“Sir, for the fifth time,” he says sharply, interrupting the angered voice on the other end, “I do not know who Lacertus is! And for that matter, we don’t even know for sure that Greenpeace really is the culprit. It seems extremely unlikely.” The voice on the other end continues to harangue him, questioning whether he was the one to make such an assertion.
He moves around the couch and toward his room. He passes the door to Logan’s room and passively marvels at how such a small room can be filled so thoroughly with clothes and other trash. He passively remarks on the posters on the wall: YouTubers such as Connor Franta and Smosh, musicians including Kanye and Troye Sivan, and other bands he couldn’t identify off the top of his head.
Dirk pauses, a realisation coming to him. He passively ignores the voice in his phone which continues to issue the same order over and over, just in different words. “I’ve never been young,” the stranger remarks stoically, “What was I raised for, if not this, though? This phone call, this job, this life?”
He sighs quietly and moves by the room, the life he will never know – the life of a normal 20-something – and moves toward his room, remarking on the bareness of it all. A simple bed with grey sheets, a cheap dresser adorned with nothing, and a desk holding his laptop and a few textbooks. “This is my life. A lie, an illusion, something made to seem unordinary.”
The voice on his phone abruptly pulls him out of his reverie and back into feeling attacked. “Sir, I will do everything in my power to determine whether or not this cell is active, but I cannot push too quickly. If they suspect something –“ he pauses, “Yes, it’ll all go to hell quite quickly.” Dirk looks toward the entryway of the dorm, “My roommate is back, I’ll call you when I have something more to tell you.” He nods absently, “Stay the cause.” With that, he hangs up and pockets his phone as the door opens.
Logan steps in, clad in a sleep black suit. Underneath it he wears a light blue dress shirt and around his neck is a black checkered tie. “Dirk!” He calls out, grinning widely, “What are you doing here? The ceremony’s going to start in like two hours.” The student runs a hand through his dark wavy hair, trying to put it back into place before moving ever closer and taking a seat on the couch.
Having lived with Logan for a few months now, Dirk was aware this pretty much meant he also had to sit. Slumping into the couch, his cold gaze moves from Logan to the grey day outside. Stout buildings cover the nearby land, and in the distance, the Pacific Ocean undulates tumultuously. “Everything alright?” Logan asks, looking up from his phone to his roommate. The young man from Europe looks over, his cold gaze once more making the other woefully uncomfortable. “I mean, I know we’ve only been roommates for a few months and you are naturally quiet, but something seems off!” His explanation comes out in a hurried jumble, and out of embarrassment he looks down at his phone for a moment, gathering his composure.
Dirk doesn’t look back at Logan, and instead returns his attention to the outside world to his right. The rain sounded quietly against the windows, like so many tiny nymphs tapping against the glass, yearning for a reprieve from their own misery. “I am the rain,” he says quietly. He shakes his head, dislodging a few blond strands of hair which fall over his forehead as he returns to reality. “It’s nothing, just some…”
“Family stuff?” Logan inquires, leaning forward, his mystical green eyes twinkling with curiosity. “I understand – well, I don’t really – but I think I get the picture. They’re probably worried about you being so far from home, right?” Dirk pauses at this, the word ‘family’ stabbing into his chest, only to be accompanied by another verbal dagger; ‘home.’
He slowly nods, “Yeah, you got it.” His demeanour, uncharacteristically quiet and withdrawn, clearly drawing concern from his roommate. After a long pause, he goes to speak again. “You know, I’ve never really had a true friend,” Dirk says calmly, leaning back into the couch. “It’s just… never been a realistic thing to happen where I’m from.” He smirks bitterly, “All in the name of progress, and all that.”
“Really?” His roommate asks, verdant gaze alive and intrigued before the reality of this revelation hits him. “That’s…” Logan trails off, fiddling with his phone, “Really sad.” He straightens up and shake his head, “And it’s wrong. You’re a good guy – sure you may be a bit different but that happens when you come from the only non-UN country in Europe.”
