Chapter 10
New Orders
Another day, another worry. At least things were not as crowded here nowadays. Prisoners had worked themselves to death in order to expand this facility to allow sufficient numbers to live here, and nowmany people were fighting here and there in Africa, South America and Asia. And those were only the official ones, Vladimir wasn't exactly sure what Isaia was doing, and where. The battle-experience gained from these battles was invaluable of course, but the costs had also been great. The soldiers were left to their own devices in small groups, and several had ended contact with the Union, and were later found out to have started their own little nations. Destroying those was hell for the less experienced ones, but those that survived were the strong ones, not the weaklings.
Things had also changed in the organization of the Union. Both of them. Isaia and Vladimir were the leaders of the Channelers Union. The Soviet Premier, President and Duma led the Soviet Union. Vladimir almost laughed out load when he though of this. Isaia led Vladimir, the Premier, the President and the Duma was powerless. Once he was supposed to have been the leader of the channelers union. That position was but a dream now, but he was second in command and the leader of the research and development department. His military uniform also donned a few stars now. And when Isaia was away, which he often was, fighting, Vladimir had almost the combined might of the Soviet Union at his fingertips. One day Isaia would come back only to find his head falling off at a surprising moment, a mental image which made Vladimir smile happily for several minutes as he sat in his grand leather chair, looking at some foreign channel showing a documentary of something that had to do with ancient furniture.
Sadly, the work had a bad habit of piling up at both ends of the hierarchy he mused as he looked at his desk. He had noticed it when he was a simple researcher, and how he noticed how all the questions everyone else was unable to answer were simple sent upwards until they came to him. Isaia did not bother with the small details, and Vladimir could ignore them too if he wanted. But what was the use in simply becoming a lesser version of Isaia? The telephone was blinking wildly.
"Yes, what is it now." he said with a sigh into the phone. "Sir, this is captain Romanova from the Kazan Rocket Base. We have just finished our testing of the AmatronA4 rocket. We were able to keep the rocket going for 6 seconds until our channeler lost focus." the person on the other end of the line said full of excitement in her voice. Vladimir was exited too, but soon noticed the apparent problem. Thinking for a minute or two, he then picked up the phone again and started talking. "Good. Very good indeed. Feel free to borrow a few planes from our friends in the air force, and try to have our channeler to sit in there. I want at least 10 successes in a row where it reaches as far up as possible for us to fuel it from our best airplanes. Then you can see about the possibilities of having multiple channelers fueling it. If you succeed in that, inform me and we'll see about preparing it for a manned firing" he said, with the good news rejuvenating him from his bored thoughts about his amount of paperwork. "Yes General, I hope to call you soon again." the woman said, after which Vladimir sat the phone down again.
Getting up from his chair and starting his round he thought about how superior his method was to Isaias. While the man would have gladly put some fool on top of a rocket built on a hybrid technology no-one could have imagined a few months ago, Vladimir wasn't going to kill off his best scientists and waste precious training on useless risks. Still, Isaia was not that incompetent, it seemed as if quite a few of his soldiers had returned from their far-off campaigns in the southern continents. Maybe some new weapon could be learned, who knew what they had come up with down there.
"Ah, hello. So, tell me, how have you been taking care of my Union." the deep, rusty voice could be heard. Another fine day destroyed by Isaia, the man was rather good at it. Even though startled by Isaia's appearance, Vladimir regained his posture quickly and turned around and did his best to look at Isaia like he was equal to him. "Ah... you have returned. Have you learned anything interesting, you do remember how the laws of this union require that you share all you know with the group" he said, trying his best not to sound too demanding, upsetting Isaia would only make the man stay around the base more.
Taking out his cigar, a Cuban brand Vladimir noticed, Isaia continued again in his deep rusty voice "I am sure all new advances will be shared in once they are ready to be shared. But for now, I have a different need for you. Come, let's talk in my office." After finishing, he put the cigar in his mouth again, completely at ease and radiating an aura that it was possible for anyone to be able to question his orders. Vladimir had already started walking towards Isaias office; Isaia followed after, keeping his own relaxed pace.
