Katya ( 2014)

[esercito sconfitto]

Katya
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This is an introduction to a story I am writing. It is my first USB story, so I'm interested in feedback. If people like it, I'll continue it.




“Anyone want any tea or coffee,’ asked Alison as she entered the office, ‘are we all dropping off here?’

‘if youre making some I’ll have a coffee,’ replied Jenny, ‘and yes - anything to make the time go by.’ The two nurses laughed. It was indeed turning out to be a long night.

Alison Chervinsky and Jenny Adebisi, along with a third nurse, Jane Hao, were employees of a private convalescent home, Bryantern House.

The home was set to receive three high profile guests the following morning, and the three had been detailed to prepare the rooms, check the equipment in each of the rooms, and wait for the arrival of the patients, the first of whom was due to arrive at 6.30 am.

It was 3am, and the girls’ work was done. So they were doing their best to pass the time, chatting and drinking copious amounts of tea.

Alison was 27 and had been an NHS staff nurse for five years. She had for a long time resisted joining the private health sector on principle, before succumbing to the economic temptations.

The job at Bryantern had seemed too good to resist. A small, discreet facility in Harrow, usually no more than three or four patients at a time, basic care duties – and a salary over twice what she had earned at her previous employer, St Thomas’s Hospital in central London.

There was, it had to be admitted, nevertheless something slightly strange about the Bryantern facility, as Alison had often noted to herself. In place of the scrubs usually favored in the NHS, the nurses wore a more traditional uniform – a white dress, blue buckle belt, black sheer tights and black shoes. The dresses were slightly shorter than the usual NHS length, too – finishing just above the knee.

Alison, who was 5’8’’, slim, and with long fair hair, had also noted that while the other nurses were clearly qualified professionals, they had also been chosen for their looks. Her companions for the night shift were a case in point. Alison didn’t know either of them particularly well, but they conformed to what she had noted to be the typical profile of the Bryantern nurse.

Jenny Adebisi was 25, and from Ibadan in Nigeria. She too was around 5’8’’, very slim, and with the kind of figure which a nurses’ dress naturally compliments. She had qualified in nursing in Ibadan and had then come to England, where she began working at Bryantern straight away. Jane Hao was 28, an immigrant from Hong Kong. She was a little smaller, only 5’6’’, but also with sharp, striking good looks and a slim figure.

The point was, thought Alison to herself as she looked at her two colleagues seated at a table in the office, that both these girls could have been models if they’d wanted to be, and the general appearance of all the Bryantern staff tended to conform to this high standard. ‘you’re basically working at a high class rich mans’ club and rest home,’ her sister had said to her, when Alison described her new job. And it was true. Still, the other girls were fun and Alison figured she’d keep the job for a while and maybe save money.

Jenny had turned out to be a good companion for a long night shift. The Nigerian girl was naturally vivacious, and she enjoyed discussing her love life with a certain surreal sense of humor and an eye for detail which kept her colleagues constantly amused. ‘I cannot believe this man,’ she would say in her heavy Nigerian accent, ‘I say to him ‘man, you need to put a condom on – or forget it. He tells me ‘as long as we wash afterward, its all right.’ What a fool. This is Africa.’ And the three would join in their laughter.

As for Jane, Alison hadn’t really had a chance to talk to her one on one. She seemed quieter, efficient, polite but with a certain distance. In any case, Alison thought, just three more hours, then we can get the new ones settled in and hand over – and then home, and sleep. And not before time.

‘I’ll just go and take a look in room 14,’ she told the others after a few moments silence. ‘The Russian guy should be arriving at around 7 or so and I want just to make sure that the oxygen equipment is all ready to go there. “ And she raised herself up from her chair, pulling down her dress which had ridden up a little as she did so.

‘go there,’ said Jenny as Alison opened the door, ‘but make sure you don’t fall asleep on the bed. We still have to go through the patient files here.’ The fair-haired girl laughed as she exited, ‘wouldn’t miss it for the world’, she said, catching Jenny’s eye.


