Enigma Earth

Good Morning and Good-bye, Part Twenty-five

    “Let’s go,” ordered Stalin/Boris to the cockpit, through the Mermaid’s communication system, “Take-off!”
    The pilot and the co-pilot eyed each other in the cockpit and then turned to the flight engineer in the back right corner. They knew if an engine failed again, their last flight might be to Siberia, as prisoner passengers. The flight engineer finished scanning his dials and readouts of engine status and then turned and nodded as confidently as he could to the pilot.
    The Mermaid’s engines powered up nicely, much to the relief of the flight crew. The largest amphibious aircraft in the world started to taxi out into the river in the early morning dark. One of the observation officers activated an access port on top of the aircraft and a spotlight appeared, scanning for water vessels. Lucky for them none of the many coal barges, or hydro wheelers that steamed along the river were near, not even a rowboat.
    The Mermaid had just got to the middle of the river and started to turn into the wind for take-off. The pilot tried to operate the marine rudder, but as he turned right the right, down river and into the wind, the plane would not stop turning.
    Jim Dawes had ordered his assault team to the riverbank across from the Mermaid.
    “One shot,” he told a sniper, “just disable an engine.”
    “Or more likely blow it up,” retorted Hans Volkswagen.
    “Volkswagen let me finish this. I have a maritime squad on the way from the Delhi station to board this thing. We’ve got to stop it from getting off the ground.”
    “You mean, water,” added Hans.
    Dawes rolled his eyes at Volkswagen.
    Hans looked past Dawes noticing what the pilots of the Mermaid were. She was locked in a right hand turn. They were not going anywhere.
    Stalin/Boris grabbed an intercom mic, “What is going on? Take-off!”
    “Comrade Stalin, our marine rudder has failed. We must shut down and try to effect repairs.”
    “What? No! Wait…” said Boris/Stalin now clutching his head again.
    “Comrade Stalin,” said Dr. Andropov, “Let me get you to the Medpunkt section, so that you can lay down and I can give you something for your head.”
    “Stopping this turning would help more,” he said dizzily following Andropov as best he could.
    In another section of the Mermaid, Silas, Nell, Halley and Mariana sat handcuffed into airliner like seats.
    “Silas, what’s happening?” asked Nell.
    “I’m not sure,” said Silas looking out a port side window. Water was starting to swirl up near the window. He noticed that either the water was getting higher or the aircraft was sinking. Within seconds, he could tell it was sinking.
The force of the spin became greater. From a vantage point outside the aircraft, one could see that a great whirlpool had formed around it. Even the rational Jim Dawes looked in awe. None of the police officers had ever seen a phenomenon of this kind on the river.
    The force of the spin plastered Silas, against the wall of the cabin. One by one, he saw the others pass out. Just as he lost consciousness, water started seeping in through the ventilation system. That is the last thing he remembered.
    How much time had gone by, he was not sure, but he eventually awoke underwater, but was not dead, alive, not but not drowning, but yet not quite breathing, dry, but also wet. The Mermaid was nowhere to be found. He was floating freely in the dark, dark, river water. His mind was as cloudy as the water. He felt as if sedated. He managed to form the thought that he might be dead or dying. It might be somewhere in between. That is when a bluish yellow light narrowly appeared above him piercing through the dark. He wondered if heaven waited.

