Traffyck: The Thrilling Sequel to Chernobyl Murders

by Michael Beres

  “How many people have been killed by Kalashnikovs over the years?” asked Janos.

  “As many as you wish,” said Lazlo.

  “I know what you mean,” said Janos.

  “What does he mean?” asked Mariya.

  “He means we will be next in line to add to the total. He means we have no choice but to return to the beach. He means he and I will go now. Am I correct, Lazlo?”

  “Yes, we only sit for a moment before our journey. It is traditional for good luck.”

  “I will go,” said Mariya, picking up an AK-47.

  “And me,” said Lena, with anger in her eyes.

  “And me,” said Guri, his voice deep and strong.

  “Who has the plan?” asked Janos. “Lazlo, my old boss?”

  Lazlo smiled. “You will create the plan, Janos.”

  Janos raised his voice so Vasily and Nadia behind him with the survivors could hear. “Vasily and Nadia stay, each with an AK-47 and ammunition. The five of us go by way of the south shore. They will not expect us back that way again. But I will take the boat and come in from the reservoir firing to divert their attention. This way the rest of you will be able to shoot guards who turn toward me. Guri and Nadia know the peninsula—”

  “Like animals,” said Guri, smiling.

  “I have only one suggestion,” said Lazlo. “Take someone with you in the boat so one can steer at high speed while the other fires. The passenger in the bow could fire two guns forward at the beach.”

  “I have strong arms from cycling,” said Mariya. “I can fire two guns at once.”

  “She knows best,” said Lena, with anger in her eyes. “Those who have been captive here will know to stay down. You will be able to shoot the creatures in the rags they call uniforms.”

  Janos thought for only a moment. “I agree. Lazlo, Lena, and Guri to the beach. Lazlo will have an AK. Lena and Guri will carry rifles with sights, because they have steady hands and it will be easier for them to fire and pick off men. Mariya and I will take the boat with two AKs. I need only one arm to drive it. Mariya can lie down and use the bow to support the weapons. We will come in at high speed and fire on them. When we come ashore, we’ll each have a gun.” Janos stood. “Agreed?”

  Mariya stood with two AK-47s, handed one to Janos, and put her arm around him. Lazlo handed a rifle to Guri and one to Lena, and the three stood together with Lazlo in the center.

  Janos waved to Vasily and Nadia. “We go now. But we will return.”

  Lazlo also waved back. “We are all one.”

  After Lazlo gave a short course in the use of their rifles and scopes, Guri led the way, with Lazlo behind and Lena behind him. The path looked familiar, and Lazlo realized it was the same path Vasily had taken during the initial assault, which had led to Mariya and Lena being raped. Lazlo would not allow this to happen again. If necessary, he would sacrifice himself. If captured again, somehow, some way, he would kill Vakhabov because without their leader, Lazlo was certain his ragtag men would dissolve into chaos.

  Lazlo carried his weapon slung over his shoulder and spare magazines tucked into his belt. But he also carried something else. At the boat, before Janos and Mariya had launched, Lazlo had taken the violin case. When he took it, Janos asked if he still knew how to play. Mariya had answered for him, saying, “It is like riding a bicycle. Of course he knows how. He is like you, Janos. Perhaps there will be an opportunity to frighten superstitious men.”

  The violin case bumped against Lazlo’s leg as Guri led the way up the path. Behind him, Lena whispered nervously, “Bring on the Gypsies.” Ahead, Guri repeated the whispered refrain. Although he could not see it, Lazlo felt the creases of a smile on his hardened old face.

  Because they had some way to go, Lazlo motioned both Guri and Lena closer and spoke softly to them. “When this is finished, both of you will have to travel with me to Chicago. It is busy and safe, and there is a neighborhood called Ukrainian Village. We can visit the Chicago Loop, which is the city’s center. It is a much newer city than Kiev, but just as wonderful in its own way. There is Lake Michigan, one of the Great Lakes, which, together, rival the Black Sea. On the shore of Lake Michigan is a historical museum and an aquarium and a planetarium. To the south, down a highway called Lake Shore Drive, there is a technical museum in which you can operate machinery and learn the latest in technology. Children run about freely pushing buttons and interacting with displays. And, of course, you can use my new computer and purchase video games. Some of the games are like what we are doing now. Perhaps you will go to college in Ukraine or even in the US and design a game of battle because you have experience. This is what the game makers want. Young people with experience.”

