Gatac
It was New Year's Eve 1979, and Anne was on the job. The job being to py tag with Alexander Arkadyevich Ignatyev, whose principal advantages in this contest were his slippery-small physical stature, utter disregard for his own safety, and Anne's disinterest in actually catching her charge — not when he was still reduced to giggling fits at her vaudevillian show of trying to catch him, stomping after him like a punch-drunk bear and making the sounds to match while five-year old Shura ran up and down the mansion's ground floor hallway. The only thing that mattered was keeping Alexander ughing.
“Rarrrrrgh!” Anne growled, miming a bear pawing at the air as she waddled forward. “Big bear eats Shura!”“I am rabbit!” Alexander squealed, darting from the kitchen door frame to the dining room door frame.
There, he tried to tuck into the frame to hide, and Anne made another show of not seeing him; she stopped pawing and walking, and instead turned her head and drew air through her crooked nose as a sniff. Alexander peeked out from behind the frame, and Anne pretended not to see it until he was putting almost his whole head in the open. For a second, an unspoken compact of continued py seemed to pass between them, and the grin on Alexander's face grew wide.
“Raaaaaaaaaaaargh!” Anne growled, even louder than before, and quickly stomped toward Alexander, who darted past her with a drawn-out squeal. Again, Anne pyed the confused predator, before loudly stomping in pce and turning around, hands raised again. She would have resumed her pursuit of Alexander, if there hadn't been the sound of a key turning in the front door. In an instant, the big bear was gone and Anne stood in its pce, quickly righting her blouse with a tug at the bottom.
The door opened and the ritual pyed out. Arkady walked in, followed by Viktor, and while Viktor took Arkady's coat and hung it up on the coat rack, Arkady took Alexander into his arms and lifted his son off the ground for an embrace. Except this wasn't the usual deal. Viktor wasn't taking off his coat, wasn't heading to the kitchen to prepare dinner, wasn't doing anything but standing around.
Anne hesitated, but figured pying her part might bring about the missing normalcy. She walked forward, hands behind her back, and came to a halt a few paces away from Arkady. “Good evening, boss,” she said.“Hello, Anne,” Arkady said. “How was Shura?”1Look, I know I ride the ‘Thieves don’t ask questions’ horse pretty hard throughout the story, but you can’t tell me a father in the privacy of his home won’t forget about that rule pretty fast.“A good boy, boss,” Anne said. She usually left it at that, but that night Arkady kept looking at her, and so she kept talking. “He counted to thirty today.”“Very good!” Arkady said, more to Anne than Alexander; the boy was smiling being carried in his father's arms, but still looked to his 'big sister', and the expression he saw on her face — made him stop smiling.“ — should I set the table?” Anne asked, feeling like her first day at work all over again.“No, no,” Arkady said, ruffling Alexander's hair and bringing his smile back in an instant. “Tonight, I do everything for my Shura.”
And before Anne could digest the news, Arkady walked away.
“Get dressed,” Viktor said. “It's time you met someone important.”
Anne had gotten dressed, which didn't mean very much because she had no earthly idea what to get dressed for, other than 'meeting someone important', and Viktor was in no hurry to provide more details. She had slipped into dark brown leather shoes Arkady had once picked out for her when they went shopping, and the bzer she wore over her blouse was one of his choices, too. Still, she said nothing when they walked down the driveway, nothing when they got into the car, nothing when Viktor drove them off the estate and onto the highway, heading west on the 25A toward the city. Minutes went by before Viktor momentarily took his eyes off the darkness ahead and gnced at Anne in the passenger seat.
“You may have heard us talk of ‘Grandpa’, on occasion,” Viktor began. “That was impolite of us. You will call him Mr. Dolzhikov always.”“Ponyal,” Anne said. “Why are we seeing Mr. Dolzhikov?”“Arkady wants you measured for a suit,” Viktor said.
That was all that needed to be said.
By the time Viktor parked the car on a half-empty lot, Anne’s attempts to stay calm had all but completely fallen apart. The lessons from Viktor in the Law, conversational Russian and knife fighting did nothing to steady her knees when she climbed out of the car. She sucked greedily on the evening air, and for a moment she considered deying what came next by asking Viktor questions about it, but she was already supposed to know all the answers. Four years. Four years working for a Thief without ever being in the same room with the man to whom even Arkady bent his knee; she had barely even seen a photograph of the man Arkady called Dyedushka.
“Come,” Viktor said, and Anne fell in line behind him.
She had already annoyed him by having him speak up at all, and he was not the type to repeat himself. Walking behind Viktor, whose bulky frame provided some shelter from the evening chill, she went down a street where every house seemed to have a shop in the ground floor, some with sedate painted signs in Russian, a select few with gaudy neon, all of them saying they were not for her.