Good Morning and Good-bye, Part Twenty-Four

    Silas held the jar of holy water for a moment, casually, calculating in his head the distance and angle needed to strike Stalin.
    Mariana weak and on all fours looked from the blood soaked body of Stroganov to where she thought the jar had rolled. She saw Silas with it and nodded weakly.
    Stalin/Boris was laughing at the look of fear on Andropov’s face after he had threatened to kill him next.
    “Don’t worry comrade. I’m sure you will come up with something.”
    “Yes,” said Andropov, “In the plane, I have a full medical kit.”
    Silas now brought the jar of water in front of him, but he was spotted.
    “Comrade Stalin!” barked one of the guards, “The American!”
    Boris/Stalin turned towards Silas.
    “Were you going to do something with that?” Boris/Stalin asked.
    “I was thirsty,” said Silas sardonically.
    “Yes, of course,” said Boris/Stalin walking over to Silas. As he came closer he looked a bit confused and was squinting.
    “You. Silas. Silas Whowood, Nell’s old friend from Moscow. She’s told me so much about you. So much that I could be insanely jealous. My transformation, as it were, has made me feel that personal relationships are in fact meaningless. Obedience to the state is all that matters.”
    “So you are just insane, but not jealous.”
    “Humor out of the American!” laughed Boris/Stalin.
    He walked up to Silas and snatched the jar out of his hand.
    “Touch my face,” instructed Boris/Stalin.
    “Why?” asked Silas.
    “Because your jar of water cannot harm me! I am Stalin, the man of steel!”
    Silas touch his face. It certainly was not human flesh, though it seemed to move like it. It felt like solid metal with a gold cast.
    “The tin man from Oz you’re not,” said Silas.
    “You see,” he said with grin. He turned and hurled the jar of water into the river. It shattered on impact.
    “Oh! This place bores me so! Perhaps we should leave for Moscow. It will be triumphant!  I’ll be back to destroy America soon enough.”
    He turned to the guards. “Bring the Ukrainian witch with us. We will find out where her family lives and start the extermination from there. And bring Nell with us.”
    “No!” cried Nell.
    “But Nell, I am your husband.”
    “Not any more,” she said.    
    He moved close to her. Silas tried to move forward, but machine guns stopped him.
    “Oh Nell, my dear wife. The Motherland needs its mother, at least for propaganda needs and that means you. Come Nell!”
    “No! Silas, do something!”
   “Mr. Whowood is going to do something. He will come along as well. We’ll put him on trial as a spy and send a message to foreigners to stay out of our affairs. Yes, nothing like a show trial. I could have him sent to the gulag though, or have him executed, if you’re not a good girl and obey me. Either way, it’s just like old times. Come!”
    “No!” cried Nell again.
    With consulate guards and Dr. Andropov having guns trained on them, Silas, Nell and Mariana made their way down to the water’s edge and the gangway that boarded to the “Mermaid”. 
    Nell helped Mariana to rise and walk. Weakly, Mariana whispered to her, “God help us.”
    Behind the police cars, Jim Dawes assessed the situation grimly.
    “Volkswagen, we’ve got to stop that aircraft.”
    Hans rolled his eyes at Dawes stating of the obvious.
    “Yup, you’re right Jim,” he said with a sigh, continuing to stare at the scene before him.
    “What are you going to do then? You said you have this under control,” said Dawes back sarcastically.
    “I’m thinking,” said Hans.
    Silas kept scanning his brain for options also as he entered the aircraft with Stalin in the lead. The “Mermaid’s” crew saluted. Out in the middle of the river, no one noticed that a small pool of water started to form and swirl.