“And, for what it’s worth,” Logan continues, awkwardly scratching at his nape, “You’re my friend.”
Dirk startles, letting out a small noise of surprise, his face momentarily flushing with embarrassment before he slowly composes himself. “That… means a lot, Logan. Thank you.”
“Well,” Logan begins, pushing himself to a stand, “I hate to say it, but I was just dropping by to plug in my phone – I’ll need it for tonight. Alexis rented a limo and she’s taking all our friends out to downtown, and I don’t want it to die while I’m out.” He looks back to Dirk, who had once more withdrawn, “You’ll be okay, right?”
The question visibly jars the foreigner, “Ah… yes, I will.” Dirk, too, stands, his intense gaze having somewhat softened at the concern for his wellbeing. “I’m not sure what I did to earn your concern, but thank you all the same,” he says earnestly.
Logan looks confused for a moment, before chuckling and shaking his head. “Man I wouldn’t be shocked if you were born in a test tube! Lichtenstein must be a weird place,” he shakes his head at the ridiculousness of it all. “Anyway, don’t sweat it. What are friends for?” He abruptly moves in, wrapping his arm over Dirk’s shoulder and the other around his midsection in a brief, if tight, embrace.
Taken completely off guard, Dirk only loosely reciprocates the gesture, and when he is released, finds an amused, if thoughtful, look on his roommate’s face. “Well,” the stranger begins, “I’ll see you at the ceremony.”
Having begun to leave, Logan stops and turns, a surprised look on his emotive visage. “You’re going?”
“Of course,” Dirk begins stoically, before a smirk breaks out on his face, “What are friends for?”
The student offers him a thumbs up, “Damn straight.”
Later…
The Chan Centre for the Performing Arts is, without a doubt, one of the most opulent places Logan has ever been. He’s seated in the centre area. Behind and around him in a huge horseshoe are two levels of balconies, and below them on the main floor, more seats. Before them, a huge stage fit for any kind of performance, though today it would play host to graduates.
The huge building his adorned with light oak and deep crimson seats, as well as heavy black curtains strategically draped over concrete walls for better acoustics. Overhead, a massive, complex lighting structure. He looks back over his chair, passively noting the students around him engrossed in their phones, but focuses on the first balcony.
All around him there is noise, but he focuses upon this balcony, intent on finding his target. In the centre of the balcony is a large empty square of chairs. On the edge stand large men in black suits, their stoic faces impassive. Inside their protective barrier sits none other than the Secretary General Lance Fournier and his family. A distance away from the Secretary General of the United Nations sits two familiar figures. He catches sight of them by the distinctive grey hair of his father and black hair of his mother. He knows they can’t see him, but smiles all the same. “They got here in time,” he thinks to himself.
Next to Logan is a woman only a few months his elder, Alana. “I wish they’d start already,” she grumbles to him as he sits forward once more, “I know we’re near the beginning of the alphabet, but I have to pee.”
“Why didn’t you go before?” Logan asks, his expression one of incredulity.
She scoffs at him, “I was too nervous! I couldn’t go! But now I certainly could…”
Logan can only snicker, “Well, you’d better hold it, unless you get to go up there with a distinctly unique grad gown design around the crotch area.”
“Oh thank god,” she says, clearly relieved. Alana motions to the stage, “It’s starting!”
True to what she says, on the stage moved a thin, middle aged man with a balding head of white hair donned in the ceremonial robes the chancellor wears. He moves up to the podium, and nods to those gathered nearby on stage, ready to start handing out the merely ceremonial documents.
“Good afternoon, everyone,” he begins, his wan voice calm and relaxed, “I am Lindsay Gordon, and I am the Chancellor of the University of British Columbia, and it is my pleasure to be officiating today’s ceremonies.” He looks over the main floor section of students, then to the balconies of family and dignitaries.