Isaias office was close by; it was the central command-complex after all. Vladimir let Isaia enter first, but did however sit himself down in the chair without invitation. Isaia did not seem impressed by the obvious act of independence, or at least it had seemed obvious to Vladimir himself, he though. After sitting down he continued to try and make himself at ease in the hard wooden chair, waiting for Isaia to start talking about whatever his important matter was. Isaia was calmly smoking his cigar.
Almost half an hour had gone before the cigar finished, with neither man saying a word during the time, instead they simply sat and looked at each other. Finally Isaia put down his cigar and started "I was thinking, we all know you are the researcher here. The Generals of our most beloved Union say that because of the need to give our forces proper mountain-fighting training and to stockpile supplies, it will take a few more weeks until we can begin our assault on Norway. And I will be quite busy directing our troops once that happens, as you can probably imagine. But the source of the power is still there, and I need you to visit it before we start our attack," he said. He spoke slowly, taking long pauses between his sentences. In the end he stood up and started banging at northern Norway on his wall-map. Vladimir could not remember seeing Isaia like this before, the man looked almost enthusiastic.
Isaia waited a short time and then continued, sniggering a bit "¿Preguntas? Did you want one of these cigars? Straight from our Caribbean allies. No? Anyway, I need the best researcher there, and I'll also send some of my finest soldiers to aid you. You'll stir up some trouble with the Americans there also, take out two flies with one blow so to speak. Oh, and take two of your own helpers with you too, but no more, our vehicles lack the space. Don't worry about the return trip, the island will be ours after 5 days of fighting," Isaia said, the motioned for Vladimir to leave by waving towards the door.
Vladimir walked calmly back to his room, saluting back the guards in the compound who saluted him when he walked past them. Not all channelers did salute him though, but he had grown used to it. When he arrived at his room, he slowly closed the door and had it locked. After that he sat down on the floor, his back resting against the wall. He opened the drawer beside his bead and searched around for a bit until he found what he was looking for. Prima cigarettes, the peoples brand, he though as he lighted the first one with the power.
After the first two he started speaking with the wall on the other side of the room. By this time the bottle of vodka had also been channeled from the bookcase on the other side of the room. "Corny, is he not comrade wall?" he said, laughing a bit. "Yes Vladimir, I'll send you far away, you little researcher you. Just because I see you as a threat I'll send my best killers with you, far away where no one can see. What, you think I'm going to kill you? And here I was trying to make my plans unknown to you. Oh, you don't have a fruit behind those two eyes?" he said, trying his best to imitate Isaia.
He talked to the wall until the cigarettes were gone and the bottle was empty. Then he started making calls.
The next morning he was waiting for Isaias men in one of the old gymnastics rooms. He was sitting in one end of the hall with the people he could gather in one day.
Captain Urola Romanova was a researcher like him, as were Jelena Tumanova and Maks Yudin. Mihai Jonker was actually a soldier, although he had been at base all the time and did not seem to like the eyes of the ones who returned from Isaias expeditions. Or not, but Vladimir felt he could trust the man. Galen Kurilenko was a Bulgarian, and more interested in using the force for civilian applications rather than brute military strength. Yakov Belov was one of Vladimirs assistants in his pet-project, trying to find out exactly what the power was, and where it came from. And last, but not least, was Juri Nikolaiov. Always with a J. The last one to use a Y when writing down Juris had contracted some strange disease and his penis had gone black and then finally fallen off.
Vladimir was looking at his men and women when the door on the other side of the hall opened and 5 men walked in. They walked into the middle of the room, forming a pentagram. Or pentagon. He never had the time to ask them precisely what they were trying to form.
The man in front started to speak. He got as far as "Why…" before he fell down dead, along with all the other ones. Vladimir started to speak instead, knowing they were not quite dead yet. "Yes. Surprise!" he exclaimed with a happy voice. "Oh, how? You want to know how? With pistols? Your killing tactics with the one power are all quite good I assume. But as we have noticed here while you were gone, people can still be killed by more physical means. Good bye!" he finished, then signaled to his men to do their job. Most of them started studying closely the faces of the now dead men, trying to learn them well enough to create an illusion that would make them look identical to Isaias men. Only Mihai Jonker and Juri were waiting by. Vladimir wanted everyone to see that at least some of the soldiers supported him, and Juri, he was just Juri.