Red Square. The spiral onion-dome towers of St. Basil’s Cathedral lay atop a heap of rubble like multicolored swirl cones somebody had dropped on a litter-strewn boardwalk.
In Moscow I could also smell Number 2 something fierce.
The black-caped creep carried the scent of a rotting side of beef jammed into a refrigerator that had stopped working weeks ago.
He smelled like death.
To complete the death theme, the pale horse he rode through the Russian wreckage was the color of a corpse—a sort of sickly yellowish green with pus-colored blotches all over its hindquarters.
“I am death to those who do not heed my call!”
The me in Moscow didn’t chase after the extremely grim reaper as his horse leaped over the shattered red star that used to top the turret of the Vodovzvodnaya Tower.
Because there was another problem within spitting distance.
A gopnik.
A street gang of tough young males with razor-cut hair and glazed “I don’t care” eyes. They were decked out in jogging suits and had just circled a babushka, a little old lady with few good teeth and a headscarf tied under her chin.
I sensed what was about to happen.
This Moscow street gang was going to have some end-of-the-world fun by mugging, and maybe murdering, somebody’s grandmother!
Chapter 35
I IMMEDIATELY SHUT down the whole quantum-leap experiment and pulled myself together on the mean streets of Moscow.
I couldn’t let these hooligans hurt the defenseless old woman, not if I ever wanted to face myself in the mirror again. For now, I needed to concentrate all my powers in this one location: Red Square.
I also needed my friends.
“What’s up?” said Joe, when he, Willy, Emma, and Dana materialized.
“We need to teach these young Muscovites a thing or two about respecting their elders,” I said as the five of us surrounded the two dozen bad dudes circling the babushka.
“Might be time to call in the heavy artillery,” suggested Willy.
“Yeah,” agreed Dana. “Make these tough guys cry Mayday.”
An excellent suggestion, I thought, since Mayday is the international distress signal, and May Day is also very close to Victory Day in Russia, a holiday when the old Soviet empire used to parade rocket launchers and tanks and goose-stepping troops through this very same square. I skipped the soldiers and concentrated on the big guns.
Twenty-four tanks and twenty-four nuclear-tipped rocket launchers rumbled into the square, one of each aimed directly at each of the twenty-four thugs threatening the defenseless granny. Clanking tank treads and rumbling truck tires crunching across chunks of concrete definitely got the bad boys’ attention. All twenty-four of them twirled around to face us and our newly arrived backup.
“Give it up, guys,” I called out. “You’re seriously outgunned. Let her go.”
“Who are you?” jeered their leader. “Are you with the horseman?”
“No,” said Dana, swaggering forward. “We’re the good guys.”
Now the leader violently grabbed the babushka and wrapped his arm around her throat. “Then call off your tanks!” he snarled. “Pull back your missiles. Or I will kill this old woman! I will kill her now!”
“You don’t want to do that, my friend,” said Willy, stealthily moving forward, ready to pounce the second I gave him the go signal.
“Da! I do!” The gang leader snarled, tightening his viselike grip on the babushka’s throat. “This old woman has lived long enough.” He raised a jagged vodka bottle he held clutched in his right fist. “There is no room for old ones such as her down below. Our new Lord and Master does not need weaklings.”
“Drop the bottle, buddy,” said Willy, both hands up and ready to rock.
The gang leader just laughed. “Or what, little boy? You will take it from me?”
Dana moved forward boldly. “No. I will.”
“Pah! You are a girl!”
“Good eye, Boris Badenov. Now play nice and hand over your bottle. If you do, I’ll give you a binky to suck on instead.”
Dana leaped forward just as I was just about to turn the Russian’s nasty-looking jagged bottle into a floppy, harmless fish.
But the gang leader slashed at Dana’s face with the thing an instant before I made the switch.
Her hands flew up to the bleeding wound.
Thinking fast—finally—I turned the gang of hoodlums, all of whom were reaching for weapons, into Red Square’s newest tableau of frozen bronze statues, something I should’ve done six nanoseconds sooner, but my reflexes were still foggy from the four-location stunt I had just pulled off (not to mention my massive military buildup in Red Square).
“Take care of the babushka,” I called to Emma, who raced over to comfort the elderly woman while