A. Zander - Moscow City

Kill him Misha. Kill him…

Anya took the steps two at a time as she made her way down into the underpass. Neo-Nazi graffiti was scattered along the walls. Messages of Black arses go home and Russia for the Russians were scrawled next to a clutch of swastikas. Metal shutters covered most of the kiosks, but it was still possible to browse in the few that had glass fronts. She stopped at one, casting her eyes over the watches, all bunched together on a plastic stand. The faces showed it was past midnight. A truck rumbled overhead as she continued walking towards the other side. She moved slowly, glancing in the remaining windows. She got a few metres from the end when a stocky man in a black coat sauntered down the stairs and stood still, facing towards her. She slowed a little and instinctively moved to the side, but he mirrored her movement. They stared at each other for a few seconds before Anya turned to walk back the other way. She waited until she was past the watch shop before she looked back over her shoulder. The man was advancing towards her, whistling slowly as he came further into the underpass. His burly frame suddenly slipped into darkness as the overhead lighting dimmed and he disappeared completely. Some make-up fell out of her bag as she sprinted towards the street, but she didn’t dare to turn and pick it up. She looked over her shoulder again, but all she could see was black. She screamed as a second figure appeared in front of her. He grabbed her arms and pulled her towards him before the other man walked up from behind and slapped a piece of cloth over her mouth. She tried desperately not to breath in, but eventually had to relent and took a deep lungful of the substance soaked into the material. Relaxation washed over her body and she stopped struggling, allowing herself to be carried up to the street. She could feel her cheek rubbing against the fur on one of the men’s coats. There was a voice in her head telling her to keep her eyes open, but it gradually faded, until she couldn’t hear it anymore.

The wheels of the plane touched down on the tarmac. Anya tried to work out in her head all the destinations that were roughly four hours from Moscow. She gauged from the air temperature that they hadn’t flown north, but it wasn’t much. The nausea from the plane ride lingered and she concentrated on breathing steadily to stave off any sickness. She kept silent as she was grabbed under her armpits, dragged off the plane and put into a waiting vehicle. The sound of the plane’s engines disappeared as they raced away. She didn’t struggle as they bundled her back out of the car and into a nearby building. She sucked in the clean air as the bag was ripped off her head. A graze on her chin seeped blood where the material had burnt away a piece of her skin. She tried to thrust her shoulders forward, but the handcuffs kept her back rigid to the chair. The sound of footsteps crept up on her and she saw a dark figure out of the corner of her eye. He sat down without looking up, keeping his eyes on a brown file.

“What do you want with me?” she said, her voice shaking.

Nikolaev ignored her and carried on reading. He finally placed it down in front of him and turned his attention towards her.

“You are Anya Valentinovna Naumova. Twenty five years old. A teacher at the Westminster School of English. Not very long ago, a new employee calling himself Ryan Evans came to live with you. Tell me everything you know about this person.”

“Where am I?” Anya felt a hand clasp her throat from behind and grip hard, cutting off the air supply. After a few seconds, it relented and she spluttered, her chin dropping forward onto her chest.

“I ask the questions,” said Nikolaev. “What do you know about him? The queer told us you were close friends.”

“I hardly knew him,” said Anya, her anger preventing her from crying in front of Nikolaev. “He hasn’t been at the school very long. They asked me to mentor him.”

“Were you fucking him?”

“No!”

“Not even once?”

“No! Not even once.”

Nikolaev smirked and signaled to the guard standing behind her, who took off the handcuffs. “Where is he now?”

“He went to Kazakhstan. I don’t know anything else.”

“Did he ever say anything about working for the British police?”

“No, I swear.”

Nikolaev walked round the table and stood in front of her, looking down. Her head jolted back as he grabbed her cheeks and squeezed, forcing her to look back up at him “Well, he does work for the British police. And that makes me suspicious of you.” Anya’s anger was replaced with fear and a few tears escaped from her eyes. She grabbed his wrist, but couldn’t force him to release his grip. He threw her head back and slapped her round the face.

“You’re going to help us.”

“I’ll never do anything to help you,” she said, the rage leaping back into her eyes.

“I expected as much from someone who spends their day poisoning the minds of young people with a foreign culture.”

He slapped her face again.

“You’re coming with us,” said Nikolaev, as the man in the shadows walked up alongside him. “Put the hood back on.”

Stanley Bay was still. A few punters sat hunched over their drinks at the pub near the water, enjoying the Hong Kong night. Varndon slipped past them towards the jetty. A low hum of voices floated over from Murray House where diners soaked in the building’s colonial splendor over expensive seafood. Ashansky turned towards him as he approached the end of the wooden platform. Gershov was crouched on his haunches, eating tiny sunflower seeds from a bag and spitting the black shells onto the deck.

“You can almost pretend you still have an empire here,” said Ashanksy.

“People in glass houses and all that,” replied Varndon.

“People in what?”

“Nothing.” Varndon kicked one of Gershov’s shells away from his foot. “Alpha’s not happy. What the hell happened with Harper?”

“He jumped in a sewage pipe.”

“Well, why didn’t you throw one of your people in after him?”

“Look, you think I don’t want that piece of shit dead as much as you?”

“I doubt it. He saw me shoot an officer of MI6. Do you know what that could mean for me?”

“We will give you job,” said Gershov, cackling and displaying bits of sunflower seed lodged in his yellowing teeth.

“I’ll get back to you thanks,” said Varndon, looking over his shoulder as a couple strolled onto the jetty. “We should move.”

They followed Varndon onto a path covered by overhanging trees. They wound their way up and back down again, emerging onto an enclosed beach. Gershov hung back on the path as Varndon and Ashansky moved down closer to the water. An oil slick from a dumped engine blackened the sand next to the rocks.

“You need to find him,” said Varndon.

Ashansky stepped forward towards him. “Are you giving me orders now?”

“We put our necks on the line getting you out of jail so you could kill him Leonid. That’s what you wanted wasn’t it?”

“You think I’m stupid? You got me out of there because you knew sooner or later those fucking cops would come asking me questions about Cavendish.”

“The reasons are immaterial. You want Harper and we need Vitsin. We have to work together or everyone loses.”

Ashansky grunted and stepped back. “What do you plan on doing with the Vitsin kid once you get hold of him?”

“That’s our business.”

“That’s right. You people like your secrets.”

“Do the Russians know you’re working with us?”