TS3 Chapter 12

 Chapter 12 

November 30^th, 2015

Zurich Airport

'This is impossible!' Konrad thought when he saw Ferdinand sitting in the large cushion sofa inside the jet. 'Twenty-four hours trapped rfwith him? No way.' 

Ferdinand stood up and smiled like a fool, still missing his warm bed and the noise of something falling down made Konrad look the other way and he saw Michael Dähler, looking sheepishly as he had broken the porcelain cup of coffee formerly juggling on the armrest of his chair. 

“Only Goran and his merry cohort are missing.” Konrad resorted to irony to express his annoyance. 

“They're inside, checking something in the aircraft hold.” Ferdinand announced triumphantly. “We all thought we should go.” 

“Who's taking care of the business?” Konrad sat in his place and huffed as Marie rushed to his side to get his coat and briefcase away. “Don't tell me it's Armin.” 

“Marvin and Monika,” Michael shrugged. “Lavrov is around just in case Marvin blows up a fuse.” 

“I don't remember asking you to join us,” Konrad barked at Michael. “As your employer I should send you back to your work. You lost nothing in Auckland.” 

“I was there once,” Michael told Ferdinand and ignored the furious Konrad. “Good food and there was this Lord of the Rings convention that was just awesome. Imagine, I met a girl who was dressed like Galadriel and she looked just like her. I asked her out and …. I fulfilled one of my fantasies.” 

“How old were you? Twelve?” Ferdinand said contemptuously. 

“At least I have fantasies, unlike some other people I know.” Michael retorted, feigning to feel insulted. 

“Don't worry, Michael, we will buy you a large koala to bring home.” 

“Koalas live in Australia and we're going to New Zealand.” Michael smirked. “There are no kangaroos too.” 

“And dodos but we don't need to go so far away to get one when we have one at home.” Ferdinand joked as he purportedly also ignored the fuming Konrad. 'Eye contact and we're lost. Keep going on Michael and he'll go away.' 

“Or maybe we get a Moa for you to wed.” 

“That would be a great idea.” Ferdinad said, glad that Michael had brought up the subject of his recent break up. Konrad hated to hear about divorces and he would probably ran away if he started to bitch. “She wouldn't ask for much in the prenup.”

“Firstly, you must have something to desire.” Michael rose an eyebrow to let Ferdinand know he was game. 

“After a first and a second wife, there's nothing left to be desired. Can you believe that Cecilia wants to take Guntram's portrait with her? The bitch! I paid for it and it was a wedding present. Wedding present means it's for the groom -me- and bride -she, bitch-. The thing should be sold and the money split.” 

“That was a nice one indeed.” Michael said. “EBay?” his suggestion made Konrad roll his eyes as he ostensibly opened the folder left in front of him. 

To be on the safe side, Ferdinand continued to tell his tale of abandonment and greed at the hands of Cecilia, her family and their refusal to pay the fine as Michael feigned sympathy. At some point Konrad stopped huffing at each page he turned and the aircraft engines became alive and both men knew were safe when Marie began to set the adjoined large mahogany table for breakfast. When the smell of the coffee was washing the cabin over, Goran came forward and took his seat silently. 

Marie and Lisa finished to set the table and disappeared to the front. Konrad, without saying a word, sat in his place at the head of the table and waited for the three men to take their places. 

“Are we waiting for someone else?” Konrad asked as he saw the three empty places at the end of the table. 

“Just Mihailovic and the two Bregovics.” Goran said and upon his words, Ratko, Milan and Mirko showed up. 

“You brought all of your troops along, didn't you?” Konrad said ironically. 

“Most people are in commercial flights, my duke.” Goran answered softly. “We'll use our own local forces too.” 

“Not even Monika could have booked a hotel for the little army you're bringing along with such a short notice.” 

“We're not staying in a hotel,” said Ferdinand as he took a bun from the silver basket. “At your house or maybe it's like a ranch. Antonov said there were many Russians and Americans around. We don't need them snooping on us in a hotel.” 

“Do I have a house there?” Konrad sounded a bit surprised. 

“Several properties,” Michael replied. “And islands too. You agreed to buy extra land in Australia and New Zealand in case things were from bad to worse in Europe.” 

“And cattle,” Goran added. “I also have a house in front of the sea.” 

“Why do I have nothing?” Michael frowned. 

“Because you waste your time chasing Galadriels.” Ferdinand said. “Wait till Monika hears about it.” 

“I will survive,” Michael said with calculated haughtiness and all the men but Konrad laughed like hyenas. 

“Very well, what do we know?” Konrad rose his voice to be heard over the laughter and the men stopped. 

