Vladimir Putin: Super Spy Ch. 1
The following is the first chapter of my novella The Early Adventures Of Vladimir Putin: Super Spy.
November 11, 1982
Dmitri Hohlakov stood over the corpse of Prime Minister Brezhenev and pondered the task at hand. Dmitri had been trusted with a great responsibility: preparing Brezhnev’s corpse for public display. A few years earlier, such an assignment would have been inconceivable. For much of his life, Dmitri’s relationship with communism had been strained, at best. This assignment was the culmination of a gradual, lengthy process by which his love for his homeland had been rekindled. This renewed love for Mother Russia coincided with a reconciliation between Dmitri and his father, Colonel Boris Hohlakov, who had devoted his life to the military, and was a rigid Party man. In Dmitri’s mind, Colonel Hohlakov was the personification of the State. When their relationship fell apart, Dmitri’s sense of patriotism went with it.
As far back as he could recall, Dmitri’s relationship with his father had been strained. As a child, Dmitri had not followed in his father’s patriotic footsteps. Growing up, he had been drawn to the arts, somewhat to his father’s dismay. This had led to an interest in fashion, and, worst of all, American culture. Even now, Dmitri shuddered when he remembered the lashing his father gave him after finding a stack of bootlegged American movies under his bed.
Colonel Hohlakov could be sadistic when provoked. After finding the movies, he had exploded with rage. His belt had rained blows upon young Dmitri’s helpless body. Dmitri curled into a ball and rolled as far under his bed as he could manage. Still, the belt’s buckle pummeled the back of his head. It left welts that would be visible for months afterwards, and that would haunt Dmitri for far longer. Dmitri’s tears did nothing to abate his father’s fury.
“My son, a traitor! What have I done to deserve this?” Colonel Hohlakov bellowed as he attacked the child. Hohlakov held one of the tapes up and read the handwritten label. “PORKY’S?? What the hell does that mean? Is it capitalist propaganda?”
Nursing his wounds the next day, Dmitri swore he would never forgive his father. Unlike most childhood vows of familial loathing, this one stuck; though he would have disputed it, Dmitri had inherited his father’s obstinate nature. He moved out at seventeen and began hanging around with a group of young artists in Moscow. Desperate for money, he began making a living as a hairdresser, an occupation that reeked of femininity to Colonel Hohlakov. They did not speak for years.
Nonetheless, it turned out that Dmitri had a talent for cutting hair, and a zest for innovation. Dmitri opened his own business, called The Barbershop Potemkin. Dmitri was the first Russian barber to offer more than one hairstyle. Initially, his expanded offerings included only two options: The Tolstoy and The Rasputin (The Rasputin was just like The Tolstoy but slightly creepier). Even these two meager options were a breakthrough to the Russian populace. Dmitri’s clientele exploded.
As Dmitri’s reputation grew, notable Russian celebrities began to seek him out for haircuts. The culmination of these visits was when the illustrious politician Konstantin Chernenko — considered by many to be the biggest sex symbol in Russia at that time — showed up for a haircut one day. Dmitri gave Chernenko a list of his newly expanded selection of hairstyles. Chernenko mulled it over.
“The Joseph Stalin looks good,” Chernenko said.
Dmitri went to work with a flourish. Chernenko was the most famous man he had ever worked on. Chernenko’s hair was, by this point, a stately silver. When Dmitri’s skilled hands were finished, he handed Chernenko a mirror. Chernenko stared at his reflection intently; Dmitri held his breath in anticipation.
“Superb!” Chernenko exclaimed, finally, after what had seemed to Dmitri to be an interminably long few seconds.
Chernenko was thrilled. His colleagues at the Kremlin were impressed as well. Jealous of his looks and success with women, people began to call Chernenko Egoistichnyy Lyubovnik (“The Selfish Lover”). In Russian culture, this is considered the highest form of romantic achievement. Jealous of Chernenko’s stylish hair, Russian officials began flocking to The Barbershop Potemkin.
As Dmitri’s clientele became dominated by political figures, Dmitri found himself drawn back into the life of a Party member like his father. Dmitri’s disassociation from his youthful rebellion became a matter of course; one simply did not resist the wishes of the Party. The acceptance of Dmitri and his occupation within the Party gave Colonel Hohlakov an excuse to accept his son for who he was. After nearly ten years of silence, the duo began speaking again. Dmitri’s relationship with his father repaired itself, slowly.
