by Robin King
By the time I was standing outside Professor Golkov’s office, the euphoria of the previous day had entirely worn off. In fact, anger began to swell inside me. Before I entered his office, I tried to rehearse what I would yell at him using every Russian swear word I knew. Unfortunately, I didn’t know any words harsh enough to express my feelings. I took a mental note to look some up as I swung open his door and slammed it behind me. Golkov sat at his desk, appearing relieved to see me.
“I could’ve been killed!” My voice wasn’t as bitter as I wanted it to be. Something about his kind brown eyes stopped me.
“Alexandra, I am so happy to see you this morning,” he said, his tone warm and calm. How was I supposed to yell and scream at him? Bags under his eyes and unkempt hair told me the past few days hadn’t been the best for him either.
“I . . . I . . .” I didn’t know what to say. Do I rehash what happened over the weekend? Does he know already? Has Elijah been in contact with him? Am I supposed to say anything? I threw my shoulder bag on the chair in front of Golkov’s desk and crossed my arms in front of me.
“It’s all right, Alexandra. I’m sure you have a lot of questions, but before we delve into them I just want to say how proud I am of you. I knew you were ready, and I am happy to be right. Not only did you adapt well to the unexpected circumstances, but you were greatly successful at the same time. I commend you.”
I stood there dumbfounded. He was praising me for the weekend? The only success was that I made it through and got home without being killed. Someone else had sacrificed his life. And for what?
“Successful?” My voice faltered. “Professor Golkov, someone was killed, and I destroyed the documents he’d risked his life for. I was chased down and almost died myself. What was this all about?” I clenched my fists at my sides and struggled to hold in my tears.
“Alexandra.” He got up from his desk and came around to place a hand on my shoulder. I looked up into his bloodshot eyes as he spoke. “I know. Things didn’t go quite as I planned. You went through a lot this weekend, but you did succeed.”
“I didn’t do anything this weekend that meant anything. And to top it off, I didn’t even solve your puzzle!” I took the folder out of my bag and angrily tossed it on his desk. I was so disappointed in myself. I had always felt so much pride in my ability to solve problems and to fix things, and I had let the professor down. I had let myself down.
“Didn’t you?” he asked.
“Didn’t I what?”
“Didn’t you solve the puzzle?”
“I’m not sure what you mean.” I wracked my brain, trying to figure out what he was talking about. He walked back to his chair and sat down. Slowly he pushed the folder across the surface of his mahogany desk back to me. I moved my bag to the floor and slumped into the leather chair opposite him. I opened the folder one more time and leafed through the pages. They were still blank. Nothing had changed. The twenty-three pages were just as I had . . . wait. Twenty-three? Something about that number called to me.
I flashed back to Russia—the ballet rehearsal hall at the Mariinsky. I watched the exhibition like I was on the outside looking in. I saw myself trip and the contents of my clutch and the briefcase spew across the floor. I paused the scene and watched in slow motion as I picked up each sheet of paper. One, two, three . . . twenty-two, twenty-three! And I saw them. I saw each page before my eyes. I had been in the rehearsal hall for less than a minute, but I had a picture of each and every page just like I was carrying a photograph of each one.
No one spoke. Golkov handed me a black pen and I got to work. I had never done anything like this before. I saw the words, the lines, the diagrams, and I put them down on paper. I wrote and sketched and wrote and sketched. At one point, Golkov brought me a sandwich and drink and sat them next to me. I kept working while I took bites with my other hand. My fingers began to cramp, but I remained focused on the ink in my head and reproduced it on the blank pages in front of me.
Once the last few words from my head made it onto the twenty-third page, I dropped the pen. I stacked the pages together, deliberately tapping them on top of the desk and then placing them inside the folder. I didn’t know what time it was, but I was exhausted and invigorated at the same time. I held the folder out to Golkov. A wide smile covered his bearded face as he took the folder from me.
“Thank you,” he said quietly. “I know you still have questions, and I’d like to answer those for you. I think the best way for me to do that is to show you.”
“Show me?”
“It’s time you found out why you are here.”
8
The Company
I followed Professor Golkov down the hall to the stairway. We descended the stairs to the main floor of Marston Hall. I expected Golkov to head to the building exit, but he rounded the corner and paused in front of a door before opening it. I peeked around and saw more stairs.
“I didn’t realize this building had a basement,” I said.
“‘Basement’ might be a bit of an understatement.” He grinned over his shoulder. When I responded with a raised eyebrow, he said, “You’ll see.”
Another set of stairs led us to a large room with organized stacks of chairs, tables, cleaning carts, and boxes. The polished concrete floor shone, its burgundy stain unexpected. The room didn’t carry the musty smell or minimal lighting congruent with the subterranean floor of an old university building. Bright lights and the faint aroma of floor cleaner filled the space.
We proceeded through the large main room and down a narrow hallway, halting only when we reached a steel door at the end. Golkov lifted the panel of a black metal box attached to the wall. It revealed an elaborate electronic panel. He pressed some buttons and then leaned in so his face was level with the panel. A beep sounded and a light ran across his eye. When the door clicked he pressed down the handle.