Katya placed the second microphone carefully beneath the bed. That should do it, she thought. Two devices in place for when Mr Rudnitski arrived. Her job was done. Now all she had to do was to get back to the sluice room and wait for the place to fill up, before quietly slipping out. Everything appeared to be going to plan.
Katya hadn’t wanted to take this particular job. She was tired, having just returned from an assignment assisting aid convoys into northern Syria. But the old man had asked especially for her, saying it was a relatively minor task, but one which would suit her skills. And she had been happy to play a part in helping to gather evidence against Semyon Rudnitski.

‘You know who Rudnitski is, right?’ the old man had asked her. She knew, all right. Semyon Rudnitski, ‘businessman,’ former KGB officer, arms dealer, trafficker in women, dealer in misery. Rudnitski had interests all across Europe and the Middle East. He owned politicians in Russia and Ukraine. He was close to the authorities, of course.

Precisely the type that Katya was happy to do a bad turn. The sort she considered were destroying any hope of normal life in Russia.

Katerina Chervinskaya was 32. She was a former member of a special unit of the Moscow police department - trained in firearms, martial arts, and later in investigation and covert methods. But she had left the service, disgusted by the corruption and nepotism, the extent to which all was for sale. Since then, she had worked in private security, as a bodyguard, and then for an investigations firm. She was 5’9’’, with a superbly toned body and long, straight brown hair and a charming but slightly toothy Russian smile.

Her work for the old man derived from her investigations portfolio. The old man - Yakov Yashin - was an oligarch himself, but one with at least democratic pretensions. So he financed civil society projects and when these needed a security element, Katya and a few others could be called in.

This mission was a fairly straightforward one. Rudnitski was having surgery and would be convalescing in the Bryantern facility. During that time, his business meetings would be conducted from his hospital room. Yashin wanted microphones placed in the room.

Katya had watched the facility for a couple of days before concluding her plan. During the day, it was relatively easy to move about there, but not possible to place the mics because of the large number of people about. But she had concluded that room 14 would be Rudnitski’s because of the obvious security considerations that had gone into its isolated location and private elevator.
She had entered the facility without problems at 4 pm. Then she had hidden herself in a sluice room, waiting for night to come so that she could place the microphones and then return to her place of hiding. Once daylight came and the place filled up, she thought she would be able to slip out with no problem.

Everything seemed to be going fine. She reached the sluice room. She heard the day employees leaving and had then been surprised to hear the sounds of voices as three nurses went about their business preparing the rooms. This was unexpected. Katya had thought only the single security guard at the entrance would be there all night. Nevertheless, it wasn’t an insurmountable problem.

Katya figured she ought to be able to reach room 14 while the three girls were relaxing in their office. And if absolutely necessary, she was armed and had brought along a surgical mask and a supply of chloroform which she would deploy if subduing one or more of the nurses became necessary. She hoped she wouldn’t need to use any of this equipment, though. She preferred to keep things clean, and simple.

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Katya figured she ought to be able to reach room 14 while the three girls were relaxing in their office. And if absolutely necessary, she was armed and had brought along a surgical mask and a supply of chloroform which she would deploy if subduing one or more of the nurses became necessary. She hoped she wouldn’t need to use any of this equipment, though. She preferred to keep things clean, and simple.

It was not to be. She had just completed the placing of the device and was getting up to begin her exit when the door opened.

A slim, fair haired nurse took a step into the room and stared at the intruder in shock.

‘Whoare you?’ said Alison, her eyes wide, ‘What on earth are you doing here?'

Katya reacted swiftly and in accordance with her training and instinct. With a single smooth movement she drew her Glock 19 from her shoulder holster and directed it at the nurse.

Then, with a quiet, sharp, hissing tone that would brook no objections, and with her Russian accent more pronounced than usual, ‘Shut the door. Get in here quick or you’re dead. Don’t say a word. Shut your mouth. ‘

The terrified nurse obeyed, her blue eyes focused only on the weapon pointed at her.

Its barrel, the possibility of sudden death.