Michael cleared his throat and took his iPad from the table he had been sitting at before. “Guntram has been hospitalized at Mercy Hospital. We asked Dr. Wagemann to speak with the doctor in charge of his case but he got the door on his face. So officially we know nothing more than he's hospitalized there. Off the record -we hacked a few things on the way- we know that his condition is critical but stable and he's on top of the national transplant list but there's not much hope. He has a strange blood type and donors are hard to find.” 

“Is he hospitalized under his real name?” Konrad asked in disbelief. 

“Yes, of course.” Michael answered. “However, there's had been a large fund established for his care by a certain François Arseniev. Antonov says that's Repin’s new identity.” 

“Was,” Goran laconically corrected Michael. 

“If he's dead.” Michael said. 

“Three direct shots to the head should do the trick.” Ferdinand shrugged. “That's what's on the police records we hacked so far. There's not much else. The house was empty, only the servants are testifying and not a single bodyguard or Chechen in sight. They're treating it as a burglary gone wrong because the safe box was emptied. The nanny is gone too so they think she might have something to do with it. They found some crystals in her bedroom.” 

“Sure,” Michael chortled. “Repin was mugged by the junkie nanny.” 

“All the material Antonov sent me has a high value for us. A true treasure, sir.” Goran said. “I assume he took some money too.” 

“Repin was alone?” Konrad asked in shock. “What was he doing with Guntram?? What about Klatschko? He was always around.”

“Gone. Almost immediately after Guntram fell ill or that's what the servants told to the police. The Chechen took their families with them. All gone.” 

Konrad frowned. “If de Lisle sold us...” 

“In all the information we've checked so far, there's nothing about us. Nothing he could have given Repin.” Goran said. “He's not a traitor.” 

“Repin knew everything about us.” Konrad said evenly. 

“Repin had a lot of our dirty laundry from 2007 to 2012 and there are strong leads to suspect that he sold us to Uncle Sam, not the Russians or Lacroix as we first thought.”

“Putin would have never sold us because we manage a large share of his own money.” Konrad huffed. “Repin.” 

“We couldn't find so far what Guntram says he has among Repin's things.” Ferdinand added. “We're still looking for it.” 

“Knowing him it must be in Megaupload by now.” Michael smirked. “Or in the Apple cloud while we surf the deep web like idiots.” 

“De Lisle is many things but not stupid.” Konrad said. “It must be somewhere.” 

“Are you not going to ask about your son?” Ferdinand asked with an edge to his voice. “If he's alive or something? The police are quite concerned and they seemed to be quite confused in their reports.” 

“Antonov has him. It's pointless to waste time on this. I want a copy of all the documents we got from Repin.” 

“Your hard disk doesn't have that much capacity.” Michael said. “We're speaking of hundreds of gigabytes of information. It will take us months, maybe years to analyze them before we can do something with it.” 

“So it is as I thought. There's nothing to reassure me that de Lisle didn't betray us just because your teams didn't have the physical time to go through all that information. You're working on a wishful thinking basis. It would be good that my Magnus Commendator and my Summus Marescalus would think with their brains before jumping to conclusions,” Konrad scolded them. 

All the men around the table went silent. Humiliated. 

“I've known Guntram for many years and despite our differences in the past years, he has never lied to us.” Goran was the first to break the self imposed silence around the table. “He has never risen his hand against us.” 

“There's always a first time for everything.” Konrad rebuked him. “De Lisle was living under the same roof as Repin. What does this make you think, gentleman? That all what we went through after Holgerssen’s  murder was a lie?” 

“Konrad,” Ferdinand sighed. “Don't start getting paranoid. You saw that snake of Lacroix sitting in front of you, shedding tears for his son. That wasn't a lie.” 

Milan, Ratko and Mirko gaped at the men at the table. All the puzzle pieces finally fell in. Guntram was crazy and a dreamer but he would have never ran away with his child only because of a dead lawyer no matter if he was his “godfather”. 

“Was Guntram a b... an illegitimate child?” Milan broke the poignant silence as Ferdinand, Goran and Micheal wore long expressions. “Lacroix was his... father?” 

“Lacroix was Jerôme de Lisle. It's a long story.” Ferdinand replied. 

“I had my suspicions the first time I saw him, right when Guntram returned from Russia, but I couldn’t get that man to admit it.” Mirko frowned at Goran. “Did we execute his own, real father?”

“Jerôme de Lisle, like all the de Lisles were sentenced in 1989.” Konrad's voice spoke firmly. “I only put the sentence on hold for Guntram's sake until this man's mad quest for power nearly ruined us all. He's a traitor. His treachery has been proved beyond any reasonable doubt.”