Then came the news that Dmitri had been chosen to prepare Brezhnev’s corpse for display to the public. This was a great honor. Dmitri’s father beamed with pride when he heard the news. This seemed to be the thing that would truly bring father and son back together. Dmitri finally felt vindicated in his choice of career, both by his father and his homeland. Dmitri was determined to amaze the party officials with the elegance and beauty that Brezhnev’s corpse would exude.
Dmitri had always found Prime Minister Brezhnev rather hideous, honestly. He and his friends had frequently made jokes about the ridiculously oversized eyebrows that Brezhnev refused to trim. Well, Dmitri thought, here is my chance to change all that, and allow Comrade Brezhnev a chance to look handsome when he is lowered into his grave, for the honor of the Party. The corpse was wheeled in, and Dmitri furrowed his brow. The expert was about to go to work. He leaned over the prime minister, scissors in hand.
*********
“Come quickly, it’s an emergency.”
Vladimir Putin needed no further prodding. He slammed the phone down and broke into a full sprint. Putin, somewhat in the KGB’s doghouse at the moment, had been stuck in a far corner of the Kremlin. After a minor incident involving a handful of unanticipated deaths, he had been removed from the field and stuck inside an office. To Putin, this was unacceptable, and he had been anxiously waiting for a chance to redeem himself. He ran from his office through the hallway, dodging pedestrians as he went. A couple of people had to dive out of the way to avoid him; the rest merely stepped aside and glowered. Putin collided with one man, sending papers flying everywhere.
“Look where you’re going you lunatic,” the man yelled.
After exiting the building, Putin had to run across the Kremlin’s vast courtyard to reach his destination. He focused on his breath, taking care to time his exhalations up with the rhythm of his feet. Putin visualized what he must look like to an outside observer. In his mind, Putin imagined that everyone was watching him run, admiring his form and stamina. In reality, they viewed him as a bizarre nuisance.
A few minutes later, Putin reached his destination. He threw the door open and burst into the room. Putin was running so fast it took him a few steps to slow down. He slammed on the breaks and skidded to a stop, like Wile E. Coyote dashing off the edge of a cliff. After he managed to stop his momentum, Putin looked around the room. There was a coffin in the center of the room, while three men huddled in a corner. The men were eyeing Putin with perplexed looks on their faces. Vladimir walked towards the trio and saluted them.
“Hello, comrades,” he said.
The men returned Putin’s salute. This bit of formality over with, Putin placed his hands on his knees and bent over in exhaustion, gasping for breath. A man Putin did not recognize spoke up.
“I believe you were told to hurry, but it was not actually necessary to run across the Kremlin,” the man said with a chuckle.
“Don’t laugh, comrade, Mr. Putin is simply a literal man. That’s why he takes orders so beautifully,” said one of the others. “And anyway, we have far more important problems.”
This man was Vitaly Fedorchuk, head of the KGB, and the only one of the three Putin recognized. Fedorchuk had recently taken over at the KGB for Yuri Andropov, who was now set to succeed Brezhnev as prime minister. Putin had never seen either of the other two men, and they did not introduce themselves. Indeed, before anyone could say anything else, Fedorchuk launched into an excited diatribe.
“We have more important things to worry about anyway. Come, see for yourself, Vladimir! It is a grave dishonor! The capitalist swine have stooped to symbolic gestures of depravity to defend their bankrupt system! It will not stand!” Fedorchuk was gesturing excitedly towards the coffin. Putin tried to calm him down.
“What, sir? What is it? Please, start from the beginning.”
“Come see for yourself.” Fedorchuk grabbed Putin and led him to the corpse.