Katya directed the girl toward a chair by the bed. ‘Sit down, nurse. Now, you and me are going to have a quick talk. I don’t have much time. And if you answer everything to my satisfaction, I wont have to hurt you. Clear?’

Alison nodded. What the hell was going on, she thought to herself. How had this person got in? what could be happening?

But she had no time to think. The questions came fast.

‘What’s your name, nurse?’

‘Alison.’

‘Ok Alison - I need to know - is there any way out of here except by the front entrance? Any back door, staff entrance, something like that?’

‘N-no,’ Alison stammered, ‘only the front way. The windows are all barred on the ground floor. Theres only that entrance.’

‘ok, Alison,’ a plan was already forming in Katya’s mind.

The Russian woman was quite calm, considering her options. She knew from long experience that the thing to do in such situations was to slow one’s reactions, to keep cool, and maintain detachment.

She would get out of this. With a little help from this nurse.

‘Ok, what’s going to happen right now, Alison, is that you’re going to be going to sleep for a little while. When you wake up, you’ll be in another room, and I’ll be gone.

I want just to mention something. I haven’t much time. But the man due to come in this room is a criminal, a trafficker. And I work for his enemies. Look up his name when you get home. You shouldn’t be blind to all this. And then decide how much of this you want to report.’

There was indeed little time. Undoubtedly, the nurse’s colleagues would come looking for her shortly. Katya needed to get out, and she needed to get past the security guard at the front entrance.

For which your dress is going to come in handy, she thought as she moved behind Alison, to prepare the drug that would knock the nurse out.

‘I’m behind you, and the gun is pointed at your head,’ she said quietly. ‘I am going to put a mask over your mouth and nose and you are going to breathe deeply, and go to sleep. There’s no way out of this and the sooner youre asleep, the sooner this will be over. Is it clear.’

Alison nodded almost imperceptibly.
Placing the pistol on the bed, out of the nurse’s field of vision, Katya crouched down to her bag and removed a surgical mask and a small glass bottle. She sprayed twice on the mask. Then, holding it in one of her black gloved hands, she picked up the pistol and placed it at the girl’s temple.

Then, standing behind her, she applied the mask over Alison’s mouth and nose.

Alison recognized the smell. Chloroform, as she had expected. She was quite calm now, not panicking. Partly, it was Katya’s manner, which was ruthless but dead cool, not aroused or passionate.

Whoever she was, this woman was clearly a professional of her own particular strange field. There was nothing Alison could do, and she found herself cooperating, partly because of the gun, partly because of this curious and somehow not unfriendly, cool manner.

Things were happening too quickly for fear. The nurse was pulled along, overwhelmed.

The smell of the drug was sweet and sickly, choking. The effect began almost immediately. Alison began to feel the room growing blurred, her thoughts resolving into simplicity. The room began to spin.

Everything falling.

As she slipped from consciousness, her last thoughts were clear. Its ok, Alison, she told herself. She’s not going to rape me. And her body surrendered her.

Katya felt the tension leave the nurse’s body as she lost consciousness, and she swiftly replaced the Glock in its holster and the mask in a sealed plastic bag.
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The girl was slumped in the chair, her white dress ridden up to her thighs, her legs apart. Her mouth was slightly open, her straight fair hair falling over her face as her head lolled back.

Katya moved around to the front and lifting Alison’s limp body in a fireman’s lift, she deposited the nurse on the bed. ‘ok, darling,’ she said, ‘I’ll be needing that dress.’

Placing Alison on her back, Katya first unclipped the nurse’s tight blue buckle belt and pulled it free. Then she swiftly unbuttoned Alison’s dress, placing the girl’s limp arms by her sides, she maneuvered it from her shoulders , and then down and off, dropping the white dress on the floor.

Well, well. The nurse’s bra and panties were white, simple and minimal. But unexpectedly, Katya noted that she was wearing a black suspender belt and stockings, rather than the pantyhose she had expected.

Alison favored the stockings not for sexual reasons but because she found them cooler to work in. But she had not, of course, anticipated that she would be showing her legs to a stranger in a room at the hospital.

