Limits.
Moscow, Russia.
August of 1990.
Ramona Belwich was a twenty-three-year-old exchange student fresh out of a small town in the westernmost part of Missouri. She was an only child and her dad was a respected local businessman. She had been given all the opportunities to succeed – summer camps, internships in exotic places, tutorship by great and expensive minds – and so when it came to getting into a good college, there was nothing holding her back. She had been so eager that she started learning the language before she left home. She knew how to greet people, how to ask prices, how to read road signs. But there was nothing in her education to prepare her to meet me.
She was wild and happy and beautiful, glowing with the passion that drove her halfway across the world. Her classmates liked her, admired her, and she had come to this bar with them after two weeks of classes to unwind. She was new to this, a naïve child in a faraway place. Without these acquaintances – who barely knew her – and her parents – a world away – she was utterly alone.
Ramona smiled at me when I sat down beside her. It was a loud place, so I barely heard her butchered Russian greeting.
I responded in English, with a southern accent, imitating my father. Her eyes lit up and she started talking. Larry was right. I barely had to say anything, ask anything, and I got her whole life story. She let me know how alone she was, how far from home, how she hardly knew the people she had come to the bar with. I bought her drinks and sipped with her, tempting her to drink more. But every sip she took, every smile she threw my way, made my stomach twist tighter. It felt bad to put myself in the shoes of a predator. But this lesson was enlightening. How could people give themselves away so willingly? Was this the sign of someone who had never been hurt?
It was easy to get her to leave the bar with me. She stumbled outside and let me guide her into the nearest alley, where the walls were high, the bricks absorbing the music from the bar. She pulled me closer, into a wet, drunk kiss, and ran her hands down my chest, blue eyes sparkling from the alcohol running rampant in her blood. How could it be this easy?
She failed to recognize all the signs of danger. We were alone, apart from all of her friends, in a quiet place with no doors or windows and no escape. I was taller and stronger than her, an absolute stranger she had known for only half an hour, and still nothing had occurred to her.
I want you to put that charm of yours to the test and prove me right, kid. I want you to understand just how easy it is. That's lesson one.
Ramona could have died that night. She could have died a thousand miles from home. Her family might never have known what really happened to her and those people inside would feel guilty for a little while, and then forget. Some crueler person than me could come along and lure her out, return her kisses, drive a knife through her throat. She could go from being a girl to being a body, a cadaver, a chart on a desk in a language she didn't even understand.
Once you have them alone, the trap closes. Never hesitate. Pull the trigger. People will never forget someone who tried to kill them, so you never leave them breathing.
I brushed her hands from my chest as gently as I could, and murmured, "Go back inside."
Ramona looked up at me, clearly confused, still unable to register the threat in this state. But she obeyed. She walked back down the alley, turned toward the bar, and the bell on the front door jingled. When she was gone, my heart began to hammer.
"I told you it was easy." Larry appeared at the other end of the alley.
Easy. It was easy for him, maybe. It was the easiest thing in the world to lie to people but using that lie to manipulate them was much more serious. It weighed on me, made me realize what I was really capable of – and that realization was sickening. Was he training me to be a killer? Were his missions about luring girls from bars and dropping bodies in alleys?
"Relax. Breathe." He made it to me and took me by the shoulders, giving me a little shake. He was smiling. "You did great. I knew you would."
"Is that it for tonight?" I asked hopefully.
"You wish, kid. Oh, oh, what did you introduce yourself as? Justin? Chad? Noah?"
"Dennis."
"Good. Dennis is a trustworthy name. Good instincts." We walked from the bar to our hotel, in a busier part of the city. Some parts of Moscow never slept. "We just got our first assignment."
"What is it?"
"Just a little information acquisition."
Our hotel room was average, fit with two beds, a bathroom, and a small kitchen area. It connected to another, unoccupied room that Larry said was good for escaping through. It gave us separate sleeping quarters, which was all I cared about.
"Who are we taking information from?" I asked from the other room, while stripping off clothes that smelled of cigar smoke and vodka. "Or are we stealing files?"
"Interrogation," Larry responded, hovering in the doorway. "Remember what I taught you?"
I remembered him shooting unarmed captives in the desert.
"Yes."
"Good. Consider this part two. We need a bank account number."
"That's it? That's the whole job? Why? Who wants it?"
"Not our business."
"But-"
"How many times do I have to tell you not to ask questions?" Larry shook his head. "We get missions from no one, give information to no one, answer to no one."
"Fine."
"You'll learn. You will." He stepped away, tipping the door shut behind him. "Get ready to leave. Our friend with the numbers is waiting."
XxX
When you train to be a spy, there are certain things you have to accept. Your career is like smoke in the wind. No one knows your name, no one remembers your face. Sometimes you have to hurt people. Sometimes you have to kill people. And sometimes the people who end up on your list are just everyday citizens. Sometimes the people you hurt are innocent.
Our hostage was innocent.