Putin looked down. It was the corpse of Prime Minister Brezhnev alright, but something was dreadfully wrong. Prime Minister Brezhnev had always been famous for his strong, virile, rugged, masculine Russian face, adorned with glorious eyebrows. As far as Putin was concerned, the eyebrows were symbols of inevitability of Russian global domination. At the very least, Brezhnev’s eyebrows were the envy of every junior KGB officer in Russia. Putin had come up through the ranks fantasizing that one day his eyebrows too would look as handsome as Brezhnev’s. Now, though, that glorious face had been replaced with a hideously feminine visage, more suitable for a Hollywood actor than a Russian head of state. The man was made up almost beyond recognition, and, worst of all, his eyebrows had been cut down from their original glory to barely perceptible lines.
“HOW COULD THIS HAVE HAPPENED?” Putin screamed, suddenly more animated than Fedorchuk.
“There was a hairdresser here, he was supposed to groom the corpse, to make him suitable for display to the public, and he decided to trim the eyebrows to make the corpse more elegant. Or so he claims - “
Putin cut in.
“Well, I think it goes without saying that he must be a CIA agent determined to sap the virility of our nation by weakening the appearance of our leader’s corpse.”
“Naturally,” Fedorchuk replied quickly. “We ascertained this at once also.”
“Has he confessed?” Putin, asked coldly, zeroing in the reason for his visit.
“Not yet. He says that he simply thought Comrade Brezhnev needed a new look.”
“A new look?? Comrade Brezhnev was the handsomest man in Russia!” Putin scoffed.
“The man says the eyebrows were particularly galling.”
“The eyebrows were THE BEST PART.” Putin screamed. “How could anyone think that such a ridiculous claim would be believed?”
“I’m not entirely sure. Any young Russian male would love to have eyebrows like Comrade Brezhnev.” Fedorchuk agreed. “He may have been the single most handsome man in Russia, as you say.”
Putin got down to business.
“You want me to extract a confession from this man, and root out his CIA accomplices, I take it?”
Fedorchuk nodded.
“There is a man outside the door. He will take you downstairs to the interrogation room.”
“Yes, sir.”
Putin saluted Fedorchuk and left the room. Fedorchuk walked over to his other two colleagues.
“How do you think he will do?” one of them asked.
“Mr. Putin will get exactly the answer we want. He is utterly ruthless,” Federochuk responded.
“That’s what his file said. High marks across the board in every category: ruthlessness, barbarity, mercilessness, lack of remorse. That is all very fine, naturally, but it also mentioned some eccentricities. Behavioral quirks are things that The Party may accept that under certain occasions, but not always.”
“What do you mean, Comrade?”
“I mean the shirt, Comrade Fedorchuk, the shirt. The man wasn’t wearing a shirt.”
“Ah, yes, the shirt, or rather its absence. Well, uh, you know, Comrade Putin frequently doesn’t like to wear a shirt. I think it’s a display of masculinity.”
“Well it’s rather unusual. And it’s not as if the man is a model of physical health.”
The third man spoke up.
“Indeed. Can you imagine what a fool he must have looked like running across the Kremlin without a shirt on? Are we entirely sure this is the man for the job?”
“Absolutely sure.” Fedorchuk assured the man. “As you said, in some cases The Party must accept eccentricities, and Vladimir Putin, shirt or no shirt, is the most ruthless son of a bitch in the KGB, and for this reason he is indispensable.”
*******
Downstairs, Vladimir entered the interrogation room. It was small, and dimly lit. It contained two chairs, a table, and an extremely bright light. A one-way mirror had been installed on one wall. The basic layout was based on cutting-edge American interrogation room technology. Putin had overseen the espionage which led to the stolen design: one of his agents acquired a series of video tapes documenting the activities of an ace American police unit known as Miami Vice. These tapes had formed the basis for many of Putin’s methods. The policemen in the tapes were absurd, Putin thought; they were the epitome of capitalist decadence. Nonetheless, Putin, as always, studied the Americans’ methods religiously to ensure they never got more than a year ahead. Thus, the Russians now had minimalist interrogation rooms with one way mirrors like the Americans. These rooms with mirrors replaced the classic Russian model with no mirror.
Inside the room, Dmitri Hohlakov’s torso was tied to one of the chairs, with his hands handcuffed behind him. The chair across from him was empty. Instead of sitting down, Putin walked up to the captive man and leaned down to look him directly in the eyes.
“Hello, Dmitri,” Putin sneered. “How long have you been working for the CIA?”
