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Chapter 8 – Hammer and Popsicle

“I think knives are a good idea. Big, fuck-off shiny ones. Ones that look like they could skin a crocodile.” - Soap - Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels

Hargrove stared at Frieda … into her deep brown eyes that he felt he could fall into for … A shout snapped him out of his reverie and brought his head around in a crepitant arc that made his eyes cross.

“Stand fast sinners and your souls may yet be redeemed!”

“Quickly, we must get to the Captain before the Bishop finds us.” The two men lurched after the lithe woman, knocking dazed stragglers aside leaving them battered and cowering in their wake.

McGuinness took the lead as they rounded a corner and led them forward. They came abruptly to a blind end. “There’s a fookin secret panel here. But I have the key.” He hefted the heavy wrench like a modern-day Excalibur with “Home Hardware” proudly emblazoned along its length. He brought the tool down against the wall with barbaric howl.

Hargrove covered his ears anticipating a deafening bell-like crash. Visions of that pell-mell flight through Paris flooded his addled mind. To his surprise, the end wall gave way with a wooden crunch under the mountainous Scot’s assault.

McGuinness battered at the facade, widening the hole, giving himself constant verbal encouragement. “Give way yeh fookin tin can!” With a final swing of the mighty implement, the opening was big enough for him to proceed. He bulled his way through and Frieda and Hargrove quickly followed. Turning to them the massive engineer gently cautioned, “This is a sight unsuited for you lily-livered, spineless lot!” He stared hard at Hargrove. “You mealy, verminous heaps of shite will have to fookin suck it up! If ye get any ah yer puke on meh you’ll be getting a sharp manners lesson.” He brandished the wrench again. Hargrove wondered if the engineer had ever been a sergeant. McGuinness pushed open the door and they again followed him through. No one could have prepared them for the sight that met their haggard eyes.

There, in the soft glow of a single spotlight, propped up in an upright position, loomed a large translucent cylinder. Suspended inside was the form of a man. They slowly stepped forward and then recoiled in horror.

“John fookin Wayne!” spat McGuinness.

“Adolf Hitler!” cried Frieda.

“Walt Disney!” cried Hargrove. He quickly turned and began heaving explosively, holding the doorjamb for support. Between mouthfuls of bile he coughed out his disgust “… capitalist …mouse … oppressor …” At length he recovered and turned to face the others. Frieda was sweating and swallowing heavily. McGuinness looked as though he would take a bite out of his beloved wrench. Wiping grey-brown slime from his face, he slowly approached the cylinder. Peering closely, he felt great relief wash through him.

This in fact was not the capitalist animator who had enslaved the minds of countless children. The decadent Steamboat Willie, the insidious Jiminy Cricket and the cunning Donald Duck; hated icons of anti-collectivism. Chilling tales of their shiftless, footloose ways had kept him awake as a child. It hadn’t been the cold, hard ground that had made him shiver, rolled in his threadbare army blankets. With a shudder he banished the painful memory.

“Everyone can relax,” he told the others. This is not Walt Disney. Nor is it the Great Fascist or the Duke. My uncanny intuition tells me this is in fact …”

“Captain Ivan Brashnikov…” interrupted a high voice. Hargrove couldn’t help but notice the definite Spanish accent. A figure slipped from the deep shadows in the corner of the room. The man twirled his long moustache and drew himself up to his fire hydrant height. He tossed his dark cloak over his shoulder with a flourish.

“You!” exclaimed Hargrove, spraying vomit across the room. “The cable car in Barcelona. You couldn’t have survived!”

The man sniggered and twirled his moustache yet again. “Why don’t you introduce me to your witless flunkies?” he taunted the detective.

“I’ll do better than that!” Hargrove shouted, reaching for his Webley.

“That would be incredibly unwise,” the man countered. His hands dipped into the folds of his cloak and, like quicksilver, emerged. In each slender hand he held a Fairbairn-Sykes throwing dagger.

“Ticks do have jaws,” conceded Hargrove. He knew without a doubt that the man could have a knife in him before he could even aim the heavy sidearm. His hand returned to his side.

“Before we proceed I believe the gentlemen should very slowly drop their weapons and kick them toward me.

Hargrove wordlessly complied. He gently placed his weapon on the floor, and slid it over to his captor. McGuinness however, protested. “I expected as much. Ye cowardly, linen-clad puddle o’ camel snot!” he shouted at Hargrove. “Yon Snidely Halfpint,” he continued, “will no be takin’ me wrench!”