Not that she was aware, anyway. Katya with a shrug swiftly unclipped the suspender belt, then unfastened the girl’s black stockings and rolled them off her long, smooth legs.

The girl’s body was exquisite, but Katya didn’s have time to enjoy her thighs and her smooth buttocks, as she would have wished.

Instead, she swiftly removed her own clothes, placed them in her bag and donned the nurse’s uniform. A near perfect fit, tho the skirt was a little short. Not to worry. It was time to go.

‘Sorry about that, darling,’ she said to the sleeping Alison and then, for a moment tempted, she turned the nurse over onto her front, leaving her shapely buttocks exposed, the white panties squeezed over them.

With a smile, she gave the sleeping Alison’s bottom a friendly pat. ‘You seem like a nice girl, Alison,’ she said to her quietly, ‘but you should be more careful who you go to work for. ‘

Alison, in any case, was dead to the world and remained motionless, now stripped to just her white bra and panties, lying on her front on the bed she had intended to prepare for Semyon Rudnitski.

Her mouth was slightly open, revealing the faintest glimpse of white teeth. Her long hair over her face.

Katya was ready to move.

Then a sudden thought struck her. And she cursed herself for accepting this job. Who would have expected such complications?

These three nurses had come on duty presumably when the security guard was already there. In other words, he would know exactly who was supposed to be in the hospital, and who was not. This meant she had no chance of just slipping by him without raising suspicion.

Her mind raced. Everything became more complicated. What she would need to do was to stay in the hospital now until the security guard reached the end of his shift and was relieved.

Then she would slip by past the new one, who wouldn’t know who was meant to be up there, and who not. She contemplated for a moment simply forcing the guard at gunpoint to let her by, but decided against it. Dealing with a nurse was one thing, but it was possible that the guard had some kind of alarm button which he would quietly activate. Not worth the risk.

This meant that she was going to have to stick around on the hospital landing for a while.

But then that created another dilemma. She was, after all, sharing the landing with two nurses, and had just drugged and stripped one of their colleagues. Alison had presumably been off to perform some errand in room 14. About a quarter of an hour had passed since her entry. They would no doubt be growing concerned in the charge room and would shortly come and investigate.

This meant a window of opportunity. Katya realized that she was going to have to deal with the two remaining nurses. There was no way that she could spend another hour or two on the landing without them finding the drugged Alison and raising the alarm.

So the other two would have to join Alison in having a no doubt well-deserved sleep. But how to arrange this?

Thinking fast, Katya, still in the white nurse’s uniform, grabbed her bag and with swift and silent steps left the room and her victim to her slumber.

With swift, silent steps, she covered the ten meters to the sluice room, on the left hand side of the corridor. From it, she could hear what was going on in the office further down. She would hear when one or other of the nurses came to see what was up with her luckless colleague. And then Katya would be ready.

As it was, she was now on damage limitation mode. That girl entering the room meant that the hospital security or Rudnitski’s own men would probably search the room or demand that the oligarch be placed in a different one.

Katya intended nevertheless to move the sleeping Alison once she had dealt with her colleagues. But it was probable that her mission was a failure. Now what remained to do was to avoid turning operational failure into disaster by ensuring her own tidy exfiltration from the hospital.
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As it was, she was now on damage limitation mode. That girl entering the room meant that the hospital security or Rudnitski’s own men would probably search the room or demand that the oligarch be placed in a different one.

Katya intended nevertheless to move the sleeping Alison once she had dealt with her colleagues. But it was probable that her mission was a failure. Now what remained to do was to avoid turning operational failure into disaster by ensuring her own tidy exfiltration from the hospital.

“Where has that girl got to?’ said Jenny, stretching herself luxuriantly, ‘Maybe she has been kidnapped?’

Jane smiled, ‘I suppose she went downstairs for a cigarette or something,' she said, in her precise Chinese accent.

‘No,’ the Nigerian girl replied, ‘Alison doesn’t smoke. Maybe she went to the toilet or something. But it shouldn’t take twenty minutes to check some oxygen tanks in room 14. Jane, do me a favor. can you go and take a look. I don’t know what’s going on with her. But we need to go through these files and I need you both here for that.’

