Midnight Black

Court, who lost his mother when he was very young, is unnerved by Milda’s maternal concern. He asks her again to show him the way into Russia; he promises that he will survive—he has skills unlike the usual operative. Milda relents and tells Court that she is in touch with an old colleague in Moscow, whose granddaughter Katarina Orlova, a political dissident, now works for the Freedom of Russia Legion. Milda will arrange safe harbor for Court and a meeting with Katarina. Court thanks Milda and waits to see if cars are headed toward Milda’s apartment. When Milda seems out of danger, Court leaves.

However, while crossing the lane in front of Milda’s building, Court notices agents watching her apartment from parked cars, as if waiting for incoming assistance. He also spots black Volvo cars waiting in the alleys. Court senses that something is wrong and heads back to Milda’s apartment, keeping himself hidden. He enters her home through a different point (realizing that his previous entry was in a surveillance zone) and manages to communicate to Milda that they need to leave immediately.

Court and Milda take the stairs to her apartment building’s basement parking lot. Just as Court drives away, they hear a cavalcade arrive at the building’s front. Court races out to the highway, expecting a volley of bullets, but no one shoots at them. As the Volvos tail them, Court makes a turn toward the woods to shake them off. However, it soon becomes clear that an escape is impossible, and their car is surrounded by the cavalcade.

Lasers are trained on their car, and a voice commands Court and Milda to step out. Court pulls over and shouts that he is surrendering his weapon. He asks the agents to let Milda go, but he is told, “Nobody goes home tonight” (143).

As Court’s eyes adjust in the headlight beams, he makes out six agents. One of the men walks toward Court; Court tries to engage the man in conversation to buy some time, and he learns that the man is an Austrian working for the GRU. The man trains his gun on Court, but before he can fire, there is gunfire from behind Court. The GRU men are all shot down in an instant. Court yells “Cease fire!” at the unknown people who killed the GRU men and hears an American voice from behind him.

Zack Hightower emerges and jokes that he has saved Court once again. When he got a call from Hanley earlier that evening, Zack went to Riga with his team to keep an eye on Court. Zack brings the baffled Court up to speed about the reasons for his presence in the Baltics. The plan now is to drop off Court and Milda at a safe house in Tallinn, Estonia. However, Court tells Zack that Milda should be taken to the US embassy in Tallinn, where safe passage will be arranged for her. Meanwhile, he is going to Helsinki, Finland, to meet Milda’s contact. Zack tells Court that he will follow because Court is bound to attract GRU men in Helsinki.

In the CIA’s headquarters in Virginia, Gina Peters, a young translations officer, is writing transcripts from video feeds hacked from Russian courtrooms. The task is boring, but Gina, a bright officer fluent in Russian, tries to give it her best. One video catches Gina’s attention because the woman is sentenced to the same prison as Nadia Yarovaya, the wife of famous dissident Natan Yarovoy. The anomaly in the hearing is that the woman’s name is not read out, which indicates that she may be a high-level political prisoner.

Gina zooms in, hoping that the woman looks up so that her face will be caught by the CIA’s facial recognition system. The woman keeps her head bowed until she is nearly out of the courthouse, looking up deliberately at the last moment. The recognition system identifies her as Zoya Zakhorova, an ex-SVR member now working covertly with the Americans.

Recognizing that Zoya is an important political prisoner, Gina calls Angela Lacy to inform her about her findings. Lacy is shocked to know that the video dates from September 7, just two months ago, indicating that Zoya is alive.

A snowstorm is wracking Yavas, and most of the guards are huddled indoors. Zoya decides that it’s a good day to attempt escape. Before the workday ends, she filches a pencil, some glue, and a couple of sewing pins from the workstations, hiding them in her hair scarf. She deliberately bumps into a female guard, removing the woman’s name tag in the process and hiding it in her hair scarf. Zoya knows that she’ll be searched by a guard on her way out of the work building but hopes that the search won’t extend to her head. The male guard on duty gropes Zoya inappropriately on the pretext of searching her—a common practice—but Zoya manages to distract him from touching her scarf.

