Returning to Zero (Mick O'Malley Series Book 2)

by Alan B. Johnston

  They also stopped in at the Chinese consulate to get visas. Apparently they weren’t staying very long in Russia since they paid for rush service—their passports with visas would be ready for pickup tomorrow. Jasinski was thankful she wasn’t a wanted person such as Mick. She wondered how he could live with that every day.

  They rode two subway lines before emerging into the streets for the short walk to NØviz’s mother’s apartment.

  The setting reminded Jasinski of her native Polski, with wide streets, high-rise apartment buildings, and little variation.

  Entering the apartment block, Jasinski saw him pause and read a handwritten sign tacked to the elevator door, then head for the stairs.

  “Only twelve floors—shouldn’t be a problem for a fit young thing such as yourself,” he called out as he dashed up the stairs. Jasinski followed at a more measured pace, balancing her pack carefully. Sure enough, she caught up with him a half dozen flights later. While she had been keeping up with her exercising and walking, she had yet to see him do more than exercise his fingers with a keyboard and his elbow with a beer.

  “Agreed—not a problem at all!” she taunted, passing an out-of-breath NØviz. He kept up with her and brushed past her as they left stairway at the twelfth floor.

  Jasinski was walking down a somewhat dark corridor behind him when she heard him knocking, and a door open. She caught a glimpse of NØviz disappearing through the doorway and a flood of Russian escaping. She found she could understand many Russian words, but the complete meaning escaped her. She did, however, recognize one word immediately: Vladimir!

  She stood patiently in the door frame waiting for NØviz—or should she call him Vladimir—to remember her. A moment later, a short, well-dressed woman poked her head around the corner and said a few words.

  NØviz, looking a little flustered—she wasn’t sure if it was because of the climb or the greeting—motioned for her to come in. She stepped into the apartment.

  Jasinski listened to NØviz’s mother and tried to say a few things back, without much success. NØviz made no attempt to translate into English. His mother didn’t seem to mind—she just smiled at Jasinski and nodded, glancing at NØviz expectantly. He seemed bored, but Jasinski knew better—he was clearly uncomfortable.

  She was ushered to sit at a table, where she could see the view out the window. There was a grassy courtyard surrounded by several tall buildings that looked identical to this one. NØviz and his mother disappeared into the kitchen, talking rapidly. A few minutes later, NØviz reappeared with plates of food including pickled herring, slices of dark bread, boiled potatoes, raw onions, and some pickled vegetables. Based on the preparations, it seemed they were expected. He set them in front of her.

  “Eat,” he said, avoiding looking at her, then returned to the kitchen. They both reappeared a moment later with more food and a samovar of tea.

  They ate mostly in silence, with his mother asking an occasional question which received a one or two word reply. Jasinski felt the need to become involved.

  “Ah, could you thank your mother for the food and tell her it is delicious?” she said to him, and he nodded and repeated it in Russki to his mother, who smiled back at her and nodded.

  Soon, they seemed to forget she was there and started conversing again. Jasinski got the impression that NØviz was being grilled—perhaps he had not kept in close touch with his mother?

  In the meantime, she enjoyed the pickled herring and vegetables, and sipped her tea. A little later, the table was cleared, and a bottle and three small cups were brought out, along with some round crackers and a small tin. She immediately recognized the tin, which had a fish on the lid.

  “Caviar!” she said out loud.

  “Da, da,” the mother replied. She opened the tin to reveal the tiny black sturgeon eggs and beamed. NØviz poured the vodka while she piled the caviar on the crackers while Jasinski looked on.

  “You have had caviar before, no?” asked NØviz. Jasinski nodded.

  “But it has been a long while!” she replied. NØviz then pushed the plate towards her.

  “Spasibo,” Jasinski said in her best Russki, taking a cracker. She must have had a strange look on her face because both NØviz and the mother were staring at her quizzically.

  The taste was a surprise. It reminded her of something else, something she had eaten recently, but she couldn’t think what it was.

  “Good! Very good!” she to her hosts, then took another bite. They continued their conversation, eating the crackers as soon as they were prepared.

  Jasinski ate her share, with each bite rippling through her senses.

  “Ha!” she burst out, interrupting the mother and son. “Sorry, I just realized something funny. No, its nothing, don’t worry. Mmm. Very good caviar.”

  She deflected their stares. She had made the association: a memory of sitting in a small house in Melbourne with Mick eating a Vegemite sandwich! How could it be that Russian Beluga caviar reminded her of the Australian concentrated yeast extract spread?

  She thought of Mick and wondered how he was doing. How would he make it to China? What would he do? As far as she could tell, NØviz was determined to sell his exploits and the botnet to the Chinese. She had had absolutely no success in reopening the discussion with him.

  “Drink,” NØviz said to her after he noticed she hadn’t had any vodka, so she downed the shot and was promptly poured another.

  Jasinski pretended to be affected, even though she was quite a proficient drinker—she thought it might come in handy sometime if NØviz thought she was a lightweight. He laughed with his mother and they raised their glasses again.