Grandpa's tailor shop was so cssy it didn't even have a sign. The mannequins in the window showing off fine three-piece suits were advertisement enough. Well, strike that: one sign, a flip-over reading “Sorry! We're closed” through a small window on the front door. It was one of those signs that mimicked hand-written words, in the bold script of an sign painter, but Anne knew it was a cheap dolr-store pstic thing, which told her everything she needed to know about the legitimacy of this shop. And she noted two more things: one, the lights were still on inside despite the shop being closed, and two, there were no opening hours posted anywhere in sight. Anne turned around while Viktor knocked on the door, scanning the empty street and the dark windows looming above, imagining a sniper behind each unlit piece of gss.
The door to the tailor shop opened, so smoothly that her first clue to it was the warm air from inside drifting against the back of her neck. Anne turned once more to face it and followed in Viktor’s footsteps, which led through the door and past the dispy mannequins to the back part of the store, where wooden shelves and a wooden counter provided a bright contrast to the wooden wall panels and the wooden door marked ‘Private’. It all reminded her of Mr. Tiptree’s store, except Mr. Tiptree did not have a Russian man in a suit sitting on a stool in the far corner. He stared at her, bent forward on the stool with his elbows on his thighs and ink peeking out between his full rust-colored beard and the open colr of his white shirt. Anne did her best not to stare back, but even looking at the ground seemed liable to be taken as a statement.
“Zdraste, Kazik,” Viktor said to the man. “I’m here to introduce our new soldier, Simmons.” Viktor looked over his shoulder. “Simmons, this is Kasimir, Mr. Dolzhikov’s bull.”2Bodyguard.“Good evening, Sir,” Anne said, bowing her head.Kasimir nodded. “He’s waiting for you.”
Before long, they were at the door to the back of the store. Viktor knocked on that, too. His arm stayed raised, as if even he wasn’t entirely sure where to put it. Somebody called “Come in!” through the door and things resumed in the way Viktor had clearly hoped for. The back room was, in intent, built to the same decor as the front, if slightly rger, but it squandered that floorspace with walls positively smothered in racks and shelves, dozens of stacks of fabrics, pstic-bagged jackets and vests, a sewing machine obviously built to double as anti-aircraft artillery in case of a Nazi air raid, a trio of tastefully baroque silver mirrors around a little pedestal, and another man in a suit. He looked to be about sixty, with fingers like withered branches of a particurly gnarly oak tree and patches of hair one might have mistaken for the st few leaves of that same tree; the ancient three-piece suit with its thigh-length jacket and broadly padded shoulders completed the image of Boris ‘Grandpa’ Dolzhikov.
“Viktor,” Boris said. There was a rasp to his voice and a lethargy in his expression Anne couldn’t pce, but Viktor quickly bowed his head, and therefore so did she.“Good evening, Mr. Dolzhikov,” Viktor said. “Arkady Arsenovich conveys his greetings.”“He can convey them himself next time,” Boris said. Anne kept her head bowed, but felt his eyes on her. “So this is the bck girl he wants measured.”“Arkady Arsenovich regrets the inconvenience, Mr. Dolzhikov,” Viktor said.“Yes, yes,” Boris said. “You, girl. Step up.”
Anne stepped closer to Boris, head still bowed.
“Zdravstvuyte, gaspadin Dolzhikov,” she began. “Menya savut Mary-Anne Simmons ee —”“Jacket,” Boris said.Before Anne quite comprehended, Viktor seized her bzer by the colr. Anne let her arms go limp as Viktor pulled the jacket off her.“Hands,” Boris added.Anne raised her arms and held out her hands for inspection.“Eyes,” Boris concluded.After a moment’s hesitation, Anne looked directly at him.“Tell me about your suit,” Boris said to her, point bnk.“— I am not sure I understand what you want, Mr. Dolzhikov,” Anne managed to say.“Then perhaps my English is not up to the task,” Boris said. “It interests me to hear the style of suit you want to wear.”“I trust your judgment in this, Mr. Dolzhikov,” Anne said. It felt like what Viktor would say, given the question, but Boris didn’t seem to care for the answer.“I cannot measure a girl who stands crooked,” he said. “Straighten up or I will sew a skirt on you.”
Anne lost the staring contest. She turned to look at Viktor, who made no move to help her. Like so many things since she had come to the city, this felt like an ambush, and the act of thinking about it like that was enough to steel her. She raised her right arm and pointed straight at a dark gray jacket on one of the racks around her. Keeping the arm out, she turned her head back to Boris.
So he wanted an answer spoken with conviction? Fine.
“I would like that one, Mr. Dolzhikov,” Anne said.“Go,” Boris said. “Get it.”
Anne went and retrieved the jacket. She was only mildly surprised when she turned around, Viktor held a leather shoulder holster out to her — with Dad’s Colt inside.
“Put it on,” Boris said.
