The Soviet Comeback by Jamie Smith (best ereader for academics TXT) 📕

went to close the doors. He paused and then said, “I meant what I said. Leave Elysia, she is not for this life. And good luck.” He shut the door before Nikita had a chance to reply.

Nikita sat down next to Zurga’s wine and braced himself for what was now nearly upon him. The engine started up again and the truck began rocking and swaying over the potholed track.

***

Giorgos was glad of the bone-shaking bumps and lack of suspension as they disguised the shaking of his hands. He could not stop thinking about the mass of weaponry adorning the strange dark-skinned man in the back. He had never expected anything like this when Kemran had first approached him; it just seemed like some easy money to paper over the cracks of his failing wine delivery service, to keep his eyes and ears open any time he entered the complex.

As he trundled up the hill, he heard the bang of a box of wine in the back. The shit better not be breaking my wine, he thought. As the trees and shrubs cleared, he rounded a corner and the road was bathed in spotlights. Barbed wire fencing two metres high surrounded the site, and visible about a hundred metres back from it was the stone building where Zurga resided.

As he slowly approached the gates, a huge guard approached the vehicle, leading an Alsatian the size of a small bear.

Giorgos swallowed nervously, and kept his hands firmly fixed on the steering wheel to avoid giving his nerves away. He tried not to think about the Jericho 941 pistol in his coat pocket, which he had no idea how to use. He wasn’t even sure if it was loaded.

The guard tapped on the window and he rolled it down. “What is your business?” the guard asked in heavily accented English.

Giorgos rolled his eyes. “The same as it is every time, Johann, to give your boss his piss.”

Johann was so tall that he had to stoop slightly to see into the truck, and his broad shoulders stretched wider than the width of the window. He looked like a mythological Viking, with high cheekbones, bearded face and blond hair. His face was expressionless as his pale blue eyes scanned Giorgos, taking in his white-knuckled hands on the wheel.

Giorgos could hear the dog panting. It did not help his nerves.

“Open it up,” said Johann, tapping his gun on the door frame and stepping back.

Giorgos climbed out and walked to the back of the truck, wondering what on earth Nathan had planned and wanting absolutely no part of it. The dog was uncomfortably close as he slowly opened the double doors, the saliva dripping over its huge teeth and onto his sandalled foot.

“You seem nervous, Giorgos,” said Johann, noticing a sheen of sweat across his brow.

“You try driving this piece of shit along these roads without sweating.”

Johann charged the cocking handle on his weapon and turned to face the door. A weapon even Giorgos recognised — an AK-47. The ultimate Russian assault rifle, used by mercenaries as much as the Soviets.

Opening the door, Giorgos was careful to keep to one side and moved backwards with the door to allow Nathan to pounce.

Nothing happened; there was only darkness.

Johann shone a torch around the cabin, showing only boxes, and then led his hound inside. Giorgos felt like his heart had stopped.

Again, nothing.

Now Giorgos felt on the verge of cardiac arrest. Where was he? A box of the Merlot on its side was the only sign to him that anyone had been there.

Johann climbed out, his face still unreadable, and led the dog around the vehicle, checking the underside.

“Let’s move this along, Giorgos,” he barked, seemingly satisfied.

“A pleasure as always, Johann,” Giorgos rasped as he climbed back into the truck. “Where is he?” he breathed, his brain racing and wondering how and when Nathan had got out. He fired up the reluctant machine and rolled through the gates to the next check point.

This is new, he thought to himself, and noticed that the place seemed to have at least treble the number of guards normally there. Not good news for his rookie assassin, wherever he was.

“He’s alone. Just the old man and his wine,” he heard Johann shout.

He slowed to a stop. Up ahead he saw Zurga standing near the front door. He was holding a gun.

Something wasn’t right. He saw a movement to his right and saw two guards standing about ten feet away. He looked to the left and saw the same on that side.

All four raised their weapons.

“Skatá.” Shit.

They turned out to be his last words.

All four opened fire simultaneously. Giorgos’s old leathery skin was no match for white hot metal and his body was thrown from side to side as he was riddled with bullets.

The clicking of empty chambers signalled the end of the shooting. A guard approached slowly and after poking Giorgos with the barrel of his Kalashnikov, signalled to the group that he was dead.

Zurga, who had watched the proceedings from the doorway, walked purposefully towards the truck, which had died along with its owner. He was wearing a bullet proof vest and holding a Glock 17 pistol, a present from the Americans for his recent services.

“Open the door,” he spat to the guard, who obeyed immediately.

Giorgos’s broken body slumped sideways, his head stopping him from falling out and leaving his body contorted.

Zurga opened fire and emptied the entire magazine from the gun.

The body fell to the ground. Blood quickly pooled around Giorgos and the Jericho 941 tumbled from his overcoat pocket in the fall. Zurga felt some of the tension leave his shoulders.

“Search the vehicle,” he ordered the guards as he approached the corpse. This is who they send to kill me? he thought. And