Is this for real? I considered turning around at that point. I mean, come on. A basement. A long hallway. A panel with a retinal scanner. It was all a little too cloak-and-dagger for me. At the same time, I respected the professor and was desperately curious.
I waited for him to open the door. He looked at me with eyes that said, “Are you ready for this?” and pulled open the door.
I probably should have responded with an adult-like reaction, but instead I blurted, “Holy cow! Whoa . . . this is amazing.”
“Yes, that is exactly what I thought when I dreamed up the place,” Golkov said.
I was standing at the edge of a large, open room. A gigantic glass oval table sat in the center of the room, surrounded by at least fifteen leather chairs. The shiny black floor resembled obsidian rock, with glittery flecks shining in the incandescent light. The thick glass walls flanking the room allowed me to see through to dozens of smaller rooms. Each housed a leather chair and a glass-topped desk with a flat touch-screen computer and a tablet.
I took a few steps forward, still not believing this place was a basement underneath Brown University. Golkov motioned me toward the center of the space.
The main room with the oval table, probably a conference room, had an enormous screen filling the upper half of one wall. A tall man in a black suit stood with his back toward me and was somehow writing on the wall with his finger, moving images and talking to the people seated at the table. When we entered the room, he ceased talking and turned around.
My eyes widened and my breath caught in my throat. Standing in front of me was the tuxedo-clad man who had sat next to me in the tsar box at the Mariinsky Theater. His left arm was in a sling, but he was perfectly alive.
“What?” I squeaked. If I was trying to give the impression I was a mature adult, I had totally failed.
“This is Mr. Daly. He is one of our top operatives here. I believe you have already met.” Golkov said to me in English. He still had a slight Russian accent, but his English was flawless. The word “operatives” spun through my mind over and over. What is this place?
“Yes? I mea
n, yes, we have met.” I sounded like an idiot.
Daly looked at the people around the table and motioned toward me. “This is Alexandra Stewart, the newest member of our team.”
If any of them didn’t already have their eyes on me, they did now. I looked down, trying to concentrate on the exquisitely painted toenails peeping out of my sandals—anything besides the strangers’ faces all turned in my direction.
“If you will excuse me, I’ll finish debriefing in a moment.” Daly left the table and walked toward us. As he neared me, I couldn’t help but notice how much younger he appeared without his tux and the Mariinsky’s low lighting. “It’s nice to meet you again.” He smiled and held out his hand. I shook it awkwardly, keeping my mouth shut. Nothing I had said so far was helping me appear ready to be part of anything important.
“Why don’t we go into my office?” Golkov said. At first I thought he meant back to his office upstairs, but then he walked us down through a glass corridor to a room at the back. It was probably the biggest office I had seen so far, but still had glass walls except for the far wall, which had an electronic screen similar to the one in the conference room. Daly sat down at a small leather couch in front of the desk, so I did the same.
“Mr. Daly, I believe this is something you might want.” Golkov sat across from us and handed him the folder with the pages I had spent all day re-creating. I hadn’t even realized Golkov had brought them downstairs. “Why don’t you take these back to the conference room and finish with the debriefing?” the professor asked Daly. “You will have more time to talk with Ms. Stewart later.”
Ms. Stewart? Golkov had always called me by my first name before. Was he trying to make me sound older, or was that how everyone there referred to each other? Either way, I straightened my posture.
Daly took the folder and opened it. He leafed through the pages. “It’s all here?” He inspected the papers, raising his eyebrows in obvious disbelief.
“Another reason Ms. Stewart will make an excellent addition to our team.” Golkov beamed at me. I gave a weak smile to both of them, but still held my tongue. Daly left the room and closed the glass door behind him.
“Mr. Daly is an important player on our team. And I am hoping you two will work well together.”
“And that team would be?” My voice came out raspy.
“About thirty years ago I began working for the Central Intelligence Agency.”
“The CIA?” I coughed on the words. Really? I tried to picture Golkov running around the world as a clandestine agent, scaling buildings, chasing cars, and wearing disguises. I couldn’t keep a smile from spreading across my face.
“I know, I know, laugh if you must. It’s not all like they portray in the movies. I was born here. My mother was an American, but I lived most of my youth in Russia.” This news surprised me. I had always thought Golkov was native Russian.
“I came back to the U.S. in my early twenties to study law at George Washington University. Can you imagine me as a lawyer?” He smiled. “After a few semesters, I was approached by a recruiter who said that with my language skills, I would make an excellent candidate in the foreign services. I thought, why not try? I never believed I would make it through the screening process.” He stood up and started pacing behind his desk.
“But the Cold War was still a threat at the time, and they were in need of Russian translators. So, I dropped out of law school and began working for the CIA. I worked for ten years translating classified documents. It paid well enough and I traveled a bit, but I never felt I was really doing something I loved. I felt there was something more I could be doing to help my country. And yes, even though parts of me still loved Russia, I was an American at heart—my mother had taught me to love her homeland.” Golkov paused, his eyes glistening. I imagined his mother was gone now.