He was on his knees, badly beaten from his encounter with Larry, his arms duct-taped together and a black mask wrapped around his eyes. Larry had taped his arms in the posture of prayer, so it looked like he was constantly pleading with us.
He was the man with the numbers.
"You have one more chance," Larry said, in an almost disinterested tone. He tapped his metal baseball bat to the ground, making the man with the numbers flinch. Larry had not hit him yet, but the sound of metal on metal was eerie.
The man with the numbers whimpered and said nothing.
Larry looked at me and smiled – he was always smiling. "Numbers are hard to remember. Sometimes people forget. They'll tell you anything you want to hear. Since our friend here has suddenly forgotten the numbers, we have to use him to make a point, so maybe our next friend will remember."
I almost didn't ask, but I could tell Larry wanted me to. "Make a point?"
"Our friend has a family. He has three beautiful boys and a baby girl, and a wife who would do anything for him. I'll find them, and gut them, and lay them out on his front lawn."
When he heard that, the man with the numbers finally spoke. "Please! 2-4-1-9-8-0-1-8-9!"
Larry crouched down, paused for several seconds, and then drew the blindfold away. He was eye-to-eye with the terrified captive, all the malice of a real monster in his eyes. "Say it again."
"2-4-1-9-8-0-1-8-9!"
Larry rolled his bat on the ground, making a sickening grinding sound, and brought it to rest near the man with the number's knee. "Say it again."
"2-4-1-9-8-0-1-8-9! Please! Please!"
I looked away as Larry feigned with the bat, making the man cry out in fear. The captive was sobbing. I focused on the metal paneling behind us, the chains hanging from the empty factory's ceiling. I wanted to be anywhere but here. Anywhere but here.
Finally, the bat made contact. I heard the solid thunk of flesh giving way to metal, and the man was thrown to his side. I looked back as he was settling on the ground.
"He told you," I said.
Larry ignored me. "Say it again."
"2-4-1-9-8-0-1-8-9!" the man screamed hoarsely.
"Stop," I said, louder this time. "He told you! He gave you the numbers!"
"Did he?" Larry glanced at me, a wicked enjoyment in his eyes. "You think he was telling the truth? Do you think he values the lives of his children?"
"I told you, I told you," the man pleaded in Russian, gasping from the blow that had taken him in the ribs. His eyes were bloodshot. "Please, please, please. I told you! I told you!"
Larry handed me the bat and crouched down again, drawing a knife from his belt. I wrapped my hands tight around the grip. What was he going to do? Why was he still tormenting this man? Was he going to kill him like he killed that cop?
"Easy," Larry murmured, sliding his knife down the bindings on his arms and cutting them loose. His voice was a whisper, almost believably gentle. "Say it again."
"2-4-1-9-8-0-1-8-9," the man whispered in response, his eyes glued to Larry's face.
"Okay. Good talking to you."
Larry stood up and left the room, left me standing there with a metal bat, while the man with the numbers laid on his side, sobbing softly to himself. For a long moment I was too frozen to move – wondering what I had been prepared to do to stop this, wondering why I had let it go on so long – and then the bat slipped out of my fingers and rattled on the floor. I followed Larry, stiff-legged, out of the factory, and got into the car that he had stolen. As I folded my hands in my lap, I realized I was shaking.
"You did good in there, kid. I like our whole 'good cop, bad cop' routine."
"I wasn't-" I looked over, disgusted by his calm. "You threatened kids!"
"Let me tell you something, Michael. When you make a threat, you better believe it yourself. Now, I wasn't really going to hurt those kids, but I had to make him believe I was. So you have to believe – if only for a moment – that you'll make good. Without that, words are just words."
"But-"
"Don't 'but' me, boy," Larry snapped. "I'm trying to teach you how to survive out there, how to get the job done. You keep that sensitive soul shit to yourself. I could have done a lot worse, and other people would have. I did as much as I needed to verify that he was telling the truth."
His tone made me silent, but he kept talking all the way back to the city.
"You have to be tough with these people, fearless. Never show them how soft you are inside – especially you. Instead, let them see that rage you got building up in there. Let them think you're as merciless as they come. Information is best gained through deception, but when you have no time or no patience, you use fear."
In the hotel room, we went through out normal nightly ritual. Larry called out phrases in Russian and I translated them, and when I got one wrong, he brought out the paintball gun. And then we practiced Krav Maga for over an hour, until my body was as tired as my mind.
When I finally laid down, I couldn't close my eyes. I kept seeing that man with his bloodshot eyes, kept seeing him wince. I kept leading that girl into the alley, imagining what a worse man might do to her. I imagined someone sweet talking my little brother, leading him into some alley. And I wondered if I was still a good man because of what I had witnessed today. I was honing talents that led to people getting hurt. I was being taught how to hurt. It was beginning to seem that people could not know the things I knew, do the things I did, and still be good at the core. Gradually, that 'sensitive soul,' as Larry liked to call it, was hardening into stone.
How long would it be before I could look at a suffering person and feel nothing? How long would it be before I could lead a girl like Ramona into an alley and end her life?
How long would it be until I was just like Larry?