The Chinese girl got up from her chair, ‘Sure, I’ll go and see what’s going on.’

‘Also remind her that we are both still waiting for our coffee.’

‘I’ll tell her that too,’ Jane said, apparently not noticing the irony with which Jenny spoke. Jane was only 23, and younger than she looked.

The Chinese nurse casually opened the door and stepped out in the corridor, allowing the door of the office to swing closed behind her.

Katya watched as the nurse began to make her way down the corridor. Her plan was in place. She waited until Jane was almost passing by the sluice room entrance, then pushed the door open, almost bumping into the girl, wearing a flustered expression.

Jane looked confused, taking in the unfamiliar face, the familiar uniform….

‘Hey,’ she began. ‘Did you come with the crew from the surgery? Is the first patient already here?’

‘Yes, we arrived, but listen, there’s a problem. One of the nurses from here, I think she’s fainted. Not sure what’s wrong with her. There’s a pulse but she’s not responding to me.’

‘Oh no!,’ said Jane. ‘Is it Alison? Where is she?’

‘She’s here in the sluice room, come and take a look. In here.’

And she motioned the Chinese nurse toward the sluice room. Jane entered, with Katya close behind her.

The Russian woman clicked the door shut in the small and cramped room.

Jane’s brow furrowed. Her confused expression deepened.

‘But where is she? I cant....mmmmph.’ Her words were reduced to a stifled cry of panic as the Chinese girl felt herself grabbed from behind by a powerful force.

One arm like iron clamped round her chest, holding her fast, another steely hand raised a surgical mask to her mouth and nose.

Jane ingested the sickly smell, panic and nausea rising in her. She tried to kick back at the iron form holding her, but her legs were no match for Katya’s unbending grip.

Writhing in panic, her eyes filling with tears, the Chinese girl for a few moments more tried desperately to free herself.

Katya, holding her dead in place, was already considering her next move as she felt the nurse’s struggles begin imperceptibly to grow weaker, her muffled cries turning to fading moans of resignation.

Good, the Russian woman thought, no one will hear her in here. And once she’s out we’ll deal with the last one. Then perhaps we can get this damned night to an end. The guard’s shift changes at 5. So we’ll have an hour and a half to spend with these ladies. As for this one, she’ll be out in another half minute, I’d say.

The strange scene in the sluice room continued in place for another minute or so.

The two young women, in identical white uniforms and black tights. The taller Russian woman holding the now visibly wilting Chinese nurse in place, the mask clamped mercilessly over her nose and her full and delicate mouth.

Jane had now passed the stage of resignation and was well on her way to unconsciousness. Fear had passed, as always happened at this stage.

She was no longer in the waking world, the drug had already invaded too much of her mind. But her almond eyes had not quite closed yet.

And then, gradually, it was over, and she sank into the arms of her captor, as though mutely requesting gentleness now that she had surrendered to the will of the other.

From Katya, she would receive it. The Russian woman felt neither enmity nor anger towards these girls that she had by necessity to temporarily disable.

On the contrary, she understood that they were mere unfortunates, caught on the wrong side of a bad business. But this didn’t mean she could afford to show them any concessions in terms of what needed to be done.

Katya’s iron grip now no longer held Jane in place. Rather, it supported her. Gently, Katya lowered the unconscious nurse to the ground, laying her out in the sluice room.

Looking at the petite Chinese girl’s fine-boned face, with her creamy pale skin and her long jet black hair scraped into a bun, Katya enjoyed the girl’s peaceful expression.

‘All over now,’ she said with a smile. And as if to compensate for the need she’d had to strip Alison, she noticed that Jane’s dress had ridden up to her thighs, and with a tug she pulled it down, covering her legs almost to the knees.

The subterfuge had been necessary so as to get Jane closed into the sluice room, where she could be safely knocked out without any chance of her muffled cries being heard from the office. There was now one nurse remaining to be dealt with.

From the sound of her voice, Katya had judged this third nurse to be African. And she had also had the impression that this one was the charge nurse.

