Chapter 56: A Hair-Trigger Situation

TL: LittlePeach

Just as she'd said herself, Yelena looked like a woman of great ambition.

There's pretty much a set way to handle people like her.

If they need money, you give money; if they need information, you give information. Simple give and take.

"I know what you're getting at. If I want a deal, I'd better put something worthy on the table. Right?"

"Sharp, aren't you? That's right. As things stand, the numbers just don't add up."

For my part, I preferred this kind of calculated approach over demands for blind trust or loyalty.

Besides, people like her hated owing anyone anything; once they felt indebted, they'd pay it back later, whatever the cost.

"Fine. Then let me show you a video."

"A video?"

"Take a look. I think you'll find it very interesting."

As it happened, I had a piece of bait tempting enough to whet her appetite.

I handed her Owl No. 5's camera, freshly charged.

Looking puzzled, Yelena took the camera and pressed play herself.

"You don't need to pay much attention to this first part."

Soon, footage began racing across the small screen.

Scenes of the North Korean agent, Viktor, and FSB special forces troops tangling with one another flashed by, until...

"...."

The video ended on its final shot of Viktor plunging into the sea.

"Ha. Fuck."

All the while, Yelena's expression twisted into a jumbled mess.

I watched quietly, but not for long.

"Right... right, of course. I knew something was off. I always wondered how a mere mafia boss got his hands on missile technology like that. The tech belonged to Mikhail all along, and it went through Viktor..."

"...."

"But blowing Viktor's head open because he might drop his name in an interrogation room? Mikhail, that treacherous bastard..."

For all the curses spilling from her mouth, Yelena made no effort to hide her giddy smile.

An expression that, at moments, verged on outright bloodthirsty.

Bulletproof as I am, I'd still really appreciate it if she put down the gun in her hand.

"You know what? From the moment Viktor recruited me, I never doubted for a second that I'd become boss of the Bratva. So honestly, part of me was glad to hear he was dead... I never dreamed Director Mikhail would suddenly plant some idiot over my head and call him boss."

"Mm. I see."

"But this one video flips the whole board."

Yelena gave the camera in her hand a little shake.

"Mikhail is a traitor who shot our boss through the head, and Aleksei, the man that traitor appointed as successor, becomes a fake boss. Now I have every justification to drag them all down and take control of the Bratva."

"And what do you plan to do with the video?"

"I'm going to persuade the Bratva's enforcers, right now. Before they and Aleksei get any cozier, this is realistically the only window to seize the organization."

I nodded in agreement.

Thinking to myself that her capacity for action was every bit as enormous as her ambition.

"Well, good. I'm glad you're satisfied. Anyway, this seals our deal, right?"

"It does."

"Everything from getting me and my friend onto a smuggling boat, to helping with my unofficial defection from the North going forward?"

When I spelled out the terms flat-out, Yelena tilted her head.

A curious smile played at the corners of her mouth.

"Will that be enough for you? What about the NIS agents being held separately?"

"Hard to say. If I wanted help with that too, I don't think that camera footage alone would cover it."

"Heh. Sharp, aren't you? That's right. The numbers don't add up that far."

"Then there's nothing to be done. I'll just have to hope headquarters handles the negotiations properly."

"Hmm."

Truth be told, no solution came to mind for me either, at the moment.

If I stormed the Security Bureau's jail alone, I might only put those five in greater danger.

Yelena smirked, as if she liked my attitude.

"Cold-blooded, aren't you. Well, anyway, the camera's mine now, yes?"

With that, she slyly tucked the camera away inside her coat.

Waggling the pistol in her hand menacingly all the while.

At the sight, I couldn't help adding one more thing.

"In exchange, there's one condition."

"A condition?"

"Take me along when you go to meet those enforcers."

"...Oh, listen to you."

She seemed to catch on immediately to what I was thinking.

Yelena snorted.

"What, you're offering to be my escort? You think I look like a toddler left playing beside a well, is that it? Forget it. I'd rather die than take anyone's help."

Sure enough, I'd figured she'd be the type who hated owing favors.

I shrugged and shook my head.

"I'm not offering to help. I just want to have a look around. Greatest mafia outfit in Vladivostok, isn't that right? I'm curious what a PMC run by people like that looks like."

"Hmm."

She dragged things out, pretending to mull it over, then glanced back at Nikolai, sprawled on the floor.

Under normal circumstances, she'd have made him play bodyguard, but no matter how many times she'd kicked him in the ribs, he'd shown no sign of getting up.

"...Fine. But once we're there, you don't say a single word. Interfere, and I really will kill you."

"Naturally."

Yelena's smile deepened as she put the pistol away.

I gave her a bright smile of my own and nodded.

"In exchange, could you pack me a few grenades before we head out?"

"...What? What do you need grenades for?"

"You do have some, don't you?"

"There are some at the Bratva office, but..."

Yelena's face twisted for a moment, but I just smiled blandly.

"Just in case."

For all Yelena's confidence, there was one thing quietly worrying me.

And as long as she was my friend Nikolai's older sister, I couldn't just sit back and watch it happen.

*****

The southwest side of Bolshoi Kamen.

A single building sat alone on a beach that curved like a bay.

At the building's private dock, a fleet of speedboats stood ready to launch at a moment's notice.

A location from which seasoned combat operatives could deploy to Vladivostok in twenty minutes flat, the moment someone decided to gun the engines.

This was the headquarters of Slavia Security.

"...."

"...."

"...."