“It really explains a lot,” Ratko huffed visibly upset with the news. “If somebody did my father away, I would also think in one, blow the place up or two, run away. Guntram is number two kind of person.” 

“Thank God for that,” Ferdinand mumbled and Konrad glared at him. 

“It was quite a shock for me too,” Michael said with a conciliatory voice. “But we have to find a way to persuade Guntram to lay down his weapons and solve this situation with di Mattei and fix that other little problem with Marvin.” 

“If he survives the next week,” Ferdinand added gloomily. 

“Do any of you listen to yourselves?” Goran asked irritated. “Guntram isn't a pawn in this game. He's our friend.” 

“Speak for yourself.” Konrad rebuked him sharply and shuffled his papers, to vent his pent up anger while the men around the table gaped at his out of scale resentment and hatred towards Guntram. Konrad's attitude was beyond sanity.  

Ferdinand was the first to break the heavy, poignant silence. 

“The only true miracle here is that the lad was coping with you for more than ten years,” Ferdinand said coldly as he glared at Konrad across the table. “Don't be such a bitch and get over the fact that he had enough of you. We have more pressing issues to solve than hearing one of your spurned lover tantrums.” 

Konrad rose from his chair and walked away from the room, closing the door to his private quarters softly. The silence falling over the table was a mix of awe and disconcert at Ferdinand's words. 

“I think you outdid yourself this time, my friend.” Goran said. 

“Let him brood.” Ferdinand answered dryly. “Or hire a nanny if he behaves so childishly.”

“Ferdinand, you should apologize.” Michael suggested mildly. 

“Or what?” Ferdinand blurted out. “Maybe it's about time our Hochmeister faces the fact that he screw it up, not us, not Guntram. Do you think I have nothing better to do than sharing a plane for 24 hours with him? Don't you think I have my own problems at home? I didn't hear him saying; “Ferdinand, how can I help you with Cecilia's?' Or saying something about you and your former girlfriend, Goran. Or even changing Ratko's children diapers!”

“The day that happens, a meteorite will destroy Earth,” Milan chuckled and Mirko snorted.

“Don't feel so bad Ferdinand, he never offered to help Michael with his building bricks.” Ratko said. “He's been trying to finish that thing since 2010.” 

“It's an extremely complicated Lego model of R2D2!” Michael defended himself. “Over thousands of pieces! I'm still working on it because I have no time to finish it.” 

“We still don't know why you're still married.” Milan shook his head and the men laughed at Michael's ways. “Ferdinand might have a point,” he said seriously after the laughter ceased. 

“The duke is the duke,” Goran shrugged. “Nobody around this table honestly expects him to behave like an adult. Aristocrats are whimsical.” 

“I'm not going to go in there and hold his hand and hear to his rants. I refuse to.” Ferdinand said. “I'm going to fulfill my promise to the lad; help him to go home if things turn really bad for him. Now it's the time.” 

“What do you mean by “home”?” Goran asked softly. “You do know the odds, don't you?” 

“I don't know. Maybe I'll bury him next to his mother or to his father. I'm sure he won't like to be buried next to the Lintorffs. Fight for him if Konrad doesn't lift a finger for him. Remember, the duke has power of attorney over his life.” 

“It would never come to this.” Ratko shook his head. 

“How can you be so sure?” Ferdinand asked and Goran turned around in his chair. 

“The duke wouldn't harm him.” Ratko insisted. 

“Guntram was with Repin, by his own will. I know what's going to happen. Unlike all of you, I was there, in 1989, and I saw the heads roll down. Guntram isn't Roger de Lisle and my best friend has to understand it. I'm going there to save him from himself. Nothing else.” 

* * * 

November 30^th, 2015

Auckland

'How does he do it? Guntam makes it look easy.' Alexei sighed and rose from his chair to get the kitchen paper roll to clean up a lake-size milk, chocolate and cereal stain. For a second, he was glad that he was staying in a cheap motel in the outskirts of Auckland. Any other place would have kicked him and his lot out without thinking it twice. 

“It's OK. Everybody can have an accident,” Alexei said to the little boy about to cry. “We clean it and I'll get you another one.” 'Could it be the sugar that's making them nuts?' 

Kostya broke up in tears and hiccups as he watched the cereal bowl overturned. Kurt had done it on purpose. He had pushed his elbow when the spoon was full. 

Alexei sighed. The noise of toddlers cries were the most annoying and unsettling thing he had ever heard. 'I'm too old for this.' 

“How about going to the zoo?” Alexei asked and Kurt immediately pouted. 

“I want to see papa!” Kurt yelled. 