“The CIA? NEVER! I told them already?” Dmitri plead, “I am a loyal party member, I have nev—“
Dmitri paused for a second and looked at Putin.
“Why aren’t you wearing a shirt?”
Putin flexed his muscles and stuck his paunch outward.
“Does my raw masculinity threaten you, you decadent capitalist pig?”
“No, I mean, uh, well, nevermind.” Dmitri trailed off, distracted from his plight for a moment.
When Dmitri glanced downwards away from Vladimir’s torso, Putin struck him hard in the jaw. The blow sent the chair toppling backwards. Dmitri, still attached to the chair, fell backwards as well. He yelled out in pain as his head struck the concrete floor. Vladimir wasted no time. He ran over to Dmitri and began kicking him in the ribs.
“Confess! Confess traitor! No one believes your ridiculous western lies!”
“I’m not a spy! I told them already. I thought Brezhnev’s eyebrows were ugly but no one had the guts to tell him while he was alive! They told me to make him look beautiful. I wanted nothing but to glorify the party. This is the truth, I swear.”
Dmitri was in tears as he pleaded with Putin. He was bleeding everywhere, but he could not protect himself from Putin’s blows with his arms handcuffed behind the chair.
“How stupid do you think I am? Brezhnev’s eyebrows looked ugly? No man in Russia will believe this tripe!”
Putin backed off for a second as Dmitri sputtered and whimpered pathetically. Putin knew that effective torture required pacing: beat a man senseless all at once and he will pass out. Allow a man to recover periodically, and you can beat him almost indefinitely. Putin lowered his voice and became dispassionate again.
“I have it from a good source that the CIA now plants computer chips in their agents’ brains to communicate with them. Have you undergone the operation yet?”
“What?” Dmitri managed to spit out.
It suddenly dawned on him that his life was in the hands of a sadist and a lunatic.
“Don’t lie, Dmitri. If you were to confess and turn this brain technology over to your homeland, you might find yourself dealt with leniently. I might be willing to simply kill you.”
The insanity of Putin’s claim, coupled with Dmitri’s physically beaten state, left him unable to speak. Putin walked slowly towards the door and opened it. He spoke to someone in the other room, unseen by Dmitri.
“Please fetch me my drill, comrade, and my saw. This man is about to confess that the CIA put a chip in his brain.”
*******
All Savka wanted to do was be rid of this man. It had been utterly horrible. Before Savka had been called in, three other men had passed out while Putin diced Dmitri up. Putin had not even bothered to kill the poor man before cutting his head open. He had died eventually, of course, but not before Putin rooted around in the man’s skull while he screamed out in agony. Savka ran outside to vomit at one point, but was ordered back inside. He had to step over the bodies of the men who had passed out assisting Putin. While everyone else in the room had been shocked by the carnage, Putin’s face registered no emotion.
Savka thought that the entire idea of a computer chip in a man’s brain seemed crazy, even if Putin was a respected member of the KGB. Truth be told, Savka thought, I always thought Brezhnev’s eyebrows looked rather comical, too. Not that he would dare utter that opinion out loud. Savka kept his head down and focused on washing the last bits of blood from his hands so he could leave the washroom and be rid of Putin. Putin had finished washing quickly, moving with the crisp efficiency of a man who had washed blood off of his hands many times before. Nonetheless, he stuck around to flex in the mirror while Savka finished washing up.
“It’s a rather dirty business, comrade, that I’ll admit,” Putin finally said, holding his arms above his
head in a U shape while he bounced his pectoral muscles up and down.
Quite the understatement, you barbarian, Savka thought.
“Sometimes, you root around in someone’s brain for a chip and, you know, you can’t find it. That doesn’t mean it isn’t there. It could be very small. And in any case, there are other times that you do find one,” he continued.
“How often do you find them?” Savka asked.
“So far, never. But when we do find them, then we will have found one and we can calculate the percentage afterwards. Everything must done in steps, much like building our great nation. Come, let us drink at the bar.”
Putin put his arm around Savka. Savka knew that he could not turn down the offer of a drink with this sadistic young officer, but he shuddered at the thought of spending another minute with him.
“Yes, we will get a drink,” Putin said, “and I will tell you about the time that I wrestled a bear and trained it to attack other bears. All while not wearing a shirt.”