Good Morning and Good-bye, Part Twenty-three

   
    Mariana pulled out of her bag a cross and a jar of holy water. At first, she had drifted back from the men who had abducted her in fear.  Now, she moved forward. Guns turned on her from the good guys and the bad guys as she stood between the two groups. She turned towards Boris/Stalin and started reciting, ““In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.”
    “Oh the Ukrainian girl is going to pray!” said Boris/Stalin with a great guffaw. Stroganov and his henchmen grinned and laughed as well.
    “Perhaps she is a witch,” said Dr. Andropov, “Are you a witch, girl?”
Unfazed, Mariana continued raising the cross and jar above her head, “ Where have you, you good-for-nothing, come from? From the wind, or from bad dreams? Here you mustn’t show yourself, here you mustn’t dwell.  You no-good. You think we do not know where you come from. You are from the evil one.”
    “What’s going on here Volkswagen?”  said Chief Inspector Jim Dawes as he crept up along where Hans had taken cover behind his car. Commander Volkswagen looked at Dawes with a smirk. Sure enough, the white hats were sticking their noses in his affairs.
    “It’s under control,” Hans said.
    A breeze started to blow along the riverbank. Inside the Mermaid X-jet, they were ready to start its two engines. One of the turbines on the jet started to spool up. Just as quickly, it shut down. In the cockpit, the pilots looked puzzled and started doing checks.
This made Stroganov look a bit nervous. Boris/Stalin was not. In fact, he seemed to settle down and stand up straight. The man of gold looked into the eyes of Mariana.
    Mariana now looked as though she were in a trance and said to Boris/Stalin,  “I’ll give you three tasks:  One task—pour water back into itself, the second task—bring noise from the rocks, the third task—make the sound of the wind, you no-good, I’ll give you a cane stick—walk with it—take yourself out of here.  Go where dogs don’t bark, where chickens don’t sing, where enemy winds stroll.
    “Silas, what is she saying?” asked Halley.
    “I‘m not fluent in Ukrainian, but based on my Russian, I think she trying to drive Stalin out of Boris. Either that or she told him she was turning him into a rock sending him to live with dogs and chickens.”
    Mariana continued, “Well of holy water, shore, roots, and rocks, wash Boris of the evil that has taken over him.”
    “Foolish witch,” exclaimed Boris/Stalin, “Do you think your god has power over me?”
Undeterred she continued, “New moon, silver-gold moon, dear, help, cleanse all, wash, cleanse, wash and bless, so he will be, as clear, and clean as are you.”
    “I am more powerful than your god! Like him, I have defeated death, but unlike him, I am still here to prove it. Where is he? I have never seen him. I am here. I am your Master!”
    Silas stood, as did the others, transfixed by this young woman taking on the golden creature before them. He wondered to himself whether Mariana could summon the power of God. Silas thought how he often found God distant and invisible.
    Nell was tortured looking at this scene. She felt helpless in Stroganov’s hold. She felt her only hope was in a woman who had appeared out of nowhere it seemed. ‘Why didn’t Stalin just have her shot outright,’ she thought. He was toying with her.
    Mariana suddenly stopped praying. The force against her made her shake and buckled at the knees. She lost the jar of holy water out of one hand and it rolled towards Silas and Halley. Her mouth felt like it had sticky spider webs in it. She still gripped her cross with the other hand.
    Boris/Stalin said with a cold expression, “Time to purge this world of traitors, spies and fools like you girl. And what a better place to start than in America. Time to finish the revolution!” Stalin raised his right arm, palm sideways and looked to the sky. The night sky grew bright with red clouds that started swirling over the downtown.  An acrid smell, like burning electrical components wafted in the air.
    Stroganov held Nell, but pointed the gun at Mariana.
    “Let’s start with her. Master, let me kill her. I will kill all the Americans for you Comrade Stalin.”
    “Would you Stroganov? Would you want me to put you in charge of America in the new Soviet order?”
    Stroganov nodded and gave a lustful grin. He hated Americans. Their democratic chaos he considered a disease to be wiped out. He had to endure being around them for so long. Exiled by the party to this nothing outpost in uncivilized America as punishment for being too reactionary. 
    “So you would like that power, eh Stroganov?”
    “Yes Comrade Stalin, very much.”
    “You would like having the power of life and death?”
    “Yes Comrade Stalin.”
    “Hand me your weapon Stroganov.”
    “What?”
    “Hand me your weapon. Let me teach you about life and death and who should die first.”
    A bit puzzled, Stroganov handed him his revolver. Boris/Stalin looked at it, feeling its weight in his hand. He turned away from Stroganov.
    “Stroganov, release the woman and stand at attention!”
    Stroganov shoved Nell towards one of his consulate guards who held her firm, with a gun to her side. Silas flinched, but knew he could do nothing.
    Boris/Stalin turned towards Mariana and pointed the gun at her. Then he spun and turned towards the tall, stiff Stroganov.
    “Comrade Stroganov, I am the only one who has the power of life and death.”
He walked up to Stroganov and pointed the gun at his stomach. Stroganov’s eyes suddenly looked fearful.
    “Anyone who is as power hungry as you cannot be trusted. Eventually, you might think you can be me. But what you would be, is an enemy of the state, my enemy.”
    “Master, no,” said Stroganov softly.
    Boris/Stalin pulled the trigger twice in succession. As Stroganov staggered back, blood splattered onto Boris/Stalin’s shirt and sport coat. He looked down at the reddish splotches that were on his funny gold clothes. The stains quickly absorbed into him, leaving no trace. Stalin/Boris looked at where the blood had been on his tunic, smiled with satisfaction and said, “Ahhh. I haven’t felt death from anyone for so long.”
    “You are right Comrade Stalin, forgive me,” said Stroganov, a crumpled heap on the ground looking up at his god. Even to his last breath, he loved Comrade Stalin, as his parents had taught him since a child.
    Boris/Stalin leaned down to the stricken Stroganov and said, “Of course comrade,” and then pushed the body over on its side with his boot. Then he put a hand to his own head, then turned on Dr. Andropov and said, “If you can’t fix this horrible headache I have Andropov, you’re next.”
    Silas looked down at the jar of holy water near him. It was just a jar of ordinary water, or was it? Was the power of the Holy Spirit was in that jar? Could he throw the jar at Boris/Stalin and destroy the evil before him? He wondered if he believed that was possible. Silas moved to pick up the jar.