  As he spoke, trying to reduce the nervousness he could sense in both Lena and Guri, Lazlo thought of Jermaine and prayed to God, the infinite vessel of those who have lived. Lazlo, the Gypsy, praying for Lena and Guri, two souls he had met that very day. Two souls merging with his.

  Lazlo stopped speaking when they neared the mound from which they had launched the attack early that morning. The sun was high now, perhaps noon. His jacket, without a lining, stuck to his skin and became a second skin. He was thirsty and tired, but he did not care.

  When they climbed the mound and settled in, they peeked over. All was as before, except now Vakhabov and Rogoza and a guard stood on a mound watching as several guards began leading a group of girls to one of the boats. It was already happening. They were taking the youngest of the girls away. Lazlo put his violin case on the ground, opened it, and left it there at his side, just in case a melody was needed to accompany the melody of the AK-47 he gripped.

  As he watched, the girls being led to the boat stopped, everyone looked out toward the reservoir, and Lazlo could hear the buzz of the boat’s motor. But there was also another buzzing.

  Guri came close and pointed. “A helicopter, coming this way.”

  “Still far off,” whispered Lena. “But definitely coming this way.”

  CHAPTER

  THIRTY-THREE

  Standing on the beach, preparing to board the boat, Rogoza felt the rifle press into his back as he pleaded with Vakhabov.

  “I can be of use to you in Kiev, Maxim Vakhabov. I would do as you say. I can find recruiters for you, and you will have so many off the streets you will not know what to do with them all. These will be cooperative ones. I will personally convince them of jobs awaiting them abroad. It will be a wonderful enterprise, my comrade. Please think about it. Simply take me across to the other side where I have a vehicle parked, and we will make arrangements. How could I possibly go back on my word? All you would have to do is call my bishop and my—”

  “Quiet!” shouted Vakhabov, staring out at the reservoir. “You sicken me! You would dig your mother out of the ground and fuck her to save your skin!”

  “Blasphemer!”

  Vakhabov turned and faced Rogoza. “I may take young women and sell them to men, Father Vladimir Ivanovich Rogoza, but I do not have little girls transported to my so-called church under cover of darkness and abuse them behind closed doors. I give women a chance to dance or sing. You simply use their bodies for gratification! You do not deserve your name!”

  Vakhabov turned back to the reservoir. “Quiet! Listen!”

  In the distance, an inflatable boat sped toward the peninsula. And above, a plane? No! A helicopter! The SBU men were coming with reinforcements. They would save him. SBU Deputy Anatoly Lyashko had gotten a message from his men, and now the full force of the SBU would come down on them!

  Janos put both the AK-47s on full automatic, and Mariya lay on her stomach in the bow, her feet braced against the wooden seat across the center of the boat. Janos had tried various speeds while far out in the reservoir, and now he drove in at full speed.

  Mariya recalled killing the SBU man named Zoltan in the house on the other shore and knew she could do this. If children were in the way, she would aim high and make them drop down. Above all else, she coul
d not kill a young person, not even one. She did not say this to Janos, but she was certain he knew.

  The motor was very loud behind her, and because there was little wind, the waves were small. The boat bounced some, but she would be able to see who was on shore when they got closer … at least she hoped so. She kept her body as low in the boat as possible, just as Janos did, hoping the waterline would be high enough to protect them.

  It happened very quickly then. The boats on the beach growing in size, the tiny figures on the beach becoming young people and men with rifles. She began firing high above the peninsula, and the crowd scattered. That is, everyone scattered except several men off to the north. They were not on the beach and apparently felt safe. They were not being fired upon.

  Although she could not hear the return gunshots, bullets sounding like quick whispers went past her head and she ducked lower. But it was no use. Bullets had penetrated the inflatable. She saw a hole erupt near her shoulder, felt the bow of the boat softening.

