by Mike Gomes
"I did not kill Antonio." Nikolai was frustrated with the accusations that, again, his mission had created an atmosphere that allowed the death of Gabriella's husband. "I offered you a mission, nothing more. You knew what was at stake and you knew who the target was. Don't blame me for simply giving you this mission when you called asked me for a job. You could've walked away and said no."
The two held themselves in silence for the next minute as Gabriella pulled up to the gardens and parked the car exactly as she said, outside of the Barrington Hotel on the side of the road. Turning the car off, she shifted in her chair and looked over at Nikolai.
"You're right, you didn't kill him. But this whole mission is connected with that," Gabriella sighed. "And right now, I need someone to blame, and that's going to be you. Once I get Victor in front of me, I'll be blaming him and not you anymore."
"I guess that makes sense to me. This kind of a situation is difficult on everybody involved, and with the loss that you've taken, I can't even imagine what the pain must feel like. My only worry is that that pain gets in the way. That it clouds your judgment and makes you off-center. I'm not saying that you're not a pro and that you don't know what you're doing, but I feel like when a variable like this gets added to the mix, it makes everything ten times harder."
"That's why you're going to need to keep an eye on me. You're gonna need to cut me off if I go too far, and you're going to need to step in if I start to do something too early," Gabriella explained, showing her vulnerable side to Nikolai for the first time. "Do you think you can do that for me? I know you're watching your own ass, but this time I think I need someone watching mine too."
Nikolai gave a smile and looked at her. "I'd love to watch your ass."
The two agents laughed for a brief moment before pushing open the doors and going to the sidewalk. They walked side by side into the long and wide paved area that sat in front of the Royal Gardens.
There were three open entrances, one in the center, and one to the left and right that allowed groups to flow in and out with wide expanses to eliminate a feeling of overcrowding. It was a location that held people that were constantly in movement, keeping everyone at arm's length, providing privacy and security for all the people that came to enjoy the gardens.
"What do you think? Is he gonna show?" Gabriella asked as they stood about thirty yards from the front of the center entrance. "You know him a lot better than me. Is he the guy that'll go for something like this?"
"He sure as hell will. In fact, here he comes."
Gabriella turned, waiting to see the face of the man that was ready to kill her and had murdered her husband. Letting her eyes drift across the crowd, she saw his face as it jumped out at her, causing a rage to shoot up inside her that was quickly quelled by fear. Makarov was beside him.
Victor and Makarov moved their way through the crowd, already making visual contact with Gabriella and Nikolai, approaching smoothly and without negative intent.
"Hello, Gabriella. It's been a long time," Makarov greeted, looking over to the woman who stood glassy-eyed.
"You're a monster," Gabriella hissed, causing Victor to give a quick smile.
"I don't think we need to get off on this kind of a negative tangent, do we?" Victor said smugly. "But I do understand that you two have quite a history."
"Who gives a crap about any history? Let's get this thing ironed out right now. And what's this guy doing here?" Nikolai snapped, frustrated by the inclusion of a man he didn't know.
"He was in charge of the child development program through the KGB," Victor spoke first, cutting Makarov off before he could talk. "He trained me, and he also trained the Mantis.
"What?" Nikolai was unable to stop himself from the question, sounding usure of himself. "What is this all about, Victor?"
"Well, I just thought that these two would like to have a nice reunion. They've only seen each other one time, other than the years she spent under his tutelage," Victor explained. "Those were some years, weren't they, Gabriella?"
Her eyes did not break from the man that she had once referred to as master. His eyes held tight with hers as the two engaged in a stare down, looking for some level of dominance over one another.
"Gabriella, I'm glad to see that you look good." Makarov smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. "You had a great many successes with us before you left. I would love to see if you could come back and join us."
"Go to hell," Gabriella growled, trying to restrain herself from showing any other emotions or any other tears. Seeing the man triggered a feeling of her closing off and wanting to fall under his guidance, having it fill her with a feeling of protection and safety. "You have no power over me anymore."
