18th June 2013
The past few days have been almost…relaxed. The scientists seem to have disappeared since we saw them a few days ago, everyone's saying they've gone down to a lab complex further down in the facility, near to the all I care they can rot down there. After seeing a man almost get shot over dropping a container full of, I don't know, fucking test tubes or something, I'm starting to think that if those FSB spooks hadn't come back in the first place, we would all be better off. But, unfortunately they're still here, spending all their time over in the command centre with Antonov. For the rest of the base though, this is the closest we've had to down time since we got here. With Antonov trying not to piss off the FSB agents, pretty much everybody in the base has been taking a well-earned break. For me, that means spending my time in the Holding Area, as far away as possible from Antonov and the FSB pricks.
It could have been nice almost, the equivalent of a holiday in this sunless hell, and it was, in a way, that is, until they arrived…
I was on a break, with a cup of dirt like coffee in hand, and down at the gate. I seem to be drawn to it now, this entrance to a world that we can't go back to until this whole mess resolves itself. I hope Katerina appreciates me writing this, because I'm starting to think that, if things start to get crazy around here, Antonov isn't exactly going to like people writing about what goes on in this pit.
The men at the gate saluted me half-heartedly as I approached, and I was about to strike up a conversation when one of the lookouts, peering at a grainy computer screen, suddenly shouted.
"There's a train coming! Open the gates!"
I know it seems like our security's a bit lax, but we're that far down in the ground that anybody who comes here knows about the place, and has some official reason to be here. And, as the gate slowly creaked open with a roar of steel, everybody in the room was blinded by a blazed of harsh white light.
One brave, or maybe foolish, man stepped out, gun raised, and barked a challenge.
"Identify yourselves!"
The response however, made the soldier go pale, as a towering figure stepped forward.
"Your fucking worst nightmare…"
There, silhouetted in the light from the train outside, was a huge, thickset man in the unmistakeable uniform of a Spetnatz commander, AK slung over his shoulder, what can only be described as an almost physcotic look in his eye. He smiled, but there was no warmth behind it, only menace.
The guard made to step back, but the Spetnatz commander was on him in a second, grabbing him by his neck, huge gloved hands constricting his breath.
We weren't going to do anything though; this man looked like he could snap anybody's neck in a heartbeat. We had all heard the horrific stories about the training these men went through, and you either had to be as tough as fuck or a psychopath to survive. This guy was probably both.
"Get your commanding officer..." He hissed to the soldier in his clutches, before dropping him. Without another word, the soldier scuttled off.
The Spetnatz commander laughed, before shouting something incomprehensible into the light beyond, and then the rest of them arrived.
Covered in body armour and bandoliers, assault rifles and evil looking knives at their sides, the Spetnatz men barely looked at us as they marched past in perfect formation onward. None of us challenged them, and when Major Voshilov turned up, red faced and berating the terrified guard who brought him, merely stammered at the Spetznatz swaggering in.
As they disappeared into the corridors beyond, the commander turned to the major, casually ordering.
"Get someone to get our shit from the train, anybody drops it I drop them…"
It was such a simple statement, but everybody there stood in silence except for the hiss of the train outside and tramping of the Spetznatz's boots on concrete nearby.
Fuck, things here just got a whole lot worse.