A second shot rang out. The man’s other eye disappeared and he crumpled to the floor. The wall behind him was covered with a fine spray of dark red.
Hands still clamped to his painful ears, Marcus tore his eyes away from the dead man and looked at Zoya. She still hadn’t moved from her shooting stance, and her mouth was a grim line.
«Marcus, get out of there now!» yelled his father.
Marcus nodded and placed a hand lightly on Zoya’s shoulder. “Come on. We must go.” He could barely hear his own voice through the ringing in his ears.
Zoya gave the faintest of nods and kept the gun out as they skirted the corpse and headed out the door.
Moscow
Sunday, June 8, 2138
5:01 p.m. MSK
Tavik gripped the manual override wheel of his classic 2110 firemist green Cadillac, his knuckles white on the faux-leather grip. He liked being in control, which is why he always pretended to be driving despite the autodriver actually running things.
Everything felt out of control now.
There was always an undercurrent of subservience in his life, primarily to his boss Lev Abramovich Romanishin, the gangster who controlled nearly half of Moscow, but also to the rest of Lev’s favored underlings, of which Big Bunny was one.
Fucking Bunny.
Tavik checked the rearview mirror and saw Bunny’s fat face with its bulging eyes and the tiny, smarmy smile that never seemed to vanish no matter what the situation. Tavik gritted his teeth and slammed a palm into the steering wheel. Should have stood up to Lev on this one, refused to take Bunny along.
One of Tavik’s gang had called in sick yesterday and another was on vacation in Sochi. When Lev’s twin brother Viktor had told Tavik about Georgy’s treachery and Tavik had informed him he was two men short, Viktor had foisted Bunny on him. Anyone else and Tavik would have refused, but Viktor was Lev’s enforcer for a reason — the look in his eyes alone made you feel like your days on this Earth were measured in very small increments. And his eyes were the kindest part of him.
Goddamned motherfucking Bunny.
Everyone knew Bunny was a psychopathic bastard. Tavik prided himself on being relatively sociopathic himself, but he felt like the sanest man in Russia compared to Bunny.
Everything would be over and done if not for Bunny. We’d have the chips, Lev would be able to tell that general to go fuck himself, and I might get considered for another promotion sometime next year.
It had all seemed fine in Georgy’s kitchen. They’d been sipping tea with Mama Drozdova, waiting for Zoya to show up with the chips. No one, not even the stupidest of his men, should have needed to be told that the scrawny old lady was insurance to keep Zoya from doing anything dumb. Then Zoya had called. What possessed Bunny to break the old lady’s neck? What was running through that chicken brain of his?
The air car slowed and descended toward a crumbling apartment building, one of a long row of similar drab buildings along Proletarskiy Prospekt. Tavik took two deep breaths as the car settled into an empty parking space near the building entrance. There were three other cars in the lot, and only one of those looked like it might actually be able to fly. He took some more breaths as he waited for his two men and Bunny to clamber out of the car. Don’t be stupid, Tavik; you can’t touch the bastard.
He climbed out to join his men near the entrance. The steel door was too warped to close, so there was no need for a code. Bunny reached to swing the door open and Tavik imagined slamming the huge man’s face into the steel over and over again. He wanted to wipe that fucked up smile off forever. There were few men that could make Tavik hesitate — Viktor, naturally, and Big Bunny. The man was a monster, nearly half a meter taller than Tavik and twice as broad in the shoulders. Even if Tavik could manage to shove him up against the metal door, he wasn’t certain his own men would back him up. Bunny was Lev’s man, and touching one of Lev’s men was a good way to commit suicide.
Tavik placed a hand on Bunny’s bulky shoulder and felt the iron sinews beneath the fabric of the gray solar coat. Bunny turned to Tavik, his thick lips stretching his smirk a little further than usual, his pig eyes boring into Tavik’s with a gleam that almost resembled intelligence.
Tavik held the gaze as long as he could but finally looked away. He pointed at the doorway. “Bunny, as far as I know that’s Zoya’s only remaining relative in there. We need him as leverage. You know what leverage means?” Nothing changed in Bunny’s eyes. “It means we need him alive. Look, why don’t you just wait here? Guard the car. In fact, why don’t all three of you wait here? I can do this myself.”
Then he realized his anger at Bunny was making him careless. He turned back to his men and pointed at the skinny one in the blue track suit. “Boris, find the Web link for this building and install a trace in case she calls. Vugar, take my car and park it somewhere she won’t see it. Don’t do anything if you see her except give me a call.”
The two men nodded. Tavik turned back to the entrance, squeezed past Bunny, and entered the foyer. The tiles were grimy and the air reeked of vomit and urine and stale alcohol. A shadow blocked out the sunlight and Tavik knew that Bunny had followed him inside.
Fuck your mother you fucking psycho bastard.
Tavik turned to Bunny and shrugged his shoulders. “There’s nothing dangerous about Uncle Vasya. Wait outside…please!”
He turned and headed for the stairwell. At least Uncle Vasya lived on just the second floor. A crunch of broken tile told Tavik that Bunny was still following. Tavik sighed and decided there was little he could do other than try to keep Zoya’s uncle alive as long as possible. He wondered who else Zoya might turn to for help. There was Oksana, her best friend from school, and he seemed to recall there was another friend — Irina perhaps? — but he didn’t know enough about her to do anything. He’d sent Nikolai to Oksana’s apartment to try to capture Zoya if she headed that way. If Zoya headed somewhere else, well…she’d be worried about Uncle Vasya and Oksana, so she’d have to turn up eventually.
Problem is, the general wants his chips now, today, so Lev wants them now, too.
There was a large grove of birch trees on a deserted dacha out beyond the Lenin Hills. This was Tavik’s favorite place to bury all the fucks who got in his way or disrespected him. He smiled and promised himself he’d throw the first shovelful of dirt onto Bunny’s clammy dead face before too much longer.
Two bums crouched against a wall on the second floor landing. They slumped further and mumbled something apologetic as Tavik and Bunny strode by. Vasya’s door was the last one on the right. There was little sign that any of the other apartments were inhabited.
Tavik reached for the buzzer before remembering that it never worked. He rapped on the padded metal door and glanced over at Bunny, who stood as implacable as a statue.
He knocked again, harder. “Uncle Vasya! It’s me, Tavik! Georgy’s friend, remember?”
He’d just about decided the old man wasn’t home when the lock clicked and the door swung open a crack. A rheumy eye peered out.
“Who’s that? Ah, I remember you, always running around with Georgy.” Vasya flung the door wide and held a bony hand out for Tavik to shake. Vasya was probably in his mid-fifties, but he looked older. He must have skipped some of the nanobot injections, because he actually had some gray hair on his head and stubbled cheeks. The bulbous red nose indicated a man who loved his vodka. Vasya peered with his weak eyes over Tavik’s shoulder and his head jerked up. “Oi! Who’s that with you there?”