Revolution (15 page)

Szabo’s expression never changed. “I did not
think that you would accept my offer the first time around. That is
why I have not killed you. You are intelligent, and although it
would be an easy matter to slay you for insulting my family’s
honor, I will not do it.” He snapped his claws, and they made a
sharp sound like a gun going off. “Be warned, though. Insult my
family line once more and I might change my mind.”

“You could make your move now—try and get
past me,” Harry suggested. Glancing behind him to see if anyone on
his side was coming, he saw and heard no one.

Another smirk formed on the gash that passed
for Szabo’s mouth. “Yes, I could, but I imagine that the agents who
have survived have more powerful weaponry stored at your cabin.
While I am strong, I am not immune to heavy firepower.”

Good to know that he could be hurt, Harry
thought. “So what do you want with Istvan? He doesn’t have any
special powers. I checked his blood. He’s going to live a long
time, but he would have without being changed over.”

Szabo received this news without moving a
muscle. “We are aware of that.”

There it came, the piece of the puzzle that
Harry had been looking for. “Do you mind telling me who
we
are?”

The massive bear-shark shrugged. “There are
others like us. We need Istvan for a different purpose. If you join
us, I shall tell you about it. Until then, I cannot.”

He didn’t answer the question about Istvan,
but then again, he didn’t have to. Szabo abruptly turned on his
heel and started to walk off. “Think about it,” he tossed over his
shoulder. “You have two days. If you wish to reply in the
affirmative, then leave a written message on this spot. If you do
not reply, then I will do what I must do in order to achieve my
goal.”

Harry started to follow him, but the larger
man dashed something at the ground, and a cloud of smoke instantly
appeared. Coughing, Harry backed out, hands spread wide and feeling
the air for a possible attack. The smoke soon disappeared and the
forest was empty.

Back at the cabin, he walked inside and found
Anastasia sleeping on the couch. The burn mark on her arm had
already begun to heal. At the back door, Farrell was wiping up the
bloodstains while the surviving agents hauled the carcass of the
frog thing out the door. “We’ll stand watch,” one of them said.
Farrell nodded assent.

After the door closed, he came over to the
table where Jason and Maze were busily working on the computers.
“What have you got?” Farrell asked.

Maze was typing furiously, but she continued
to shake from the adrenaline overload, as did her boyfriend.
“Nothing much,” she said. “I’m still working on it.”

Farrell turned to Harry. “Did you meet Jaws
outside?”

On any other day, Harry would have laughed at
the joke. Today, though, was no ordinary day. “Yeah, I did,” he
answered. “I’ve got more bad news. Szabo’s into building his own
world, away from society.”

Farrell grunted. “If you want even more bad
news, Bartok contacted me while you were outside. That disc you
gave him? It was damaged, but he managed to decipher some of the
information. It’s a list.”

“It’s a list of what?”

Harry should have expected the answer, but it
came as a shock all the same. “It’s a list of prisoners, newly
released and those still incarcerated. It’s like your
who’s
who
of scum, not just in Hungary, but in Serbia, Russia and a
dozen other European countries.”

“Oh holy crap,” said Harry, now aware of the
full scope of Szabo’s plans. “Did you get in touch with... I mean,
what are you going to do?”

Farrell rubbed his forehead. “I’ve already
contacted the authorities in those countries. The FBI, working in
conjunction with the State Department and Interpol, is keeping an
eye on the convicts. Thing is, if they haven’t broken any laws, we
can’t really arrest them. They have rights, dumb as that may sound
to you.”

It
did
sound dumb, but Harry thought
about the practicalities of it all. It was a given that not every
ex-convict would want to become a mutant. It was also a given that
the authorities would be watching them. So maybe the conversion
rate could be held to a minimum... maybe. However, he still
couldn’t figure out one thing. “Okay, we’ve got ex-prisoners that
may want to join Szabo’s cause. We know that he wants to build an
army, but I still don’t know what he wants with Istvan,
though.”

