Booty Shorts - Beyond The Red Room

In fact, Malina's group of ex-Widows could probably be counted among the wealthiest organizations in the world for its size. That is, if anyone knew about it in order to count it.

The trio slipped down an alley, to a rusted service door in the back of the building. Chhaya held her bracelet up to what appeared to be a blank spot on the brick wall next to the door, and was rewarded with a click and soft buzzing sound. She pushed the door open and they found themselves in an empty concrete room, with a single door opposite the one they'd entered. Obiya peered into an optical scanner set into the wall and the door slid open, revealing a tiny elevator.

There were no buttons, but as soon as they squeezed inside the door closed and the elevator began to ascend.

Alyssa was fidgeting nervously, and Chhaya gave her a reassuring smile.

"It is okay, sestra. You are among your family now. You are home."

The doors opened to what was, to all appearances, a comfortable hotel lobby. Couches and tables were scattered about the spacious room, with two televisions on one wall, one showing BBC news, the other a sports channel with an alpine skiing competition.

There was only a pair of women occupying the room, huddled together on a couch in the corner talking in low voices.

Chhaya frowned. "Nazanin, Alañya, where is everyone? Where is the welcoming committee?" It had become tradition that every time a new Widow arrived, all the Widows who were in the building gathered to welcome their sestra home.

Nazanin looked up, her eyes red. "You and Obiya need to go see Malina in Ops."

Chhaya and Obiya exchanged a glance.

Alañya rose from the couch. "We'll get Alyssa settled. Go."

Without another word, the pair turned and walked out one of the rooms several doors, leaving their newest sibling with their sestras.

The Ops center was dark, the glow from the video displays covering one wall the only illumination. Dr. Vostokoff was standing over the large table in the center of the room. A display built into the table top showed a map of Spain. Malina stood with her arms wrapped around herself, as if cold.

"Mama?" Obiya asked tentatively as they approached.

She turned. She looked tired.

"Girls. I'm glad you're home safe. I'm proud of you, the two of you have freed more of your sestras than any other team."

"What's wrong, Malina? What is happening?" Chhaya asked.

"I have some bad news. Reetu was killed this morning. June was severely injured as well, but she is on the way home."

"What?! No!" Chhaya whispered.

Obiya gasped, putting her arm around Chhaya's shoulders. "Was it the U.N. and their fucking accords?!"

"I'm afraid it's worse than that. They were extracting a Widow in Barcelona. They... did not catch her by surprise. She was able to kill Reetu. June was stabbed, but managed to gas her."

"स्वर्ग के तारे और उनके नक्षत्र आज रात अपना प्रकाश नहीं दिखाएंगे," Chhaya whispered, the color draining from her face.

Several Widows had been injured while freeing their sestras. Each sleeper agent was too well trained to simply walk up and gas them. It was one of the reasons the teams were so careful when planning their extractions, and sometimes went to such ridiculous lengths to distract their targets when approaching them. But none of their sestras had yet given their lives to free a Widow.

Chhaya looked absolutely stricken.

"Cha-Cha, I'm so sorry," Obiya said, wrapping her in a tight hug.

Chhaya and Obiya had freed Reetu in Delhi the year before. Chhaya being the only other Widow in the organization who spoke Hindi, Reetu had latched onto her as a big sister, following her around like an adorable puppy anytime they were both at the safe house.

"Your new sestra, Eva, is devastated, of course. As I said, June managed to free her during the fight, but it was too late for Reetu. Eva is inconsolable, but after she was released from her control, she helped June get away from the scene before the authorities arrived. The police have Reetu's body at the moment, but I'm sending two teams to bring her home tonight."

The three stood in silence for what seemed like forever.

"I need a drink," Chhaya finally said, then turned on her heel and stalked out of Ops.

Malina and Obiya exchanged a look. Chhaya hadn't drunk alcohol since being freed from Dreykov's control.

"I'll look after her," Obiya said.

"Good. I have a new target for you in Tbilisi, but there is no rush. I sent Anya and Dolce to observe and develop intel for you. They have strict orders to maintain distance. They aren't ready to pull off an extraction yet. Especially after today. You two take all the time you need."

"Spasibo, mama." Obiya said, turning to go. She paused and looked over her shoulder. "We need a reliable method of delivering the gas from a distance."

