By the time I made it to my car, my nerves were starting to show. I felt my hands jittering as if I had the coffee habit that Luna did, jittering enough that it took several tries to get the car door unlocked and open. I inserted the key into the ignition smoothly enough, but before I even managed to shut the door, my head was seeking the edge of the steering wheel. A personal meeting with Kerimov only ever meant very good or very bad things. Being recalled to Russia at this point, having provided very little information of any use to my comrades at the KGB and the Soviet Space Program, specifically those working on Soviet Moonshot. Learning the inner workings of NASA was certainly helpful, as I frequently reminded myself, but not enough. Never enough. I will never do enough. Never be enough. Never enough for Kisa, for Mother or Father, for Kerimov, for Russia.
I heard myself make a noise, an animalistic sound of desolation and anger escaping my throat. Instead of allowing myself more time to wallow in self-pity, I snapped the door shut, started the vehicle, and prepared to drive as quickly as I could back toward Florida and the airport. There is no self-pity, only your duty to Mother Russia. This American living is softening you. Within a few brief moments, I had maneuvered my car out of the surprisingly full hospital parking lot and onto the highway. There was no time for relaxing or enjoying the dark scenery outside the windows. I had a destination and a deadline and I could not afford to miss this flight, no matter what might be waiting on the other side of the world.
The five-hour drive to Orlando went by in a haze of dark trees and bright flashes of memory with each streetlight or set of headlights I passed. Kisa’s first dance recital—Mother and Father gave her roses and bright smiles. The road darkened for a few miles. Another car with its headlights reflecting on the pavement. Another memory reflecting off the backs of my eyes. My first speech competition. I won first place, but all I got was a dingy ribbon and “You forgot part of your speech, Aleksandr. Why can’t you be more like Kisa? More headlights, more memories. Why are you crying, Aleksandr? You must be a strong man for your Motherland. Be more like Kisa, she knows what is important. Then, Aleksandr! Silence! You are a foolish child. You know nothing! And then, Aleksandr, do not use such language in this household. Your sister would never say such a thing and neither should you! I jolted out of my memories long enough to swerve past a small animal scuttling across the road, its eyes reflecting an eerie greenish cast as my headlights rushed over it.
By the time I arrived at the airport, my eyes had grown red, the sensitive skin around them puffy and colored like day-old bruises. My dark hair was disheveled and falling into my face while the tattered remains of my suave charm, broken apart after a sleepless night with doubt, confusion, and anger, seemed ready to blow away entirely in the force of the gusting wind.
I stumbled wearily into the airport, making my way slowly toward the portion of the terminal indicated on the ticket I picked up upon entering the building. The flight was not directed to Russia, but to neutral territory in Switzerland where I could find a second flight back to Moskva. All of the fear and tension between my Motherland and this capitalist dungheap made travel like this difficult and such a recall notice both extremely important and inopportune, especially given Luna’s fragile condition that I could have been exploiting for information. There is no telling what such an emotionally compromised female would have revealed given another few hours of my charm and care in her time of distress. Though I cannot stand her inane whining and crying, it would have beneficial to my mission. Anything in the line of duty.
I boarded my flight with the rest of my fellow passengers, checking each one as he strolled by. A wealthy American family going on vacation was followed closely by a small pack of businessmen leering lecherously at the mother’s back. There were a few men travelling alone, each wandering singly down the aisle of the plane, searching out the appropriate seat so they could catch up on their reading or paperwork. My seat was in the rear of the plane, just as it always was. The rear of the plane provided privacy, something everyone in my line of work valued immensely, whether for work-related activities (reviewing notes, preparing an identity) or just for rest without the constant disruption of stewardesses and passengers wandering up and down the aisles. As I settled into my seat, I surveyed the aircraft and the way everything and everyone was organized around me, just in case a quick escape was needed or a fight erupted. My training forced me to always search for just these things—exits, signs of threat, potential weapons, and the like. Anything that could be used against me or that I could use against others if the occasion arose.
My training also demanded constant vigilance, especially in a public place full of the potential for danger such as this one. My weariness was nearly overpowering me, but my training was so ingrained into me that I had no choice but to force my eyelids to stay open and my mind to stay alert. I busied myself with counting things idly, just to maintain consciousness. My head began to pound and my eyeballs felt as if they were on fire. My skin began to crawl under my clothing; my heart pounded out irregularly in my chest, almost in time to the shaking of my hands. As a tall, blonde stewardess came back toward my end of the plane, I flagged her down.
“Vodka. Straight.” She stared at me in confusion, noting my physical symptoms, probably fearing I was going through a detox period and that she shouldn’t serve me. Instead, I forced a grim smile on my face and muttered, “It’s been a long couple of days at work.” She nodded forgivingly, though her smile was still uneasy and she kept glancing forward, toward her fellow stewardesses and the captain’s cabin.
“I’ll be right back, sir.”
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