It was an undercover assignment that became complicated, much more than Illya Kuryakin had bargained for when he assumed the identity of a Russian drug dealer nicknamed 'Rasputin.'
He was able to sidestep partaking the drugs that surrounded him, while he watched others using needles...injecting themselves with heroin, or snorting lines of cocaine.
Pills, pot, chemical concoctions...you name it, Rasputin dealt in it.
He sat on a bed covered in black satin sheets in a garishly decorated room that had been prepared for him by Stefano Ferrero, his new best friend. The walls were covered with crude paintings of nude women done on black velvet that seemed to glow like neon as they were hung beneath what looked like some sort of ultra-violet light fixtures.
Beside him was sprawled another gift, a scantily clad young girl sent there to fill Rasputin's only known vice.
Her blonde curls were tied up into pigtails and her face painted with plenty of makeup, in an attempt, he guessed, to make her look older and more alluring. Her clothing was nothing but a thin cotton blouse tied at the waist, through which he could tell she wore no brassiere, and a red plaid pleated mini skirt so short that left little to the imagination.
"Hey handsome, Stephano said it was cool, you know if we get high before we do it." She produced a syringe, a spoon, a lighter and a piece of foil, no doubt containing heroin."
"No thank you, I do not like needles," Kuryakin pushed it aside.
"Okay man, maybe you wanna do some lines with me then?" She dropped a small plastic bag containing white powder, a straight razor and a rolled up dollar bill on the night table. "Or pills maybe, I got plenty of those. This is all your stuff in a way."
Laughing nervously she dumped a handful of multi colored tablets and capsules beside the other drugs.
"How old are you?" He asked as she began to disrobe.
"Fourteen but I'm gonna be fifteen next week. I ran away from home last year."
Illya reached out, staying her hands and pulling her blouse back on, buttoning it closed.
"If I give you money, would you leave this place and go back home to your family?"
"Why would I want to do that? My mother is a drunk and my father beat me...when he was home."
"All right then, if I give you the address of a shelter would you go there? I will have some money waiting for you and help so you will no longer have to live this sort of life."
"You're weird," she tried tossing a few pills into her mouth but Illya stopped her." They said you'd be weird, but I didn't think like this, I thought that meant you liked kinky. You're the head honcho right, the big cheese aren't you? I would have thought you were cool with drugs." She tried crawling closer to him, making a grab for his crotch.
"No, do not touch me please," he held her by the wrist until she relaxed and backed off, "and yes I am the head honcho as you say, but I do not like to see young girls like you living this way. I had a sister once...you remind me of her. She," he hesitated in his lie for effect, " she died of a drug overdose at a young age."
He'd complicated his cover by telling such a story, but hoped his sad little tale would work on her sensibilities.
Illya reached into his pocket, and handed her a twenty dollar bill after scribbling the address of the Bowery Mission and the name of Claire on a piece of paper.
"What is your name?"
"Louise, Louise Miller," she took the money and the paper from him. "Thanks Mr. Rasputin."
"You go now and do as I tell you. Do not speak to anyone, you understand?" He wiped the makeup from her face with his fingers.
"That is much better," he smiled at her. Now she looked like a wide-eyed child instead of a painted prostitute.
"Yes sir."
"And if I find out you have not arrived at the address," he warned, "you will suffer the consequences for ummm, double-crossing me. You get my drift? Dig?"
"Yes sir."
He handed her his black suit jacket, "Now put this on, cover yourself up and get out of here right away. Do not stop for any of your things."
Louise looked at him in bewilderment, yet she was grateful. She wasn't happy in this life but didn't know of any other way to survive. At fourteen she'd hit rock bottom and thought this was it.
Illya watched as she left, closing the door behind him. He gathered up the drugs on the nightstand, flushing what he could down the toilet and destroying the syringe; he tossed it and therazor into the trash.
He walked out on his balcony, staring up at the moon, seeing a lunar eclipse had begun. Illya reminded himself it was the first in a series of predicted eclipses...
It was not just astronomically significant, as the self-proclaimed Godless Russian knew of a religious meaning to this event as well. Tonight was the first of the Blood Moons, the upcoming lunar tetrad – the series of four total lunar eclipses…
Illya spoke aloud…
"The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the Lord come."
They were words that appeared in both the Old and New Testaments. A fulfillment of a Biblical prophecy… the moon supposedly turning to blood red before the end times. Though he denied the existence of a God since he was a child, Illya still read the bible and other such texts...they were books after all.
The blond agent brushed his hair out of his eyes as a sudden breeze blew. Was it his imagination coloring his vision? Did the moon appear to indeed be red?
It was time. He pulled his communicator from his pocket.
"Open Channel D-Solo."
"Here tovarisch, everything ready?" Solo spoke softly.
"It is, you may commence the raid in fifteen minutes. Out."
He looked up at the sky again...it would indeed be a Blood Moon tonight, perhaps not literally but figuratively for Stefano Ferraro and would indeed mark his end of days.
As to the Blood Moon being the start of the end of the world, that remained to be seen…
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Thanks to Lindafishes who inspired this.