"I am working on it, dear, but so far the grenades are too dangerous. It was a miracle Yelena didn't kill or seriously injure any of you with shrapnel from the vials when her flash bang went off."

Obiya looked grim. "We need a better way."

Malina looked away. "I know."

Chhaya wasn't in the common area, nor was she in her apartment. Obiya checked the kitchen, the gym and armory, before returning to her own apartment.

She opened the door and found Chhaya sitting on her couch. Her feet were drawn up, one arm was draped over a knee, a bottle of vodka casually dangled from her fingers.

"Sorry, I let myself in. I didn't want to drink in front of everyone and this is the only place I knew where to find a bottle besides the lounge." She lifted the bottle to her lips and took a small sip.

Obiya walked over and took the bottle from her hand. Chhaya looked up at her.

"Are you going to stop me from getting drunk?"

"I'm here to join you. But we can be civilized about it, no need to drink like heathens." Obiya retrieved two vodka glasses from her tiny kitchenette then sat next to Chhaya on the sofa. She handed her one of the small glasses, then filled both of them from the bottle.

"To Reetu," Obiya said.

"मुझे तुम्हारी याद आएगी, छोटी बहन," Chhaya said, then they both drained their glasses. Chhaya held hers out for a refill.

Hours later, Chhaya looked out the window at the sun setting behind the building across the canal, then reached out with her foot, gently tipping the bottle on the table to reveal less than a centimeter of clear liquid sloshing in the bottom.

"I owe you a new bottle," Chhaya said, the slightest slur in her voice.

"Why? I drank more than you did."

They had passed the day alternating between sharing memories of Reetu, and deep silences, lost in their own thoughts. Obiya had left a couple of times to check if June had made it back yet.

"We should eat something," Obiya said, "Do you want to get curry?" she asked, hoping to cheer up her partner.

"The curry in Denmark is मल." Chhaya said without looking up from her toes, which she'd found fascinating most of the day.

"You need to eat."

"Do you ever think about leaving?

Obiya turned on the couch, leaning back against the arm and regarded her partner thoughtfully. "You're saying this because of what happened today."

"No."

"No?"

"I've thought about it a lot. Finding a quiet corner of the world. A new identity. A boring job, maybe opening a bakery or a flower shop. Getting a cat."

"Sounds peaceful."

"Peaceful," Chhaya agreed.

"You can't though."

Chhaya looked up sharply. "Says who? Everyone here has a choice. It's my choice!"

"It is your choice. But that choice is not one you will make."

Chhaya tipped her head to one side, regarding her partner curiously. "Why not?"

"Because you're the leader. Everyone here looks to you, you set the example for all of us."

Chhaya snorted derisively. "I've been a Widow for less time than almost every woman in this building. I'd graduated from the Red Room less than a year before Dreykov died."

"But you've been free longer than almost everyone," Obiya said. "You and I, and the fifteen whom Yelena freed, the others look to us. We were the first to have our free will returned. You and I, we have chosen to use our free will to free the rest of our sestras. We are regarded as the leaders, even though almost every one of our sestras whom we free were Widows long before we were. I think the longer they were subsumed, the harder it is for them to find themselves as free women."

Chhaya pursed her lips and examined the wall. "What about you? You have been free as long as I. Why do you assume they look to me and not you?"

"They do, but in a different way. I am good at fighting. I am respected in the dojo. But all of us can fight. You are a leader, in a way that I could never be. You are thoughtful, your mind is still when others are excited, undisciplined. You always know the smart path, the correct path. Have you never noticed that when you speak, all ears are on you? When you make a tactical decision, that we all defer to you?"

"And you think this makes it... what? Unfair for me to quit?"

"Cha-Cha, you more than any of us have earned the right to rest, if that's what you want. You have freed more of us than anyone."

"What are you saying, then?"

"I'm saying, I do not think you could rest, knowing how many of our sestras are still out there, imprisoned away from their own free will, awaiting orders from Dreykov that will now never come."

Chhaya nodded, her cheeks suddenly wet. "You're right. But this life is so... lonely. I am just... so lonely."

Obiya sat up and touched her on the shoulder. "Why are you lonely, Cha-Cha? We have a whole building of our sestras here. And I am with you everywhere you go."

Chhaya fell silent for a long time while Obiya waited patiently.