“Over the years, the UBC has grown from a small college on the windswept coast of Vancouver to a sprawling city unto itself, where the pursuit of knowledge can be found in its purest of forms, and where we fear no idea, no matter how alien.” He pauses for applause, and receives a polite amount.
Looking over the graduates once more, he continues. “It fills me with great pride to look over the class of 2018, to know that you will go out into the world, do great things, and, most importantly, tell everyone you meet what an excellent speaker I am so I can keep my job.” He grins wickedly, and the audience laughs.
“But, as you know, it is only April, yet here we are, at graduation. This is because we have a very special guest. He is an alumni of some importance, I dare say, and one of my personal friends and colleagues, Secretary General of the United Nations, Lance Fournier.” The audience roars with applause as the curved wall behind the stage lights up from a projector, showing the Secretary General smiling, waving and nodding at those in the balconies with him.
“Now, the Secretary General has asked to share a few words with you while he is here,” Chancellor Gordon says amiably, motioning to the man in the first balcony. Logan cannot help but notice how paternal the leader of the UN looks: he’s a little overweight, wears a grey suit, has brown hair streaked with grey, and has kind, tired eyes.
On the wall where his likeness has been projected, Fournier speaks. “Thank you, Chancellor, and thank you all for the warm welcome you have given me,” he smiles, his words light and pleasant. “It’s a great honour and pleasure to be back at my alma mater where I made so many friends, met so many future colleagues, and of course, on occasion, did things I’d rather not mention.” Once more, the audience chuckles.
“However the world is a different place than when I went to school,” he says gravely. “Nowadays we have a tenuous peace with the World Confederation, a group of states that exceeds our own UN in both population and wealth.” His words hung ominously in the air; the drab realisation that their own seemingly peaceful UN was not the most powerful entity in the world leaving Logan ill at ease as he watches the projector screen.
Fournier continues, his tone a serious one, now, “It was for the young that my predecessor, Secretary General Anderson signed the armistice in 1997 following the twin tragedies that were the nuclear bombings on Chad and Zambia.” His words leave the room extremely on edge, for few in political circles dared to speak of the African bombings. “Back then, your predecessors’ hopes for peace and safety inspired my predecessor’s vision for an end to the war… and it worked.”
“The world you enter now is not one without danger, but it is also not one without hope,” he becomes emboldened, his words striking out more strongly, “You are the future of the Canada, of the UN, and I know, looking over your bright young faces, that you will help us old codgers do everything we can to keep the peace going.” He pauses once, “Now, I’ll stop taking up your time. Today is for you graduates, good luck to you all in the years to come.”
Logan looks over the veteran statesman, nodding approvingly. “CNN calls him a ditherer and Fox News calls him indecisive, but I like him,” Alana remarks thoughtfully. Logan nods in agreement, finding Fournier to be a likeable man, even if he struggles to keep the UN from being strong-armed into war by America.
The Secretary General takes his seat, and just as Logan turns back to the stage, having twisted himself in his chair to watch the real man and not the projection at the end, he hears a high pitched whine akin to a knife being drawn down the length of a tense wire. His heart drops into his stomach as he sees the Secretary General’s guards lunge toward him, bodies splayed out wide as they dive to protect him.
The world, then, seems to slow for Logan. A ripple of fire explodes outward from the first balcony’s centre, directly below Fournier. The entire structure, much akin to a horseshoe, surges upward in the centre, fire surging forward in every direction, engulfing anyone in a thirty meter radius. Screams sound and the entire building erupts in a cacophony of death as the explosion continues upward and outward.
The Secretary General, already lost to the explosion, is now replaced by a massive fireball of debris and death. The explosion slams into the upper balcony, shredding it from bottom up. Logan looks over at where his parents are, and finds to his horror the remnants of the main balcony sagging dangerously.
The entire structure lets out an agonising groan as it fails to support the new distribution of weight. Lights flicker and go out, and more screams sound as the red emergency lights come on and paint the scene in a new horrific light.