Anne handed the jacket off to Viktor. She reached out for the holster and pulled it over her shoulders; a tight fit, but a fit nonetheless. Viktor helped her into the jacket, and unbidden, Anne stepped onto the pedestal to inspect her reflection in the mirrors. The jacket was too wide, even with the holster underneath, the sleeves too short, and the shoulders rode up when she raised an arm — but that didn’t matter. Anne saw herself in the jacket, and that was like seeing herself in the suit, shirt and pants and all, and she liked that.
“Medium wool, single-breasted, three buttons,” Boris told her. “Very pin.”“I like it,” Anne said. She turned to look at Boris. “I think. It’s a little wide, but I can take it in.”“My dear girl,” Boris said, showing the first hint of a genuine smile, “you speak to a tailor. Do not concern yourself with the size or the fit, these are for me to adjust. We are talking about style.”“Do you think it looks good, Mr. Dolzhikov?” Anne asked.“Anything can look good, if correctly executed,” Boris said. “What matters is how you wish to be perceived. Elegant, professional, practical —”Anne didn’t need to consider. “Practical,” she said.“You wear this open, for access to your weapon, and I shorten the sides so it looks right that way,” Boris said. “High arms, no padded shoulder, so you can punch. No vest, no tie, a fighter must breathe. And a good shirt, standing colr, less material for your opponents to grab on to. I will match the pants to the jacket, of course. It also interests me to hear if you fight with kicks.”“Not usually,” Anne said.“A belt, then, for your tools,” Boris said. “And for those times when you do need to kick, you should take care to wear dress shoes with steel toe. There is no wiser investment, girl, than a good pair of shoes. You need not search long for them. Simply find your way to Lana Yanovna’s shop. Ask her for foreman’s shoes.”“I will,” Anne said. “Thank you, Mr. Dolzhikov.”“Make me look good and I will do the same,” Boris said. “Viktor knows the price of this suit. You will work for it tonight.”
Anne said nothing to that.
“Another thing,” Boris said. “When you appear before the council to report your success, you will look the part.” She started to turn to him, but froze in pce when she felt him grab her hair and yank her head by it. He didn’t move to tear it out but made clear he could. “Straighten it or cut it off,” he said. He shoved her head away and let go. “When you put one of my suits on, you represent the Thieves. And we are not one of your street gangs. Learn this.”“…yes, Mr. Dolzhikov,” Anne said.“Good,” Boris said. “Now take off your clothes so I can measure you.”
Boris let go of her head and turned to gather up his measuring tape. That gave her a chance to turn her head and cast a pleading look at Viktor, but all she got in return was indifference.
Numb.
Anne knew a lot of words, but none better than this for what it was like, half an hour ter, to be sitting in the car with Viktor, driving into the night again. So she had met Boris Dolzhikov, Dyedushka, the kindly old ‘Grandpa’ to whom the little pack of Thieves in South Brooklyn all owed fealty. And he had measured her for a suit. None of it meant anything anymore, if it ever had.
He had touched her hair.
Truthfully, he wasn’t the first to have done so. Alexander had done it more than once, from curiosity, and she had let him. His bright eyes and bright ughter and bright teeth were the picture of a boy who lived in a world without No, as much as could be practically arranged, and Anne was in no position to teach him. Nights like this just proved that for all she had done for the Ignatyev family, she was hardly a part of it. She could stand Alexander touching her hair, if that had been the worst of it, but of course Arkady had reached for it, too, ughing to his son about how strange it felt, and she had let him, too, not wishing to act too prideful toward the man who had picked her off the street and given her almost everything she owned. But Grandpa — he had seemed just a degree or two away from ripping it right off her head. For all of Alexander’s questions and Arkady’s weird gnces, Anne had been at peace with who she was for those st four years. Right there, she wasn’t, nor was she entirely sure if she would be again.
Her mind turned on the matter of the price.
“You are thinking of withdrawing, maybe,” Viktor said, apropos of nothing. He stuck to English, as if to comfort her. “It is natural that the soul aches when the mind tries to kill. Tell me right now and I will handle things with Mr. Dolzhikov. There is no shame in honesty.”Anne closed her eyes, tried to drown out the noise in her head with the noise around her. “I closed that door when I went on this ride with you,” she said. She still sounded confident and leaned into it. “You could have stood to tell me more about how this would work but I am under no illusions about what I signed up for. And what difference does it make to the target? I could no more save his life than I could part the sea. If he has made an enemy of Mr. Dolzhikov, his end is fixed, as is the sin of it, and the only decent thing for me to do is to arrange a straightforward, compassionate kill.”“You sound very sure of this,” Viktor said.“And I would appreciate it if you could spare us both the attempts to dissuade me,” Anne said, reopening her eyes. The tiny horizon of the car’s headlights was filled with the same old asphalt she had gotten used to those past few years. Still the same city.“I do not mean to dissuade, but to point out you have already made a mistake,” Viktor said. “You assume the target is a man.”