"I see families walking down the street, and I think, was that me once? Did I have a mother and father who held my hands, who loved me? Was I stolen from them, did they mourn my loss? Or did they sell me to the Room for money?"

Obiya reached out and squeezed her hand.

Chhaya took a deep, shuddering breath and continued, "For a while, when we'd come home, Reetu was always here, waiting for me at the door. It felt like I had a little sister, like I had a real family. And now she's gone."

"That's why it hurts so much, Cha-Cha. She was your little sister, your family."

"Moya malen'kaya sestra." Chhaya whispered, then stifled a sob.

Obiya moved closer and wrapped her arms around her comrade. "But Chhaya, never forget, you gave her the greatest gift any of us could receive. You freed her. You were the one who freed her. She died doing what she chose to do, helping free more of us, making her own choices. Not following the twisted commands of that कुत्ते का बेटा."

Chhaya laughed through her tears. "Your pronunciation is terrible."

"I'm getting better and you know it."

"I appreciate the effort."

A knock made them look up. Obiya wiped her eyes, then went to the door, finding Nazanin standing in the hall.

"Sorry to intrude, sestras, but Malina needs you both. Now."

Obiya turned to look at Chhaya.

"Eto ne khorosho," she said.

Malina's voice came to them from deep within the Ops center as they walked in the door. "Obiya, I said you could have all the time you needed, I know you both are grieving. But something has come up."

"We are ready if you need us, mama, what's happening?" Chhaya said, her voice as steady as if she'd had a cup of tea, not a half a bottle of vodka. Obiya glanced at her, pride on her face.

"I have a tasking for you that I believed wasn't time sensitive. Unfortunately, things have become a bit more urgent."

"How so?" Chhaya asked as they moved to the tactical table.

"Your next target," Malina said, touching the table's controls. A picture popped up, showing a fair skinned woman with straight, black hair. The picture was obviously taken from a distance with a telephoto lens. "Her Widow name is Daria, she's been in Tbilisi for six years. Oddly, she doesn't appear to be embedded with any government agency, or high-profile business interests."

"What's her cover?" Obiya asked.

"She's running an aikidō dojo, catering to high-income clientele."

"So, she's probably an accomplished fighter," Chhaya said wryly.

"Safe to assume," Malina agreed. "She was asked to be on the national team for the Olympics, but declined."

"So why is her extraction now time-sensitive?" Obiya asked.

Malina brought up some more information on the table-top display.

"Yelena has been working to try and uncover some of Dreykov's orders to the Widows prior to his death. Our information is incomplete, but Daria's mission seems to be very simple, yet unbelievably difficult."

"What is it?" Chhaya asked.

"I believe it is to protect President Gogoladze and his interests. There have been two high profile assassinations in the last few years, both prosecutors who were sticking their noses into Gogoladze's business. He's incredibly corrupt, and Dreykov was profiting handsomely from his contacts within the Georgian government. I think Daria was behind the killings, although we don't think Gogoladze even knows about her existence. But now, there is a populist challenger in the election this year. The polls indicate he is substantially ahead of Gogoladze."

"So, what? Do you think she's going to start campaigning for Gogoladze?" Obiya asked, a smirk on her face.

"No, I believe she's going to assassinate the challenger, Viktor Nozadze, at a rally in four days' time."

Obiya's humor evaporated from the room, replaced by tension.

"Well... we can't let that happen," Chhaya said.

"We want Gogoladze out of office? Because he's aligned with Russia?" Obiya asked.

"What? No, don't be silly," Malina said. "I don't care who is President in Georgia. Honestly, our investments in the region would do better with Gogoladze there."

"Then what is the rush?" Obiya asked.

"Because if she kills Nozadze, especially publicly, in the capital, Gogoladze will have to make a show of bringing the killer to justice to make sure blame doesn't fall on him and lead to an uprising," Chhaya said. "He'll send the police after her, the army, special forces, secret service, everything. Even Interpol and the U.N. will be involved. We'll never get her out alive."

"Just so," said Malina approvingly. "The team we sent to surveille her has observed her reconnoitering several buildings near the rally site, and this morning they tailed her to an arms dealer in Batumi. They believe, based on the size of the package she left with, she purchased a long gun."

The girls stared at the tactical table, which was displaying several buildings around Tbilisi's main public square.