Good Morning and Goodbye, Part Twenty-two

        Was it a scene from the Keystone Cops or Miami Vice? It was hard to tell as the dark in the inky night, as the dark limousine burst out from the alley behind the Soviet consulate on Petrosky Avenue.  As fast as they could, Volkswagen turned his car on a dime, as did Sol and his cab. Silas leaned forward to see where they were going. Halley just held on. Soon they raced out of Mariemont, down Columbia Parkway towards downtown Symmzinnati.

        Mariana sat terrified in the rear-facing seat of the limousine. She sat between one of the security men and Nell.  Across from them sat Dr. Andropov on the left and Commissar Stronganov on the right. Between them, sat this creature who was Stalin or Boris. It was hard to tell. His face was morphing in parts back and forth. His expressions went between psychotic anger and fear.

        “Boris,” cried Nell putting her face in her hands.
        “Shut up!” said Stroganov.
        “Where are we going?” asked Mariana.
        “You shut up also,” said Stroganov, “We are taking the Master home, back to Moscow. Soon we, I mean he, will be once more ruler of the Soviet state. We will have order and freedom once more. Where are you from girl?”
        “Ukraine.”
        “I thought so. Your accent is educated, as much as a Ukrainian can be educated. You will need to be re-educated, like many Soviet citizens. We will take you with us eh? Get you out of this depraved capitalist country. They cannot even run a world war properly anymore. Soon they will fall to the Pyramid Confederation. I will enjoy that.”

        Sol drove like a lunatic to keep up with the Commissar’s black limo in his cab. Silas fell back in his seat and said, “Halley, we’ve got to stop them from getting on that plane no matter what.”
        “Boris looked so, so…”
        “Yes, I think monstrous is the word you are looking for. They’ve somehow changed him into a pseudo clone of Stalin. Interesting technology, re-writing someone’s DNA into someone else.”
        “Any clue where we are going?” asked Sol.
        “No. I imagine they are going to get transport out town. I heard their Dr. Frankenstein mention that they needed to get his creation to the mermaid,” said Silas.
        “Yeah, whatever that means.” said Halley.
        “A mermaid in Symmzinnati?” said Sol.

        Just as he said that, the limo at the head of the line took off down a side street sloping down towards the riverfront.
        “Hang on!” said Sol.

        On the block below, a white hat police cruiser happened by. It also, got in the chase parade.  In his cruiser, Volkswagen cursed upon seeing it.
        Finally, it ended with the limousine screeching with to a halt at an angle. The others also screeched at different angles so that it looked like a job for parking patrol rather than Symmzinnati police regulars.
        The limousine doors whipped open. Stroganov held Nell in front of him, with a gun to her head, as a shield as Silas ran forward out of the cab.
        “Ah, ah, no, no, mister Whowood. Once we are safely on board the Mermaid, I will release the lovely Nell.”
        “Silas!” exclaimed Nell.
        Boris/Stalin struggled to stand. Andropov propped him up, but he moved like someone with palsy, involuntary movements of his arms and legs. His face twitched, but had settled into a more Stalin looking physiognomy.
        “Nell,” Boris/Stalin stammered, “Nell save (pause) kill comrades, kill them comrades, (pause) me, kill.”
        Terrified, Mariana reached into her purse and felt for a cross, an icon and a jar. Then she remembered her grandmother and closed her eyes.