Chapter 1: Brezhnev’s eyebrows
November 11, 1982
Dmitri Hohlakov stood over the corpse of Prime Minister Brezhenev and pondered the task at hand. Dmitri had been trusted with a great responsibility: preparing Brezhnev’s corpse for public display. A few years earlier, such an assignment would have been inconceivable. For much of his life, Dmitri’s relationship with communism had been strained, at best. This assignment was the culmination of a gradual, lengthy process by which his love for his homeland had been rekindled. This renewed love for Mother Russia coincided with a reconciliation between Dmitri and his father, Colonel Boris Hohlakov, who had devoted his life to the military, and was a rigid Party man. In Dmitri’s mind, Colonel Hohlakov was the personification of the State. When their relationship fell apart, Dmitri’s sense of patriotism went with it.
As far back as he could recall, Dmitri’s relationship with his father had been strained. As a child, Dmitri had not followed in his father’s patriotic footsteps. Growing up, he had been drawn to the arts, somewhat to his father’s dismay. This had led to an interest in fashion, and, worst of all, American culture. Even now, Dmitri shuddered when he remembered the lashing his father gave him after finding a stack of bootlegged American movies under his bed.
Colonel Hohlakov could be sadistic when provoked. After finding the movies, he had exploded with rage. His belt had rained blows upon young Dmitri’s helpless body. Dmitri curled into a ball and rolled as far under his bed as he could manage. Still, the belt’s buckle pummeled the back of his head. It left welts that would be visible for months afterwards, and that would haunt Dmitri for far longer. Dmitri’s tears did nothing to abate his father’s fury.
“My son, a traitor! What have I done to deserve this?” Colonel Hohlakov bellowed as he attacked the child. Hohlakov held one of the tapes up and read the handwritten label. “PORKY’S?? What the hell does that mean? Is it capitalist propaganda?”
Nursing his wounds the next day, Dmitri swore he would never forgive his father. Unlike most childhood vows of familial loathing, this one stuck; though he would have disputed it, Dmitri had inherited his father’s obstinate nature. He moved out at seventeen and began hanging around with a group of young artists in Moscow. Desperate for money, he began making a living as a hairdresser, an occupation that reeked of femininity to Colonel Hohlakov. They did not speak for years.
Nonetheless, it turned out that Dmitri had a talent for cutting hair, and a zest for innovation. Dmitri opened his own business, called The Barbershop Potemkin. Dmitri was the first Russian barber to offer more than one hairstyle. Initially, his expanded offerings included only two options: The Tolstoy and The Rasputin (The Rasputin was just like The Tolstoy but slightly creepier). Even these two meager options were a breakthrough to the Russian populace. Dmitri’s clientele exploded.
As Dmitri’s reputation grew, notable Russian celebrities began to seek him out for haircuts. The culmination of these visits was when the illustrious politician Konstantin Chernenko — considered by many to be the biggest sex symbol in Russia at that time — showed up for a haircut one day. Dmitri gave Chernenko a list of his newly expanded selection of hairstyles. Chernenko mulled it over.
“The Joseph Stalin looks good,” Chernenko said.
Dmitri went to work with a flourish. Chernenko was the most famous man he had ever worked on. Chernenko’s hair was, by this point, a stately silver. When Dmitri’s skilled hands were finished, he handed Chernenko a mirror. Chernenko stared at his reflection intently; Dmitri held his breath in anticipation.
“Superb!” Chernenko exclaimed, finally, after what had seemed to Dmitri to be an interminably long few seconds.
Chernenko was thrilled. His colleagues at the Kremlin were impressed as well. Jealous of his looks and success with women, people began to call Chernenko Egoistichnyy Lyubovnik (“The Selfish Lover”). In Russian culture, this is considered the highest form of romantic achievement. Jealous of Chernenko’s stylish hair, Russian officials began flocking to The Barbershop Potemkin.
As Dmitri’s clientele became dominated by political figures, Dmitri found himself drawn back into the life of a Party member like his father. Dmitri’s disassociation from his youthful rebellion became a matter of course; one simply did not resist the wishes of the Party. The acceptance of Dmitri and his occupation within the Party gave Colonel Hohlakov an excuse to accept his son for who he was. After nearly ten years of silence, the duo began speaking again. Dmitri’s relationship with his father repaired itself, slowly.