“Do it,” commanded Hargrove quietly, “if you ever hope to labor again, confident that your suffering and stoicism will cast out the managerial class and bring to fruition the Worker’s Utopian Dream.” McGuinness shot an exasperated look at Hargrove and then glared at the diminutive figure confidently brandishing the knives. Sighing heavily, he dropped the wrench and kicked it solidly across the room.

“I am Louis Santiago,” the tiny assassin introduced himself. He capered briefly. “You are all fortunate enough to be here during my ultimate victory.” He waited expectantly. Frieda didn’t move.  McGuinness spat. Hargrove slumped against the cylinder. His grin dimmed somewhat and he shrugged. “In a moment my mission will be complete and I’ll be back on board the submarine in time to see Captain Borisovitch send this tub to the bottom.”

“So the Armenian separatist …” Hargrove began.

“…story was just a ruse,” finished Santiago. “Once again you’ve somehow blundered your way to the truth. “In fact it is Captain Brashnikov who is the Armenian separatist. Ever since the breakup of the beloved USSR, Armenia, like the Balkan states wants self-rule. Smaller Communist states may even be helpful to the glorious revolution. But Brashnikov is a Capitalist.” He made a gesture of contempt with his throwing knife. Hargrove, spattered with blood, gore and vomit stepped away from the cylinder containing the Captain with an expression of distaste. “Worse he had the political clout to set up Armenia as a Capitalist puppet state of the Great Satan!”

“France!” exclaimed Hargrove.

“Just so,” he continued. I was sent to eliminate the problem. I nearly had him when he foolishly attended an embassy three-legged race in Beijing, but the Irish Special Forces executed a daring raid and managed to spirit him away along with all of the whiskey.”

“And now he’s …” began Hargrove.

“ You surprise me with your astuteness,” said Santiago. “Brashnikov had himself cryogenically frozen. Safe in suspended animation, he thought he could outwait me, waiting for his chance to but now I, thanks to your fumbling assistance, have found him.”

 “So…”

“Right again detective. Serapion is actually an Irish Special Forces triple agent. When the Irish found out you’d been brought aboard by Tobermorrey they knew that the Brashnikov must be here. They, like I, just waited for you to find out where he was.

Hargrove was beginning to feel dizzy. The close confines, his wounds and his aroma were beginning to take their toll. He rallied for a final attempt to sway Santiago. “Look you antiquated toad, we’re both faithful soldiers in the glorious revolution, why not bury the ah … why not leave the past in the past. We’ll take Brashnikov back to Minsk and thaw him out for trial …”

“Never! I am a true soldier, you have become contaminated. You’re a consumer,” he added with a sneer. Your years among the Cheetos-munching, Nike-wearing, Survivor-watching hedonists have contaminated you beyond redemption. Even if my instructions were to leave you alive, I would have to report you as lost during the operation.

“In fact,” he said glancing around, “all of you know too much. The presence of the Irish special forces, details of my mission, my painful upbringing in Havana, my pivotal role at the Bay of Pigs, my hatred for flannel, my fascination with Klingon opera…”

 McGuinness, Frieda and Hargrove exchanged worried, quizzical glances.

“No,” Santiago continued, “you simply must join the Captain as he goes down with his ship.”

“Give yourselves to the Lord! Ask his forgiveness and all shall be revealed!” The bellow from the door way nearly knocked Hargrove off his feet.

Santiago whirled at the sound and instantly loosed a Fairbairn-Sykes at Serapion. The Bishop strode forward raising his crozier. One massive foot slipped in the noisome puddle left by Hargrove and the huge man went down flat on his back. The flying dagger zipped through the air over the prostrate man and clattered down the passage behind him.

As soon as Santiago turned, Hargrove lunged at the man. Weakened by his many wounds and preoccupied with the implications of cryonics to the Balkans, he fell far short of his target. Santiago turned and raised his knife for a killing strike.

Hargrove flinched where he lay, knowing his illustrious career was about to meet a painful, ignoble and sticky end. His life flashed before him; the young heady days chanting glorious slogans of egalitarianism, the somewhat less young days chanting glorious slogans of egalitarianism, the slightly middle-aged days chanting … Just then the sharp report of a small-caliber handgun rang out. He looked up. Santiago reeled where he stood, the throwing knife still poised. Another shot and the man fell to the floor. Blood quickly began to pool from the pulpy remains of his temple. Hargrove searched for his unknown savior.

Frieda held the smoking Derringer in a steady hand. A look of hatred slowly melted off her face. She quickly crossed over to him “Hargrove, my love, you were magnificent.”

Will our heroes be able to save the ship? Will the Captain be taken to Minsk to stand trial? Where did Frieda have her gun hidden?

On to Chapter 9