Michael Bunker - WICK

Uugghhh …! He had to come up for air… What was this freaking place?! He was sitting here, going under water in a freaking Russian prison camp in the Cascades… Or was it the Caucasus… Whatever! He was sitting here before a crowd of people who seemed unfriendly and who spoke Russian and who were in the path of his freaking homestead farm in Ithaca! He thought of the Superstorm and the aftermath. And the Walk. And the Almost Was. And the “What is that!” He was feeling overwhelmed and shell-shocked. He was thinking of the talk with Clive, and the firewall. And His Cheryl’s Face. And the sweet, precious faces of his daughters… His Daughters! His beautiful, artful daughters…

…and then he blacked out.

After a brief moment in which the crowd sat and watched the group of men at the podium bend to the aid of the collapsed man near the podium, life in the crowd began to stir. A man stepped out of the crowd, a woman cleared her throat, two stomps of a foot, a shift of a grocery bag across the floor, conversations about hairdressers and ‘when do we find out what is going on?’ and ‘God when is this going to be over?’, and whispers while children run on the floor and start playing… and all of it is in Russian.

Vladimir spoke again. “Every one of you here knows who this man is.”

The crowd reassembled themselves and fell into silence again. They were taut. At attention. The man at the podium began to speak as Clay slowly, groggily opened his eyes…

“Lev Volkhov is known to everyone in Warwick…”

Spinning . He was going under again. He steadied himself and began to breathe deeply and the spinning slowed and then stopped. The man at the podium was standing, and talking, and his words began to wash over him and Clay calmed himself and listened.

“… unhappily, as some sort of wise sage—an ancient seer and prophet of forgotten times. At one time or another he has taught everyone here, and he is called The Professor by most of you who still cling to him as your honorable teacher and grandfather. But who is Lev Volkhov really? He is a traitor, many times over! In fact, not one person in this gymnasium could tell me positively which side Lev Volkhov is on today. Do you know? Of course you don’t. It has been a long day, and perhaps he has switched sides again since he woke up this morning?

“Volkhov was born in Soviet Russia in 1937 but came to America in December of 1956 after the failed Hungarian Uprising. He came to America in the guise of a Hungarian college student seeking asylum, supposedly having fled the so-called ‘Soviet crackdown.’ But that is not who Lev Volkhov was or is.

“Let’s see if we can unravel it. By his own admission—and we all know this from his own stories in our classes—he was a Soviet spy, and the Hungarian college student cover was designed to infiltrate him into the American society. But wait, it gets better!—”

Clay sat.

And waited.

For any of this… any of it… to get better.

“In 1962 Volkhov was exposed to the Americans as a Russian spy by Golitsyn and other traitors to the Soviet Union. That is the risk, isn’t it Professor?” Vladimir spit on the floor as if to say that the title of Professor was offensive to him. “Isn’t that the risk, that no matter how well you do your job, that some weasel or coward or double is going to get caught and then give you up to your enemy? Isn’t that what has happened to most of our friends and parents and loved ones in Russia? Aren’t many of them dead now for this same reason?”

Vladimir turned back to the crowd.

“Rather than take a free ticket of expulsion back to his homeland, we are informed that Volkhov switched sides! We all know the story because he has told it to us enough times that we know it by heart. He became a traitor to Soviet Union, and began working for the Americans. Eventually, afraid for his life—because he is by nature a dishonorable coward—Volkhov agreed to come here to Warwick and be an instructor, to train other spies to infiltrate and harm his own people. That is how most of you know him. But is that all we know about Lev Volkhov? No! Still No! Some of you know, as do many of us standing here before you, that—according to Lev Volkhov—he never did switch sides! Over the years he recruited many of us to secretly work for the Russians, and to do harm to the American intelligence plans. How can we keep it all straight? Well, to those of us who knew that Volkhov was actually, and had always been, a Soviet spy, we loved him for that and he became to us like a father—even while he was betraying you. He taught us English and how to put away our Russian accents so that we might better serve our Mother Russia. Some of you today, your hearts go out to broken Volkhov because you know him as grandfather and teacher. To you, he was a traitor to Russia and a lover of America, and you loved him for it. To us, he was faithful to Russia, and we loved him for it.

“Let me pause now and clear the air. So many faces! So much switching of sides! What can we believe? Right? But, in reality, it is all very simple. Volkhov was sent to the U.S. as a spy. He was unwittingly exposed by Golitsyn and served his country by allowing himself to be recruited by U.S. intelligence so that he could infiltrate this place for his home country. He has switched sides only once, and that most recently. For all intents and purposes, Volkhov has been a faithful employee and servant of his former Soviet masters… until just over a year ago.”

The gasps started up again in the audience. And Vladimir let it go on for a minute and then he began, again, his speech.

“Just over a year ago, Lev Volkhov informed his superiors here in Warwick, and their handlers in American intelligence, what he has been doing all of these years. That was when he became a traitor. He exposed the names of hundreds of your neighbors, your parents, your friends as double-agents. He gave them everything. The damage wrought by what he has done spirals outward, even now.

“I have spoken long enough. Now it is time for our new leader, our liberator Mikail Mikailivitch to speak to us.”

There was some applause and a lot of general noise, and a smattering of boos, and hisses, and even a few sounds of spitting as Vladimir bowed to Mikail and went to take a seat.

Mikail stood up and looked over the crowd. His eyes were piercing. While the crowd looked on and at one another and wondered whether anyone would tilt at windmills, or hoist themselves, you know, on their own petard, Mikail’s eyes gripped the whole town and everyone began to wait, in absolute silence, for whatever he had to say.

When he spoke, there were no interruptions. There was no applause, and no booing. The gymnasium, as a single entity, embraced the voice of Mikail with utter and soundless attention.

“Comrade Vladimir Nikitich has spoken well. I do not plan to wear out your patience, so I will speak only briefly.

“I am a young man. But I believe that actions speak louder than words.

“I know what you may think, but you are wrong. I do. I believe that actions… speak louder … than words.”

Full Stop.

“I think you all have some idea now as to what is happening. In here, and out there.

“As we gather here tonight, forces beyond your reckoning and your imaginations are gathering together to right many of the wrongs of the world. As you in Warwick now know, all of this part of the country is without power, and the Americans have announced that voting in Tuesday’s elections for the Presidency of America has been delayed in all of the areas affected by both Hurricane Sandy and the blizzard that we have all just suffered.