So she was in the office, thought the Russian woman, still blissfully unaware that her two subordinates were now drugged to sleep. Well, no problem. She would be joining them presently.

In this, however, Katya was mistaken.

While Katya had been subduing Jane in the sluice, Jenny Adebisi had stepped out to fetch a supply of pens and paper from the adjoining storeroom.

Logistics and happenstance had been against the shrewd Russian professional operative since the night began, it seemed.

Her quick wits, ruthlessness and skills had nevertheless ensured her ability to achieve her goals with regard to both Alison and to Jane Hao, who as a consequence were both now defeated and safely unconscious as required – Alison in her bra and panties, breathing softly on the bed in room 14, Jane still in her uniform and placed among the laundry on the sluice room, the slight frown still on her face, her lips still slightly pursed.

But the night was not over yet. And the charge room office that Katya was now moving slowly towards was, as she was about to discover, empty.

Meanwhile, as she moved slowly toward the office, and carefully and gingerly pushed the door open, she was not aware that a pair of dark eyes were watching her from behind – those of a resourceful and now coolly angry young charge nurse from Nigeria.

Jenny, seeing the unfamiliar figure in a nurse’s uniform entering the office was aware that something was wrong. She considered her options for a moment. This was probably a burglar of some kind.

Perhaps she had hurt Alison, perhaps taken her uniform.

She could race for the stairs and alert the security.

But the young woman from Ibadan was inclined toward a more direct approach toward intruders, and did not care to hide behind security. In Nigeria, she had been no stranger to dealing with scammers and petty thieves of all kinds.

Coolly, spying Katya entering the office, Jenny ducked back into the storeroom. In the closet there was a box-cutting knife, used for opening boxes containing drugs. Jenny took the squat, ugly looking thing in her right hand and extended the blade. Then she silently opened the door and began to move toward the office.
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Coolly, spying Katya entering the office, Jenny ducked back into the storeroom. In the closet there was a box-cutting knife, used for opening boxes containing drugs. Jenny took the squat, ugly looking thing in her right hand and extended the blade. Then she silently opened the door and began to move toward the office.

Katya entered the office, looking around her. Empty. Strange, where was the African nurse?

Then, suddenly, she felt an arm grabbing her from behind, and a cold blade was place against her neck, digging slightly into the skin. She stopped, her body still relaxed, immediately considering the situation.

‘What have you done with my nurses, you !@#$ !@#$?’ Said a voice with an African accent. So the situation was clear. Katya cursed her overconfidence. This nurse would need some special attention.

‘Your colleagues are sleeping, nurse. You’ll be joining them in a few moments.’

As she spoke, Katya felt behind her with her left hand, quickly touching Jenny’s stomach, locating something.

‘You think so, huh?’ said Jenny with a laugh in her voice. ‘Well what I think is that you are going to be coming with me to security, or I’m going to cut your throat. Is it clear?’

‘quite clear,’ said Katya, dropping her bag on the floor.

‘one thing, tho..’ and as she spoke Katya grabbed with her hand the little finger of the African nurse’s right hand, which was wrapped round her neck, and yanked it violently sideways, freeing her head enough to move a few inches from the blade. Then, simultaneously she jabbed her left elbow backwards, hitting Jenny directly in her solar plexus, knocking the wind out of the African girl.

Katya then spun around, and with a quick move knocked Jenny’s feet from under her. The African girl hit the ground hard, doubled over, her mouth open, fighting for breath. Katya placed her foot on Jenny’s left wrist, and leaning down, prised the box cutter from the African girl’s hand, sending it sliding across the floor.

Jenny writhed on the floor, unable to make a sound, fighting for breath. As she did so, Katya calmly took a couple of steps, opening her bag and taking out the chloroform and the surgical mask. Applying a few drops of the liquid, she returned to the winded nurse, and coolly placed the mask over Jenny’s mouth and nose. ‘You didn’t want to do this the easy way, nurse,’ she said with a tight smile, ‘But you see – I was right. Now sleep.’