With a horrific crash, the left side of the main balcony comes crashing down in pieces, crushing those below. Screams are instantly stopped as tonnes of metal, wood and fabric come down. The left side is soon joined by the right, but not in the same way. Above his parents, Logan sees the second balcony dislodge a huge portion of the cement wall and shatter, cascading down as huge shrapnel onto the first balcony.
The first balcony’s remaining right wing, already badly damaged by the explosion, is destroyed utterly by falling debris before it itself joins the second balcony and collapses downward onto the main floor. Logan can now see the splatter of blood, tissue, organs and brain matter across the hulking mess, seeing grad gowns with body parts sticking awkwardly out from under huge chunks of debris.
He pushes himself to a stand, sickened by what he sees, and moves with those also rising out of their seats, many discarding their graduation gowns, to flee, only to be crushed by falling debris from the ceiling around him. Logan screams brokenly in horror as he watches one of the many huge stage lights come crashing down ten feet before him, crushing a fleeing young woman and sending her blood splattering in all directions.
Logan, adrenaline pumping, goes toward the stage, dragging a few students paralysed with fear up onto the structure punched with ragged holes from falling lights and chunks of ceiling. The Chancellor lies dead before his podium, a piece of ceiling shrapnel buried into his back. His lifeless eyes look over the students, horrified and still, as his hand reaches out for the help that never came.
As he moves to go back stage, more debris falls from the ceiling, catching the large curtains framing the stage and sending them flailing downward, restraining fleeing students. Overhead, Logan sees the grey sky, and feels cold rain pour down on him.
Something catches him on the shoulder and he collapses, screaming in pain as he clutches his clavicle, snapped in two. He pushes himself to his feet, watching students stream out the emergency doors before looking over the horrific carnage that was once the balconies.
He sees where his parents had once been, but cannot find their faces in the dim lighting and messy display of horror. “Mom, dad!?” He calls out, moving against the flow of the crowd, heedless of the danger that the destroyed building now presented.
Twenty feet sections of the walls had collapsed outward and inward, and everywhere the elements mixed with bodily fluids, letting them run across the floor. He holds his shoulder, feeling blood ooze down his arm and make him weary, but does not let up. He can see their faces in his mind, the small smiles, the face his dad has when they argue, the face his mother has when she teased him about his long hair. It all fades away as he moves to the edge of the wreckage, stopped by its enormity.
Roughly twenty feet away he sees two still forms, splayed out in their seats, their upper bodies covered by a chunk of the second balcony. Logan recognises the woman’s heels and the man’s shoes, and slowly drops to his knees, tears running freely down his face. His head feels light and his heart pumps quickly, and before he realises it, he collapsed to the ground, his hair wet with blood and rain.
“This is where I die,” he thinks to himself, “I’ll be with them soon, then, thank god…” Logan closes his eyes and lets the noise of squealing alarms, groaning structure and the screams of those dying and trapped become ever quieter.
Cold, wet hands abruptly grasp him by the arm and the back and haul him upward. Muffled words sound as he slowly opens his eyes again, only to find an angular face, slate-coloured eyes and bloodied blond hair above him. “Logan!” Dirk shouts at him, dragging him toward the stage once more, “Stay awake!”
“What…?” Logan mumbles, his head feeling abnormally light and his body cold.
“Stay awake! Don’t fall asleep!” Dirk’s voice, uncharacteristically panicked, is the last thing Logan hears before succumbing to the deep sleep that his body yearns for.
~*~
When Shari had been approached by her boss to join her for a professional development seminar, she had expected the worse, but when she learned the reality of this seminar, she had never felt more important. Now, the majesty of it all had partially worn off.
“To your right, you’ll see the UN General Assembly Hall. We’ll be taking a look inside on our way through the east wing, so for now hold your pictures,” she says, her chipper tone having become something of a habit. She continues to walk down the wide, palatial hall, regardless of the fact a few people had stopped to take pictures.