  She kept firing and glanced above the bow. The men to the north stooped down. But they were out in the open! And she knew by the way they were dressed who they were!

  Mariya scrambled back over the wooden seat to Janos. She was about to shout up to him when he winced in pain! He was hit again, blood spurting out of his shoulder!

  Mariya pushed Janos to the bottom of the boat and took the tiller, twisting it to keep the boat at full speed. She headed for the group stooped down on the beach. The shore came closer, more bullets flew past. And then, as if they were in an airplane on takeoff, the boat touched bottom and launched itself onto the beach directly at the group of men.

  When she heard gunfire, Nadia tried to leave with the rifle, and Vasily also struggled onto one leg with a determined look on his face. But, suddenly, Vasily held her back.

  “A plan is a plan!” he yelled. “We cannot betray it!”

  “But Lena is there!”

  “Those shots are out over the river! The river mutes them!

  “How can you know!” yelled Nadia, her eyes blurred with tears.

  “I know!” shouted Vasily.

  Some of the Chernobyl survivors had begun screaming, and Vasily turned Nadia’s face toward him. “Do your job! Lena expects it!”

  Suddenly, Nadia realized Vasily was correct. If screams were heard on the beach and Lena and the others were trying to sneak up or fight…

  Nadia ran to the screaming Chernobyl survivors and began hugging them and talking softly to them. She began singing a Ukrainian lullaby called “A Dream Passes by the Window.”

  Vasily joined in, and this quieted the Chernobyl survivors, causing some of them to close their eyes and smile.

  After the Russian Mi-8 helicopter loaded up with fuel and more SBU junior agents, Yuri Smirnov switched seats so he could sit at a window seat behind his comrade, Agent Sergei Izrael. This gave Smirnov a better view of the ground and also allowed him to speak to Izrael without shouting across their fellow passenger, Opus Dei representative Mikhail Juliano. As the helicopter headed south to the peninsula, Izrael passed word back to the men, who now totaled ten, that they should ready their weapons. Mikhail Juliano, hearing this, wondered aloud if these precautions were superfluous, but Izrael simply stared at him.

  Smirnov leaned forward in his seat so he could speak privately to Izrael. “Do you think it superfluous?”

  Izrael turned toward Smirnov. “If Lyashko found it necessary to kill himself, nothing is superfluous. Evidence exists of attacks on clinics and fires in Kiev started by young men. The client of your investigator friend, Nagy, was kidnapped by young men. How many and how old and how well armed? These are the unknowns.”

  Smirnov sat back and looked out the window. In a few minutes, the Dnepr River widened and the vast Kiev Reservoir began. Up the Pripyat outlet to the west, Smirnov could see a few derelict barges half sunk on the shoreline. And then there was the peninsula.

  When the pilot came in low and slowed, Smirnov saw three inflatable boats nosed onto the beach. Farther up the beach, he saw perhaps a hundred people. As the pilot banked and turned west to come back over the peninsula at lower altitude, Smirnov saw another boat out in the reservoir speeding toward the shore. And something else! Puffs of smoke from the barrels of rifles. Many rifles on shore shooting at the boat, and someone in the boat firing back!

  Izrael shouted forward to the pilot. “Keep your altitude! Can you land on the north shore?”

  The pilot shouted back. “I can! But if those idiots down there start firing at us—”

  “Go north beyond those three standing there!”

  Smirnov looked ahead and saw the three men. He pulled a pair of binoculars from his bag. Two of the men had rifles; the other was unarmed. The unarmed man was heavy, bearded, and wore a business suit. Smirnov recognized him. Rogoza! He shouted ahead to Izrael. “Father Vladimir Ivanovich Rogoza of Kiev’s Moscow Patriarchate is down there!”

  “Look at the boat!” shouted Izrael.

  “What?”

  “It’s coming into shore!”

  As the helicopter slowed for its landing north of the men, the inflatable boat speeding into shore did not slow. Instead, it ran onto shore, lifting a plume of sand as it skidded forward onto the beach. The three men tried to scatter, but the speed of the boat coming onto the beach was too fast for them and the boat mowed them down.

