We're All Capitalists Now
Please check Chapters 1 & 2 for the caveats and restrictions.
We're All Capitalists Now
Chp. 3 I am Pavel
I am Pavel Dimitrievich I was born in the city of Volgograd and am the only son of Dimitri and Maria. My parents were born in Volgograd to parents who had participated in the heroic defense of the city during the Great Patriotic War.
The Nazis had surrounded the city, but been unable to force its immediate surrender and so like fools, instead of merely isolating the city and moving past it, they sat down to lay it siege. They hoped to starve the population into surrender. Their dictator and our dictator decided to make the siege of our city a propaganda battle that would by the time it was over cost both sides dearly.
The propaganda value stemmed mainly from an unfortunate decision to kiss our dictator's ass by renaming the city in his honor thus by the time the Nazis arrived our city was called Stalingrad or "Stalin's City". As much as the Nazi's wanted the city that much and more its citizens did not want to give it to them, and many tens of thousands of patriotic Soviet citizens died there.
Years later, after Stalin had died, Nikita Sergeivich Khrushchev, who had been one of Stalin's henchmen, announced that Stalin had been a bad man and great evil had been done in his name and the city changed its name again. This time the city fathers decided to call the city for the river on whose banks it was built. I guess their theory was that a river could never end up becoming a political liability.
Anyway, my grandparents had all participated bravely in the defense of the Motherland during one of her greatest trials. They had been thrown together to become sniper teams. They would seek of places of concealment as near the enemy's lines as possible and then one at a time shoot the invaders whenever they presented good targets. The siege lasted 900 days. I don't know for sue how many Nazis my grandparents killed, but while they worked in such close proximity for so long their first coalesced into four friends and then into two couples.
Their superiors realized that they had become couples and "suggested" that if they got married they could perform another service for the Motherland as propaganda weapons showing the rest of the Union that life inside Stalingrad was still going along normally. Too, they'd show how powerless the nazis were to destroy the will and commitment of young Communists fighting for their city, Motherland, and Party.
They were sworn into the Party in the morning and married at noon. Their honeymoons lasted until sunset when they resumed their forward positions. By the time I was born so many years later they were plump older people who dressed up every First of May in their best clothes to which they attached an absolutely amazing number of medals. I used to love going out with them then as a young child because everywhere we'd go they'd be greeted warmly by everyone we encountered. Then, they'd introduce me as their grandson and all the older people, especially the women would make much of me. Some would give me a candy or two or maybe even a couple of rubles.
There were real advantages to being an only child and even more to being an only grandchild.
Because of my grandparents' status minor patriotic celebrities, my parents were able to go to university and both became teachers. They were permitted to join the Party and did because life was better for Party members, but they really never cared much about the struggle of the proletariat in general or the Party in particular and I guess they conveyed their lack of revolutionary zeal because by the time I was ready to advance to higher education my reception was decidedly tepid.
My youthful educational record, while it had no huge blemishes was nothing that would set the world afire. Everything has always come pretty easily for me. As a young child I was so cute I was nearly pretty. I didn't understand that then, I just knew that if I wanted something, usually I all I had to do was ask for it. With six doting adults I often was given things before I even knew I wanted them. That atmosphere combined with a slight tendency to laziness probably accounted for my lackluster scholastic record.
Don't get me wrong, I never failed any classes but I certainly had more scores in the upper seventies when with just a little bit more application I could have had scores predominating in the high nineties, if not full 100s.
I was staring conscription in the face. I didn't want to be forced into the army and shipped to Afghanistan which was rapidly becoming a "bone factory." It was my grandmother Ekaterina, my mother's mother, who seeing the lowered quality of my immediate prospects suggested that the grandparents might forge a united front and try to get me into the Agency's training program.
It sounded like a good idea to me as everybody knows that the KGB always gets the best of everything. Then too, I might get some foreign travel of it and it wouldn't be a bad career. What followed was a campaign of letters, phone calls, visits and presentations by my grandparents and their friends (all of whom had watched me grow up) to a succession of bureaucrats. I was accepted.