Anne blushed. Viktor was right. She had assumed that and more. She had made it too easy on herself, imagined someone very much like Boris Dolzhikov, a gnarled tree equally old and rotten and liable to fall in the next storm. Those were zy thoughts she couldn’t afford if she wanted to get through this.
“Who is the target?” Anne asked.“She is called Sacha Nowack,” Viktor said.“And what has she done?” Anne asked.Viktor stayed silent for a moment. “You assume, again,” he said. “You assume she has done something that requires a punishment. You are not to judge. Good reason, bad reason or no reason, it must make no difference to you.”“I don’t imagine it will be a righteous act, if that is your implication,” Anne said. “What I assume is Mr. Dolzhikov is not given to waste, or random acts of violence that gain him nothing. How does he stand to profit from Sacha Nowack’s death?”Viktor didn’t answer.“Do you not know or is it not my pce to know?” Anne said.“I am not certain whether to be proud of your coolness,” Viktor said. “You chill me, Simmons.”“I ‘chill’ you?” Anne asked. “What did you expect from me?”“More hesitation than this, at your age,” Viktor said. “We are driving to murder and your interest is only in politics. When I started this life —”“Now who is making assumptions?” Anne asked, cutting him off. “I agreed to the task and I stand by my word, that is all there is to it. This hand-wringing wastes both our time. Answer my questions or don’t.”“…she shot one boy of Fyodor Petrovin for his drugs and money st week,” Viktor said. “Dolr could not save him.”“I see,” Anne said.“It is not eye for eye, understand this,” Viktor said. “Boy lives, boy dies, is not important. What is important is theft. If she lives, it is bck mark on Mr. Dolzhikov’s — what is word, repuhtadsui.”“Reputation,” Anne said.Viktor groaned over missing the obvious transtion.3Learning nguages is the same as most other projects: the first 90% take up 90% of the time, the st 10% take up the other 90% of the time. “And it is less respect for all of us,” he said. “We must make example of Sacha that nobody steals from a Thief.”“An example,” Anne said. “I suppose you don’t mean dangling her from a tree or a mppost.”“Your mind goes to such a terrible pce,” Viktor said.“Actually, the first thing I thought of was crucifying her,” Anne said, “but that would offend all of us, wouldn’t it?”“Speak pinly,” Viktor said.“A room with three Thieves contains five churches and more crosses besides,” Anne said. “I should hope none of you would condone debasing the sacrifice of our Savior. ”Viktor harrumphed. “You dislike that criminals fear God, too,” he said.“If only we truly did,” Anne said. “A good Christian would not send me to do unspeakable things to that woman for the sake of their reputation.”“The price for your suit is her death, nothing more,” Viktor said.“And overlooking whatever he has pnned for her dead body,” Anne added. “Unless his understanding of an example is a decent funeral.”“You think too much of these things,” Viktor said. “Just kill her, he will do rest.”
Anne said nothing more. She was too busy thinking about her mother.
Anne had rarely had occasion to venture into the safehouse’s basement. Most of the time it was exactly what it should be, a home to the machinery that provided the hotel with its meager comforts and a pce to store the tools and supplies not needed upstairs. Past the utility rooms, though, was a door of good steel, fitted with a lock Anne doubted she’d ever be taught how to pick. The hallway leading to the door was speckled with small drops of blood, dried but still tacky. Finding such in the woods would be evidence her prey was merely grazed, still nimble enough to slip her grasp. A wound struck true would’ve bled far more and left a denser trail, even at the speeds a panicked animal would race away from its certain death. Viktor said nothing as he unlocked the door and pulled it open. She said nothing as she stepped into the room beyond.
The door closed behind her, leaving Anne and Sacha alone in the basement room. Sacha was curled into a corner of the cot; the blood on her sleeves was dry, but only just, and her face still freshly bruised around the cuts. Forced to guess, Anne thought Viktor had brought Sacha here just before driving home with Arkady and fetching her. It all reminded Anne of the first time her father had left her alone with a grounded whitetail and the Colt. Hardly a test of her ability to pick up the trail, run down the target and quietly dispose of them. This required no more art than drawing her gun, shooting Sacha Nowack a few times and walking out. What it did require, however, was a finger strong enough to pull the trigger, and Anne supposed that, after two years of training4If you were about to raise your finger and say “nuh-uh, you just said earlier she’s been there four years”, please note that Anne spent the first two years in service to the Ignatyevs focused on Alexander and getting her own life in order before Viktor trusted her enough to start training her.No, we’re not having a fshback to that, at least not in this story., this was the only aspect still in honest doubt.
