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Chelyabinsk, U.S.S.R.
May 1982
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MY, MY, HOW FORTUNATE, thought that part of Mikhail’s brain that dealt out sarcasm.
He finally found an aisle seat in third class on a train to Chelyabinsk, a city that lay pushed up against the Urals, 1494 kilometers (929 miles) east of Moscow. Mikhail didn’t know whether to focus his anger on the army or the GRU, so he let his mind rant against both:
They send me on a critical mission by train without the courtesy to reserve me a sleeping compartment!
This meant that he would have to sleep slouched in a seat barely large enough to fit his bum for the entire trip. Even a baggage or cattle car would have been preferable. The seats were two-by-two and faced each other. The seating guaranteed unwanted and uncomfortable intimacy, with one passenger’s knee practically in the opposite passenger’s groin. Undoubtedly, this carriage had been designed for pygmies, not full-sized human beings. Given that Mikhail was a couple of notches above full-sized, this trip would be hell. But at least he could stretch his legs in the aisle when needed. The three other Russians seated with him — a young husband and wife, and the old woman next to him — were packed together like minks on an industrial farm. The young wife sat across from Mikhail.
He did his best to respect her personal space.
Mikhail was in a foul mood when the conductor stopped to punch his ticket.
“I see you are going to Chelyabinsk, Comrade Captain,” said the conductor pleasantly. “It’s a long ride, forty-four and one half hours.”
Mikhail already knew that, but just hearing it said aloud sank his spirit deeper into a dark pit. He presented the conductor a polite smile and a face that read: Tell me about it.
“Did you serve in Afghanistan, Comrade Captain?”
Although in no mood for chit-chat, the conductor seemed a decent sort and Mikhail did not want to be rude. “Yes, Comrade Conductor. I served with Spetsnaz.”
The conductor tapped the side of his head. “Ah! I should have recognized the uniform; my apologies, sir.”
“None necessary, Comrade Conductor.”
“My son also serves in Afghanistan. He is a child, only eighteen-years-old.” Then the conductor pulled back hard on the reigns that controlled his emotions. “He has been conscripted by the State.”
Mikhail reached up and gently grabbed hold of the conductor’s arm. “He will be OK, comrade. Given his youth, he is most likely helping the Afghans build roads and schools. He will come back to you safe; he will come back to you a fine young man.” Mikhail did not enjoy lying, but he’d say anything, do anything to ease a father’s pain.
“Very kind of you to say, Comrade Captain. A war veteran, a hero who serves Mother Russia, you should not have to ride third class. I shall find you a sleeper and an empty seat in First Class. We have plenty. Only KGB rides in first class to Chelyabinsk. At the moment we have only two of them, also in uniform.” He snickered, “Neither look like warriors to me. More like over-indulged fat slobs.”
“Thank you, comrade, but I do not wish to cause you any trouble. I’m quite comfortable where I am.” He grinned, “I promise I will survive this trip. I have survived worse.”
“I doubt you will feel so cheery in another two hours. The best deserves the best, Comrade Captain, so do not argue with me.”
“Thank you, friend.”
The conductor returned less than an hour later. He gave Mikhail the number of his sleeping compartment and a new first class ticket. When Mikhail got up to follow the man, his ex-seatmates smiled their approval. The old woman who had been sitting next to him stood up and kissed him on both cheeks. “God bless you, comrade soldier.”
Mikhail’s heart swelled with love. These were his people, including the conductor and the man’s son. It focused his mind more clearly on the important mission ahead:
If Comrade Katkov had indeed betrayed Soviet citizens like these, the man would pay.
“Thank you, Babulya (grandmother). Thanks to all of you. It is my honor to serve and protect the Soviet people.” To the conductor, “I know I speak for your son as well.”
The man beamed, proud.
After dropping his duffle bag off in his compartment, Mikhail followed the conductor to the first class dining car.
“What is your name, sir?” Mikhail asked the conductor.
“Please call me Evgeny. That is my son’s name, too.”
“And please call me Mishe, Evgeny. The kindness you have shown me shall never be forgotten.”
Evgeny showed Mikhail to a table and summoned the waiter. “You will take special care of this man,” he told the waiter. “He is a veteran.”
The waiter eyed the medals on Mikhail’s chest. “A decorated soldier? But of course, Evgeny, it shall be my honor.”
While Mikhail studied the menu, almost as fancy as the one in GRU’s training restaurant, he noticed the two senior colonels in uniform. Both wore blue epilates that signified KGB, but one man’s uniform further identified him as being from the border guards. As far as Mikhail was concerned both were KGB shits; like Evgeny had said the three of them were the only passengers in this carriage and in first class. He hoped his sleeping compartment was as far removed from theirs as possible. The stink of KGB oppressors always made him nauseous.
Indignant, the colonels immediately summoned Evgeny to their table. The KGB swine had finished their appraisal of Mikhail, their stares harsh but also curious. He could hear some of what they were saying to the conductor: Why is a junior officer, a Spetsnaz soldier, allowed in this carriage? Mikhail also caught the word, American Negro, from the border guard colonel.
I am not a fucking American, asshole!
Mikhail’s turn to scrutinize them: two men in their late 50s who were undoubtedly cemented into their current stations. They had reached the end of their careers performing a miserable duty in a miserable place: Chelyabinsk. And as far as Mikhail and the GRU were concerned, the border guards were a trashcan for soldiers not quite good enough for the regular army. As for the other chap, the KGB man, he doubted he had ever been out of the Soviet Union. Judging by the crude way he and his comrade ate their breakfast, both borzois (dogs) would be major embarrassments if assigned to diplomatic posts.
The colonels were small men, maybe five foot five or six inches, and both had complexes common to all small men denied greatness. Clearly even as KGB they did not intimidate the conductor, who replied loud and clear,
“That man is a very important person, comrades. He served in Afghanistan in the same unit as my son... Good day, gentlemen.”