He glanced at the couch. The pig-man was
sleeping, some crumbs of food dotting his face. It figured. Up for
the food, and asleep when the action went down. Maybe it had
something to do with the devolution process, or maybe Istvan was
just lazy. Whatever, there were bigger issues to worry about.
“Szabo gave us two days and he expects an answer.”

“And then what?”

Harry shrugged. “He’ll probably attack us
again.”

The group spent the night in the main room
downstairs. Farrell called in the surviving agents and the three of
them took up positions at the windows. Anastasia woke up and joined
Harry on a nearby couch. They kept on the alert, but the only
sounds they heard were Istvan’s snores and farts. Anastasia pulled
a face when he passed a mighty gust of wind and waved her hand in
the air to get rid of the smell. However, there was nothing she
could do about it.

On the other hand, Jason and Maze were
appropriately freaked out. “That thing—it’s not going to come back,
is it?” asked Jason, his face drawn and anxious. Maze’s eyes grew
round, and while it was expected that she’d say something
sarcastic, the events of the past few minutes had already begun to
hit home.

“Hang tough,” Anastasia countered in a tight
voice, her claws out. “If he comes, we’ll be ready.”

It sounded good, but Harry remembered the
battle and did his best to fight off any possible panic attack.
Getting hurt was part of the equation for him, and he accepted
that. However, it wasn’t on his to-do list for his friends.

Fortunately, the rest of the night passed
without incident. Once Anastasia’s arm healed up, she checked out
the newly grown fur. “No scars,” she remarked with a sense of
satisfaction. “Enhanced healing is something I could get used
to.”

At dawn’s first light, Jason and Maze got
back on the computers. They were still rattled from the events of
the previous few hours, but Farrell spoke to them in a quiet,
fatherly tone, reassuring them that they’d be safe. It was the
first time he’d ever shown such a kindly air. Maybe he did care,
after all. “We’re on it,” Jason said. In a furious burst of speed,
he began typing in tandem with his girlfriend.

While they worked, Harry thought of
something. “Have you tried finding out who led the KGB at the time
Kulakov was there?” he asked.

Farrell chuckled, although this wasn’t the
time or place for laughter. “I’m way ahead of you, kid,” he said.
“That’s what we’ve been working on since we came up here. In fact,
we already know, and he’s on his way.”

Kid
—when is he ever going to stop
calling me
kid,
Harry wondered. He was almost nineteen, so
it was time for this to stop. A sigh of exasperation burst from
him, but Anastasia put her hand to his lips and shook her head. “I
got it,” he whispered.

A few minutes later, a knock at the door
sounded. Farrell checked the window, gun at the ready, but a second
later, he put his weapon away and opened up. Four men stood in the
doorway, three of them FBI agents, wearing the usual black suits
and the obligatory dark sunglasses. “We’ve got a car waiting, sir,”
one of them said.

“Jason, Maze, take whatever information
you’ve got on your discs and clear out,” Farrell ordered.

They quickly complied with the order and
grabbed their information. Two of the other agents hefted the
computer equipment and took it outside. As Maze walked by, she gave
Anastasia a quick hug. “Thanks for being here for us. School’s
looking safer and safer all the time.”

Anastasia, in turn, favored her with a
friendly nod as Maze walked to the door. “Take care of yourself.
We’ve got this.”

“You’ll be protected,” Farrell said, “And so
will your families. You’ve got my word. Get going.”

Jason nodded at Harry. “Talk to you soon,
man. Take care.”

Then they were gone. One of the agents took
the blood sample as well. Harry didn’t bother protesting. He
doubted that Szabo was interested in it or even knew about it. In
any case, it would be safer at FBI headquarters.

He stood in the opening and watched the car
drive off. It was a beautiful sunny summer morning, the birds were
singing, and the smell of pollen wafted through the air. However,
the simple wonders of nature had to be ignored. Reality intruded,
but this reality meant butting heads with mutants and monsters.

He swiveled his gaze to the other man. Short
and slender with wizened features and heavy spectacles, he had
thinning white hair and his eyes looked old and rheumy. He had to
be in his mid-eighties, if not more. He wore a ratty brown suit
that looked thirty years out of date. When he raised his left hand
to wipe the sweat from his face, it trembled, perhaps from
palsy.