Then came the news that Dmitri had been chosen to prepare Brezhnev’s corpse for display to the public. This was a great honor. Dmitri’s father beamed with pride when he heard the news. This seemed to be the thing that would truly bring father and son back together. Dmitri finally felt vindicated in his choice of career, both by his father and his homeland. Dmitri was determined to amaze the party officials with the elegance and beauty that Brezhnev’s corpse would exude.
Dmitri had always found Prime Minister Brezhnev rather hideous, honestly. He and his friends had frequently made jokes about the ridiculously oversized eyebrows that Brezhnev refused to trim. Well, Dmitri thought, here is my chance to change all that, and allow Comrade Brezhnev a chance to look handsome when he is lowered into his grave, for the honor of the Party. The corpse was wheeled in, and Dmitri furrowed his brow. The expert was about to go to work. He leaned over the prime minister, scissors in hand.
*********
“Come quickly, it’s an emergency.”
Vladimir Putin needed no further prodding. He slammed the phone down and broke into a full sprint. Putin, somewhat in the KGB’s doghouse at the moment, had been stuck in a far corner of the Kremlin. After a minor incident involving a handful of unanticipated deaths, he had been removed from the field and stuck inside an office. To Putin, this was unacceptable, and he had been anxiously waiting for a chance to redeem himself. He ran from his office through the hallway, dodging pedestrians as he went. A couple of people had to dive out of the way to avoid him; the rest merely stepped aside and glowered. Putin collided with one man, sending papers flying everywhere.
“Look where you’re going you lunatic,” the man yelled.
After exiting the building, Putin had to run across the Kremlin’s vast courtyard to reach his destination. He focused on his breath, taking care to time his exhalations up with the rhythm of his feet. Putin visualized what he must look like to an outside observer. In his mind, Putin imagined that everyone was watching him run, admiring his form and stamina. In reality, they viewed him as a bizarre nuisance.
A few minutes later, Putin reached his destination. He threw the door open and burst into the room. Putin was running so fast it took him a few steps to slow down. He slammed on the breaks and skidded to a stop, like Wile E. Coyote dashing off the edge of a cliff. After he managed to stop his momentum, Putin looked around the room. There was a coffin in the center of the room, while three men huddled in a corner. The men were eyeing Putin with perplexed looks on their faces. Vladimir walked towards the trio and saluted them.
“Hello, comrades,” he said.
The men returned Putin’s salute. This bit of formality over with, Putin placed his hands on his knees and bent over in exhaustion, gasping for breath. A man Putin did not recognize spoke up.
“I believe you were told to hurry, but it was not actually necessary to run across the Kremlin,” the man said with a chuckle.
“Don’t laugh, comrade, Mr. Putin is simply a literal man. That’s why he takes orders so beautifully,” said one of the others. “And anyway, we have far more important problems.”
This man was Vitaly Fedorchuk, head of the KGB, and the only one of the three Putin recognized. Fedorchuk had recently taken over at the KGB for Yuri Andropov, who was now set to succeed Brezhnev as prime minister. Putin had never seen either of the other two men, and they did not introduce themselves. Indeed, before anyone could say anything else, Fedorchuk launched into an excited diatribe.
“We have more important things to worry about anyway. Come, see for yourself, Vladimir! It is a grave dishonor! The capitalist swine have stooped to symbolic gestures of depravity to defend their bankrupt system! It will not stand!” Fedorchuk was gesturing excitedly towards the coffin. Putin tried to calm him down.
“What, sir? What is it? Please, start from the beginning.”
“Come see for yourself.” Fedorchuk grabbed Putin and led him to the corpse.
Putin looked down. It was the corpse of Prime Minister Brezhnev alright, but something was dreadfully wrong. Prime Minister Brezhnev had always been famous for his strong, virile, rugged, masculine Russian face, adorned with glorious eyebrows. As far as Putin was concerned, the eyebrows were symbols of inevitability of Russian global domination. At the very least, Brezhnev’s eyebrows were the envy of every junior KGB officer in Russia. Putin had come up through the ranks fantasizing that one day his eyebrows too would look as handsome as Brezhnev’s. Now, though, that glorious face had been replaced with a hideously feminine visage, more suitable for a Hollywood actor than a Russian head of state. The man was made up almost beyond recognition, and, worst of all, his eyebrows had been cut down from their original glory to barely perceptible lines.