Jenny was desperate for air, but now she found that as she gradually filled her lungs, instead of sustaining oxygen, she was sucking in a sickly smelling vapor. She was aware of what was happening and through the pain cursed her carelessness. She thought of the other girls and hoped they were all right. Then her thoughts began to blur and darken…

Katya watched as the doubled over African nurse breathed in the vapor and slowly lost consciousness. She waited until Jenny was soundly out before finally removing the mask from over the now sleeping girl’s mouth and nose.

‘You did well, nurse, and I respect your courage,’ she said to the sleeping Jenny. ‘Rudnitski likes trafficking in African girls, you know. He didn’t deserve your devotion.’

So it was done. All three nurses safely drugged. Now what remained was to create some kind of diversion to distract the attention of the security when they finally arrived. But for this, Katya needed some advice. And now that all three of the nurses were sleeping, she could afford to take some time.

Taking out her phone, she called Ben-Hanan, her coordinator for the mission. He would be awake, waiting for her signal of completion.

‘Katya,’ he said, answering almost immediately.

‘David, I’m here at the Bryantern facility. There have been some problems. I’ve had to knock out a couple of nurses and in a little while I’m going to try and get past security. I need to leave some kind of diversion to attract attention from the room they’re going to put the Russian in. I think the mission might have failed. Give me some suggestions.’

Ben-Hanan responded quickly, his voice remaining cool and unflustered. ‘Ok, Katya. Listen carefully. Its fine. Bryantern’s selling point is its discretion. Their people will arrive before Rudnitski’s security. And they’ll almost certainly try and clean up any mess you leave and keep him uninformed of it. They’ve no reason not to. To do otherwise would be to compromise their own brand. They aren’t going to panic because of a couple of drugged nurses. What you need to do is make it look like your intrusion was a drugs theft, maybe by some crazies. Create a spectacle, somewhere other than Rudnitski’s room. Something that will immediately distract attention. ‘

‘I’ll think of something, Ben-Hanan. See you later.’ And she hung up. An idea was already forming in her mind. She looked down at Jenny. The African girl, still doubled up in a foetal position, was now breathing evenly. Good.

Leaving the charge room, Katya walked quickly down the corridor. Opening the door to room 14, she smiled as she looked at Alison, still sleeping peacefully, in her white bra and panties.

‘Ok, darling. Time to go back to work,’ she said. ‘But for me now.’ And she took the fair haired girl by the middle , and hoisted her over her shoulder, easily carrying her. Thus encumbered, she exited the room, down the corridor and back to the charge room, where she placed Alison on the floor next to the sleeping Jenny.

Next, it was Jane’s turn. Katya opened the door to the sluice room, to find the Chinese nurse still safely in a drugged slumber. Lifting her in a cradle carry, Katya brought her third victim to the charge room, placing her alongside her colleagues.

‘Ok, ladies, she said with a smile. ‘thanks in advance for your assistance. ‘

Then she crouched down by Jane Hao, and began to unbutton the Chinese nurse’s dress.

Soon the girl was naked except for fetching burgundy bra and panties. Katya placed her dress, belt, shoes and tights by her side.

Jenny, the charge nurse was next to be relieved of her clothing, and soon her dress too was added to the pile. Jenny’s bra and panties were beige and practical looking. Still, the African girl’s toned and muscular body looked gorgeous and Katya gently stroked the nurse’s smooth, ebony thigh.

Now all three girls were naked but for their bras and panties, all still deeply asleep. Katya dragged Jane over to the corner of the room , leaving her sprawled by two oxygen tanks. Then, a thought occurring to her, she lifted Jenny in a fireman’s lift, and seated her at the desk , carefully allowing the nurse’s upper body to fall forward over the desk, her hands placed on it. She left Alison lying by the entrance.

Then Katya opened the cupboard and taking some sachets of pills, strewed them over the floor. Finally, noting the pile of patient files on the desk next to the inert form of Jenny, she took a couple at random and placed them in her bag.

Having artfully created a scene of utter chaos, Katya then completed the scene by gathering up the girls’ dresses, shoes, belts and tights, and taking them to the sluice room, placing them in the laundry basket.