“Who are you?” Harry asked, although he had a
good idea.

“My name is Andrei Ulyanov Morozoff,” the man
said in a surprisingly strong and vibrant voice. “I am the man you
seek.”

Morozoff sat at the table, a cup of tea in front of
him with a lone sugar cube on the dish. Harry and Anastasia sat
opposite him. Farrell sat watchful in his seat off to Harry’s left.
No one spoke as Morozoff surveyed the coffee cup, mentioning
something about not having a samovar handy. With a dour expression,
he picked up the cube and placed it between his teeth. He sipped
his tea noisily, which Harry thought odd. The sucking noise was
also a major turnoff.

Anastasia leaned over whispered into his ear
that this was a traditional Russian custom practiced over a century
before. “You were supposed to hold the sugar cube between your
teeth while drinking. I remember that much from my days in
Russia.”

“Do you remember anything else?” he asked.
Her memory had largely come back over the days they’d been
together, but there were still gaps. He never questioned her about
it, though. Some things had to remain in the past.

“I just remember that there are a lot of
Russian customs I never cared for. This is one of them.”

After some more sucking noises came, Farrell
cleared his throat. “Just so you’re aware, Mr. Morozoff defected to
the West over twenty years ago. He was just past retirement age
back in Russia and didn’t like the direction that the KGB was
moving in.”

The old man stopped drinking his tea long
enough to eye each and every one of his hosts without moving a
muscle in his face. He didn’t look very threatening at all, but
Harry felt as if he was under scrutiny by someone who knew far more
than it seemed. Perhaps he’d been told about what they were and
what they looked like.

As if reading Harry’s mind, Morozoff spoke in
a quiet tone. “I have heard about you, Harry Goldman. When you went
to the Ukraine a few short months ago, the details of your, er,
adventure were provided to me shortly afterwards by Agent
Farrell.”

“How long have you known about us?” Anastasia
asked with an edge to her voice. Just being reminded of her Russian
heritage and how her people had betrayed her seemed to set her off.
Harry knew it by her body language. Every muscle in her frame was
tensed to the max.

“About you,” Morozoff replied, “only
recently. However, the idea behind the both of you being as you are
goes back many years.”

He added that he was not a member of the
active KGB. “I was trained as an accountant, and I became a record
keeper for that organization. I handled disbursements to various
agencies, provided logistics, and all throughout my work I kept
detailed records of what went where and to whom.”

“In practical terms, it means that one of his
jobs was laundering money,” Farrell chimed in. “Over the past few
years, we’ve learned a lot about which departments got money for
nuclear fuel, heavy arms and where they went, not only within the
old Soviet Union, but also to other countries hostile to the
interests of this country. Mr. Morozoff’s testimony has helped the
United States immensely.”

Anastasia’s face got a dubious look on it.
“And you call that a find? Every government agency knows that
already.” She hissed at the old man, “You’re nothing more than a
database operator.”

“True,” he answered in a mild tone while
looking at her. “That is what I did. But you must also understand
that in the course of my duties, I came into contact with many
people... the people you seek.”

Morozoff went on to provide a richly detailed
history of the KGB’s rise to preeminence through methods that were
both ruthless and effective. “And we were feared,” he stated with
calm assurance. “It is not something that I am proud of. At the
time, we were afraid of the power that America held and were
paranoid, intensely so, about what their country was like.”

He spoke of taking notes at secret trials,
meetings with scientists, doctors, industrialists, power brokers
and more, all those who had the ability to turn a beaten and
bankrupt country after the Second World War into a preeminent
powerhouse. “From the early nineteen-fifties until the
mid-seventies was the Golden Age for our expansion. We ruled
athletics in many areas and we built up our military. Even our
people, oppressed though they were, had limited freedom and food to
eat.”

However, time marched on and attitudes
changed. “So now we come to the nineteen-eighties. Even with
Glasnost,
I was told by my superiors in the Kremlin that my
time was limited,” Morozoff said while finishing off his tea with a
noisy gulp. “I became disillusioned with how the country was being
run. It was corrupt and brutal. I was no better.”