Three rough-looking men had gathered in the building's business lounge.

The enforcers who held Slavia Security's actual muscle.

They merely operated behind the legal mask called Slavia Security; at their core, they were the Bratva's elite combat operatives.

Which meant that commanding them was, in effect, the same as being boss of the Ivanskaya Bratva.

"You saw the video, so you understand, don't you? We have to tear Mikhail apart right now and set the Bratva's code straight."

Yelena had shown them the footage in question from beginning to end.

Every frame, right up to the moment Mikhail led Viktor off alone and shot him from behind, blowing his head off.

Which brought them to now.

"Hmm."

"Tsss."

"Tch."

Even after the screen had gone black, the three men kept their mouths shut, holding their silence.

Feeling an unease she couldn't place, Yelena wet her lips before going on.

"Aleksei, the man Mikhail appointed as boss, is no different. Once we've torn those two apart and thrown them to the fish beside Viktor, then naturally I, the next-ranking officer, should lead the Bratva..."

"Yelena."

One of the silent enforcers cut her off.

The man regarded her with steady, narrowed eyes.

"You're right that Mikhail broke the Bratva's code. He betrayed Viktor and put a bullet in the back of his head. He's a traitor who must be hunted down and killed, no question."

The Bratva's code.

Nothing grandiose about it; it goes roughly like this.

Never inform on a comrade.

Never kill a brother without just cause.

Always keep your word.

Break even rules this simple, and depending on the weight of the sin, the offender becomes the Bratva's sworn enemy and a target for vengeance.

Even if that someone is the director of the FSB's Primorsky Regional Security Bureau.

"Right, well said. So let's move, right now..."

"But we cannot be certain Aleksei was part of that betrayal."

"...What?"

Whether Yelena froze mid-sentence or not, another enforcer picked up where the first left off.

"Look at the video. Mikhail pulled the trigger, and Aleksei was nowhere in that scene."

"...So you're telling me you'll accept Aleksei, the man chosen by the traitor Mikhail, as the next boss?"

"Even if Mikhail hadn't chosen Aleksei as successor, by the Bratva's rules we would have had to choose between you and Aleksei anyway."

"...."

"So let it be said here and now. Aleksei should be boss."

Yelena's face hardened.

Seething, she ground her teeth and shot back.

"Why... why the hell? Does that bastard bring in more money than I do? Is he smarter? I'm the one who keeps this organization fed."

"The reason is simple. You're not an ex-convict."

At the man's flat declaration, Yelena's mouth snapped shut.

"You wouldn't know, since Viktor scouted you straight into the organization. To join the Bratva, you're supposed to earn your qualifications first."

"That's right. Only someone who's eaten prison food can give us orders."

"A tall order for you, seeing as you've never gotten a single drop of blood on your hands in your life."

Unlike the ever-confident Yelena, this was exactly what had been quietly worrying me.

An average life expectancy of fifty-eight.

Russian men, who live and die by their pride.

And within Russian mafia society in particular, whether or not you have a criminal record is a serious matter.

A rite of passage, of sorts.

"Even if you killed Aleksei this very moment, you were never fit to be our boss in the first place."

"True. Your little brother, the one they called the Butcher of the Gulf of Aden, would make a far better boss than you."

"That one lives like the law doesn't exist. He must have plenty of blood on his own hands by now."

So at its core, Yelena's claim that she should be the next boss was, to them, nonsense that didn't land at all.

It didn't matter how much money she brought in or how brilliant her mind was.

"...Is that right? Nikolai would be better, would he?"

Your little brother is better than you.

Did an insult that colossal snap the last thread of her reason?

"Fucking hell. Then all I have to do is shoot one of you dead right here, right now, and get that goddamn criminal record inked on me, is that it?"

In a flash!

Yelena, eyes gone completely wild, drew the pistol from behind her back.

But before she could level the muzzle properly at any one of the three...

Cla-clack!

"Put the gun down, Yelena."

The enforcers drew as one, from inside coats, from behind backs, from waistbands, and trained their guns on her.

It happened in an instant.

The composed men who had been politely watching a video were gone; murderous stares converged on Yelena all at once.

"Until now, we've listened and humored you out of regard for our friendship with Nikolai. But the moment you draw a gun, the story changes."

"Go home, and wait for our decision."

"Viktor's revenge will be settled among us, the brothers of the Bratva."

It was a hair-trigger situation, one where a single wrong word from anyone could set the guns off.

I was watching that grisly scene from the back when...

"Ahem."

I sensed that my moment had finally come.

First, a cough to clear the air.

Rummage, rummage.

"Excuse me. Just a moment, everyone."

"...."

"Could you take a quick look at this?"

"...?"

The three enforcers, guns still trained on Yelena, flicked only their eyes toward me.

Right in front of them, I began tossing the objects I'd pulled from my pockets into the air.

Fwip, fwoosh, fwip.

The grenade juggling show of shows.

Three round objects traced smooth arcs between my hands and the air.

"...."

The three enforcers stared at my act, slack-jawed.

Yelena, who'd been glaring daggers at me for daring to step up, went visibly pale, her white face tinged faintly blue.

I kept the juggling going for a good while longer, and then, before long – catch, catch, catch.

"Ta-da."

"...."

"...."

Silence fell over the room.

Never mind that my clown act had left them dumbfounded; either way, the murderous mood seemed to have settled down considerably.

'Good thing I practiced with those RPG warheads last time.'

I was proud of myself.

*****

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