  In the end, Jasinski didn’t need to drink very much as the conversation picked up again and lasted the next few hours until the herring and the potatoes were gone and the vodka almost gone. Jasinski helped clear the table and got her first look inside the kitchen, which was more of a closet than a room, with simple metal cabinets and counter top, and smallish appliances.

  When she returned to the room, the table had been moved aside and NØviz was rolling out mattresses on the floor—one for each of them.

  The mother said what Jasinski presumed to be “Good night” and disappeared into the only other room in the apartment and closed the door solidly.

  “So, you like caviar?” NØviz asked her.

  “Da, da,” she replied, imitating his mother’s voice.

  “Really? That’s good. My mother doesn’t get out the caviar for every visitor. I tried to convince her you weren’t my girlfriend, but I don’t think she got the memo.” He looked over at her and for a moment she wondered if he hadn’t got the memo as well, as he seemed to be blushing. “Why don’t you use the W.C. first,” he suggested and she agreed.

  Inside the bathroom, she glanced at the exposed wiring on the walls and the unusual toilet flushing arrangement that involved a high mounted tank and a chain. The shower was more familiar—she remembered a similar one in her grandparents’ apartment in Gdansk.

  As she opened the door to re-enter the room a moment later, she paused as she spied NØviz on the floor with his back turned. He had moved a couple of items of furniture and had removed a floorboard. This might be the real reason for stopping in Moskva!

  She watched for a moment as he removed a small sack and placed it in his pack. As he replaced the floorboard, she quietly closed the door, killed a few more minutes, then noisily opened the door.

  “Your turn!” she said to NØviz, who was now sitting cross-legged on the spot. Whatever was under the floor was presumably in his backpack now.

  When he closed the door, she opened his pack and found the sack—as she expected, it was full of cash, credit cards, and fake IDs. It seemed Vladimir didn’t believe in banks. Or crypto-currencies.

  The rolled up mattress was surprisingly comfortable, Jasinski discovered as she reclined in her sleeping bag. NØviz lay on the ground next to her. He startled her a few minutes later by speaking.

  �
�Jaz, are you asleep?”

  “No,” she replied, rolling over to face him.

  “Are you involved with anyone?” he asked. Jasinski chuckled to herself—was she back in school again?

  “No, and I plan to stay that way.”

  “Sure, but I kind of got the impression that you and Mike—”

  “Mick and I are not together,” she replied.

  “Have you ever been involved with anyone?” he continued. She thought back to her time in Polski.

  “Yes, but it was a long, long time ago. I don’t plan to repeat that again…” she trailed off into her own thoughts, remembering her adolescent days. “How about you?”

  “Oh, sure. I broke up with this girl in Praha just a month ago. Things were getting too serious.”

  “Right,” she replied, not believing him for an instant.

  “Where do you plan to go when all this is over?” he asked.

  “I haven’t really thought about it much. Probably somewhere new, somewhere warm,” she replied, shivering a little in her sleeping bag.

  “Yeah, that sounds good. ‘Night!”

  “Good night.”

  Jasinski woke twice during the night. The first time, she fell back to sleep almost immediately, listening to the soft snores from NØviz. The second time, she awoke, realizing she had rolled over to NØviz and was pressing against him. She carefully rolled back, although this time it took her a lot longer to fall back to sleep.

  In the morning, when she awoke, he was already rolling up his bedding. She jumped up and helped him put the room back together.

  “I have to meet people,” he said as he pulled his coat on. No shower or shave was apparently needed for these meetings. He said something in Russki to his mother then headed for the door. He paused with his hand on the door handle. “You don’t… you don’t have any money in crypto-currencies, do you?” he asked. Jasinski shook her head and he nodded and walked out the door.

  Jasinski passed the time sipping tea with NØviz’s mother, who seemed to think she could figure Jasinski out if she just stared at her long and hard enough.

  That afternoon, they were back at the airport, waiting to board their Aeroflot flight to Beijing. They had purchased the tickets with cash at the airport. NØviz had seemed very pleased when he had returned a few hours later, although he also seemed jumpy. He had glanced carefully up and down the street before getting in the taxicab, and said something to the driver that made him drive to the airport as if on a Grand Prix track.

  Waiting in the security line, Jasinski shuddered to think what kind of screening might be in front of them, but they went straight through security without even a pat down. She had also questioned why they weren’t flying straight to Shanghai. She also expressed a preference to spend a few more days in Moskva to see more.

  But NØviz would not be persuaded—he didn’t want to spend even a single day more in Moskva and he refused to visit China without seeing the Forbidden City. So the couple of extra days before the start of the security conference in Shanghai would be spent in Beijing. Then they would take the high speed train to Shanghai.

  “Hey, what’s the matter?” NØviz asked her, jolting her out of her thoughts. She was again nervous at the prospect of flying, but she thought she had been successfully hiding it.

  “You’re blushing. You are a queer fish!” he said, shaking his head and returning to his magazine, which had scantily clad women adorning the cover.

  Jasinski composed herself and decided to level.

  “OK, I’m not a good flyer. I usually avoid it at all costs.” NØviz looked at her impassively. “I just don’t like the up and down or the pressure changes.”