Enigma Earth: The Theme Music

Every TV show has theme music right? Well, while "Enigma Earth" is just found in the written word of a blog of fiction, I thought it would still be nice to have a theme. Usually, at work, when I am working on a new production, it takes me a long time to go through music to find just the right piece. This was not the case with "EE." I had not even started searching.

Recently, I was listening to one of my Pandora stations. The one I call, "Positive Refuge," from WC3PO. I heard " The Vanished Gardens of Cordoba," by composer, Ray Lynch. It struck me immediately that this piece envoked feelings in me that I wanted to convey for "Enigma Earth." The piece comes from the album, "Nothing Above My Shoulders but the Evening," circa 1993.

Here is a quote of a review from his website:

"The Vanished Gardens of Cordoba ", the most orchestral piece Ray has done, expresses the majesty and the melancholy of incarnation, the paradox of human existence with both the promise of possible transcendence and inevitable mortality (with all the melancholy attending the perception of a paradise lost). Passionate and stirring melodies with members of the San Francisco Symphony on flute, English horn, oboe, solo strings, guitars, piano, brass, and his trademark richly textured keyboards."

This description certainly fits with the feelings I want to evoke. In listening to this, I imagine a fade up from black at the beginning of the first story, "Good Morning and Goodbye." The camera sweeps over the still dark skyline of Symmzinnati ( the setting for the story that parallels the real world Cincinnati, Ohio.) The camera leads up to the top of the Carew Tower where our protagonist, Silas Whowood, contemplates the world and his life.

The follow mp3 file comes directly from Mr. Lynch's website. It is © copyright, Ray Lynch Productions 1995-2007. Go to raylynch.com to find out more about his music and how to order some for you own.

And now, here is "The Vanished Gardens of Cordoba," by Ray Lynch.
Listen Here

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Enigma Earth, a fantastical fiction series from T.D. Miller.

This is an illustration from the Enigma Earth story, "Good Morning and Goodbye." It shows the container of Stalin's DNA leaking out it's cryogenic ooze. It is reaching out to meld Boris Savchenko and Stalin, the man of steel into...what? Intrigued? Here is the story so far:

The Continental Blogcasting System and T.D. Miller proudly present... Is it a strange past, a warped present, or a surreal future? A place that might be or might have been. This is Enigma Earth.

Silas Whowood, is former Clear Vox News commentator with a mysterious past. As he is about to leave his hometown of Symmzinnati, Ohio, in search of a new future, part of that past arrives in the form of ex-girlfriend, Nell Chandler. Nell arrives with fiancé Boris Savchenko, a Soviet government official and hero of the Perestroika Revolution of the 1980s. It was a revolution that heralded a new Soviet Union of freedom and democracy.

Meanwhile forces loyal to the old Soviet Union are plotting to resurrect the old order when oppression and gulags were part of the supposed worker’s paradise. One sample of DNA and a human host is all they need to re-animate their god, Stalin.

Can Silas, with the help of his friends and a young Ukrainian woman, stop the evil that is about to be unleashed upon the world? Find out in the first story of the Enigma Earth Series, “Good Morning and Goodbye.”

Good Morning and Good-bye, Part Twenty-One

Comrade Stalin swung his legs off the table and stood up. Immediately he knew this was not how he remembered his body to be. He turned to Dr. Andropov.

“Who are you?”

“I am Dr. Sergei Ivanovich Andropov, scientist in your service master.”

“Scientist? I have never trusted the intelligencia. Knowledge is a dangerous thing. It ferments dissent.”

He grabbed Andropov by the throat and held him in the air, enjoying his newfound strength.