The tour group behind her looked around with mild interest at the portraits of former UN General Assembly Presidents hung on the pale blue wall opposite the assembly hall entrance. At the end of the hall, large windows looked over the Themes River which was currently choked with ships.
Looking back at her group, she speaks again, “Alright everyone, let’s move on, there’s still lots to see!” Those gathered slowly move toward her, families with teenagers dragging them away, their eyes glued to phone screens. Even still, some did not leave and, although she wanted to get them going, she simply couldn’t find it in her to start that kind of conflict.
Shari resigns herself to yet another personal failure and moves on, moving eastward through the building. She looks over the Themes once again, watching the ships slowly move through the traffic jam they presented on the water. “And if you look right, you’ll see that the Themes looks like a highway,” she remarks, eliciting a few charity chuckles.
Moving onward, the tour group was witness to various offices of relative importance, and yet Shari could not keep her attention on that task at hand. She could still feel it inside her pocket; the letter, folded twice over, that she was to drop off in Fournier’s office.
Finally, after twenty minutes of milling around the halls, she stopped before two large doors. They were made of solid oak, painted white, and had golden handles that pulled outward, effectively blocking any traffic in the hall. “The reason why the doors pull out and not push in is so no group of people can storm the office and capture the Secretary General,” Shari explains to the tour group who look genuinely surprised at this information, and so she explains further that “It was made like this when there was a greater worry for the safety of the Secretary General, in the late 1990’s.”
As she opens the heavy doors, inside she finds something different. Whereas on normal tour dates when Fournier is out the office and its adjoining offices would be empty, today they were filled with people. Before them was a widespread area of desks and adjacent offices with glass walls. The entire space was busy with bureaucrats moving back and forth, phones ringing loudly while, oddly enough, conversation was hushed and little was being said.
Shari looks from the busy room to the Office of the Secretary General, its doors uncharacteristically closed. Finally, one of the bureaucrats she recognises hurries toward her. “Shari, get these people out of here!” He hisses sharply, “Fournier’s dead – there was a bombing at a school he was visiting.”
The words hit her hard and she visibly staggers backward, shocked at the news. “He’s… dead?” She knew the envelope she was carrying was not a letter – even if she had wanted to believe it was, she knew better – but to know that the man her allies had wanted to kill was dead still struck a powerful blow to her heart.
“Yes!” The man whispers hoarsely, now get these tour shits out of here!”
She slowly nods and closes the doors, eliciting confused stares from those gathered. “Well, I’m sure you’ll learn sooner or later,” she begins hesitantly, “But the Secretary General has been killed. I’m afraid we’ll have to cut the tour short, today. Please excuse me for a moment.” Her breath came out raggedly as she hurried away from the tour group. She moved down the hallway that they would have eventually went down and shoved a washroom door open, stepping in to the stale environment.
Her breath comes out raggedly and she pulls the letter from her pocket, giving it a firm shake. She hears something, a fine, coarse substance, tumble around inside. “What the hell?” She whispers, dropping it into the sink. “What is this, anthrax?!” She steps away from the sink, and looks at herself. Her cheeks are flushed, hr black hair, frizzy and out of place, and her blue and white uniform consisting of just a jacket, shirt and pants, was sweaty and uncomfortable.
“I almost killed him…”
At that moment, she hear the familiar chime of her phone. Removing the device from her pocket, she finds her boss calling her. Shari stares at the screen for a long moment before finally accepting the call and putting it up to her ear, “Yes, Mr. Malkinson?”
“It appears the Vancouver group was more successful than we ever could have imagined. Open the envelope over a fresh air register on your way out of the building,” her superior instructs coolly.
Shari feels her stomach tie itself into knots at the idea. “Won’t that kill everyone in the building?” She shakes her head, regardless of him not being able to see it, “No, there has to be a better way.”
“There isn’t,” the voice says, “Do it or you won’t wake up tomorrow.” The phone call ends abruptly, leaving a deeply disturbed woman standing alone in the washroom.