"Don't be silly, my darling, I've always had power over you. You know as well as I do that it wouldn't take me long to bring you completely back. To have your mind re-engage and live the delights of working for the KGB. You'd be a hero amongst your people. Have you forgotten that Russia is your people? That Russia is the one that you vowed to love and protect with your life?"
The feelings came rolling back in as Gabriella pictured herself as a child standing in front of the man, waiting for his instructions. To please him was all that mattered, a twisted father figure with a penchant for aggression and violence. Not that he would do it to Gabriella herself, but instead commanding her to commit the violent acts upon adults and children alike.
"You had me kill children." Gabriella’s anger built higher and higher inside her. "You let that happen, you told me to kill them."
"And you did. You were the perfect soldier," Makarov praised. "And now look at you, running all over the world and getting into fights. Why don't you stop the foolishness and come back where you belong, back to the place that your parents wanted you."
"That's enough. Stop talking to her," Nikolai snapped, trying to gain control of the situation. "This is not the place for this kind of conversation. If this spills ugly, we all wind up dead."
"You wanted to kill those children. You thought it would impress me," Makarov continued with his gruff voice. "Don't you remember how proud you were? It was one of the few times I ever saw you even smile. You brought back a lock of the girl's hair when I sent you to kill her father."
"I thought I needed evidence," Gabriella replied in a soft and timid voice, letting her mind's eye drift back to the murder of the young girl.
"No, no, Gabriella, that's not what you felt." Makarov took a small step in closer to her. "If that were the case, you would have brought the man's hair back, or taken off his ear, but instead, you decided to show me the hair of the little girl. You wanted me to know that you killed the wife and the little girl as well. People that had done nothing to you, but they had done something to the KGB."
"Sorry to kill this little reunion you two are having, but can we get down to brass tacks and figure this thing out. What is it that you want, Victor?" Nikolai’s frustration rose in his voice. He held the back of Gabriella's arm, bringing her in close to him.
"Gabriella, first of all, I'd like to apologize to you." Victor’s tone was snide and unconvincing. "Killing your husband had to be done. You were no longer there. You left. I would have much rather have gotten you alone and then killed you."
"Don't speak about him," Gabriella said through gritted teeth, turning her attention to Victor. "He was more of a man than you'll ever be."
"More of a man than I'll ever be?" Victor gave a small chuckle. "Right now, he's wolf food. The wolves, the coyotes, and every other piece of vermin that's out there has fed off of his dead body, and whether you like it or not, that's the existence of him at this point. There is no question who is superior between he and I."
Nikolai's hand reached down, grabbing Gabriella’s hand and squeezing it tightly. The pressure from his thumb and fingers pressed in hard to the back of her hand, trying to divert her attention and focus away from Victor and Makarov into the stimulus that he was providing to her.
"Again, Victor, with all
the dramatics. What, you wanna torture this woman? You wanna give her a play by play of what happened?" Nikolai asked sarcastically. "I wanted to deal with professionals here today, not men that thought this was nothing more than a joke. If you have nothing to say to us, we'll walk away and be done with the whole situation." Nikolai started to turn, with his hands still firmly held to Gabriella who stood her ground.
"It seems like the little lady doesn't want to go with you," Victor snarked, causing a laugh from Makarov.
"She knows where home is. She knows her father wants her to come." Makarov placed his hand on his chest as he said the word father, letting the girl feel that he had such affections for her.
"You were never my father, and you were never my friend. You were never anything but a sadistic warmonger who wanted to take young children and have them do your bidding." Gabriella let the fire rise up in her voice as she spoke. "You're no better than those bastards that sent children in to do bombings for them in the Islamic world and in Vietnam. Children who don't know any better, but have a bomb strapped to their back, ready for eventual death that reeks over them. You didn't put a bomb on us, but you put something much worse that would destroy our lives."
