Teen Ink

Five

Chernobyl, Ukraine
Lieutenant Hannah Schifman peered over the long grass covered plains surrounding the abandoned city of Chernobyl. The meltdown of the nuclear power plants has turned the once prideful city into a ghost town. Old buildings and equipment lay where they had laid decades ago on the day everyone evacuated. At least, that was what was written down in the history books.
Schifman knows that it was the Russian undercover authorities lead by a man named Victor Chernkov who was responsible for this act. He ordered the power plants to be destroyed in order to use the overall city as a black operations headquarters. Interestingly enough, it turned out that the base was used for the storage of large amounts of secret documents belonging to the United States. Since the city itself has radioactivity levels too harsh for everyday life, no country bothered to search it for years. But for Schifman, a short, blonde haired woman who likes to take risks, this mission was too good to be of a waste. She was notified earlier that week that Russian Black Operations officials under the direct rule of Chernkov has managed to capture a downed U.S. Satellite with information to the nation's air defenses. Her objective was to go in solo, sneak past as many guards as possible, and retrieve the small satellite's chip.
The catch was that once she is spotted, she only has ten minutes to get out of the area and reach the extraction point before the Russian Air Force shows up. Creeping amongst the shadows cast by the worn buildings, she easily snuck past a small patrol of men and dogs. As she neared the city center, the clicker began to give small clicks to warn her of radioactive pockets. She turned her course and began to make a different route to her target. The PSA decided that she was supposedly "too good" for a gillie suite to mask her presence, so she cannot risk exposing herself to the enemy. Schifman stopped at a small opening in what used to be a small garden courtyard between some apartment buildings. Near a small, dying tree was two Russian Black Operations Soldiers, taking a break from scouting. She aimed her silenced M21 sniper rifle at one of the soldiers, careful that the crosshairs were put right on the back of the head. She flexed her fingers and squeezed the trigger, being carefull not to jerk the trigger and cause the muzzle to rise up. The muzzle gave a slight "pop" as the bullet sprang forward and hit one of the soldiers right in the head. The other soldier only had time to see his buddy go down before he was hit in the head as well. "Good night" Schifman said quietly under her breath. She checked her watch, being ahead of the intended schedule; Schifman decided to take a safer route. She moved through an old apartment building, walking through a crumbling wall inside the house, she happened onto an old family living room. Hanging on the wall was a faded, frayed family picture of a man, a woman and two children, the group was smiling at the camera, all happy and unaware of what was to become of their home. Schifman paused to look into the picture, the date read "March 1986" just one month before the disaster happened. She felt a small bit of sorrow for the family in the picture as she checked her weapons. Once everything was in place, Schifman walked to the next room, wandering what had become of the once happy family.
She exited the apartment via a fire escape and quietly walked across another old garden. The sounds of vehicles could be heard as Schifman came near a road leading to the facility. Hiding behind an old chunk of wall, she watched as a dozen assorted vehicles passed. Some were just Jeeps with a few high ranking officers, some were trucks with black operations soldiers, while some carried weapons and supplies into the facility. Following behind was a Russian BMP armored vehicle, its loud engine covering up the voices and conversations of the soldiers. Once the vehicles passed, Schifman picked up her gun and walked across the road and clambered behind an old log covered by tall grass and bushes. She peeked above the log and pushed her binoculars upwards. Scanning the area, she watched as the vehicles she saw earlier enter the compound, the facility was surrounded only by a tall chain link fence. No person in their right mind would we sneaking around the perimeter so the government did not need to invest on top quality defense. She looked through te binoculars and counted over two dozen guards at the entrance. Most were carrying AKs or P90s, a few had RPGs strapped on their backs. Afterwards, she walked to a house and planted a C4 charge on it.
Slowly Schifman edged forward until she was about one hundred feet away from the gate. Pulling out her remote control detonator, she drew in her breath, and then clicked the button.
The explosion blew off a large section of the building; it also caused the guards to run at it to see what was going on. They sprinted away from their positions long enough for Schifman to dart through the open gate. Inside, she continued to walk in the shadows, sticking to walls and the tangled growth of ivy and grass. Finally she reached the front entrance to the facility, peeking through grass and bushes, she caught sight of a few guards at the front of the entrance. Schifman counted over four guards, all were talking to each other as they watched the others check out the diversionary explosion Schifman set. As the sun begins to set, the guards all returned to their posts. Hannah Schifman herself knows that there is no way she could take on fifty men armed with assault rifles and RPGs. She decides to wait it out. Taking out her watch, she quickly dialed out a message to Dmitri, her partner who was in charge of extraction. Once Dmitri received the message, he replied back.
After another hour of sitting, Schifman decides to take a look, the guards were taking a break, and now only one of them is sitting in front of the building. She quickly seized the opportunity by grabbing her M21. Checking to make sure that the guards in the entrance were not looking, she aimed down the scope. Quietly squeezing the trigger, Schifman shot the guard standing in front of the building right in the head. The guard went down without a sound. Knowing she is running out of time, she rushed out and sprinted silently to the front of the building, the guards by the entrance were looking out on the road and did not see her. After dragging the body behind some bushes, she opened the rusty door of the large warehouse. Once inside, the tracker on her watch told her exactly where to go. Apparently the small satellite was housed in an airplane hangar, just on the western side of the facility. In front of the hangar was a medium sized airfield for transport of troops and supplies.
Schifman prodded onward, to her luck; the hangar was completely abandoned; only a small plane used on farms along with the satellite was there. "Guess they never thought this would happen." she whispered to herself. Quickly Schifman got down to work and began unhooking the satellite's mainframe to get to the chip containing all the information inside. She began unscrewing the bolts and nuts with a wrench she found nearby. Just as she retrieved the chip from the satellite, Schifman heard the hangar doors open. Before she could even turn around, she heard the sound of rifles being lifted as well as a man in a Russian accent shout, "Hands up, drop your weapon."