“HOW COULD THIS HAVE HAPPENED?” Putin screamed, suddenly more animated than Fedorchuk.
“There was a hairdresser here, he was supposed to groom the corpse, to make him suitable for display to the public, and he decided to trim the eyebrows to make the corpse more elegant. Or so he claims - “
Putin cut in.
“Well, I think it goes without saying that he must be a CIA agent determined to sap the virility of our nation by weakening the appearance of our leader’s corpse.”
“Naturally,” Fedorchuk replied quickly. “We ascertained this at once also.”
“Has he confessed?” Putin, asked coldly, zeroing in the reason for his visit.
“Not yet. He says that he simply thought Comrade Brezhnev needed a new look.”
“A new look?? Comrade Brezhnev was the handsomest man in Russia!” Putin scoffed.
“The man says the eyebrows were particularly galling.”
“The eyebrows were THE BEST PART.” Putin screamed. “How could anyone think that such a ridiculous claim would be believed?”
“I’m not entirely sure. Any young Russian male would love to have eyebrows like Comrade Brezhnev.” Fedorchuk agreed. “He may have been the single most handsome man in Russia, as you say.”
Putin got down to business.
“You want me to extract a confession from this man, and root out his CIA accomplices, I take it?”
Fedorchuk nodded.
“There is a man outside the door. He will take you downstairs to the interrogation room.”
“Yes, sir.”
Putin saluted Fedorchuk and left the room. Fedorchuk walked over to his other two colleagues.
“How do you think he will do?” one of them asked.
“Mr. Putin will get exactly the answer we want. He is utterly ruthless,” Federochuk responded.
“That’s what his file said. High marks across the board in every category: ruthlessness, barbarity, mercilessness, lack of remorse. That is all very fine, naturally, but it also mentioned some eccentricities. Behavioral quirks are things that The Party may accept that under certain occasions, but not always.”
“What do you mean, Comrade?”
“I mean the shirt, Comrade Fedorchuk, the shirt. The man wasn’t wearing a shirt.”
“Ah, yes, the shirt, or rather its absence. Well, uh, you know, Comrade Putin frequently doesn’t like to wear a shirt. I think it’s a display of masculinity.”
“Well it’s rather unusual. And it’s not as if the man is a model of physical health.”
The third man spoke up.
“Indeed. Can you imagine what a fool he must have looked like running across the Kremlin without a shirt on? Are we entirely sure this is the man for the job?”
“Absolutely sure.” Fedorchuk assured the man. “As you said, in some cases The Party must accept eccentricities, and Vladimir Putin, shirt or no shirt, is the most ruthless son of a bitch in the KGB, and for this reason he is indispensable.”
*******
Downstairs, Vladimir entered the interrogation room. It was small, and dimly lit. It contained two chairs, a table, and an extremely bright light. A one-way mirror had been installed on one wall. The basic layout was based on cutting-edge American interrogation room technology. Putin had overseen the espionage which led to the stolen design: one of his agents acquired a series of video tapes documenting the activities of an ace American police unit known as Miami Vice. These tapes had formed the basis for many of Putin’s methods. The policemen in the tapes were absurd, Putin thought; they were the epitome of capitalist decadence. Nonetheless, Putin, as always, studied the Americans’ methods religiously to ensure they never got more than a year ahead. Thus, the Russians now had minimalist interrogation rooms with one way mirrors like the Americans. These rooms with mirrors replaced the classic Russian model with no mirror.
Inside the room, Dmitri Hohlakov’s torso was tied to one of the chairs, with his hands handcuffed behind him. The chair across from him was empty. Instead of sitting down, Putin walked up to the captive man and leaned down to look him directly in the eyes.
“Hello, Dmitri,” Putin sneered. “How long have you been working for the CIA?”
“The CIA? NEVER! I told them already?” Dmitri plead, “I am a loyal party member, I have nev—“
Dmitri paused for a second and looked at Putin.
