"Yes, colonel?"
"All work with factories for prosecuting The War effort with The People's Republic of China and remaining NATO troops is to be temporarily put aside. All agricultural production not vital to the Womb effort is to be put aside— all energies, as your orders indicate, are to be devoted to the speedy development of the Womb Project to its ultimate goal."
"What is this ultimate goal, colonel—" Varakov would not call him comrade— those he had called comrade had meant too much to him to so debase, so abuse the word.
He watched Rozhdestvenskiy— not a hair out of place, the uniform neat, perfect, without a wrinkle— so unlike his own, which even he realized much of the time looked as though it was slept in. It was.
"In simple terms, Comrade General—"
"Yes— we must be simple—"
"There was no slight meant to you, Comrade General— I have always held the deepest admiration for your past distinguished military career—"
"Please— spare me—"
Rozhdestvenskiy raised his right eyebrow, his lips downturned at the corners, held tight together, his eyes seeming to emit a light of their own. "Very well— the goal of the Womb is much the same as the goal of the American Eden Project— the survival of the best and finest ideology. But we shall triumph— the Americans will not—"
"You speak in hyperbole, colonel— be more concrete."
"The Eden Project was conceived to ensure the survival of the Western Democracies at all costs in the event of a global nuclear confrontation. The Womb will counter this last desperate gesture of the degenerate Capitalist system, and at once ensure the eternal triumph and majesty of the People's Revolution. But one element is missing, one needed element. To accomplish this goal, to ensure the very survival of the Soviet system, of Communism itself, the military must be fully committed to release KGB-attached forces to pursue that needed element, without which the Womb is doomed and American Imperialism will triumph."
"And what about the survival of the Soviet people, colonel?" Varakov asked, his voice sounding dull to him. "What of their survival?"
Rozhdestvenskiy smiled. "May I be blunt, Comrade General?"
"A change, yes."
"The spirit of the Soviet people, of the struggling masses everywhere, is best embodied in the political leadership of the Soviet and in the KGB as its extension of will—"
"And the people be damned," Varakov said flatly, staring at Rozhdestvenskiy.
"The sheer force of numbers implies at its most basic conceptualization arbitrary selection—"
"An ark-like Noah in the Judeo Christian Bible— but an ark by invitation only, based on dialectics?"
"You do know— all of it," Rozhdestvenskiy almost whispered.
"I do know— all of it—"
"There will be room for you, Comrade General—"
Varakov laughed. "I have lived long enough to sleep for five hundred years— to awaken to what?"
"Perhaps your niece if she can be found—"
"To be your concubine— or to be executed because you consider her to have had complicity in the death of Karamatsov— hardly, colonel."
"You have been ordered by Moscow—"
"I have been ordered by what was Moscow— and is now a group of old men afraid to die with dignity because they did not live with dignity— old men who hide in a bunker and are so afraid, so distrusting, that not even their commanding generals know exactly where the bunker is located. Are they packed— and waiting?"
"Yes, Comrade General—"
"Do not call me comrade— I have been given orders. I have spent my entire life since I was fifteen obeying military orders. Now I am reduced to obeying the orders of cowardly murderers who save themselves over the finest of Soviet youth— I will follow the letter of my orders—
have your troops— have them all. But I am not your comrade— I have never been— you are dismissed, colonel."
Varakov looked from the eyes to his desk, studying the communiqué. He heard the chair move slightly as Rozhdestvenskiy would have stood up, heard the click of heels as Rozhdestvenskiy would have saluted, then the long pause when he— Varakov— did not look up to return the salute.
Finally, he heard the sound of heels on the floor of his place, his special place, the sound diminishing with each step.
There would not be a recall to Moscow, a premature pension— or perhaps an accident.
There would not be the time for that. He— Varakov— would die like all the rest.
His feet hurt badly.
Chapter Forty-Three
David Balfry opened his eyes— they hurt to open, his nose stiff and he could not breathe through it. The lights were bright.
He looked down to his chest, then looked away, sickened, the nipples of his breasts black, burned, the electrodes still clipped to them.
"You are awake?" The voice was almost kind-sounding. "He is awake— let us be sure—"
Balfry felt the pain starting in his testicles— the burning, felt it, smelled his flesh as it smoked.
"No— o-o-o-o— Christ, no—!" The pain stopped and he was numb except for a core of pain still somewhere inside the pit of his stomach.
"Then you will cooperate and tell us the information we request about the so-called Resistance?" There was a laugh.
"Fuck you," Balfry stammered, his tongue thick-feeling, his words strange-sounding to him—
his teeth gone, broken, his tongue swollen from thirst, cut where it scraped against the jagged edge of his teeth. They had used a hammer and chisel part of the time— part of the time pliers. The salty taste started again in his mouth and he knew he was bleeding.
"Our dental care— our electrical stimulation— you found this offensive? Hmm." The voice— he could not see the face— cooed to him. "Hard on you? Painful, even?" There was laughter in the frightening darkness beyond the light. "There are things unspeakable in yours or any language—
things we can make you endure, Balfry— but there are drugs to calm your pain, to ease you happily into death— these choices are yours to make. We have hours, days, weeks— as long as necessary."
"No, ya don't," Balfry coughed. "You need what I know— and you need it now— but to get it now you're gonna have to kill me— and then you won't have it— eat shit."
"A college professor— such a way for a university don to speak— let's try the electrodes to the breasts again— the twitching is interesting to watch."
The pain— it flooded his chest and he cried and felt ashamed. But he didn't talk— he would have laughed. With the pain, he couldn't talk.
Chapter Forty-Four
Rozhdestvenskiy entered the room at the far corner of the museum basement. What he saw made his stomach churn.
"You are barbarians— and worse than that— incompetent! This is an important prisoner whose information may be vital and you so risk his life!"
He couldn't see the face in the darkness beyond the light— all he could see was the captured Resistance leader, Balfry.
"But, Comrade Colonel!"
He recognized the voice— and more than that, his eyes drifting across the naked, horribly abused body strapped against the "work" table, the table hanging the man almost completely inverted—
the technique.
"You will call medical assistance immediately— the man will be treated, made comfortable and then administered drugs— drugs against which he can offer no resistance and that will allow his successful interrogation— not this butchery."
"You are insane—" and Rozhdestvenskiy started out the door—
"Comrade Colonel—"
Rozhdestvenskiy, his hand on the knob, stopped, not turning back, not wanting to see the American again.
"He is dead, Comrade Colonel— I— I had no idea that—"