Pocketing the letter, she moves toward the door and pauses. Could she do it? She is not sure, and while part of her says it’s for the greater good, another part cannot conscience the brutality and indiscriminate nature of this weapon. She feels her phone vibrate once more and looks down at it, reading a text from Mr. Malkinson: “This is revenge on all those that kept you down, Shari.”
Memories pour in from their unknown reservoir in her mind. Memories of her coworkers shunning her, ignoring her, teasing her. For Shari, high school never ended, but perhaps the bullies could end now. She moves out of the washroom and into the hall.
Once more on the move, she walks with purpose down the halls, uncaring of the group of people she left to die outside the Secretary General’s office. Shari does her utmost to not feel any remorse for what she’s about to do. She moves toward a ventilation duct, one she knows pulls air from here to the upper floors. She tears the envelope open in her pocket and, with no one around, slips it into the vent and hurries out of the nearest exit.
“With this, we can have peace…” She tells herself, but a gnawing part of her knows that she’s done nothing but bring more death.
~*~
What became most apparent was that she was restrained. Now, it is that she can’t see. Her senses are slow to return, groggy and evidently having been unused for some time. She can feel cold air on her body – she’s not fully clothed. Her hands, bound to what she believes are chair legs, trace them, searching for some weakness. There isn’t one.
“You’re awake,” a gruff, hoarse voice sounds somewhere. Footsteps sound on a dirty floor, crunching and skidding on unknown debris. A hand grasps the cloth wrapped around her eyes and lowers it, letting it fall around her neck.
Sasha squints as dim light partially blinds her, but slowly her vision returns and she finds herself in a small windowless room. Through the door she saw a street looking to belong to the deserted streets of Moscow. “Alright, girl,” he begins. She looks over at him, now that he’s stood up, she can see him for a man in his mid-fifties, and although he’s clearly underfed, it appears to have been a recent phenomenon: his arms are strong, he has a thick neck and his legs are by no means skinny. “Nothing personal, but you’ve got a real nice face that’d look great around some cocks. How does that sound?”
“Ah,” she begins coldly, “A pimp that gets his girls through force. How cliché.” She looks up at him, her face impassive, “Just let me go before you get hurt.” Her words hang in the air for a long moment before the man belts out a large laugh, and she takes the moment to survey her surroundings.
Her weapon was too far to grab, but the chair she’s seated in is not bolted to the ground. Despite the fact she’s clad only in her undershirt and uniform pants, she feels a surge of heat through her system as her adrenaline begins to pump. “You’re a funny girl, now open up,” he says, grinning and displaying two rows of browned, fetid teeth. His hands move to his fly and he unzips it, however before he can go any further she’s on her feet, still strapped to the chair.
Crouched over due to the chair, Sasha steps back with her right foot before bringing it around her left, which she pivots. The chair’s legs slam into the man’s thigh, and he curses noisily, collapsing to the ground. Still tied to the remainder of the chair, she falls backward, flinching as she does so, ready for the pain that was to come.
She collapses back on the chair, and, as she expected, the old piece of furniture shatters below her, digging splinters into her back and through her pants. However, now she’s free. The young Russian reserve soldier stands up, only to barely avoid the swipe of a knife going by her face. “You little bitch, all you had to do was shut up and do as you’re told – now you’re going to die!” He cries aloud, “They gave us weapons to get rid of you fuckers, why not get some on the side why I’m at it?”
“Who’s they?” She shouts at him, her tone an angry one, but her movements controlled. She holds her forearms before herself hands extended loosely. As the man spins the knife in his hand and goes to stab her, she lunges forward, catching his forearm with her own, the bone of hers like a blade against his tensed muscle. His hand spasms as bone cracks and he drops the knife.
Sasha does not take any chances: she brings her right arm around and delivers a head-ringing punch to the man’s cranium. He staggers downward, dazed and confused. “You little bitch,” he says again, clutching his fractured arm, “I won’t tell you!” He reaches back with his useful hand and, much to her irritation, grabs her gun. Her firearm, a Chinese QSW-06, is a finicky weapon, but she knows she can’t rely on it jamming to save her.