It was 4.30. Half an hour to go. Back in the charge room, Katya looked at the three sleeping nurses. She felt a little regret at turning what was meant to be a regular night for the three girls into what they would no doubt remember as a nightmare. Still, all three would be awake in a couple of hours, and with no physical harm. Except for the African one, who might have a broken finger.

At 5.10, it was time. Now, the greatest danger of all. Leaving her three stripped victims to their slumber, Katya coolly and purposefully strode down the corridor, and down the stairs.

The security man at the entrance smiled as she walked by. ‘You all right there?’ he said, ‘I’ll be up in a sec. Just arrived.’

Katya smiled her full and toothy Russian smile back. ‘Great. I’ll be back in a sec.’ And she strode out into the cool early morning air. Done. It was over.

Finding her car a hundred meters from the entrance to the facility, she climbed in and started the engine. Relief flooded her body as she maneuvered the car onto the road. With one hand free as she reached the highway, she tapped out a message to Ben-Hanan. ‘Thailand,’ it read.

This was the signal that the mission had been completed and all was well. The first light was appearing as she drove. Only a few cars were on the highway as the Russian woman began the journey to her apartment in Ladbroke Grove, her face expressionless as she negotiated the early morning traffic.
________________________


Katya was in Prague, working on her computer in a café restaurant in the late afternoon when the email arrived. From an unknown address.

Three weeks had passed since the Bryantern assignment. Oddly, the mission hadn’t been a failure despite the complications. Rudnitski had been delivered to the room as planned. And Yashin and his team had gleaned much significant information from the bug.

A complication had arisen when Katya discovered that somewhere along the way, she had left her wallet at Bryantern. But the wallet was nearly empty, containing only a number of fictitious business cards with a false identity and an email address created for a different assignment. She was checking this address when she noted that a new mail had arrived. Frowning slightly, she opened it, and began to read:

‘Hello, this mail will probably surprise you. I don’t know your name. The business card said Julia, but I’m not sure if that’s real. This is Alison, one of the nurses you knocked out a few weeks ago at Bryantern. You left a wallet in room 14 which was rather careless. I found it in the morning. I’m not sure if you’ll even read this, and I still don’t know exactly who you were working for (tho I have a good idea).

Well, as you can imagine, there was something of a commotion in the morning when we were found. I woke up in the middle of it. The other two were still sleeping when I came round.

Something strange happened. I expected that the police would be called, but they weren’t. And neither the patients, not anyone else, was informed of what had happened. Mr Rudnitski arrived later that morning, and we were all just sent home.
Over the next few days, I read up a little on him and his activities. And I realized that he was a criminal, a trafficker, as you’d mentioned on the night we ‘met.’ So I decided, on reflection, not to inform Bryantern about the microphone you were placing.

I was tempted to, because I felt angry and humiliated at what had happened. And you hurt poor Jenny the charge nurse quite a bit, tho Jane and I were basically fine. But on reflection, I decided that there were other things no less important than my personal feelings.

So I suppose I contributed to your mission. I thought of demanding a meeting with you via this email and other crazy ideas, but I don’t want that. Anyway, you might like to know that I left Bryantern last week and have gone back to my old job in the NHS. I’m not interested in that sleaze. Tho Rudnitski on a personal level was a perfect patient and a gentleman.

Anyway, I thought you might be interested to hear all this. It feels a bit strange to be writing like this to a person who knocked me out and stripped me. But if youre working for Yakov Yashin, as I suspect, then I wish you luck – and hope I don’t meet you again.

Yours,

Alison Brooks RN.’


Well, well. A curious turn of events. But for Katya, the Bryantern episode was just another mission. She was heading for Kiev in the morning, to take some observers down to the frontlines near Sloviansk. She thought for a moment about Alison Brooks, her calm under pressure, and how beautiful her slim, smooth body had looked sprawled on the bed.

Then, with a shrug and a slight smile, she called to the waiter for another glass of red wine.

The end

(10/17/2014),