The four grandparents flew with me to Moscow (my parents' teaching schedules wouldn't allow them to come). We spent that night in a good hotel and they took me to a nice restaurant for supper. Later as we sat around the hotel room each gran in his or her turn tried to fill me with the wisdom they'd acquired during their long and honored lives. Basically it boiled down to the following: 1) This is my big chance, it is not like a train, there won't be another along in a few minutes; 2) It's going to be the Agency for me or if I wash out, forced induction into the army, shipment to Afghanistan and who knows what after that with no future worth living thereafter; 3) Make the best of any situation I which I find myself; 4) Nothing is going to be so bad that it couldn't get almost incredibly worse; 5) No matter how bad I might think a given event or circumstance was there are boys in Armenia who'd freely kill to take my place, so be a man and take the future as it comes; 6) As long as there is life, there is hope - so never give up on hope - do what you have to do to stay alive; 7) I don't have to live as a monk, but do not form an permanent relationship until I had a few years in the Agency - there was no advantage to encumbering myself too early.
My surprise at the last bit of wisdom offered must have been easily visible on my face as my other grandmother laughed, patted the back of my hand and said, "No, dear Pavel we're not talking about ourselves. But, our situation was extraordinary in the extreme and those conditions do not apply any more. So, live a normal life, find yourself a girl, but keep your options open for as long as you can. Besides, being single will mean you'll be more easily available for assignments which might help you climb the ladder."
After a while of this, my eyes grew leaden and I was struggling to stay awake. My grandmothers seeing this, made my grandfathers bring the lecture to a close so that "the boy" could get some sleep before his big day. Each grandparent, in turn, then gave me a big hug and a kiss on my cheek. They were all crying and I was choked up a bit, too. I laid my head down and the next thing I knew light was streaming in through the windows, everybody except me was up and there was a general bustle in the room. I was shipped off down the hall to the bathroom to shave and clean myself up. I had to look my best for my first day in the Agency.
That whole day went by as a blur with so much to absorb. A part of me felt like a child being delivered to school on his first day. I was leaving the life of my childhood behind and entering the world of adults and suddenly I wasn't so sure I wanted to do that. My grandfathers walked beside me to the door indicated on my instruction sheet. We'd stood off in the square and watched a few other young men carrying suitcases present themselves at the same door so we were sure we'd gotten the right one.
We hugged and kissed each other again and then the stern looking, but smiling officer at the door indicated that I should enter and they could leave. He reminded us that we would be able to write and after a time, I'd be able to visit them. The door closed and my new life began.
I was taken to the barracks and shown my bed and a closet. They said that tomorrow or the next day I'd be issued my uniforms and then I'd have to ship my suit case and its contents back home. Nothing much was done with us that first day as more and more of our classmates arrived until by supper time we were all there. We were marched do the dining hall and fed, then the lounge was open for those who wished to watch TV or write letters. I wrote long letters to both sets of grandparents, even though I knew they'd share my letters and a short note to my parents.
I took the three envelopes out to the lobby of the building and dropped them into the postal box, then walked back slowly feeling excited and happy. As I entered the barracks I could see that my fellow recruits were standing at attention and there were three officers in the center of the room. I wasn't sure what to do. Should I immediately come to attention or hurry over and join my classmates and then stand to attention? I decided on the latter so that, at least I would be able to hear what was going on.
I ran forward and taking my cue from my classmates stood in front of my bed at attention. The officers had noticed my approach and the Lieutenant barked at me, "Name." I answered with my name. There was an immediate reaction among the officers. Again, the Lieutenant spoke, "Where were you?" "Sir," I answered, "I went to the lobby and posted three letters home." This time the officers conferred quietly amongst themselves. The Captain walked over to me and said, "Three letters?" "Yes, Sir. One to my parents and one each to each set of grandparents."
The Major instructed me to follow them and we three left the barracks. We walked down a couple of hallways and ended up in what looked like a doctor's clinic. There was even a doctor standing there in her white jacket. The Major turned, faced me and said, "Pavel Dimitrievich you are here to become a KGB officer and take a salient point in the great struggle of the proletariat and the Party which represents it against the decadent forces of the bourgeoisie. This will require a great deal of strength from you. We will help you build yourself up to the strength required for that struggle. It was your grandparents who steered you towards a career in the KGB wasn't it?"
"Sir, yes they were instrumental in showing me that I belonged in the KGB. They even escorted me to Moscow and this morning walked me to the front door" I answered wondering just where this was all going. Surely, they already knew all that. Might my parents' lack of interest be what he was working toward? Should I mention my grandparents' status as heroes of the Great Patriotic War?