Anne stood thinking about this for more than a moment, and so Sacha looked up at her. Anne pegged her pink, round face at maybe 22 or 23, and her clothes were — actually, her clothes looked just fine, almost new, caked blood aside. Anne wondered how her kind of woman had gotten into this kind of a situation.“Hello, Miss Nowack,” Anne heard herself say. “My name is Simmons. I do not wish to frighten you, but I see no reason to encourage any confusion about my motives. I have been sent here to kill you.” She sounded very sure of it, but Sacha kept staring, so Anne switched to Russian. “I am called Simmons, and —”“Stop,” Sacha said, sounding just like a Josie or Henrietta or Susan, not like Anne had expected. “Please…don’t talk.”“I thought it would be decent,” Anne said. “To let you know why I am here.”“Not,” Sacha muttered.“…I did not catch that,” Anne said, taking it as her cue to step farther into the room. Closer to Sacha Nowack and her death.“It’s not!” Sacha hissed, turning away again. “What…why would you…”“I thought you might have something to say,” Anne said.“Screw you,” Sacha said, though it seemed to hurt her far more than it did Anne. “Just...get it over with.”“I would prefer we do this another way,” Anne said. “Will you listen to me for a minute or are you in such a big hurry to die?”Sacha turned to face her again. “Screw you,” she repeated, sounding if anything even less sure of it now. “You caught me. You got me here. What more do you…do you want me to beg?” Her voice had run out of venom. “…just…tell me what you want me to do. Anything…I’ll do anything.”
Anne reached under her bzer and felt for Dad’s Colt. Unsnapped the leather strap. Wrapped her hands around the grip and pulled it free.
“Would you kill?” she asked, holding the gun at her side.
Sacha stared at her.
“Some people in your position would,” Anne said. ”To them, there is nothing worse than death, and so they have nothing to lose.” Anne sighed. “But I think we both know better.” She holstered the gun again. “You are afraid, but it is not death that scares you most. You are afraid that the thing most precious is what you already lost when you killed someone. And on the chance it is not so, you are certain you would lose it if you chose violence now. You would rather surrender your life to me than touch a weapon again. Am I close?”
Sacha stared at her.
Anne sighed. “What was it like, for you?”“What do you mean?” Sacha said.“The way you killed him,” Anne said. “I don’t mean to pry, just…well, I thought it might help to unburden yourself.”“What’s it to you?” Sacha said. “Unburden myself? Who made you my priest? And what do you know about what I did and why I did it, huh? You’re just their little wind-up toy.” She took a deep breath, seemed to think about it all some more. “I just shot him, okay?” she barked. “He moved and I told him not to move and then I just, I…”
Neither of them said anything for a few seconds.
“I didn’t see what happened after that,” Sacha said. It was pin she didn’t want to keep talking, but needed to do so all the same. “I ran. I ran until I thought I’d gotten away with it. But they caught me today and told me I killed him, and ever since I’ve been here, just — God, I didn’t see it.”“Seeing it doesn’t make it easier,” Anne said.
Sacha stared at her.
“Well, it didn’t, for me,” Anne said. “There is a moment. It is not as if there is a light going out in their eyes or anything like that. Not that I could make out, anyway. But you see them slump, in a way you know people aren’t supposed to. They slump and then they are still. No twitching, no breathing. You realize their life has ended for good at your hands. No, seeing it doesn’t make it any easier at all.”“…we’re not talking about this,” Sacha said. “We’re not…” The tears broke through. “We’re not talking!”
Anne nodded. With her free hand, she reached under her coat, producing a tissue. She stepped closer to Sacha, holding it out.
“…damn you,” Sacha croaked. “All of you.”“I did not mean to burden you further, Miss Nowack,” Anne said. “If you would please…please just close your eyes. I will see to the…rest.”“You don’t get it,” Sacha said. “You don’t…you don’t know. You don’t know anything.”“I don’t,” Anne admitted. “I am sorry, Miss Nowack.”Sacha chuckled. “You know what’s funny?” she said. “I’ve got…nothing. Literally nothing. I’ve been here a while, you know, kept busy thinking what I’ll shout at that tattooed guy when he comes to shoot me, you know, really piss him off. I wanted to die ughing at him, not…not afraid. Not like this. And then you come in and…and you’re just so calm.” She chuckled again. “That was his pn all along, huh?” She looked up. “You think I had this coming, don’t you?”“There is a difference,” Anne said, “between the inevitable and the deserved. I think sometimes, we tell ourselves we came by our misfortunes honestly. If we are to bme, we are in control. Then maybe, there is a reason we can understand, some inexorable logic that draws a straight line from whatever it is we did to whatever found us at the end of the road. I know the things I don’t understand scare me the most.” She sighed. “But being scared makes this easier for me, actually. There’s a…there is a crity in fear. I am sorry, Miss Nowack. I am rambling.”“…it’s okay,” Sacha said. She looked up. “You really want to hear about how I feel?”“I do,” Anne said.
