A light came on. I understood everything. Not many Ukrainians worked for the Xunta de Galicia, and Pritchenko was one of them. Now I knew exactly what my friend did. An excited shiver ran down my spine. What an idiot I’d been.
I turned to study Prit’s affable profile.
I felt completely drained all of a sudden. We’d spent five terrifying days together to retrieve that damn case lying on an old wooden table. At least five people had died on account of whatever was inside. But we were still alive. We’d come within a hair’s breadth of losing our own lives a couple of times. Natural selection had been ridiculously harsh over the last few months. We survivors are the most skilled, the fittest…or we just haven’t made many bad decisions. All that was in the past. We had the case.
Now we had to get out of that fucking store, thanks to Prit. He didn’t know it, but he was one of the most valuable people left in that part of the world. Not even Ushakov, the
Prit was worth his weight in gold. Sitting beside me, quietly smoking a Chesterfield, his huge blond mustache drooping over his mouth, was Mr. Viktor Pritchenko: the only living helicopter pilot for hundreds of miles around.
Wildfires plague Galicia during the summer. Because the area is so heavily wooded, voracious fires destroy acres and acres of woodlands every year. Combating those fires takes enormous efforts, materials, and human resources.
The early 1990s were very dry years, with particularly large fires. The Galician government was overwhelmed. Using military aircraft to fight the fires didn’t cut it. Firefighting crews couldn’t get to the affected areas fast enough on the ground, and seaplanes weren’t very reliable. They decided to hire pilots from Eastern Europe.
The majority of those pilots were former Russian, Polish, and Ukrainian soldiers who were kicked out on the street when the Eastern Bloc fell. After paying ridiculous sums of money in bribes to save their planes and helicopters from the scrap heap, they earned a living in emerging Eastern European nations by giving air shows or transporting people and goods more or less legally from one country to another. They were experienced, tough, cheap, and had their own helicopters. The perfect solution.
They quickly proved they were worth every penny. Plunging into a forest fire was child’s play for those pilots, especially the ones with combat experience in Afghanistan and Chechnya. Where the terrified Spanish civilian pilots refused to fly, the former Soviet soldiers dived in with a recklessness bordering on madness, losing their lives on more than one occasion. What’s more, their old Soviet helicopters were tough, easy to maintain, and had a larger cargo capacity than their Western twins, making them ideal.
Since then, pilots from the East and their old workhorses fought fires in Galicia year after year, from March to October. In the winter they went back to Eastern Europe, loaded down with Western goods they resold on the black market.
Prit related all this in a monotone, lighting one cigarette after another. He was from Zaproshpojye, a tiny village in northern Ukraine, but he was a Russian citizen. He joined the Red Army when he was only seventeen. After basic training, he was assigned to a company of transport helicopters. He fought in the final days of the war in Afghanistan, where he was shot down once, and in the Second Chechen War, transporting Russian troops to the front. He had a bright future in the army. Then he married Irina.
He took a crumpled photo of Irina out of his wallet. His voice trembled, and tears welled up in his eyes. Irina was gorgeous, a little Slavic doll with blonde hair and huge green eyes. He met her on leave, and they got married a year later. Little Pavel came along a year after that, complicating the couple’s lives. A Russian military pilot’s salary was terribly low compared to what he could make in the West. Plus the Chechen war was getting more dangerous and out of control. Prit had a family to support, so the decision was easy.
Three months after getting out of the army, Pritchenko was working for a shady German transport company. He first came to Spain as a forestry pilot in 2002. He’d returned, year after year, while his family settled in Dusseldorf, Germany. He’d been considering bringing them to Galicia to live when the apocalypse started.
Prit was now sobbing. He hadn’t heard a word from his family since late February, when they took refuge in the Dusseldorf Safe Haven. He was sure they were dead. I didn’t dare give him any hope. What good would that do?
The question was on the tip of my tongue, but I didn’t dare ask it as Prit wept bitterly on my shoulder for people who’d been killed or turned into monsters months ago.
When he’d calmed down, I blurted out, “Prit, where’s your helicopter now?”
“Where I left helicopter two months ago, maybe,” he replied, his breathing still ragged. “At forest camp. Mount Facho, twenty miles from here.”
“What about the other pilots? Where are they? What did they do?” The questions shot out of my mouth.
“Oh, when everything kaput, they go. I don’t know where.”
My heart sank. Had Pritchenko’s helicopter disappeared in the chaotic days before the fall of the Safe Havens, or been stolen by another pilot or seized by the army? To my surprise, the Ukrainian shook his head.
“Not possible,” he said. “Helicopter damaged. Need cog tail rotor. Part small, but very expensive. Mailed from Kiev to Vigo.”
My temples throbbed as I guessed the rest. “Where’s that piece, Prit? Do you have it?”
The Ukrainian shook his head again. “
I plopped down in a chair, thinking at top speed. Ushakov or Kritzinev must have gone to the VNT office to pick up their fucking package. The employee couldn’t read the label in Cyrillic, so he gave him the package with Pritchenko’s part. The situation at the time was chaotic. A scared employee anxious to get the hell out and head for home wouldn’t have bothered to check IDs. The package was from Ukraine, and Ushakov was Ukrainian. When Prit showed up for his part, they discovered the mistake, but by then it was too late. The world was falling apart.
This is great. I have a pilot and a helicopter at my disposal. That changes the situation dramatically. I only need two things: a small helicopter part and a cat. And I know where they both are. On the
ENTRY 72
The sun’s coming up. It’s really cold in the VNT warehouse. Prit and I plan to leave in fifteen minutes. The Ukrainian is checking the battery and tires of one of the delivery vans parked in the garage. They aren’t as safe as that ill-fated armored van we came in, but at least we’ve got four wheels to drive to the port. Or as far as we can get.
I’m jotting down these notes as my friend tunes up our transportation. We changed out of our torn, filthy clothes and into gray-and-black VNT coveralls we found in a dressing room. We couldn’t take a shower since there’s no water, so our odor and appearance still leave a lot to be desired. At least we don’t look like fugitives from the law anymore.
We talked at length about how we could swap the briefcase for Lucullus and the helicopter part. We finally had a plan. We spent hours working out all the details, but I think it’ll work.
This’ll have to be fast. Pritchenko’s just started the van and is signaling for me to raise the garage door. The engine sound will soon attract a mob of those creatures, and we still have to make a stop along the way.
I hope everything goes well. The next time I write in this journal I’ll have Lucullus.
Time to go. We’re off.