That noise again: not a real cry of pain but one of hysteria mixed with a touch of fury and impatience. “Well, you heard the nurse. We're not allowed in the ICU. When he's better, we'll see him.” 

“I want to be with my papa!” Kurt was able to yell a notch louder than before and Kostya went from the crying to the wailing stage. 

Alexei not only felt old but desperate to the point of catatonia. He had never known how much he hated little children until now. The sound of little footsteps would never be heard in his home if he had a say in the matter. 

'Someone should record all this yelling and use it for torture.' 

“Papa is at the hospital.” 

“My other papa, you idiot!” Kurt yelled back and Alexei didn't know if he should shout him back or be quiet. 

“Don't talk back to me, young man!” Alexei said in his best officer's voice and both children promptly ceased their displays and looked at him in awe. 

“That's better.” Alexei felt that he was again in charge after being dunked in a bathtub, sprayed with milk, shouted at, questioned every second and having lost a good shirt to ketchup. “We'll go to the zoo because that's the best I can offer you. No running wild, no tricks, no complaints. One more word out of place and you'll both wish the duke would be here.” 

“Papa is coming?” Kurt opened his big eyes because Guntram had been very clear: “you'll never see him again”. “Papa Konrad?” 

“Yes, he's on a plane flying all the way here. Maybe he's landing as we speak and can meet us at the zoo.” Alexei said softly. 'Papa number three has to fix this mess.' 

Kostya frowned at his brother and he smiled back, encouragingly. “Konrad is my papa too. Maybe he can be yours too,” he told his brother whose frown became deeper. “There's a large piano in his house and papa has the grandmother's piano at his real studio. Uncle Goran can even play the violin.'

Kostya looked at his brother suspiciously. “I want my papa,” he said clearly. 

'Not a chance.' Alexei sighed. 'Busy burning in hell.' “Look, Konrad is.” The use of the duke's Christian name gave him a bad aftertaste. He gulped but valiantly continued with his speech. “Is a very good man and a wonderful father. He's married to your papa and Kurt knows him well,” Alexei glanced at the boy and he nodded vigorously but Kostya seemed to be skeptical. “There's a large piano at the music room and I remember once I heard Claudio Arrau playing there, a private concert. And once, Rostropovich played his violoncello there. Do you know what is that?” 

Kostya nodded.

“Once a week or maybe every two weeks, the duke, Konrad is a duke which is like being a small king, has dinners with musicians and he goes to the opera whenever he has free time. You'll like to go to the theaters and listen to the music.” 

“I was never in a theatre.” Kostya said. 

“He likes really classical music -rock, I'm not so sure-, but you both like the same and there's no reason why you shouldn't become good friends.” Alexei smiled confidently and put the little boy on top of his lap. 

'If the duke doesn't fall dead on the spot when he finds out that he has another child.' 

“Uncle Goran's music teacher. He showed me his.... that paper on the wall.”. Kurt supported Alexei's case. “He plays the piano much better than papa. His brother was a fine pianist in the great theaters and he taught him.” 

“All right,” Kostya mumbled. “Where is my papa François?” 

“He had to fly back to Russia.” Alexei lied without batting an eye. 

“He always says good-bye.” Kurt told him shocked. 

“It was an emergency. The best is if we go to the zoo- 'last place the Chechens would look for me. They must have found the body by now'- “and wait for Konrad.” 'The police must be looking for me too. I was the only stranger to the island. Fuck! I was never before so clumsy!' 

Alexei put the child back on the floor, walked to the main bedroom and opened the new and cheap suitcase he had bought the day before and began to stuff brutally all the clothes he could find in the rooms. 

“Why are you packing?” Kurt asked. 

“We're leaving to a better place. This one stinks.” 

“You can't say stink.” Kurt reprimanded Alexei. 

“No, the word I can't say is “sucks” but I used “stinks”, smartass.” Alexei replied dryly, more concerned about the police looking for him. He had shaved his beard but probably the millennials had given his photo to the cops. The police should be looking for him by now. He needed to get the children back to the father and leave the country as soon as possible. He closed the suitcase loudly and felt someone tucking his trousers.  

“Can't say “ass”.” Kostya smiled broadly, shocked that the grown up had put his brother in his place. “Smartbottom,” Kostya pinched his brother's arm and Kurt quickly returned the favour with a kick to his shins.

Alexei sighed and took the smallest child in his arms, away from  brotherly harm and went to look for the large “Snickers” bag he had bought as a last peace-restoring resource. Stuffing the children with candy was a good idea as it kept them quiet.

'If I dodge the Australian police and the Chechens, then Guntram will kill me when he wakes up.'