Spetsnaz officers.

  “No idea. They look like they’re expecting trouble, though.” Jacob adjusted the zoom and focus on his binoculars, trying to get a clearer view of the trio. After a few seconds, he gasped and furiously tapped Oles on the shoulder.

  “That older one, with the glasses standing behind the other two; don’t you recognize him?”

  Oles took a few more seconds to zoom in closer, then he gasped as well. “Dr. Michael Evans?! No… it can’t be!”

  While the two soldiers had been doing their level best to ignore the furious whispering going on behind them, the muted shouts of the two men were too much for Ostap. He turned and snapped at the pair. “What the hell are you two going on about?”

  As Ostap spoke, Oles realized that Carl’s rifle was pointed at the three people on the hill. He lunged forward, knocking the rifle to the side, then turned to Ostap. “You can’t shoot them! One of them is Dr. Evans!”

  “Who is that, and why should I give a damn?” Carl spat at Oles as he retrieved his fallen rifle.

  Oles groaned, removing his cap and running his fingers through his greasy hair. “He’s a prominent computer scientist; he actually designed the precursor to Damocles!”

  Carl was just about to level his sight on the three when Ostap held out a hand to stop him. The lead Spetsnaz officer narrowed his eyes at Oles, studying the technician closely. “Are you certain?”

  “Positive!”

  “Then who are the other two?”

  “I’ve no idea!” Oles was still nearly shouting, and Jacob had to put a hand on his comrade’s shoulder to help calm him down. “But if Dr. Michael Evans is here, then that can only mean that he’s searching for a way to stop Damocles, too! I’ll bet anything that those two are helping him.”

  “Why would the U.S. government send a lone scientist with a pair of what look like civilians all by themselves into a place like this to search for a way to shut down their own creation?”

  “You’re assuming, of course, that the U.S. government didn’t intend for all this to happen.” Carl inserted himself into the conversation and Jacob rolled his eyes.

  “Ple
ase. Not even they are stupid enough to… well, perhaps. But they still wouldn’t do it.”

  Ostap sighed heavily and rubbed his eyes. Not even years of training and practice could properly prepare him for such a mission, especially when he was having to play babysitter to a pair of eggheads who seemed fragile enough to crack under the slightest pressure. “What do you want to do about it, then? Walk up and say hello to them, introduce ourselves and offer to help them?”

  “Is that an option?” Oles’ voice was dead serious, and Ostap gave him a long glare until the technician finally turned away. The four sat there for a moment, each of them lost in their own thoughts, until Carl happened to turn and glance back at the hill. He quickly sat back up on his knees and grabbed his binoculars before tapping wildly at Ostap’s knee.

  “Look. On the edge of the compound. They’ve got company.”

  Ostap peered out toward the compound that he was supposed to be guiding the technicians toward. In addition to the trio inside, there were half a dozen individuals lurking near the close side of the wall. Each of them wore blue jeans and leather jackets and wielded rifles and pistols along with pipes and crowbars. They cut imposing figures and looked as though they were aware of the trio inside the compound. The three individuals—including Dr. Evans—seemed oblivious to the presence of the other people as they were still focused on watching something across the street.

  After watching everyone down the road closely for just a few more seconds, Ostap put everything together and realized precisely what was going on. This realization came just a few seconds before the shooting started.

  Chapter 3

  The Waters’ Homestead

  Outside Ellisville, VA

  Dianne stood on the porch with the rest of the group, frozen by Sarah’s words for a few seconds before Mark put his hand on her arm. “Mom?” His touch and the single word spurred her to action, and she began giving hasty instructions to the rest of the group, speaking in a low tone as she glanced around at the woods in front of the house.