Sacha thought.
“So, I had this dream, this…” Sacha said. “Walking through the whole day until I shoot him, just…until I shoot him. And I can’t change anything. Nothing changes. I…it was like I couldn’t even try. Everything was like in a movie. You can shout at the screen all you want but it’ll never listen to you. And it’s been like that the whole time, like…it’s all running and I can’t stop myself, can’t do anything. That’s how I feel. Like I don’t even know how this could have been any other way, like I can’t…I just can’t wake up.”“I see,” Anne said. “I think I have had those dreams as well.”“How many?” Sacha said. “People, I mean. Not dreams, you…well, you’ve done this before.”“Two,” Anne said.“Two?” Sacha asked.“…yes,” Anne said.“I don’t know why I asked,” Sacha said. “Two. That’s…I wasn’t expecting that. I thought it’d have to be a dozen or so, you know, where…where it’s what you do. Not just two. You sound like you’re more…experienced than that. You know?”“So I have been told,” Anne said. “The dreams did not begin right away for me. At first I thought I wouldn’t feel anything at all. But it simply took a while to get going. Nothing so coherent I would call it guilt or despair, but it stirred feelings inside me that just wouldn’t settle down again. So now I am quite careful with how I arrange my days, I avoid agitation and light and noise for at least an hour before bed. Prayer and reflection, every day, to bed by 10 PM. No exceptions.” Anne breathed out. “I don’t dream much anymore.”“But still you’re here, to kill me,” Sacha said, quieter than before. “And you don’t seem to have a problem with that.”“I have plenty of problems with it,” Anne said. “But making a big production of those problems with the Thieves won’t help your situation. I don’t know what would, if anything.”“So…”“What it comes down to is I am here to kill you,” Anne said. “I realize it might not seem like you have much of a choice — me or them — but I would rather you get to make it anyway. Do you think you can?”
Sacha nodded. In about five minutes, she’d gone from hiding herself to looking like she was about to fall into Anne’s arms. It was too easy and above all it wasn’t fair. No matter how often Anne told herself it wasn’t supposed to be fair, it took her too long to find her words again.
“How do you want to do this?” Anne asked.
It took half an hour to properly calm Sacha, half a minute of watching her breathe with her eyes closed to shoot her above the ear, and what felt like half a second for Viktor to come running into the room even while the remains of Sacha’s head were still settling against the bricks. Anne didn’t turn to face him. Instead, she calmly clicked on the safety of Dad’s Colt, holstered it and pulled out the ear plugs. A second pair of ear plugs was in Sacha’s ears. She hadn’t felt a thing, or so Anne hoped.
“You are alright!” Viktor said, audibly breathing from his quick entrance. “You take very long time.”“She wasn’t ready,” Anne said and looked down at Sacha’s body. “And I suppose I wasn’t either, not quite.”“Come!” Viktor said, taking her by the shoulder and trying to turn her away from the carnage. “It is done —”“Not yet it isn’t,” Anne said, standing her ground. “I need to see this through.”“You do not need to torture yourself,” Viktor said, but Anne didn’t turn to him. “They teach me to do it quick, for first time. Have a drink before, for courage. Do not wait. Do it before you think yourself out of it.”“And how did that work out?” Anne asked, still looking at Sacha. Sacha’s face was still the same, but it no longer looked like her, or anyone else for that matter. It was just profane meat and bone. No more miracle.“I killed him,” Viktor said. “Walk in, shoot until gun was empty, walk out.” He paused. “Mr. Dolzhikov does not need to hear of your hesitation.”“I don’t care what you tell him,” Anne said. She looked at Viktor. “He wanted a body, I delivered one.”“If that is how you see it,” Viktor said. “Mikhail will clean and I will prepare her for transport. You can wait outside, maybe calm your nerves and get some sleep. You have done your part.”“No, I will help,” Anne said. “And I will be there when you hand her over.”“You do not have to do this, either,” Viktor said.Anne gnced back at Sacha. “I do,” she said. “She made a mistake. So I made a promise.”
Anne stayed with Sacha on the way to the tailor’s shop, praying all the while for her soul to now find rest. Anne had taken her fear away, sweetened her st moments on Earth with a calm voice and words from the Book that Anne held in her heart always. What a beautiful way it had been to conduct this monstrous ceremony. While Sacha’s body was taken away on arrival, Viktor and she went back into that stuffy little backroom, to collect their dues. All was as she had left it, except for herself.
“Mr. Dolzhikov,” Viktor said, meeting the old man’s expectant eyes. “What you have asked has been done.”
Anne couldn’t see what was going on in the backyard, but she didn’t need to. The image of two of Petrovin’s men wrangling Sacha’s corpse from the trunk of the car, still taped up and double-bagged in bck pstic, came to her with unforgiving crity and her hand clenched to a fist unbidden when she saw the slightest smile on Boris’s face. Had Arkady smiled the same way when she killed Da — the panhandler? Boris looked at her, smile still on, and in her heart Anne already knew insisting on coming along had been unwise. Yet she felt that, unwise as it was, it was necessary all the same, and the thought buoyed her.
