(Rated MA)
**
Tiksi Harbour, Siberia, Russia
Ivan Gort stood, hands in his jacket, dressed like he was going out for a jog and not for the frosty -15°F that it was. His breath made ghost-like sheets as it rose into the night. A man rugged up in too many clothes approached him.
“Stalnoivolk?”
“Da!”
The man handed him a briefcase “The FSB are reinstating the Red Shadows”
Gort looked at the little man in his many layers “The more the world changes, the more it remains the same. Why?”
“In response to the Americans.”
“Bah!” Gort threw his hands up in disgust “Our country, our nation, crippled itself spying, out doing and competing with a rogue state that needed to win at all costs! Why must we play their games?”
“We’re not. Not this time” said the man as he walked off into the cold night. Gort stood watching holding the briefcase.
Novosibirsk, Russia
A blindfolded Katarina Bolotnikov balanced between two chairs, her legs split, toes the only thing holding her up. Her arms were raised holding two laden dumbbells.
“Are you ready?” asked her father from across the room as he loaded a pistol.
“Da Papa!” she replied as she exhaled.
Alexei Bolotnikov raised the pistol when he spotted Gort standing in the door way. He switched targets aiming straight for Gort’s forehead. “I thought I said I never wanted to see you again?!”
“Then close your eyes Alexei,” said Gort “I am not here for you”
Katarina lowered her arms and peeked “Papa?”
“Go to your room Katarina!” barked Alexei, beckoning with the pistol.
“Do not make this harder on yourself Bolshoi,” said Gort as he walked into the room “If she is as good as they say, then you have nothing to fear.”
“You are not taking my daughter!” he barked, his hand shaking as he resisted the urge to fire.
“What is going on Papa?” Katarina flipped with deft skill onto her feet and took a fighting stance next to her father. Gort smiled and beckoned her over, but her father caught her by the elbow and drew her back.
Gort took up a chair and sat, casually waiting “Whenever you are ready?”
Alexei stormed forward and stood over him, seething with rage “You have no right!”
Gort stood up and stared him dead in the eye “You are correct, I have no right! But the State has EVERY right! Your fingers were saved, along with your life when you lost that game of catch with Captain Boomerang. You said you would give anything, ANYTHING to keep them. Now the state has come to collect! If you have done your duty then she, should be as good if not better than you! She is now Bolshoi, you…we no longer care for you.”
Alexei slumped and burst into tears, his daughter coming to his side.
“Papa? What is going on?”
“You will come with me Bolshoi,” said Gort pointing at the girl and began to leave “Do not make this an incident Alexei!”
Gort left, leaving the grieving father to explain why his daughter had to leave him.
Volgograd, Russia
Gort stepped off the train and spat onto the ground “This city disgusts me!” he said to the people within earshot and walked down the platform scowling at the citizens and tourists. He remembered a time when this city was proudly called Stalingrad, the hero he faithfully served. Gort walked to a door on the platform marked ‘Maintenance’ and entered. Inside it was a simple supply closet, to the untrained eye. Gort moved a bottle of bleach and pressed a brick causing the wall to swing inwards. The smell hit him like a fist.
“You disgusting animal!”
Gort wandered into the small hidden room to see Schrek sitting in the corner, the floor littered with human bones, dried blood and torn clothing.
“Always nice to see you too Ivan” growled the albino “Is it night?”
“No Schrek, I would only come to see your kind during daylight hours. I may be old but I am not stupid”
“What do you want?”
Gort looked around “You have been drafted back in”
Schrek stood “I did my service in Cambodia!”
“And now it is time to serve again vampire!” snarled Gort, his hands curling into balls “Or do you enjoy living like this? In your vast closet kingdom?”
Schrek snarled and Gort charged forward, slamming him into the wall and gripping him by the throat “I know you don’t breathe, but I will rip your head off! This is not a request!”
Schrek’s eyes seemed to move and dance as his voice sounded like cool water “You will release me Ivan”
Gort slowly removed his hand and then grabbed him by the head with both hands and slammed his skull into the ancient sandstone “I do not hypnotise monster!”
CHOK!
“You will do as you are told!”
CHOK!
“Or I will crush you into paste!”
CHOK!
“Do you understand?” Gort threw him to the floor and stepped on his neck “Well?” Schrek lay dazed on the floor, squirming like a dying cockroach. “I ASKED YOU A QUESTION?”
“…yes” wheezed the vampire. Gort spat on him and promptly left.
Russian Military Hospital, Omsk, Russia
Gort looked intently at the man lying in the hospital bed. He was decrepit, old and limbless being kept alive by machines. A doctor sat by the bed reading a book.
“Wake him up.” said Gort as he rolled up his sleeves.
“He is in a coma!” replied the doctor.
“Then go get some adrenaline or paddles!” said Gort as he pulled back the covers and opened up the nightshirt of the patient “Because I need Nikolai Karpov awake and to give me the codes to his Cauldron armour. Waiting for a miraculous recovery is just stupid! Failing that you will get Natalia Spirin here and crack his mind like an egg!”
The doctor hastily left the room.
**
To be continued....
(Way back when, there was a title called the Suicide Squad. It was brilliant, but alas the title got cancelled in 1992 and then everything got washed away with the reboot. This story ignores the New 52 and brings the Russian counterpart The Red Shadows back. You've probably never heard of them, don't worry I'll keep you informed. This runs on a timeline roughly the events in Suicide Squad happened about 18yrs ago)
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