"Maybe I did," Makarov nodded. "But wouldn't you like to give your father the opportunity to take you back and make you whole again."
"You're not my father!" Gabriella yelled, causing heads in the area to turn and look at them. "You have no right to say that. I was taken from my family. I was taken from my parents, and there is no way that you are anything more than a random encounter that resulted in a torturing of my life. My only hope is to see you in the grave."
"Well, that's all very dramatic, Gabriella. But right now, Daddy wants you to come home." Victor grinned. "And you don't wanna disappoint your daddy, do you? Do you really want to make him feel that you don't appreciate everything that he did for you?"
Turning her eyes toward Victor, Gabriella felt the hardness in her face shift to softness as she looked the man in the eyes. She was not met with anger or frustration, but rather a man that looked as if he had some feeling of understanding for what she was going through. "Maybe you're right in some weird way. But I don't want to go back. I just want freedom. I want you, Victor, and you, Makarov, and the whole KGB to leave me be. If any of you had any sense, you’d realize I could have still been an asset to you, but instead you've chosen to make me an enemy and stalked me."
"Enough of this talking to the woman, she doesn't know about—" Victor began, before being harshly interrupted. Gabriella had reached deep into her pocket and pulled out the small 38 caliber snub-nose revolver that sat inside her jacket. Her hand had covered it, keeping it out of sight from all of the men that stood around her.
In a motion that held excitement, fear, regret, and pain, her hand quickly rose, firing a shot first into Victor’s chest. He grunted as his body curled over at the waist. Her hand rose slowly again, firing two shots into his head, the first in his forehead, the second in his mouth, from the movement of his head going backwards. The blood flowed rapidly from Victor before his body even hit the ground. The great agent caught off-guard, not thinking that the woman would dare to commit such an act in front of all those around her, especially when another member of the KGB was there.
"Gabriella!" Nikolai yelled. "What the hell are you doing?"
Gabriella's eyes shifted, not paying attention to that of her friend. She locked on Makarov who stood silent and motionless as if the murder had never taken place around him.
As the crowds screamed and ran for cover, Nikolai took two steps away calling for her to join him. But Gabriella and Makarov stood face-to-face as she pointed the gun directly in his face.
"I'm an old man, Gabriella, I'm not going to be able to fight back. But I can still offer you the ability to come back with me, to let me take care of you."
"I hate you!" Gabriella’s tears started to roll from her eyes and the gun in her hand shook.
"Gabriella, we need to go!" Nikolai urged, moving over to her again.
"He needs to die!" Gabriella shouted. "I need to kill him, I need to put this down to rest."
"Then pull the trigger, and let's get the hell out of here."
Gabriella's finger laid on the trigger, twitching and ready to fire the next shot, to render the man's life ended, but he showed no weakness. He didn't cower, he didn't crumble, he didn't do anything that would indicate he had any fear of the woman who had just murdered a man no more than two feet from him, and now held the gun on his face.
"I think you know, Gabriella, I always loved you like a daughter. I thought I was simply making the best of you."
"You need to die, you need to die right now." Gabriella was frustrated and angered. "I can't let you do this to anyone else."
"I think, you know that program has been shut down for a long time," Makarov said softly. "You do what you need to do, but I don't think you'll kill me, I don't think you'll kill me at all, because when it comes right down to it, I'm one of only two men that ever gave a damn about you, and the other man is now dead in Northern Chile. Gabriella, in short, I'm all you've got."
"Stop it. Don't say that." Gabriella could feel the harshness of Makarov’s words digging into her.
"Did I ever once let you down? Did I ever once not do what I said I would do for you? Did I ever stop caring and working with you?" he asked. "No, you were the one that left me. I didn't leave you."
Gabriella still held the gun to Makarov’s head, but without the confidence that she once had. In the background, off the side of the buildings, the sirens roared as the cellphone calls that bounced off the cell towers alerted the police to the murder from the woman in broad daylight. The body still down at her feet with blood flowing from his head and a hole in his chest.