  Farther down the beach, what appeared to be a group of ragtag soldiers near one of the beached inflatable boats began firing at the helicopter. A dozen or so young women dressed in jeans and sweatshirts dove down onto the beach. Smirnov heard several bullets hit the helicopter, but the pilot kept in control and, instead of landing in his original spot, hovered low and went farther north to land behind a natural dune.

  Izrael shouted orders to the men, who piled out the back door of the helicopter, ran up the dune, and lay down in firing position. Izrael, Smirnov, and Juliano ran with them. Izrael handed Smirnov a Stechkin machine pistol, but Izrael had a sniper rifle with scope. When Smirnov looked to the side, he saw several of the other men also had sniper rifles. Smirnov had brought his binoculars and looked behind the inflatable, which was slowly deflating. The three men mowed down by the boat did not move. Two rifles were on the ground away from the men. Smirnov could see Rogoza, face-up in the sun. The two others were uniformed with ammunition and equipment belts. All three were either dead or knocked out. The blades of the helicopter behind them were coming to a stop, and, for a moment, there was silence.

  Suddenly, screams came from the deflating inflatable between the SBU and the crowd on the beach. A woman yelled, “Janos!” and Smirnov knew it was Mariya Nemeth. She crawled over the side toward them, reaching back into the inflatable, while several of the ragtag soldiers ran toward her from the far side.

  “Take them out!” shouted Izrael.

  Within seconds, six ragtag soldiers were down.

  This caused a commotion on the beach in the distance. Obviously the remaining soldiers were gathering their captives into a group. In a matter of seconds, all the young people in jeans and sweatshirts had become human shields.

  Mariya Nemeth waved from within the inflatable, and Izrael sent two of his men scrambling on the sand to her. They dragged her out, reached in, and dragged out another man. The soldiers with their human shields in the distance were too far away to interfere, and the men came back to the dune with Mariya Nemeth and Janos Nagy. Both were injured, Nemeth with cuts and a possible broken leg, Nagy with a bullet wound in his shoulder and a wound on his arm, wrapped earlier. Izrael sent them back to the helicopter with the medic.

  Suddenly, one of the men hit by the inflatable got to his hands and knees and crawled to a rifle. Izrael aimed and killed the man. “I am taking no chances. It is time to show strength.” He turned to a nearby man. “Sasha, watch those other two. If one goes for a gun, kill him.”

  “So now we will wait?” asked Smirnov.

  Izrael turned and smiled to Smirnov. “I think you wil
l be a good negotiator.”

  Smirnov looked through his binoculars. Roughly twenty grisly-looking mercenaries had surrounded themselves with at least fifty young people. Most of the young were women, but there were also some men, and two boys. Perhaps Smirnov could count on some of the young men to act. Or perhaps women who’d been abused would be better. He tried to study their faces, but at this distance…

  A guttural voice rang out. “You will give us helicopter with pilot!”

  The man spoke in Russian, but the accent was from one of the former republics, Kazakhstan or Uzbekistan.

  Another voice shouted. “He does not joke! We will begin killing in seconds!”

  This accent was completely different. Romanian.

  “Professional mercenaries from various countries?” asked Izrael.

  “I think so,” said Smirnov, trying to think of what to say.

  A shot rang out. Sasha had killed the other in uniform behind the inflatable who had moved toward a rifle. Smirnov saw only Rogoza remaining and made an assumption.

  He rose up slightly and took a deep breath before shouting loudly and strongly. “I have killed your leader! SBU agents and Army troops surround you! You will either give up or die! There is no choice! Hostage taking is not acceptable in Ukraine! We do not even know who these so-called hostages are! Perhaps they are your comrades posing as hostages!”

  Smirnov listened. He could hear arguing among the men in various languages. Suddenly, two shots were fired in rapid succession, and the group reacted by all going to the ground. Smirnov saw one of the soldiers crawl to another, and one of the young people seemingly attending to another hostage. A soldier and a hostage, shot.