“What happened to me? I was at the dacha. I had fallen asleep,” said Stalin, voice trailing off.

“Comrade Stalin!” gasped Andropov, face turning purple.

Stalin then noticed the skin on his hand with its golden cast. He let go of Andropov who fell back on a lab table holding his neck and trying to gather air.

“My skin,” said Stalin in amazement. At the same time, he had a feeling of fear also. It was almost as if that fear was not his own.

“An unforeseen side effect of the re-animation process,” said Andropov.
“The re-animation process?” Stalin glowered at Andropov, “What do you mean?”

“There’s no time. We must get you back to Moscow. A plane is waiting.”

“A plane? Where am I now?”

“It takes too long to explain. Your people need you.”

Stalin narrowed his eyes and said, “Betray me Andropov and I will kill you. How do we get out of here?”

Mariana heard Commissar Stroganov through the paneled door of the formal reception room across the hall. Whomever he was talking to, they were being told they were going to die. The scream she heard must be this Savchenko they were referring to. It sent a shiver through her. She was not sure what to do. The feelings of evil were at once terrifying her and drawing her to its source. She put her back to the door, adjusted the her bag strap over her shoulders and glanced in both directions down the carpeted hallway, warmly lit by sconces. She could see a door down the hallway to the right that was set under stairs that went above. She spied the other direction, the front desk where the consulate official had questioned her. She could see the dim black and white monitor with glowing a view of the front gate. She wondered if it could be any easier than that. A panel on the desk had the correct button to open the gate. She could get out and have Sol call the police. She started to move towards the desk when the door at the other end of the hallway burst open. A cold wind shot down the hallway and she gasped.

Two men struggled to the top of the stairs and through the doorway, one smaller, helping the larger, whose head was turned down.

Dr. Andropov saw her and barked, “Get over here and help me.”

A scream did not come out of Mariana as hard as she wanted to. Almost robotically, she stumbled over to help the men. She could not seem to restrain herself. As she came to the side of the larger, weaker man, his head lolled up. She gasped again. The evil was in this man and she recognized him. That face that she had first seen in a statue on a winter’s day, in a park when she was very little. She had sworn to her mother it had talked to her. It asked her to help it. Her superstitious mother made the sign of the cross and whisked her away from it. It talked to her again.

“Help me,” she heard in her mind and then another voice said, “Help me.”

The loud disturbance in the hallway was the distraction Silas had hoped for. Stroganov and his men glanced in the direction of the door. Silas leaped towards Stroganov and Nell made the move on one guard. Halley leapt towards the other. Nell was a trained fighter from her time in intelligence operations and had managed to knock the gun out of her combatant’s hand. Silas struggled with Stroganov for his gun. Halley did not win. The other guard whipped her body around as a shield in front of him.

“Ok, that’s enough! Or I kill the woman!”

Like a freeze frame of video, the struggles stopped. Then they unfroze and backed away from each other. Stroganov recovered control of his gun.

“Cover him,” said Stroganov to his other associate and gesturing to Silas with his gun. He then opened the doors to the hallway. Looking at the man of gold, who once again lolled his head up at the sound of the door opening, the Commissar exclaimed, “The Master!”

“We must get him to the Mermaid,” said Andropov.

Stroganov gained his wits about him and went to the phone at the front desk. He spun the rotary dial around in the moment he had fantasized about so many times.

“Pearl to mermaid,” he said, “return from Luna. I repeat, return from Luna.”

Down on the Ohio River between the Roebling Suspension Bridge and New Crozley Field sat the "Mermaid," a Beriev X-42, seaplane. Dim amber light from the streets and exterior stadium lights lit the bluish gray Mermaid to a greenish hue. From out of the cockpit side windows flew small a Soviet Naval flag and a Soviet diplomatic flag. After the phone call from the Commissar, four men who had been sleeping inside were now busy, doing pre-flight checks. The pilot furiously set the navigation computer, destination Moscow.