  “I see,” he replied, returning to perusing his magazine, reading the articles most likely.

  Jasinski tried to think of a time when NØviz had shown any empathy and failed to come up with any instances.

  “Do we have a hotel in Beijing?”

  “Yes, I have a suite booked for three days.”

  She questioned the wisdom of spending days in Beijing when they needed to get to Shanghai, but she decided against arguing with him.

  Chapter 21.

  Ja2 More #funniesthacks! Sending xenophobe politicians deportation notices! And the IVR system that they called that put them on hold for hours!

  On board the aircraft, Jasinski decided that if she closed her eyes, it would be difficult to tell she wasn’t flying a western airline. Aeroflot no longer flew Russian-made Tupolev jets, and used the same Boeing and Airbus aircraft used the world over. Jasinski had studied the life of A.N. Tupolev at school. An incredibly talented aeronautical engineer, he had pioneered many aspects of flight, before becoming a victim of Stalin’s purges in the 193Øs. He was imprisoned for a decade, before being rehabilitated after Stalin’s death. Tupolev also led the reverse-engineering of the United States B-29 Superfortress bomber—the same kind of plane that dropped the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The reverse engineering work was done on American planes that landed in Siberia in 1945 after bombing Japan and was used to copy the American technology.

  Besides the attractive stewardesses in their orange skirts and the sound of Russian spoken all around, the experience wasn’t that unique. Even smoking was not permitted, which must have be quite an inconvenience for the Russki passengers.

  She watched NØviz pay careful attention during the safety demonstration, but she decided it was due to the curves of the blond stewardess, and the fact that she seemed to be directing her kilowatt smile in his direction.

  Jasinski felt the rising tide of panic inside her as the initial pressurization of the cabin began. She pictured Mick’s smiling face on her last flight and desperately wished he were there. She considered grabbing NØviz’s hand but held back—she didn’t want him getting the wrong idea.

  She felt her head moving from side to side and slowly regained consciousness as NØviz shook her.

  “Hey, the meal. Open your tray,” he said.

  “Right.” She couldn’t recall taxiing or taking off. She checked the display on the monitor—still six hours to go. The meal was typical airline food, unfortunately, not traditional Russian fare—no Olivier salad or blinches, but there was some tasty salami.

  After the meal, Jasinski watched NØviz play video games on his mobile. His taste in games was towards the shooting/exploding side, in contrast to her strategy/adventure. But watching him kill virtual people did help pass the time.

  She studied his face, noting the lines and angles. From his tiny eyebrows to his strong jaw, he was definitely attractive. For once, the bored expression was gone from his face as he closed in on his prey.

  “Yolki palki!” he muttered under his breath. Jasinski didn’t need a translation to get the gist.

  He wasn’t such a bad guy and was actually attractive sometimes. He certainly was very simple—what you see is what you get. She wondered what he’d be like when he was a few years older.

  “Blin!” he cursed as his avatar bled to death. He hit reset immediately and went back to shooting and dodging.

  Jasinski dozed again.

  Customs and immigration took a long time in Beijing, despite having many agents on duty. More than half of the agents were exclusively for the Chinese nationals, while the majority of the passengers, foreign nationals, waited in long lines. The airport was beautiful and clean, and everyone courteous. Jasinski, however, couldn’t forget why they were here, and wondered for the umpteenth time if it was a good idea or not.

  On the taxi ride to the hotel, she noticed the time on her mobile—it was the middle of the day! It felt like early morning, due to the fog and gloom. She then realized that it wasn’t fog but smog. She recalled Mick telling her about the bad air in Los Angeles in the 7Øs and 8Øs, and now appreciated it. The air didn’t smell very good either—it reminded her of air in a highway tunnel.

  During the afternoon at their hotel, they both mainly worked on their computers. She wrote some code for a project and che
cked it into github. NØviz seemed to be looking up tourist information.

  “Jaz, you hungry yet?” NØviz called out to her from across the room. He had been working at the desk. She was sprawled on her stomach on the bed.

  “Sure, let’s go get some! I think there is a restaurant here in the hotel.”

  “What? No, let’s go for a walk and see what we find,” NØviz countered.

  They set out walking in a random direction from the hotel. The smog had lifted a little, and some blue sky could be seen in places. Out of sight of the hotel, all the shops and signs were in Chinese, and hence incomprehensible.

  NØviz wasn’t very interested in any of the restaurants they passed, but was excited to find a street market.

  “Look!” he said, crossing the street to get a closer view.

  A few dozen vendors were set up, most using wheelbarrows or bicycles with built-in stoves and woks. The smell of the food was delicious. They wandered from stall to stall for a few minutes, looking over each one carefully. They eventually selected one which seemed to be quite popular, and also seemed to cook only vegetables—the way some had raw meat lying out in the open wasn’t very appetizing.

  As their stir-fried noodles sizzled in the wok, Jasinski realized how hungry she was. She was amused at how attentively NØviz was watching the cooking. When their food was poured into a giant paper tub, he almost beamed with delight. He produced a large note to pay. When the man shook his head, he produced a smaller one which the man eagerly grabbed and returned a few coins in change.