He jogged over to the team and repeated their orders, leaving out the part about prisoner bounties. Handle them as equals told Felix everything he needed to know about the hostile force. He had to kill all of them quickly and efficiently, or they would extract a heavy price from his team. Fifty thousand dollars was tempting, but not that tempting—to him. He couldn’t speak for the rest of the team’s financial situations. His life was worth far more than a measly fifty grand, and he wasn’t about to put it in the hands of someone who needed a quick money fix to pay off a gambling debt.

Satisfied that everyone understood the parameters of the mission, he turned them loose. They split up into two groups and boarded their assigned helicopters. Felix followed Oksana and Lashev, their sniper, to the leftmost Bell 429 helicopter, where they climbed inside, slid the wide side door into place, and immediately went to work donning their equipment.

The helicopter lifted off a moment later, a feeling of heaviness overtaking him until the helicopter’s flight leveled off, headed toward SITE ZERO. The pilot told him it would take no more than four minutes to reach the landing zone, which put them all under a bit of a time crunch to slip into their full combat kit. They worked methodically, starting with their plate carrier vests and moving on to their drop holsters. Rifles attached to one-point carry slings next, followed by helmets and night vision.

“One minute!” yelled the pilot.

He was glad Pichugin had arranged for two helicopters. This particular Bell model was rated for seven passengers, enough to ferry the team to the site, but the cabin felt cramped enough with the three of them unloading and swinging gear around. He couldn’t imagine trying to pull this off with the seven operatives in the same space. Not in four minutes. He patted himself down again to make sure he hadn’t missed something. All good.

With his personal gear squared away, he went to work on the last duffel bag with Oksana. Together, they wrestled the M249 LMG (light machine gun) out of the bag and onto the rear passenger bench seat. He retrieved one of the seventy-five-round-drum magazines from the bag and inserted it into the magazine well. All a gunner had to do at this point was release the safety and pull the charging handle back. Four additional drums sat in each bag.

“Should we bring one of these along?” asked Oksana. “The firepower might come in handy.”