Cold steel is pressed against her forehead and the man slowly rises to his feet, looking triumphant. Sasha remains calm, “Is it UN infiltrators? Some sort of spy agency arming dissidents?” Her question is not answered, and so she tries again, “So it’s another organisation? Not affiliated with the UN or WC? Interesting.”
“That’s enough out of you!” The man shouts and loads the weapon.
Sasha smirks, “No, that’s enough out of you.” She looks to the entryway and shouts: “NOW!” before diving to the side. The sound of a gunshot echoes in the room as the man fires at where she would have been, though instead merely hits the cement wall behind her. However, he abruptly grunts and clutches his chest over his heart before collapsing to the side, dead.
“You really had to wait until my life was in danger?” She looks to the door, finding a black haired youth only two years her senior walking toward the entrance. “Vadim, you’re an ass,” she critiques him, though he can only laugh, and, after all that had happened, so too can she find no better emotion. She briefly embraces him, “Thanks for coming.”
The man shrugs and goes to collect her things, offering Sasha her boots first. “No problem, but it’s not my fault I arrived when I did. Your brother radioed in the moment the guy knocked you out,” his words are exchanged so matter-of-factly it’s almost comedic, if not for the gravity of the situation that both of them now seem to recognise. “You should be more careful, you’ve got him to take care of, remember?”
“If I die he can always join up early,” she defends stubbornly, but sighs in agreement after a minute, “But you’re right, I know. I can’t leave him responsible for my idiot parents.” She slides on her jacket once more and clips on her utility belt and looks to Vadim, “Well, do I have to go on a date with you now? Isn’t that how it goes in the stories?”
Vadim shakes his head, “No, no, it’s straight up marriage at this point.” He pauses and places his fists on his waist, “So where’s my ring?” His hazel eyes alight with mirth. “What a shitty husband you are, I want a divorce.” She rolls her eyes and shoves past him, ignoring the body on the ground, around which a steadily growing pool of blood existed.
“Keep joking,” she advises sarcastically, “Where’s my brother?” Silence meets her question, and she looks back at Vadim, who busies himself with moving the body into the street for collection. Overhead, the sun had begun to set, and long shadows stretched over the desolate streets.
Vadim moves into the street as well and motions north. “I sent him home,” she goes to interrupt him, but he stops her with a raised hand in protestation, “But in my defence I did it so he didn’t have to be in downtown when the sun set! We didn’t know how long you’d be gone for.” Sasha grumbles, but remains quiet, begrudgingly accepting his logic. “Now, let’s get going. I’ll walk you out of downtown, but you’re on your own for the rest of the way.”
“Fine, do what you want,” she says impassively and begins a brisk pace up the street. In the dark shadows inside the crevices of buildings she could see the movement of transients and drifters, and pretended to pay them no heed. Despite the man’s ineptitude with capturing her, she did not like being caught off guard and was unwilling to let it happen again. “Did you hear? The Trade Minister was killed,” she offers after a long pause.
Her counterpart nods tersely, “Xiao’s dead, yeah. But what does it matter? Just another damned Chink running us into the ground for the sake of their own wealth.” She looks over at him, surprised at the bitterness in his voice. “Valla cracked the firewall and she googled Beijing. It’s a fucking city-sized palace! And here we are, walking the former capital of Russia to make sure the riffraff and drug addicts don’t get too organised,” he scoffs, “It’s bullshit.”
The two continue in silence for a long time, either lost in thought or content to be quiet. Skyscrapers are replaced with shorter buildings, and as they move away from the city centre, Sasha begins to notice signs of life. Vehicles – old but functional – motor past noisily, pedestrians step over cracked sidewalks, warry of the two dressed in the notorious grey military uniform of the reserve forces, who so often acted as the ones to break up fights and the like.
