David Nickle - Rasputin's Bastards

“There is enough water,” said Wali Beg. “You will be able to live here comfortably for weeks.”

“Only us?” said Shadak. “You are not staying here then?”

Ahmed shrugged. “I will leave you some men. I must go and see to our brothers.” He pulled loose his cowl then, shaking loose long black curls down to his shoulders, and strode across the cave-floor to the first of the three cubby-holes. “You will find blankets here, and rations of food in tins, as well as lamps and a stove for heat in the night. Here—” he stepped to the next hole — “is ammunition and some small arms. Better to use these than the merchandise.” He stepped out and with a flourish to the next one — with the same little crates. “Here is your water,” he said. “It seems plenty, but that’s all there is. Don’t use too much.”

And then, with the same flamboyant stride, Ahmed crossed the cave to the space in the rock, and vanished into it.

“Well,” said Alexei. “It is us three for now. Others, no doubt, will join us soon. Let’s see what the Mujahedeen have left for us.”

“I would like some water please,” said Ming. “Not too much…” she added with a little grin.

“We brought a woman,” said Alexei. “Into Afghanistan. That’s crazy. What a risk!”

“You are just figuring that out,” said Vladimir. His eyelids fluttered.

“No, I’m not. But I’m just looking at it. Why didn’t we figure something else out? Why didn’t someone else object? Wali Beg, for instance?”

Vladimir closed his eyes and curled his chin into his shoulder.

“Unless,” said Alexei, “none of them had the capacity to object. It is puzzling — wake up!”

Vladimir shook his head and blinked sleepily. “I am listening.”

Alexei was quiet for a moment. He shook his finger in the air, opened and shut his mouth. Looked at the sand at his feet as he thought it through.

“I think I know why I am not in my body — why I cannot know my own thoughts.”

“Tell.”

Alexei took a breath. He felt the excitement of revelation coursing through his blood. “In our own memories, we change history. We delude ourselves half the time anyway. And then as the days and weeks and years pass, we change them. We forget the things we don’t want to have as a part of ourselves, and we edit and amplify those things that bolster us. So any memory, unchecked, is a lie.” He looked at Vladimir expectantly. Vladimir said nothing.

Alexei continued. “I have failed to find truth in memory. So you have taken, somehow, a film of the past — in the manner of tape-recording a drunken man at a party — to show me the true scope of my history. It is true, isn’t it?” Alexei pointed at his younger self — awkwardly stepping over the sand to lift a crate from the bottom tine of the E . He struggled and swore as the older Alexei stood behind him. “Look at him! Thin and weak and lecherous. Stupid enough to go along with a scheme to bring a pretty girl on a KGB operation. This is not how I care to remember myself. An indication that it is true — yes?”

Vladimir grabbed his foot and sucked on the toes. Alexei suspected it was unsanitary, but he didn’t stop him.

“Why don’t you answer me?” he said. “I am coming closer to understanding my history! This is what you wished, is it not?”

Around them, the phantoms of Alexei’s past were busying themselves setting up a camp. Shadak stepped back out with Ahmed, to supervise the camouflaging of the trucks, and study the routes to the sentry points that the guards would use to watch the pass over the coming days. Young Alexei dragged the crate a few steps further, but dropped it in the sand and swore. He turned around and sat on it. And as he did, his face slackened and his eyes went blank.

Ming, meanwhile, stopped what she was doing and walked gracefully into the shaft of light that was coming down through the chimney. She stood straight for a moment, then lifted a hand to the coveralls she wore, and undid the top button. Her eyes were on thin young Alexei but they were focused elsewhere.

Alexei stopped talking. He walked over to himself, and studied his face. It was as a statue. He turned back to Ming. She had removed the top of her coverall and was pulling off the T-shirt underneath. Her small, dark-nippled breasts gleamed in relief from the sun. Her eyes held the same stillness as those of Alexei’s younger self.

“What is this?” he asked.

Vladimir said nothing.

“Is she—”

Ming dropped the top and bent to pull off her boots. She slipped off the rest of the coveralls and stood naked before Alexei.

“Did we—” Alexei blinked. “Did we… make love?” He would, he hoped, have remembered that.

“I don’t think so,” said Vladimir. “If I remember the file — about now — look to there.”

Alexei turned. There were noises in the tunnel.

Wali Beg stepped into the chamber. He too had removed his cowl, to reveal a half-bald head and eyes that on another occasion would have been laughing. Now they were dead as Ming’s.

Ming turned to him. Young Alexei sat perfectly still, his eyelids fluttering. Wali Beg stepped into the light. He extended a hand to touch Ming’s shoulder. Ming did not flinch away. Wali Beg moved his fingers down her collarbone and took hold of a breast in the calloused palm of his hand. Ming pressed herself into it. Young Alexei’s eyes opened to behold the scene.

Alexei sat stunned. He looked to himself — the couple — awkwardly up into the shaft of light through the cave — and finally, back at Vladimir.

“I’m dream-walking them. Aren’t I?” Alexei paced off to the far end of the cave and came back again, hands excitedly grasping one another behind his back. “That is it! Of course! All the times that Kolyokov and the rest told me that I had no talents — that is the lie of my life!” Alexei thought back to the tiny memories he had of his mother and what she used to say: You are a little Koldun — a little lodge wizard . He looked back at the strange couple, clasped in a passionless embrace. “I am dream-walking them! I have been a dream-walker all along! A wicked dream-walker like Fyodor Kolyokov!”

“What a clever man you are,” said Vladimir drolly. “Good thinking. But no. Completely wrong.”

Alexei’s face fell. “No?”

Vladimir shook his head. “You talk too much, Kilodovich. Too much talking is dangerous. You should listen more.”

Alexei opened his mouth. Vladimir made a hushing motion with his little hands. Alexei closed his mouth again and frowned — and listened.

Alexei blinked in astonishment. There were voices. Other voices. Russian voices — which he vaguely recognized.

Stop playing. This is serious business.

What is serious business? This? It is done?

Not done.

Not done?

All.

All but—

All but one.

Soon.

Why?

Remember Rodionov. GeneralRodionovsaidhewouldreturninforceandfinishthisobsceneexperimentwit

hgunsandtechnology“YouarefinishedKolyokovwehaveawartofight”“thenletmefightt hewarwithyou”“onelastchanceonelastchance”

Your problem.

Our problem.

Problem?

Letrodionovdohisworstweshallbebeyondhisreachinthestationinthestationwher-etheseasingsandthedevilcannotreachus

Problem if he discovers our boy here.

Point.

Point.

Agreed.

Pay attention.

Over

By

Shipment —

Who?

Thedeafonetheonethatwillnotmaketheonewiththecontactsinpakistantheonewho-broughtthegirlwelovethegirlthegirltheonewhobroughthimtheonewiththesolidskull-solidskullsolidskull