“One day I complained about my dilemma to a friend in the CIA. He mentioned that he felt the same way. We spent two years drafting a plan to present to the agency. We wanted to create a new division to work on special projects. A separate entity, if you will. We wanted to be free to find threats that might not be under the radar of the CIA—a smaller division that wasn’t governed by the current CIA rules and regulations.”
“You asked the CIA if you could break their rules?” I moved to the edge of my seat.
“Of course, they turned us down. They thought of it more as a rogue operation. But I couldn’t put the idea out of my head. A few months later, I left my office with a resignation letter on my desk.” He paused, staring beyond me and into his past.
“And then what?” I prompted.
Golkov looked back at me and rubbed at his beard with one hand. “Then I got to work on the plan. Brown hired me as a Russian professor, which I still enjoy, but it is more of a cover for my real love—puzzles, code breaking, and uncovering truth. I did freelance work for anyone who needed work done. Some of my jobs were for language scholars around the world, deciphering codes and translation of ancient texts. I even did several jobs for the CIA and FBI until I had the funds and connections to begin building this place.” He sat back down and spread his arms out toward the walls of his underground organization.
“How did you do it? Does Brown even know?” I looked around to all the offices and guessed there was even more to this basement than I could see.
“There have been several renovations on campus over time. I just took advantage of a few of them to expand this space. You’d be surprised at how underutilized the basements of many university buildings used to be. It also helps to be on the board of trustees with no one to report to.”
“But what about your friend in the CIA?” I asked. “What happened to him?”
“He remained at his job there. Unlike me, he had a family to support, and his job at the CIA was sure, steady, and safe. He decided he couldn’t be a part of the dangers that are sometimes associated with our job.” Golkov said the last part solemnly. “He continues to work in administration and often sends a task our way when CIA resources aren’t enough.”
“I guess I am still a little unsure as to what that job is. What do you do here?”
“A general answer to your question would be that we discover truth and we protect people with that truth. We report to no one, but we help everyone. I know that might sound a bit vague, but it is the job description. Sometimes it involves discovering plans for dangerous weapons so we can find and put a stop to them, as you helped us with this weekend.”
“Those plans were to be used on people? As a weapon?” I knew the twenty-three pages included formulas and instructions for a biological toxin. I never considered it was for use on people.
“Everything we do is to protect someone we have discovered is in danger. We spend a lot of time deciphering codes or making connections—we learn about assassination attempts or attacks on our soil. And like I said before, sometimes we are hired by government agencies to assist them.”
“Then why aren’t you just a part of them?”
“Bureaucracy, mostly. We have our own rules and resources. Though we are compensated for the work we do for them, they don’t officially recognize us. We have many foreign operatives in different places all around the world, in places without the protection of embassies.”
“But how do you pay for it all? Doing some jobs for the government couldn’t have paid for this place.” I stared at the view screen behind Golkov, filled with an intricate assortment of internet pages, television channels, and computer programs.
“That is a fair question with a complicated answer. Some of our work is for individuals or organizations who have the means to compensate us generously.” I cocked my head to the side. “Don’t worry. It is all legal,” the professor assured me. “And like any business, we invest, helping to keep this place running.”
“So what are you called?”
“We have no official name. Some operatives refer to us as ‘The Company,’ but you won’t ever hear me referring to us with any name. As far as any
one should know, we do not exist. Anonymity is important in what we do. But you may have noticed our symbol.” He held up his ring to show me the flower emblem.
“Why do you want me?”
“Alexandra, that day you came to my office when I asked to tutor you, I already suspected that you had an inclination toward what we do. I found Mr. Daly just a few years ago in a similar fashion. When I saw the video footage of you climbing that statue and then the Rubix cube in my office, my suspicions were confirmed. You were born for this.”
I had to remind myself to breathe. “There’s footage of that?”
Golkov laughed. “Brown University hosts, unbeknown to them, one of the most elite organizations this country has ever seen. No one does anything on campus without us knowing first.”
I looked down at my lap and pulled at the bottom of my shirt. Having video footage in my head was very different than an actual recording of me. I really hoped Daly hadn’t seen it. It was bad enough that Golkov knew.
“How am I supposed to help you here?” I asked. Besides my memory, I didn’t have the skills to do any of this save-the-world stuff he was talking about.
“You already have been a help. I don’t think you realize what an asset you will be here. I know it is a lot to ask of someone your age, but we could really use you. Your quick decision-making skills and ingenuity, coupled with your amazing memory, would greatly enhance our work.”
“This is a lot to take in.” I leaned back on the couch and rubbed my right temple. I didn’t want to disappoint the professor, but this information was a lot to process. Even though I was technically still a teenager, I already knew my rash decisions could get me into trouble. “Can I think about it?”
“Of course. And I will respect any decision you make,” he replied.
“Wait, maybe I’m still a little slow on the uptake, but I’m still confused about the weekend. How did you know I would get the documents? How did Mr. Daly come back from the dead? And who were those men chasing me?”