The sun moves ever lower into the sky and eventually the two of them reach an intersection of a relatively busy boulevard and the quiet street upon which they had walked. “Alright, well, I’ll see you tomorrow Sasha, go make sure your parents haven’t sold your brother or something,” Vadim gives her a lazy salute and strolls off.
“Goodnight,” she offers in return and makes her way east on the boulevard toward a row of drab, cream-coloured townhouses. The stucco had discoloured badly below the eaves of the rooves as well as under windows, some of which were boarded up while others were missing any sort of protection whatsoever.
She moves down the street, observing each unit before she reaches one with a familiar blue door. The paint had faded greatly since it had been applied, but it still brought up bittersweet feelings for her. She turned toward it, ascended four steps, and pushed it open, for it was, unsurprisingly, unlocked. “I’m home,” she calls out.
The main floor is dim: dirty curtains are drawn over the bay window to her left and blinds are closed over the windows in the back of the townhouse. To her left is the living area, where a solitary figure stares blankly at an old CRT TV, its picture grainy, while further away, seated at the dining room table, kitty-corner to the entry, another heap of person is slumped over the table. Directly in front of her is a small kitchen in which a much livelier person stands.
This figure has dirty blond hair that hangs loosely over one side of his tanned face, and has a pair of deep blue eyes, now focused upon the task at hand: opening a can with a knife. She moves into the kitchen, absently discarding her utility belt on a nearby chair in the dining area. “Ivan,” she chastises him, though finds no response. Only now does she realise he has had headphones in his ears, and she quickly removes them with a tug of the main cord.
“Son of a –“ he whines, looking up at her, “Oh, you’re back!” His eyes light up with surprise and excitement. He places the knife on the counter and turns toward her, “I’m sorry I didn’t go after you, but I didn’t have any kind of sniper rifle or anything, otherwise I would have totally smoked that asshole. Did Vad help you?”
She pats him on the shoulder and moves around the counter, taking a seat at a breakfast bar set up against the floating island between dining area and kitchen. Reaching over the counter, she takes the knife and the can and deftly slices out a circular hole in the top, almost the size of the can’s circumference. “It’s alright, better you got Vadim than risked your own safety. And don’t worry about me, I’m fine,” she pauses for a moment and looks over at the woman passed out on the table behind her, her dirty yellow hair splayed out before turning her attention to the portly man asleep on a dirty beige couch. “Those two been like this since you got home?”
He frowns at her taking his job away, but does not mention it. “Yeah, there were a few lines set up in front of mom, so I swept them up and tossed them out the window. Dad had a twenty-four pack of beer he stole from Casey’s shop, so I gave it back, sans about five beers he drank.” She sighs, shaking her head. “I’ll just let them sleep. With any luck, they’ll wake up and think they drank and snorted it all.”
“For a sixteen year old kid, you’re not that dumb,” she says wryly, ruffling his hair, to which he retreats with a snarl of irritation and feverishly fixes his long blond locks. Turning in her chair, she looks over at the grainy tube TV. “Wait, what the…” She slowly gets out of her chair, “Ivan, c’mere.”
He too approaches the TV, and both
listen in as the young woman, a news reporter from St. Petersburg, reads out
the headline: “And to recap our top
story: Secretary General Lance Fournier, leader of the United Nations, was
killed earlier today while attending a graduation ceremony in Canada. President
of the UN Security Council, Angela Merkel, has been named acting Secretary
General.” She looks over at her brother, her auburn brows knit in worry.
“In a rare statement, Merkel reached out to Chancellor Zheng in World
Confederation City, west of Beijing, to demand his full cooperation in
discovering the identity of the UN Secretary General’s killer or killers, and
has promised that, quote, “Justice will be done for Fournier.”. Chancellor
Zheng’s office has yet to officially respond, but sources tell us…” Sasha
stops listening and moves back to the kitchen, taking a seat once more.
“This is not good, Ivan. Not good at all.”
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