Chapter twenty eight

I spent the next week practicing martial arts with Narumi in the afternoon but the mornings were dedicated to shooting practice with Kazimir. I might have been a crack shot with a pistol but I have never operated an SMG or AK 47 before. He showed me how to shoot and reload each gun in the bunker, and he had a lot of guns in the bunker.

As for my martial arts training , it was progressing fairly well. I didn't fall as much as I used to, although my movements were still a little jerky and uncoordinated , miles away from the fluid dance like movements of my sensei . Even though I couldn't execute them as perfectly as her I was still able to learn a lot of the techniques that she had to teach me.

On the family front things couldn't get any better. Dad had just opened another branch of his hospital and the amount of money he was making sharply increased (even though he does a lot of probono work it is still a private hospital so it rakes in the dough) He was very excited because he was able to snag several specialists for his new facility which was said to be world class. Instead of focusing on pregnancies and birth , the new hospital is able to give a full range of services by a variety of specialists who are experts in their field. Basically dad poured in most of his money into the new hospital making it one of the largest, most well staffed, and most well equipped hospitals in all of Russia. Of course this meant that he was away a lot, even sometimes missing our family dinners but he was happy and safe , that was all that mattered to me.

Mother on the other hand has been getting more and more sullen these days. It seems like her plans weren't going very well. She was always silent during dinner and when dad finally asked her what was wrong she just said that she was having difficulties at work. That was music to my ears .

Vladimir called back two days after our meeting with an apology and put another hundred grand in my bank account although Babichev technically wasn't an Atelli. He promised to listen to my advice from now on even if he didn't believe my explanation for the monsters. For a man who has seen monsters in real life he was surprisingly skeptical when it came to souls and spirits.

Sergei had been suspiciously absent for a while and when I asked him about it he said that he had a new girlfriend. When I asked him if I could meet her he said hell no and hung up on me. I guess she must be really hot, I suddenly became very curious.

It was Monday and I was getting ready for my usual shooting lessons with Kazimir when the mainframe made a sound that indicated that Vladimir was calling. Since I wasn't in character I switched off the video function and chewed the voice altering gum for a few minutes before answering.

"Good morning Mr Mikailov."

"Persephone? I think there is something wrong, I can't see you."

"I disabled the video, it is morning and you have caught me when I'm not quite presentable. Why did you call Mr Mikailov?"

"I just wanted to inform you that we are going to attack one of the territories that have been taken from us by Fairweather."

"When and where?"

"Pier 49 , two hours from now. Will you be there?"

"I'll try my best.", then I ended the call.

I looked over at Kazimir, "I think it is time to take out the big guns."

* * *

It was raining heavily when I drove a van that Kazimir had procured for me to an abandoned building a thousand meters away from pier 49. The building actually had a funny story behind it. A rich business tycoon decided to build a tall building as a monument to his success but it seemed that he wasn't as successful as he thought because he ran out of money before he could build the last floor of the building. Until all the legal issues were fixed nobody was allowed on sight but a pair of bolt cutters gave me all the permission I needed.

For today I had a buzz cut that was covered by a hat, brown contacts covering my green eyes, and using a special adhesive and some small black fibers I even had a 5 o'clock shadow. Bandages had been wrapped around my chest compressing and hiding my breasts and I was wearing a fake bulging stomach. The whole thing was covered by a dirty yellow sweater and a tench coat. To finish off my ensemble I had baggy khaki pants that were stuffed into cheap plastic boots that were covering my feet. All in all I looked like one of the many workers that made their living working at the docks, the beer gut specially made my disguise look authentic.

I opened the back of the van and carried a heavy case all the way to the top floor of the abandoned building and because the elevator wasn't working I had to use the damn stairs . Then I went all the way back downstairs and carried a second heavy case all the way back to the top, cursing all the way there. After I got there I found an unobstructed vantage point of the pier and set up the Macmillan TAC .50 BMG sniper rifle that was in the first case. Since I was a few minutes early I took a seat near the sniper and took out a bag of chips from my trench coat.

Now all that is left is to wait for the action to begin.