Moscow Machination

But since then, things had been sweet in Kiev. For starters with Russia out, dick moves were down by 80 %. Pissing matches by 90 %. However pussy moves had increased by 10 %, but whatever. The reduced number of stakeholders, tremendously improved the development process. The bug count had again diminished by 92.8 %… guaranteeing yet another quarter’s retainer.

Bangalore loved him… not as much as it loved Ebola Cooomar, but fuck him.

Berlin loved him. The Germans had finally found someone who could shepherd the Ukrainians without getting into Nuremburg.

As for the Ukrainians, they were more than satisfied. Steady paycheck and productive work? They were in 13^th heaven.

Cheap vodka, smuggled cigarettes, Afghani kush, hanging out with Ilya and the occasional visit from Katya provided the perfect balance for the fourteen hours Pulikesi spent away from his Kiev-Lubyanka. On the rare occasion when Pulikesi found the social scene unappealing, there was always a Natalia or a Svetlana or the rare Natalia-Svetlana combo.

But the only thing Pulikesi loved more than Natalia and Svetlana and Katya was the Hryvnia. Despite the American-IMF-Berlin-ECB interventions, the Ukrainian currency had remained unsalvageable. And Pulikesi’s retainers were in euros.

Other than the odd sauerkraut snafu, Pulikesi was living it up in Kiev.

* * *

Ilya blew a Marlboro as Pulikesi lit.

“So, apparently we forgot to submit the time sheet reports.”

“Haha, you mean you forgot…” guffawed Ilya.

“If you dipshits hadn’t dragged me to that E party, I would have turned it in.”

“Haha. That was some real good times. Plus what are they going to do? Fire us? Good luck trying to get another firm to even sniff the RFP.”

“Ya, but still… someone’s gotta dot the t and cross the i.”

A group of vibrant protesters marched by chanting something about how the Russian President was a feline abuser.

“What’s riled them up today?” asked Pulikesi.

“Something about the Russian President’s cats.”

“Right, now that the new guy has fixed the economy and found shale gas, he wants to go after Russia’s first cats?”

“As trivial as it may seem, at least we aren’t apathetic anymore. Cats, dogs… it doesn’t matter. If I wasn’t working on the Albatross, I would probably be there with them right now…” gushed Ilya.

“Ya, me too… see that redhead…”

“Redhead in the Cat Riot T-Shirt? Way ahead of you my little friend. Have been checking her out for the past two hundred yards.”

“She seems bored, maybe we should catcall her… SWEET EARS…” yelled out Pulikesi.

“Wow… wow… Jesus man, cut it out,” seethed a mortified Ilya.

The redhead flashed a smile and pushed back her hair, thus exposing her left ear.

“See… she likes that.”

Ilya couldn’t believe it. “She liked that??? That creepy catcall…”

“Dude, you are overthinking it.”

“Aww fuck it. Let’s just go fix those darn bugs.”

Chapter 24

Bodo Airbase, Arctic Circle, Norway

In the 3AM Arctic glare, six F-35 jets leapt off the tarmac in unison. After hovering for a few seconds, the cool looking jets shot out into the Nordic sea. The sortie, unlike their regular missions had nothing to do with the Russians. Today, the Norwegians F-35s were headed to the Paris Air Show — to justify their existence to the American Congress.

Being a field trip, they had dispensed their ammo with extra fuel and several pounds of coffee. All they had to do was, take off and head to Paris while tapping away to Ke dollar sign ha’s stimulating message to young pilots.

Murmansk — Arctic Circle, Russia

“Boss, the F-35 Lightnings are in the air,” Korlov announced.

A few hours earlier Primakov and Korlov had caught a redeye to Murmansk. There, their point of interest was the Severomorsk air base, home to a squadron of the supersonic Tu-160s, aka the Bear Bombers. On arrival at Severomorsk they had handed over their cargo to a couple of Tu-160s.

When the Norwegian F-35s took off, Primakov gave the go ahead, “Alright, send out the bombers.”

“Sending out the Bears…”

“And tell them to make as much noise as possible. I want every Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian kid to miss school tomorrow.”

“Haha, that’s so cool. Wish someone had done that for me in school,” reminisced Korlov.

“Ya, ya sure.”

“I mean think about the odds…” added Korlov.

“Odds of the mission?”

“No. What if some Lapland boys actually scheduled a fake threat for tomorrow… to skip exams… midterms… and all their planning would be wasted… I mean you can’t repeat a fake threat for like a semester and… and even if you did…” ploughed on Korlov.

Primakov couldn’t take it anymore, “What the fuck do you care about the academic challenges of a bunch of reindeer blowers? Just, keep your eyes on the mission ok? Make sure everything is in place.”

The Atlantic Ocean

The Norwegian F-35s leisurely hit their allotted altitude of 45,000 ft. To avoid civilian traffic they had to loop around Iceland, before turning south.