Read Gentleman Agitator! (GA Poster #1 for EE)

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Good Morning and Good-bye, Part Twenty

Commander Hans Volkswagen had waited for a moment like this for a long time. He had honed his special transit corps into an elite branch of the Symmzinnati Police Department. That is what he thought anyway. At police headquarters, Volkswagen’s officers were seen as outcasts. It was the last chance for officers who could not make it anywhere else on the force. They were tucked away over at Union Terminal Station and throughout the tunnels and stations of the Symmzinnati Central Subsystem.

The chief of police liked it that way. With the rampant murder rate in Symmzinnati, he had bigger problems. He only chewed on Volkswagen when the latest murder occurred on a train or at a station.

Overall compared to the rest of Symmzinnati, crime on the subsystem was pretty low. So covered by his people and Motherland Defense personnel, rarely did anything happen in Union Terminal Station. Now, the commander played a hunch that something was really afoul with the theft at the station. He could only guess what was going on in the Soviet consulate. He knew Silas Whowood had been a spook once with NASAIT attached to Moscow. Perhaps Silas knew a lot about the Soviets and their links with aliens. Moscow was contiuing their glastnost policies by interviewing him about what he knew then. The Soviets had him over for a visit with a point of the gun invitation though. Maybe it was just that theft. They wanted their property back. He was not sure. Now, if he could break a spy ring or smuggling ring, his name would be on the front page of the Symmzinnati Inquirer and the chief would have to take notice.

He had his Special Incursion Squad gearing up in front of the consulate. Busting right in would be an international incident; he knew he would have to be diplomatic, at first anyway.

Commissar Stroganov re-entered the formal reception room. The consulate’s two security agents were at his side.   

“I am afraid Mr. Savchenko has taken ill.”
Nell gasped.
“Not to worry. We have a doctor on staff and he is attending to him. He just fainted as we were meeting.”

“Where’s Boris? Where is this doctor?” asked Nell standing up suddenly. Halley moved to comfort her.

“Yes, where is he? Can we see him?” asked Halley.

“Since when does a consulate have a staff physician?” asked Silas also standing up.

“It is new for Soviet consulates. Your American medicine is so expensive that we hate to have to go to your hospital, if we can be treated at home,” said Stroganov.

“Uh huh,” said Silas, “So you wouldn’t mind taking us to Savchenko?”

Suddenly there was a muffled scream. It seemed to come from right below them. It could only be Boris.

“Where is he Stroganov?!” said Silas making a move towards the Commissar. Stroganov’s security men stepped forward and produced handguns.

“Don’t worry Mr. Whowood. Savchenko will be just fine. I would say that he will be a new man even.”

Across the main hall from the formal reception room, Mariana heard the scream. She had been left there in the other waiting room that was for members of the public with appointments. It was so typically bureaucratic that she was forgotten and left to sit there. She was used to that back home, so it would not have bothered her, except for the urgency. The scream sent a chill through her. She made for the door to the hallway. She had to do something as much as it terrified her.

Dr. Andropov scanned the vital signs of his, well, patient would not be the word. It would be his subject. He had injected Comrade Stalin’s DNA, the reactive agent and the nanoprobes into Boris that would build the new man of steel. His subject had screamed, fought against the restraints, and then passed out. Boris’ vital signs were strong though. Within a minute of the injection, facial features that were Boris’ seemed to change. A moustache started to grow. His skin had a light yellow tint. It started to shine even. As this happened, the bust, sitting on table nearby, lost its gold luster. You could see that it was still Boris, but was also someone else.

Boris’ face twitched. His hands flexed and squeezed into fists. He grunted and then took in a deep breath as if someone who had just held their breath underwater too long and had lungs desperate for oxygen. He gasped a few times and then his eyes flickered open. He turned his head to look at Andropov. He ranked at the ankle and wrist restraints.

“Who are you?” he growled with a scowl.

“No, who are you?” asked Andropov expectantly.

“I am Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin, general secretary of the communist party of the Soviet Union, and your leader. Release me now or you will die!”

Andropov wavered on his feet. There were tears at the corners of his eyes. He beheld his god. “Comrade Stalin, you’re alive! I have brought you back to life.”

“I was never dead!”