"Pavel Dimitrievich," he continued, "you must now look deep into yourself and find a core of strength. It is my duty to inform you that the plane carrying your grandparents and a great many other good Soviet citizens exploded in the air. We believe the explosion to have been the work of either an Afghani or a Chechen rebel who may or may not have been on the plane himself. All aboard were lost. You are to remain here in the clinic tonight and the doctor will give you a sedative to help you sleep. But, if you are to remain with your class you must pull yourself together and rejoin your classmates tomorrow morning." The major placed his hand briefly on my shoulder and then the three officers left the clinic.
"Open your shirt," it was the doctor whose voice seemed to be coming from some other dimension. Mechanically I opened my shirt, she grabbed the muscle of my right upper chest and there was the brief sensation of an insect bite. I know that I was just standing there staring at the wall, tears streaming down my cheeks. "Come lie down before that takes effect and you fall down," it was the doctor again. I did as she commanded and lay down fully clothed. One moment I was staring at the ceiling, my tears rolling into my ears and the next I was out.
I don't remember dreaming at all that night. All I do remember for sure is that suddenly there was a lot of very bright light and a voice I did not recognize was ordering me to get out of the bed or I'd be late. There was another doctor there at the side of my bed. I did not recognize her but she was very insistent that I get up and get moving. I felt as if I were moving in slow motion. "Hurry up, the Commandant wants to see you. What have you done?" solicitude was not her long suit. I don't know what I was given last night but I felt groggy. Last night !!!! It came back to me. My four dearest friends, the pillars of my childhood, were all gone at once. I made some kind of choking noise and the tears began again.
A sergeant arrived with the news that he was there to guide me to the Commandant's office and I had better hurry up. I left the bed a mess and stumbled along behind him. We walked for a bit, he was trying to march but I could not focus enough to keep in step with him. Besides, tears in your eyes make it difficult for you see clearly and I didn't want to crash into anything nor bounce off any walls. By the time we'd arrived at the Commandant's office the sergeant was well and truly angry with me but I was genuinely unable to care about him just then.
I was introduced into the reception area and a secretary took pity on me and showed me where the loo was so I could wash my face at least before I went into The Presence. I am sure she knew my story and further, I believe that she'd told the sergeant because his attitude towards me had changed completely by the time I came out. He even asked if I'd like some tea? I was really too numb to want anything, and knew that I had to gather my wits hurriedly before I met the Commandant.
Too soon, a box on the secretary's desk buzzed and she looked up at me and in a kind voice instructed me to enter the door she was indicating, that the Commandant was awaiting me.
I don't remember much of the interview. Just a few things impressed themselves on me. I know that the Commandant was offering to discharge me and allow me to return home if I wished. But, return home to what? To whom? No, that city on the river was become a home to my memories but it was no longer my home. I would make the KGB my home. I would take my grandfathers' maxims to heart and make the best of the situation in which I found myself.
I did not leave and I made the Agency my home. For the first time in my life I really made an effort academically. I ended up doing so well that I was assigned to cryptography and did so well there that I was assigned to work on the signals passing to or from the Chairman himself. I had it made.
Then one day a short two and a half years later I decoded a private message that had arrived for the Chairman from a major in the field. This message came in a cypher so secret that I'd never seen it used before. When you decode a message you try not to allow yourself to string all the words together so that you understand the message. Usually I had been able to do that, decode a message and not remember anything about it. But this message was different from any I had ever handled before. It was from an Agency major and contained an analysis of the chaos that was enveloping the Union and a prognostication that the Union was doomed to ultimate failure. As if that weren't dangerous enough, the writer then proposed, as a money making venture, a project so loathsome and horrific that I was sure that he'd be arrested and either buried in the deepest basement of the Lubyanka were I work or failing that, he'd be marched directly to a wall and shot.
I went off duty within a couple of hours after that message came in and no response to it had come across my desk. When I came back on duty the next day, I checked the log and noticed that a message had gone out to that major from the Chairman. I decided to check the text of the outgoing message and had deciphered "Return Lubyanka immediately prepared to discuss. . . " I noticed a captain watching me and maintaining my business-like demeanor shuffled some papers and back got down to my job.
I was sure that I'd pulled it off reasonably well. I had managed to get the major's name and thought I might ask around quietly and see if anybody knew anything about him. He turned out to be a career member of the KGB having joined as a private and risen up through the ranks to be a major. He had spent the majority of his career working in the basements below my feet interrogating prisoners and had a earned not one but three nicknames, each more frightening than the last. I wasn't quite sure what I could, or should do after all - if he was corresponding with the Chairman of the Agency himself, and nothing were done, I'd just better tuck in my head and hide at my desk and hope to go unnoticed.