The conductor’s back was to the KGB colonels as he walked passed Mikhail on his way out. He smiled and winked at the Black Russian.
When the colonels finished gobbling breakfasts clean off their “feed bowls”, they stood, adjusted their tired uniforms as best they could, and strutted up the aisle towards the exit. The KGB colonel suddenly stopped at Mikhail’s table. The trailing colonel almost ran into him.
“You there, darkie,” he barked. “Stand to attention when superior officers pass.”
Mikhail snickered. “I am not with your group, I am Spetsnaz. If you were KGB generals I would not stand for you. Go back to suppressing the people; it’s much safer than trying to suppress me.”
The colonels reddened, looking like two red beets trying to avoid a borsht pot. Then they swept towards the exit like ill winds. At the door, the border guard colonel said to his comrade, “It was beginning to stink in here, Boris.”
Mikhail turned and shot them a grin. “Yes, I’m sure the air will clear as soon as the two of you are back in your sties. And please do not keep me awake tonight. The sound of old men filled with gas quite disgusts me.”
The border guard slammed the door behind him. Mikhail listened to their growls slowly fading away.
The waiter came to serve the food. Mikhail reached for his wallet.
“No, Comrade,” said the smiling waiter. “Evgeny said to take good care of you.” Then, “As the Americans say, Is on the house.”
Although gratuities were frowned upon in the Soviet Union, “Your kindness is much appreciated, friend.” He handed the waiter some extra rubles. “My father was born in America. This is called a tip. Please do not be offended, Comrade Waiter.”
Grinning, “I shall give it to the poor,” the waiter replied, “which is me. Thank you, comrade soldier.”
***
DESPITE THE COMFORT of his sleeping compartment, Mikhail did not get much rest that night. This business with Comrade Katkov aside, it was where he was headed, and what he was heading into, that hurled his thoughts and smashed them against the four corners of his mind. As far as Mikhail was concerned, Chelyabinsk was hell on earth. It was (and still is) one of the most polluted regions on the planet. And at its core, the very lowest level of hell was Ozersk, codenamed, City 40. Mikhail had done his background reading, so he’d been horror-struck when he saw that the town’s coat of arms featured a flamed-colored salamander.
Someone’s idea of a sick joke?
Ozersk, a.k.a. City 40, was the birthplace of the Soviet nuclear weapons program after World War II. The last two digits “40” were taken from the postal code of the nearby largest city, Chelyabinsk-40. This was an old Soviet custom for naming closed towns like Ozersk. Mikhail was not happy to read that in 1957, Chelyabinsk, Ozersk, and the surrounding countryside had been contaminated by an explosion at the nearby plant of Mayak. Mayak produced weapon’s grade plutonium for the Soviet military.
(Over time the radioactive pollution from Mayak has been two to three times that of Chernobyl. Of course Mikhail was unaware of this because Chernobyl would not occur until 1986.)
The full extent of the Mayak disaster was kept from the Russian people until 1980, a fact that angered Mikhail when he learned it. The sooner he got out of this horrid place the better. He and Valeria might want to have more children someday, children who would not glow in the dark like the local salamanders.
There were seventeen cultural, educational and research facilities in Ozersk, but only one concerned Mikhail: the nuclear research facility where physicist Mikhail Katkov worked. As he would soon find out, KGB’s border guards secured everything outside of Ozersk; inside the army and GRU ruled.
Before getting off the train, Captain Mikhail Khalatsyn said his thanks to comrades Evgeny, the conductor, and the waiter. He exchanged hugs and well wishes with both men. Then he shouldered his duffle and ambled off the train at Chelyabinsk.
Once Mikhail had arrived in Chelyabinsk, dread engulfed him like an invisible cloud of radiation that not even the refreshing winds from the pine-scented Urals could blow away.
He had to make short work of this Katkov business so he could get the hell out of here.
***
SOMEHOW MIKHAIL MANAGED to suppress a strong urge to throttle these two borzois. Like a two-headed Cerberus, they guarded the main gate that led into the underworld of Ozersk. When Mikhail had handed over his papers to the first guard, the man turned to his comrade and said in Ukrainian accented Russian, “Looks like we have another darkie, Fedir. How lucky we are.”
Mikhail could see that Fedir was quite intimidated by this particular big darkie. Also in Ukrainian accented Russian Fedir replied, “The man is a Spetsnaz captain, Oleksiy.”
Both these border guards wore ill-fitting uniforms with the blue epaulets and both were slovenly and out of shape. Beating them shitless would not be a problem. Neither of them looked fit enough for the regular army and both were above forty. Old men like these two were quite content to let the fighting and dying in Afghanistan be left to teenage conscripts like comrade conductor’s son. Oleksiy and Fedir were quite happy to serve the state by keeping Soviet citizens inside of places where they belonged and outside of places where they did not. The only KGB military units on the Afghan border were stationed inside the U.S.S.R.’s three republics of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tadzhikistan. Their duty was to keep the Mujahedeen out of these southern republics. In Mikhail’s opinion this was equivalent to the American National Guard keeping the Viet Cong out of California.
The one named Oleksiy said to the nervous one named Fedir, “I don’t care if he’s a fucking general. I’m the one holding a Kalashnikov.”
Mikhail smiled malevolently, “Which I am quite happy to shove up your bum, comrade.”
Fedir snatched the orders out of a startled Oleksiy’s hand. “You will please pass, Comrade Captain.”
“I’m sure we will meet again many times, comrades. Good day to you.” As Mikhail walked through the gate he could hear the two guards snarling at each other like hellhounds.
Hopefully, the next time they met Mikhail would not be in such a charitable mood.