“Tell me, girl,” he said, “how the price was paid.”“Sacha Nowack died quietly,” Anne said, and when the smile left Boris’s face she couldn’t keep herself from saying more. “I expined to her her time had come, and all that was left for her was to either deny or accept it. She chose to y down her life without further struggle. We prayed for her soul and, when she was ready, I ended her decently.”“Your only task was to kill her,” Boris said. “Nobody asked you to make friends with her.”“I did no such thing,” Anne said. “I simply saw no call for cruelty. Would you rather she have suffered?”
Viktor said nothing. Boris said nothing.
“Was my conduct not in accordance with the nature of your request, Mr. Dolzhikov?” Anne asked.
Viktor said nothing. Boris chuckled.
“Quite,” Boris said. “I wanted the little rat to twist in fear and pain.” She winced and he smiled. “But it is alright. I maybe should have specified. My mistake.” He ughed, and Anne tried to smile, but nobody else ughed and so Anne didn’t end up smiling at all. “Your mistake is an assumption,” Boris said between chuckles, loud enough to freeze her in pce. “You assume, in your arrogance, that your way was better. You assume you can show this to me on your face and in your words and not be reprimanded. I will not have someone work for me who thinks they know better than me.” Whatever was left of ughter in his voice died. He stared at her. “Now apologize, girl.”
Anne gnced at Viktor for a clue — for anything to tell her what to do — but got nothing. She went with the safe thing and slowly bowed her head.
“I am sorry, Mr. Dolzhikov,” Anne said.“As our soldier, you must act how I wish you to do,” Boris said. “If you do not know the way, you learn from your betters before you make a fool out of me and yourself. You have learned this now, I hope.”“I have,” Anne said, “and I will make sure to follow your wishes in the future.”Boris sneered. “Orders,” he said.“Orders, of course,” Anne said. “I…did not think of the right word. But I understand.”“Excellent,” Boris said. “I forgive you, Simmons.”“Thank you, Mr. Dolzhikov,” Anne said, bowing her head deeper. She tried to keep her hand from twitching as she did so. How the devil shouted at her to sh out…Boris nodded and turned to Viktor. “Perhaps the two of us can help this girl remember the lesson.”“If you deem it necessary,” Viktor said. His eyes met Anne’s. “But the failure is mine. I did not teach her well. It would be correct for me to be reminded in her stead.”“…um,” Anne managed. Kasimir turned and left the room. How she knew he would soon return with a weapon, she couldn’t say, but she knew, so she turned to Boris. “Wait, I am…I did apologize, Mr. Dolzhikov,” she said. “Again, I am sorry. I…I spoke out of turn. I acted arrogantly. I disrespected your orders and I am very sorry for my failure.” She bowed her head again. “Please. Whatever you are about to do —”“I know Viktor did not teach you to grovel,” Boris said. “Pay attention to his example. He will help you remember how Thieves and their soldiers conduct themselves.”“Wait,” Anne said, and he eyes flicked to the left when Kasimir reentered the room with a baseball bat, then to Viktor. Viktor pulled two chairs together opposite one another, sat on one and put his outstretched right leg on the other. “Wait, please, Mr. Dolzhikov,” Anne begged. Her weapon hand twitched again as she read the room. Seven bullets, two men — maybe Viktor, too. Wasn’t she trying to save him? Would he want it? No, if she set it off, it would be for her and her alone, and she would have to face him, too. Seven for three. The devil told her it could be done, so should she do it or stay her hand? She wanted neither, yet nothing else came to mind.“Anne,” Viktor said, drawing her back into the moment as he rolled up the leg of his pants to expose his shin. “I must ask that you watch this.”
Kill them, the devil told Anne. Just kill them, Kasimir first, Viktor if he makes a move, finally Boris — no, use him as a shield, he’s an old man, grab his wrist and lock his joint —
“Such anger on your face even as you make apologies,” Boris said. “It does not suit you. It does not suit a Thief or his soldiers to be ruled by feelings. You will come to a bad end if you do not overcome them.” He walked up to her and cpped her on the shoulder, spinning her around to look at Viktor. “But it is good you can pull a trigger! Your skill in this will be very useful to us.”
She looked at Boris; out of the corner of her eyes, she saw Kasimir hand Viktor a piece of leather to bite down on.
“Now, now, girl, don’t look at me,” Boris said, and his fingers dug into her shoulder while she tried to deny the devil. “Look at your teacher,” Boris continued. “You will remember this lesson better if you watch. And I do not want to have to remind you again. You see, girl, what moves me…and what should move you…is how much Viktor trusts you, that he asked for you to be here despite your obvious weakness, and how even now he is helping to teach you. Such commitment and loyalty is rare indeed and will be beneficial for you to learn from. Now watch.”