"Gabriella, now, let's go now!" Nikolai grabbed her hand and pulled her away from Makarov, her other hand still extended with the pistol facing him and him not turning away.
Between the tears, the shame, and the confusion that held in her mind, the bullet never left the chamber of the 38 snub-nose revolver. Instead, the woman who was once the protege little girl of the man, felt like she was a child all over again.
Chapter Twenty-Six
"I've always loved Florence," Gabriella said wistfully as she picked up the glass of wine, taking a small sip. Sitting in the Piazza Della Signoria, she shared a table with Nikolai and a bottle of wine. "Antonio and I came here for our honeymoon. It was a wonderful time in our lives. He already knew what I did for a living, and I knew what he did, the same thing."
"Antonio was like us?" Nikolai asked, giving a smile. "I had no idea. I thought he was just a regular guy. How is it that you keep winding up with people like us?"
"I guess it's just luck." Gabriella shrugged, taking another sip from her glass of wine before putting it down and watching the children in the piazza kick a soccer ball back and forth.
"What do you think the KGB is going to do?" Nikolai asked, trying to draw the conversation off of her late husband.
"I don't know. It's not Makarov’s style to send a complete regiment of men to come chase me all around the world. I think he still believes that I'll come to him, and that it will just take time." Gabriella sighed. "He knows more of what he did to me than I do. When it comes to all that kind of mind control, I can only remember what they wanted me to, and once in a while, I get glimpses of other things, things that trigger me to react, and I realize I have to get control over it."
"Well, it's been a week, and we haven't seen anything yet. And we've made damn sure not to talk about anything as we've been on the road." Nikolai tried to reassure her that they were safe. "I think if they had really wanted us, they would have sent out the whole fleet for us and tried to trap us before we got out of Asia. I think your old friend there from the past is just letting us go. But who knows what he told them when he got back?"
"My guess is he told them nothing. He doesn't need to tell them anything. He's in programs that are so c
lassified that the rank and file have no idea about them. Even some of the highest leaders have no idea about him and what he does. It's straight militaristic. Nothing else, only the men that are there for life and in secured positions have any idea."
"I guess you're right. Nobody in the normal world has ever heard of the Mantis. And if they ever did, they'd probably want to make damn sure you were on their side."
"I'm not even sure that I want to be on my side anymore," Gabriella admitted. "What happened back there in Bangkok wasn't good for me, or you, or anybody else. It feels like it just came down to egos wanting to control things, and who was going to win out."
"Well, you kind of took care of who won." Nikolai swirled his wine around his glass. "You know, I haven't even asked you about that yet. Why did you do that when you did it?"
Gabriella lifted up her own glass of wine and took another sip. There was cheese already cut on the board on the table, with bread lying next to it. She took some cheese and placed it on top of the bread, taking a small bite. Gaining the moment to reflect on exactly the words she wanted to use, Nikolai was sure that her feelings were still being sorted out and would be for a long, long time.
"In actuality, it was something that Makarov had taught me a long time ago. About the unexpected. About people not knowing what you're going to do and when you're going to do it," Gabriella explained, smiling at the children as the ball they kicked rolled up to her table. She kicked it gently back with her pair of high heels.
"Thank you, ma'am," said a young boy, kicking the ball up into his own hands and waving at her.
"Antonio and I had always talked about someday having a child. He would have loved to have had him just like that boy, out here in the piazza kicking the ball and having a great time."
"Does that mean you finished your explanation about why you did it?" Nikolai asked.
"It was just the right moment," Gabriella shrugged. "Nobody there expected it, not even me until I did it. We could have got involved in some long chase of them after us, or us after them, bullets could have flown all over the city. But when it came right down to it, I knew I was going to be on the run, no matter what happened. Or I would have wound up dead. So I just thought, he's not prepared. He's not waiting. He saw me transfixed by Makarov and he didn't think I was ready to do a thing."