Everyone Dies in the End #27

Anatol

Captain Anatol Vorishnov was dead. His senior sergeant and leader of the Sagger team, Nikoli Berliavskii, still knew that, but he also knew that if the ambush in Cameron had gone as smoothly as this slaughtering, Anatol might yet be alive. Yet, to be honest, Berliavskii wouldn’t have expected anything less from his men.

After all, their targets were nothing more than civilians. A gang, Berliavskii suspected, boys who saw themselves as tough men bristling with weaponry, but civilians nonetheless. No one is tough when the bullet meets the bone. The Soviet’s RPD slaughtered the motorcyclists, and then almost everyone in the squad had joined in, the cacophony of small arms as deafening as it was deadly. Within minutes they had swept the street clean of the civilians.

Almost.

He sent Arkady and Viktor to the flank of the gangers. The ambush required neither a Sagger anti-tank missile nor small thermonuclear device. So, as the would-be toughs cowered from the withering fire laid down by Berliavskii, Sasha and Mikhail, Arkady and Viktor finished them off.

Almost.

Berliavskii wanted to know about Charlotte. Where were the survivors? Was there any military? Where would the Spetsnaz nuclear device do the most damage and kill the most people? So, Arkady and Viktor had done their job. The result of that doing sat in front of him now, hands and feet tied to a pair of chairs his men had found in the storage room of the electronics store. Mikhail and Arkady watched the street as Sasha walked among the wounded gangers, slitting their throats. Dead men don’t talk and bullets were precious.

Viktor kept his AK74 trained on the two captives. One was skinny, with long, dirty hair, and pimply face. Berliavskii guessed he was no more than 16. He was frightened, very frightened. Berliavskii wasn’t surprised. He and his men were much harder fair than the innocents these men were used to bullying. At least if these men were anything like the gangs that roamed the southern Moscow ghettos, the same ghettos that birthed Berliavskii.  The other captive was a sullen black man, dressed in combat boots, camouflaged pants and a Kevlar vest that showed off his hugely muscled arms. Whereas the skinny boy’s pale skin was nearly covered with blue-inked tattoos, the black man only had one—flaming letters on his left bicep that read “Kill Dog.”

Berliavskii knew both men would talk, but he also knew the black man might just take a little longer, and little longer was something Berliavskii didn’t want to take. Gunfire always attracted more people with guns. He and his men needed to move on and needed to move on quickly.

Berliavskii spoke fluent English, all his team did. He looked at the black man, and the black man glared back at him. “Your name is Kill Dog?”

It was. Of course it was. Kill Dog spit on Berliavskii’s boot. “Fuck you, Commie.”

Berliavskii didn’t laugh, offer a clever reply, or cajole. “That wasn’t the answer I was looking for.” 

Without preamble he pulled his 9mm Makarov PM, placed it to Kill Dog’s temple and pulled the trigger. The head exploded, most of the bone, brains, and blood bursting onto the face of the skinny kid. The skinny kid screamed, and then sobbed and sobbed, and Berliavskii slapped him. “Quiet.”

It only took the one word… that and a casual gesture from the Makarov. The skinny kid quieted, the sobbing replaced by a low, almost involuntary, whimpering.

“Let’s start over, shall we?” The skinny kid nodded, his eyes wide, almost comical.

“Good,” Berliavskii smiled. “Now, what’s your name?”

“B…b…Bill,” the boy stammered.

Berliavskii smiled again, “Ah, Vasillii in our language. Do you mind if I call you Vasillii?”

Bill looked at Berliavskii as if he were crazy. I probably am, thought Berliavskii, at least a little bit. Bill shook his head. “No, no, call me what you want.”

“Good. Let me ask you a question, Vasillii.”