Falling out of the queue of prisoners going to the living quarters, Zoya makes her way to a warehouse, the layout of which she has memorized. She picks out a guard’s uniform and pastes the guard’s name tag on her shirt. Zoya walks out of the building and joins a group of guards leaving the compound. She hopes that the pitch darkness means she can get out undetected. She finds a car in the lot and opens it with the sewing pin. Just as she is about to start the ignition, floodlights come on, and she is discovered.

Zoya is surprised to see Baronov walk to her car. She steps out and is immediately seized by guards. Baronov directs them to search Zoya roughly before she is brought to him in the meeting room.

In the meeting room, Baronov tells Zoya that he was visiting Yarovoy in the men’s prison when news broke out of her escape attempt. For his amusement, Baronov directed the prison officials to let Zoya think she was undetected. He also casually informs Zoya that Yarovoy is dying; Baronov has instructed the prisoner’s workload to be increased to hasten his death. Disgusted, Zoya calls him a “psychopath.” Baronov informs her that he is letting her live because he has a plan for her to serve Russia. Time will reveal the role.

Court is on the ferry to Finland when he gets a call from Hanley saying that “Anthem”—Zoya’s code name—is alive and being held in a prison in Mordovia. Court weeps in relief. Hanley shares more information: Yavas is 400 miles away from both Ukraine-controlled territory and Kazakhstan, increasing the chances of an escape from Russian land. Further, since Yarovoy and Nadia are also being held at Yavas, Court can leverage the help of the Russian resistance in breaking out the political prisoners.

In Vienna, Dvorak receives information that the GRU team in Riga is dead and that Milda and the man known as Chayka have gone missing. He tells his team to move resources to the north because it is likely that Chayka may try to approach Russia from Finland.

Meanwhile, Dvorak gets a call from Baronov. Baronov introduces himself, regretting that Russian intelligence agencies do not work in tandem as they did in the past. Baronov wants to rectify that error and pass on valuable information to Dvorak: Baronov has identified Zack Hightower as the man behind the Riga massacre. They know that Zack is on his way to Helsinki, and once they discover his Helsinki location, Baronov will share it with Dvorak. All Baronov wants in return is that Dvorak share his progress since they have a common enemy.

Before Helsinki, Court stops in Pori, a city on Finland’s west coast, where the warehouse of Austmarr Marine Salvage is located (marine salvage companies save or recover cargo from endangered or wrecked ships). Court sneaks into the warehouse to steal scuba diving gear and then speeds away in a stolen car.

In Virginia, Hanley visits Trey Watkins, the CIA’s new deputy director of operations. The position was held by Hanley until the events of Relentless (2021), in which Hanley was reassigned to Papua New Guinea for his unapproved directive to Court to assassinate the prince of Dubai. Because of these developments, there is awkwardness between Watkins and Hanley.

Hanley tells Watkins about Court’s plan to infiltrate Russia, and he advises him that he can leverage Court to break Yarovoy out of prison, scoring a major victory against the Russians. Though Watkins admires the ingenuity of Hanley’s plan, he flatly refuses to play any part in it, advising Hanley to stick to his job in Colombia.

In Moscow, Denis Maskaev and his team are scouting their high-profile target, former-general-turned-TV-show-host Vadim Trifonov. Trifonov is a huge supporter of President Vitaly Peskov “and a rabble-rousing mouthpiece” (210). As Trifonov crosses a busy street with his bodyguard, Maks, Legion members pull up in a gray van. They open fire on Trifonov’s waiting car, killing the driver and Trifonov’s security team. Maks pulls Trifonov away from the car and into the crowd as more members of the Legion appear on the scene.

Denis ambushes Maks in a nearby alley, killing him. He manages to shoot Trifonov three times before a bus blocks his view. As the bus drives away, Denis watches Trifonov hobble away. He gets into the gray van, which has returned for him, and tells the team that Trifonov is mortally wounded and not long for the world.

After her botched escape attempt, Zoya is assigned to the claustrophobic confinement wing, where the work hours are even worse, and her cell is dark and tiny. Before the workday begins, Zoya is strip-searched by a guard, a process that invariably turns into sexual groping. At the workstation, Zoya and her fellow prisoners sew belts, the toughest sewing assignment in Yavas. As Zoya sits at her station, she takes notice of Nadia, Yarovoy’s wife, among the prisoners and is shocked.