“Why aren’t you wearing a shirt?”
Putin flexed his muscles and stuck his paunch outward.
“Does my raw masculinity threaten you, you decadent capitalist pig?”
“No, I mean, uh, well, nevermind.” Dmitri trailed off, distracted from his plight for a moment.
When Dmitri glanced downwards away from Vladimir’s torso, Putin struck him hard in the jaw. The blow sent the chair toppling backwards. Dmitri, still attached to the chair, fell backwards as well. He yelled out in pain as his head struck the concrete floor. Vladimir wasted no time. He ran over to Dmitri and began kicking him in the ribs.
“Confess! Confess traitor! No one believes your ridiculous western lies!”
“I’m not a spy! I told them already. I thought Brezhnev’s eyebrows were ugly but no one had the guts to tell him while he was alive! They told me to make him look beautiful. I wanted nothing but to glorify the party. This is the truth, I swear.”
Dmitri was in tears as he pleaded with Putin. He was bleeding everywhere, but he could not protect himself from Putin’s blows with his arms handcuffed behind the chair.
“How stupid do you think I am? Brezhnev’s eyebrows looked ugly? No man in Russia will believe this tripe!”
Putin backed off for a second as Dmitri sputtered and whimpered pathetically. Putin knew that effective torture required pacing: beat a man senseless all at once and he will pass out. Allow a man to recover periodically, and you can beat him almost indefinitely. Putin lowered his voice and became dispassionate again.
“I have it from a good source that the CIA now plants computer chips in their agents’ brains to communicate with them. Have you undergone the operation yet?”
“What?” Dmitri managed to spit out.
It suddenly dawned on him that his life was in the hands of a sadist and a lunatic.
“Don’t lie, Dmitri. If you were to confess and turn this brain technology over to your homeland, you might find yourself dealt with leniently. I might be willing to simply kill you.”
The insanity of Putin’s claim, coupled with Dmitri’s physically beaten state, left him unable to speak. Putin walked slowly towards the door and opened it. He spoke to someone in the other room, unseen by Dmitri.
“Please fetch me my drill, comrade, and my saw. This man is about to confess that the CIA put a chip in his brain.”
*******
All Savka wanted to do was be rid of this man. It had been utterly horrible. Before Savka had been called in, three other men had passed out while Putin diced Dmitri up. Putin had not even bothered to kill the poor man before cutting his head open. He had died eventually, of course, but not before Putin rooted around in the man’s skull while he screamed out in agony. Savka ran outside to vomit at one point, but was ordered back inside. He had to step over the bodies of the men who had passed out assisting Putin. While everyone else in the room had been shocked by the carnage, Putin’s face registered no emotion.
Savka thought that the entire idea of a computer chip in a man’s brain seemed crazy, even if Putin was a respected member of the KGB. Truth be told, Savka thought, I always thought Brezhnev’s eyebrows looked rather comical, too. Not that he would dare utter that opinion out loud. Savka kept his head down and focused on washing the last bits of blood from his hands so he could leave the washroom and be rid of Putin. Putin had finished washing quickly, moving with the crisp efficiency of a man who had washed blood off of his hands many times before. Nonetheless, he stuck around to flex in the mirror while Savka finished washing up.
“It’s a rather dirty business, comrade, that I’ll admit,” Putin finally said, holding his arms above his
head in a U shape while he bounced his pectoral muscles up and down.
Quite the understatement, you barbarian, Savka thought.
“Sometimes, you root around in someone’s brain for a chip and, you know, you can’t find it. That doesn’t mean it isn’t there. It could be very small. And in any case, there are other times that you do find one,” he continued.
“How often do you find them?” Savka asked.
“So far, never. But when we do find them, then we will have found one and we can calculate the percentage afterwards. Everything must done in steps, much like building our great nation. Come, let us drink at the bar.”
Putin put his arm around Savka. Savka knew that he could not turn down the offer of a drink with this sadistic young officer, but he shuddered at the thought of spending another minute with him.
“Yes, we will get a drink,” Putin said, “and I will tell you about the time that I wrestled a bear and trained it to attack other bears. All while not wearing a shirt.”
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