Forty-eight hours later I was instructed to leave my desk and take a limousine from the motor pool and go to the Agency's private airport outside Moscow and pick up an officer who was coming in. Why wasn't someone from the motor pool assigned to this routine taxi service? I was a cryptographer, not a taxi driver. So who was I to pick up?
They were waiting for me at the motor pool the car was freshly washed and its tank was filled. I was handed a sealed envelope and told to open it as I saw the plane taxi to the service line and not one minute before. "That's strange," I thought, but orders are orders and in my short, but promising career in the Agency I had learned to obey orders implicitly.
The drive from the city felt strange. To begin with there was a lot of military traffic. Armored personnel carriers and even tanks were entering Moscow in convoys! There was no holiday coming up, no military parade in the offing that I could remember. I decided to ask around when I got back. Sometimes after a parade a fella in a sharp uniform can find a girl who in a spasm of patriotic fervor will invite him in and share a few minutes' fun.
I had had a girlfriend of sorts early on in my career, but she wouldn't let me in her and while she and I would get naked and play with each other's bodies on her bed, she insisted on keeping her hymen intact! Hand jobs were better than nothing but not much and anyway, I could do that for myself and didn't have to take myself out for dinner and dancing or a movie or maybe to the ballet which was only a few blocks from Headquarters before my fist would make me feel good.
In the end, I decided that my hand was as good and much cheaper and that I really ought to concentrate on my career, so I let her go. That doesn't mean that from time to time as the internal fluids built past the safety level, I didn't go to the dance clubs on a night out to try my luck. Usually the girls at the clubs were interested in finding a guy who was doing postgraduate studies at the University, or a guy who'd finished his postgraduate studies and had some money to spend on them. A junior sergeant in the KGB really wasn't much of a catch and more often than not, I came back to the barracks and went into the loo to manually lower the level of my "internal fluids" to a safer level.
I got to the airport early, no need to piss off some VIP by being late and making him wait. I saw the plane when it was on final approach and watched it land. It was a small passenger jet with two engines located at the rear. Whomever this guy was he must be really important to rate such fancy transportation.
I watched the touch down then the roll out as the plane rolled down the runway until it exited onto a taxiway and headed for the service line. In strict obedience to my orders I watched the plane taxi up to my location and as it's door opened, I reached in to the front seat and picked up the large manilla envelope. I saw a man in a regular suit standing on the top of the rolling stairs looking around, he saw the car and me and began to descend the stairs. I opened the envelope and there was a large portrait photo of the VIP I was to pick up. The photo matched the face of the guy walking toward me, I turned the photo over to see his name. It was the originator of the message, the guy whose nickname within the Headquarters was Andre the Destroyer. Why had I been sent to pick him up?
I broke out into a sweat. I knew that I had to appear cool and calm. I opened the back door for him and the boot for the one piece of luggage being carried by crewman from the plane. He entered the back of the car with a nod of his head in my direction. I felt like he'd stared holes right through my eyes as he passed on his way into the car. "Get a hold of yourself," I thought as I circled around the back of the car, closing the boot and getting into my seat.
I checked him in the rear view mirror to see if he were ready to leave and again he nodded to me. That was all the permission I needed and I turned over the engine and started out. My passenger sat there looking out the windows as if he hadn't a care in the world. Being this close to a man as ruthless as both his reputation says he was and his message confirmed him to be made me extremely nervous. I just had to try to keep from showing my nervousness.
I didn't realize it then, but my life had already started down a path that would change it past anything I'd ever known and irrevocably towards things I never would have guessed. I got my passenger to the Lubyanka and as he was exiting the car he ordered me to remain with the car in case he should need me. Then he bolted into the building. I drove the car back to the motor pool where some time later I was helping the motor pool staff clean the car when a very agitated colonel arrived saying, "Come with me immediately, the Colonel General wants you."
Colonel General? I had delivered a major! Well, he'd just have to understand if he summoned me and I was off doing for the Colonel General. I scurried along behind the colonel giving silent thanks for my delivery from the major. We went through hallway after hallway past offices and I realized only just as we arrived that we were only a few offices removed from those of the Chairman himself. This general, whomever he is, may have the ability to protect me from the major, if I can only ingratiate myself with him as quickly as possible. My grandfather was right, there's always hope.
End of chp.3