A/N: Yay for Russian! Okay, "Prada" means like true, indeed?, certainly- that kind of thing. "Dah Sveezhdahnyah" means good-bye.
Chapter 2
Bradley Talmadge looked at his friends' faces. Nathan Ramsey, Craig Donovan, John Ballard. Their expressions were as they should be in this situation: serious and expecting the worst. Probably not this, though. Bradley looked over to Frank Parker, perhaps a second too long.
Parker looked around, then back at Bradley and said, "Oh, please don't tell me they dropped the football again." He paused a second, then added, "Hey, where's Olga?"
Bradley looked at Parker, then at the rest of his friends. "I'm going to show you all a tape I received this morning from an anonymous source." He turned around and pushed play on the VCR behind him. A Chinese man appeared on the screen.
"Is this thing on?" the dark hared man asked someone off screen.
"Yeah, I think so, Jay. Lemme check," said the man off screen. The camera shook a little. "Yeah, it's on," the second guy added, sounding a little annoyed.
"Good. Greetings, Backstep Team! Hopefully you've noticed that your Commie comrade is not present at your little get together. If you haven't noticed, well, then I'm wasting my time, because then she's-."
"Get to the point, Jay!" said the camera guy, cutting Jay off.
"Oh, right. As I was saying, Olga's here with us." He looked to his left, at something off screen and asked, "Prada?"
"Yes, I am," she agreed from off screen. She didn't sound like she was in any trouble, just fed up.
"Not that we've established that, I'm going to give up my fifteen minutes of fame so your resident Soviet can have a turn." He smiled and stood there a moment. He then scowled and said, "Put the camera on her, you idiot!" The camera turned, showing a clear view of water and giant cement columns before stopping on Olga.
"Bradley, we're on top of the Hoover Dam. They want Backstep secrets in exchange for my life. You have…" she looked down at something, then back at the camera, "…ten hours." The camera shook violently and Jay's face appeared mere inches from the screen.
"Make sure you guys get a good look at this!" he said, spraying spit on the camera lens before pointing it at Olga again. This time though, it was a wider shot, showing just how serious the situation was. Olga was standing next to the back of a small dump truck, her left wrist chained to the bumper with handcuffs. In the back of the truck were stacks of brownish yellow clay bricks.
"Tell 'em what they've won, Ms. Vukavitch," said the second man from off screen.
"Four-hundred pounds of C4 explosives," she said dolefully. Jay walked into the picture and stood as close to Olga as possible.
Leaning on her shoulder, looking her in the eyes, he said, "Very good, my pretty little Bolshevist." He turned to the camera and added, "By the time you get our little home movie, you should have four hours. You'd better get cracking! Dah Sveezhdahnyah!" Jay waved at the camera, then grabbed Olga's right hand and waved it at the camera.
A few seconds went by and then Jay said, his patience running thin, "Jim, you can turn the camera off, now."
Parker sat for a moment, looking at Olga and Jay's images still on the television screen. Taking a deep breath, he squelched irrational fears and asked the simple question:
"So when do we go?"
