Best also saw, outside there were several Toyota Land Cruisers parked and four or five men were watchfully looking around.
Khalid opened a Toyota Land Cruiser and threw him in, just as he was about to speak, a rocket suddenly shot out from the nearby grove!
Before a team member could finish shouting, he viciously lunged to the side, and the rocket struck the back of an off-road vehicle, instantly blasting it into the air. When it crashed back to the ground, it turned into a fireball.
Two members of Omega A Team were caught in the blast wave and swept away.
"Retreat!" Khalid Baskabilu commanded calmly, pressing his earpiece.
They were being pursued, there was no choice but to run.
The driver hit the gas pedal to the floor, tires flinging mud from the ground, and shouted, "Get in!"
The rest of the men got in the car, not even closing the doors, and started firing toward the grove.
The Toyota Land Cruiser charged off into the distance.
Three white Lada Nivas burst out from the grove and gave chase.
Inside sat armed men wearing Balaklava hats, holding AK74s, their eyes profound.
No insignia was worn.
They were either "Signal Flag" or "Alpha Group."
But more likely the former, they wouldn't be transferred to the "counterintelligence division" until 1991 because of a major event. Before that, they were in charge of external special operations.
During the Afghanistan war, their presence was everywhere.
By the Millennium, having been established for 20 years, "Signal Flag" had only lost four men: one during the Soviet era in Kandahar, Afghanistan; one in 1996 during the abandonment of Grozny; the remaining two in the past two years in Chechnya.
In Chechnya, "Signal Flag" had achieved a glorious record: they killed the brutal murderers Barayev and Abu Oumar, and captured one of the ring leaders, Raduyev.
Of course, this time they were here for Best.
They adhered to the national bottom line!
But due to political reasons, they didn't dare to operate openly in Latvia…
"Move to the front!" Khalid Baskabilu yelled at Best, who was holding his head. The latter swallowed hard and crawled toward the passenger seat.
Khalid repeatedly punched the rear window of the Land Cruiser until it shattered, then aimed his gun and opened fire on their pursuers.
Bullets raked across the Lada Niva, and the KGB driver, indeed ruthless, showed no fear. With his teammates' shout of "Ura!" they caught up to Khalid's vehicle from the side.
The Omega A Team driver was also a fierce one. Seeing the enemy approach, he abruptly turned the wheel and rammed over, striking the Lada Niva's tire and sending it tumbling off the road, rolling several times.
"Long live Viktor!" shouted the team member, excitedly honking the horn.
Land Cruiser vs. Lada Niva, the former victorious.
The pursuing KGB members hesitated, and finally, the commander, with no choice but regret, called off the chase and ordered rescue operations for the wounded. The commotion had been too great—continuing would invite complaints from the Latvian government.
The Lada Niva had rolled several times and was dented inward, with four men inside all gruesomely crushed to death.
"Твоюмать (Motherfucker)!" cursed the commander, angered. When had they ever suffered this kind of loss?
"This is definitely the work of Americans!"
Watching the Land Cruiser disappear, he could only curse and leave with the bodies.
About forty minutes after they left, the Latvian troops arrived late, looking at the Lada Niva and then at the bullet holes...
A gunfight had actually happened here!
"Captain, I seem to remember the KGB has a branch here that uses this type of vehicle... This should be theirs, look, there's Russian on it," said a captain, pointing at the trim.
Russian words etched with "Loyalty!"
The team's captain felt a headache coming on and shook his head, "We can't handle this, call the higher-ups."
It was beyond his remit.
Khalid Baskabilu and his team didn't enter Riga but took the outskirts.
They had already found a cargo ship, heading straight for Mexico.
"Mr. Best, check if the item is still there," he called out to the man in the passenger seat, who hastily opened his briefcase to see a bottle, intact, and let out a sigh of relief.
This thing couldn't be broken.
If the specialized bottle were to break, its contents would be enough to kill all nearby.
Perhaps uranium-238 isn't considered as valuable as uranium-235, but it's still nuclear material and can be used for various research, its radioactivity is very intense.
Remember the world's largest toy manufacturer, Gilbert Company, and their "toy," the Gilbert U-238 Atomic Energy Lab?
The kit contained real radioactive elements such as lead-210, polonium-210, ruthenium-106, and zinc-65. This toy could be used for assassination—the polonium-210 in the kit, an extremely radioactive and toxic substance, requires less than 0.1 micrograms to fatally poison an adult.
There were also four uranium ore samples in glass bottles. If one were accidentally broken, the entire building and yard would be severely contaminated with nuclear waste.
"Thank God," said Best with a long sigh of relief, "Thank you, Viktor!"
He also looked at Khalid Baskabilu in a good mood, "And thank you guys."
"It's what we should do," replied Khalid.
"But we haven't left the Baltic Sea yet; once we get back to Tijuana, I'll definitely treat you to a meal."
"Got any Australian lobsters?" a team member asked, eyes gleaming.
"Of course! Eat all you want!"
The man grinned with delight.
Khalid Baskabilu took a deep breath, but he felt the journey home was still very long.
The KGB wouldn't let them off easily!