Anne found herself nodding and turning to look. Before she could close her eyes she saw the bat come down on Viktor’s leg. She had read the phrase ‘sickening crunch’ in a dimestore novel once, but taken it for exaggeration. What she hadn’t expected was how squarely the simple sound of a breaking bone gripped and twisted her inside. It pressed the air from her lungs as if she’d taken a hit herself, and she only noticed how tightly she had gritted her teeth in anticipation when that breath forced itself out through her nose. Viktor spasmed, all but snapping the backrest of the chair. Tears rolled from his squeezed eyes while hers stayed open and dry.
All of that was easier to take in than the sight of Viktor’s leg, roughly slipping from the chair and dripping blood onto the floor from where a blood vessel near the skin had popped under the assault on his shin. Anne wasn’t sure whether she saw bone sticking from the wound. She hoped she didn’t. Kasimir put his free hand on Viktor’s shoulders, helping him stay upright. The baseball bat swung loose at Kasimir’s side as he looked down on Viktor’s leg, as if to judge whether they would need to reset and do this again just to be sure. He looked to Boris and gave a little nod. Boris, however, looked to Anne, until she turned back to look at him.
“Thank you for your assistance in teaching, Viktor,” Boris said. Viktor grunted and Boris nodded in reply. “Help him, girl.”
Anne staggered to Viktor’s side and fell to her knees. She didn’t quite know how to touch him, so instead she just said “I’m sorry”, but there were no tears on her cheeks to suggest the truth of it. She closed her eyes in a bid to find a connection between how she felt and how she looked, but came up empty. Her hands gingerly felt for Viktor’s leg, hovering just an inch or two away from the quivering meat.“Girl,” Kasimir — now sans baseball bet — said, making her look up at him. “You must set bone.”
Not a question.
Anne nodded and seized Viktor’s calf with one hand while grabbing his ankle with the other. “I’m sorry,” she said, a little louder over Viktor’s grunts of pain. “I’m sorry,” she repeated. She pulled on Viktor’s lower leg while Kasimir held him back.
His body thrashed at the new spike of pain, and Anne felt her stomach turn again, boiling over, all this wickedness inside ready to eat its way right through her. If her left hand hadn’t been gripping Viktor’s calf, it would have shaken, far more than she could ever hope to steady. Instead it slid upwards with a mind of its own, and she felt the broken tibia under the skin beneath her fingers, where she pressed it back into some sembnce of its former pce. She still held the leg when Kasimir crouched down next to her. With practiced speed, he slid a wooden stick along Viktor’s shin and underneath her hand. He pced another stick on the other side and began wrapping the leg with cord to create a temporary splint. He grabbed Anne’s hands and pced them where she could support the weight of the leg. Together, she and Kasimir helped Viktor onto the floor while his leg stayed elevated.
“Call the doctor,” Boris ordered. “Tell him Arkady Arsenovich will pay for a house call. As for you, girl — your suit will be ready in a week. I expect you to be ready by then, too.”
Kasimir whispered to Viktor in Russian — Anne only understood “good man” from whatever he said, and Viktor’s grunts through the leather piece in his mouth were no help either. “Right away, Mr. Dolzhikov,” Kasimir said. He rose off the ground and walked away. Anne scooted closer on her knees, trying to catch what Viktor was saying, but she couldn’t make out anything intelligible escaping from between his teeth and the leather, so she spoke up herself.
“Viktor, I’m sorry,” she said to him, not turning to look even as she heard Boris walking away and out of the room. Viktor sucked another few breaths through his nose, steadying his rhythm, and eventually he reached up to cp Anne on the shoulder. When he did so, Anne knew what to do. She reached for the leather piece in Viktor’s mouth, and it seemed he only just had the strength to open his mouth enough for her to pull it from his teeth.
“You hardheaded girl,” Viktor said. Anne could feel tears in her eyes. “Ah!” he breathed. “This is…the price of your…pride.”
“I am so sorry” and “I didn’t want this” and “I will never fail you again” were all things Anne thought about saying. She thought about them instead of saying them because the devil had her in his grip, even stronger than before, and he told her she ought to be gd it was Viktor on the ground and not her, that she had had plenty of opportunity and cause to intervene and merely chosen to let this happen, that she could make no cim to tears shed over her own bullheadedness. She listened to the devil, as she too often did. So her heart hardened yet more and what she said instead was altogether colder.
“You are right,” she said, wiping the tears from her face. “What happens now?”5Anne doesn’t cry. Her eyes become wet as part of her stress response, but she doesn’t cry. Just so we’re all clear on that.“Now, Anne,” Viktor said, “you must prove you have learned.”