"How fast can you get us there?" Chhaya finally said. "We'll be sober by morning."

"We have identities ready for you and you are booked on a flight through Berlin that leaves in three hours," Malina said. "You can sleep on the plane."

"We'll bring her home," Chhaya said.

Obiya simply nodded, then the girls walked out of Operations.

~~ Tbilisi, Georgia ~~

"This is the place," Chhaya said, surveying the view of the public square below. "This is where I'd take the shot from."

Their target hadn't been to her apartment in two days, according to the team who had been observing her. She'd given them the slip yesterday, either because she'd detected she was being followed or just through good tradecraft. Either way, they had no idea of her whereabouts, so Chhaya had decided their best course of action was to set an ambush for Daria in the most likely place that she would choose to kill the candidate.

"What makes you sure? Anya and Dolce said she spent as much time in that one as here." Obiya pointed to the building on the other side of the square. "The rally is midday, the sun or wind shouldn't be a factor, and this is a much further shot. An extra two hundred yards, easily."

"That building isn't under construction. This one is." The structure of the building that Chhaya believed to be where Daria would take her shot was complete, with mirrored glass covering the exterior, but the interior was largely unfinished.

"But four of the top five floors of that one are unoccupied."

"Doesn't matter. That building has three financial firms in it."

Obiya said nothing, but her brow furrowed.

"Tomorrow is Sunday," Chhaya continued patiently. "There won't be a construction worker in the country working. Most of them will probably be down there, supporting their worker's candidate. Ever heard of a finance guy that takes time off when he can be working to wring the last dollar from the proletariat? There's likely to be several people in that building on Sunday, while this building will almost certainly be empty. A much easier getaway."

"'The proletariat'? Really Cha-Cha, I know we were raised in Russia, but the Soviet Union fell before you or I were born."

"Blame it on Alexei's Karl Marx knuckle tattoos." Chhaya said, eliciting a chuckle from Obiya.

Chhaya started prowling around the top floor of the building. Steel studs formed the skeletons of walls to come, but there was no drywall to provide cover anywhere.

"She'll have something rigged in one of the buildings across the way to cover her shot. Perhaps just a small squib to blow out a window suggesting a shooter. Maybe something bigger. I doubt she'll take down the whole building though. We should have Anya sweep for them tonight. She and Dolce can cover that building in case I'm wrong."

"You won't be wrong. You never are," Obiya said. They had crossed to the back side of the building and stood looking down at the streets of the city. "We'll need to take her before the rally starts. If she gets a shot off, even only while fighting us, we may never make it out of here without her distraction going off. The escape routes are iffy."

"Then we'll get her before she's ready." The confidence in Chhaya's voice was absolute. She unslung her pack, knelt and took out her small pair of binoculars to examine the streets below.

"Cha-Cha..." Obiya said, hesitatingly.

"Yes, sestra?"

"Did you mean what you said? That you would be happy living a quiet life?"

Chhaya straightened up and stretched. "I think so, yes."

"Being a baker?"

"Why not?"

"You are a terrible cook for one thing."

Chhaya laughed. "This is true, but only because I have not focused on learning to cook. If I had the time, I'm sure I could be good at it."

"I know you would," Obiya said softly. "Would there be a husband? Children in your future?"

Chhaya gave her a dark look. All of the Widows had been sterilized in the Red Room as a matter of routine.

"I mean adopting," Obiya said quickly. "Lots of little girls out there need a safe home. As you and I well know.

"Kids? Maybe. A husband?" Chhaya trailed off. Obiya waited patiently. "I think not. Most men feel the need to be in charge. And I'm not interested in having someone in charge of me. Also... just..."

"What?"

Chhaya grimaced. "I only had to use my seduction training once on a mission as a Widow, back before. It was a man, and I didn't... I can't say I cared for it."

"Because you were doing it to turn an asset, not because you had feelings for him?" Obiya said.

"Maybe. Maybe not. I enjoyed the training in the Room on seducing a woman more than a man, I have to say," Chhaya said, missing the intense glance Obiya shot her. "So perhaps a partner, rather than a husband. Enough talk, let's check the lower floors and see if we can find a better ambush location to take her tomorrow."

"What if she takes the elevator?"

Chhaya eyed her disapprovingly. "Would you let yourself be cornered in an elevator during a hit?"