January 20, 1991, 7:18 PM
Ivan found the first one in a basement.
Not a metaphorical basement. An actual, damp, concrete-walled basement beneath a crumbling Khrushchev-era apartment block in the Vyborgsky district, where the heating pipes groaned like dying animals and the air smelled of mold, cheap tobacco, and hopelessness.
Sergeant Pyotr "Petrukha" Vasiliev had been the company's best sniper in Afghanistan. Nine confirmed kills, though the actual number was closer to twenty if you counted the ones nobody reported. He could hit a man at eight hundred meters in crosswinds. He could wait motionless for thirty-six hours. He had saved Dmitri Volkov's life during the Panjshir Valley operation in 1985, taking a bullet through the shoulder that shattered bone and ended his military career.
Now he lived in a six-meter-square room with a cot, a hot plate, and thirty-seven empty vodka bottles lined up against the wall like trophies of a different war.
Ivan stood in the doorway, blocking what little light came from the corridor's single bare bulb. "Petrukha."
The man on the cot didn't move. "Go away."
"Captain Volkov's son needs you."
A pause. Then Vasiliev rolled over, his movements slow with alcohol and despair. His face was pale in the gloom, the sharp features blurred by months of neglect. But his eyes, when they focused on Ivan, were still the eyes of a sniper—calculating, distant, cold.
"Dmitri's boy? Alyosha?"
"Alyosha is sixteen now. And he's planning something."
Vasiliev sat up slowly, wincing as his bad shoulder protested. "Planning what? A school project?"
"He's selling his grandfather's medals to pay for his mother's funeral. He's reading economic reports. He's making phone calls to Kazakhstan." Ivan stepped into the room, letting the door swing shut behind him. The darkness thickened. "He's not a boy anymore, Petrukha. He's something else."
The sniper reached for a half-empty bottle on the floor, took a swig, and offered it to Ivan. Ivan shook his head.
"Suit yourself." Vasiliev wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "What does he want with a broken-down sniper who lives in a basement?"
"He wants the men who owe his father. All of them."
"Owe." The word came out bitter. "We all owe, Ivan. We owe for being alive when others aren't. We owe for coming home to this." He gestured around the basement with the bottle. "What does the debt buy him? A drunk in a hole in the ground."
"It buys him loyalty," Ivan said quietly. "And in the world that's coming, loyalty might be the only currency that matters."
Vasiliev stared into the darkness for a long time. Then: "When?"
"Soon. He's putting together a team. For a job in Kazakhstan."
"Kazakhstan." A dry chuckle. "Of course. Because Afghanistan wasn't far enough away."
"It's not a war, Petrukha. It's business."
"Same thing, different bullets." He took another drink. "What's the pay?"
"Five hundred dollars. American."
The bottle stopped halfway to Vasiliev's lips. In the darkness, Ivan could see his eyes sharpen. Five hundred dollars was six months' wages for a factory worker, if the factory was still paying wages. For a man living on a disability pension of ninety rubles a month, it was unimaginable wealth.
"You're lying," Vasiliev whispered.
"I never lied to you in the mountains. I'm not starting now."
Vasiliev set the bottle down carefully, as if it were made of glass instead of cheap plastic. "When do we leave?"
"Not we. You. First, you clean up. You sober up. You remember how to be a soldier." Ivan took a wad of rubles from his pocket—Alexei's money, advanced from the last of the medal sales—and tossed it onto the cot. "Get a room with a shower. Eat real food. Buy clothes that don't smell. Then come to this address."
He handed over a slip of paper with an address in the Petrogradsky district—a warehouse Alexei had identified as their temporary headquarters.
Vasiliev stared at the money, then at the address, then at Ivan. "He's really Dmitri's son?"
"He has his father's eyes. And his grandfather's brain."
A ghost of a smile touched the sniper's lips. "Then God help Kazakhstan."
Ivan turned to leave.
"Ivan."
He paused at the door.
"The captain saved my life twice," Vasiliev said quietly. "Not just in Panjshir. Before. When I was going to shoot that prisoner in Ghazni. He took the rifle from my hands. Said we weren't animals." He looked at the empty bottles against the wall. "Sometimes I wish he'd let me pull the trigger. Maybe I'd remember how to be human now."
"You'll remember when there's work to do," Ivan said. Then he was gone, the door closing behind him, leaving Vasiliev alone with the money, the address, and the ghosts.
Meanwhile, at the Volkov apartment
Alexei was on his fourth cup of tea, the caffeine keeping the exhaustion at bay as he worked through the logistics. Spread before him on the kitchen table were:
A railway timetable for the Moscow-Almaty line.
A map of Kazakhstan with roads marked in three colors (paved, gravel, dirt).
A list of truck rental companies in Leningrad with prices per day.
Calculations of fuel consumption for a 6,000-kilometer round trip.
A growing list of equipment needed: tarps, ropes, tools, spare tires, extra fuel cans.
The numbers were brutal. Even the most optimistic estimates put the cost of the Kazakhstan operation at over
100,000 rubles—more than he had, more than he could borrow. The medal money was almost gone, spent on the funeral and Ivan's advance payments.
He needed capital. Now.
He opened the address book again, flipping past the military section to the economic and industrial names. Grandfather had trained more than soldiers. He'd trained the sons of factory directors, party officials, economists. Men who had gone into business, or what passed for business in the late Soviet Union.
His finger stopped at a name:
Lebedev, Boris Alexandrovich - Class of 1974
Current: Deputy Director, Foreign Currency Operations, Leningrad Branch, Gosbank (State Bank)
Note: Exceptional with numbers. Married to Elena (dancer, expensive tastes). Gambling debts at cards. Approach carefully.
A banker. With gambling debts. And expensive tastes.
Alexei checked the clock: 8:47 PM. Too late for a business call, but desperation kept his own hours. He dialed the number listed beside the entry—a home number, not an office.
The phone rang six times before a woman's voice answered, sharp with annoyance: "Yes?"
"I need to speak with Boris Alexandrovich."
"He's not available. Call his office tomorrow."
"Tell him it's about General Volkov. And about his debt to the general."
A pause. Muffled voices. Then a man came on the line, his voice cautious: "Who is this?"
"Alexei Dmitrievich Volkov. The general's grandson."
"I heard about your grandfather. My condolences." The words were right, but the tone was wary. "What debt are you referring to?"
"The 1982 incident at the dacha," Alexei said, reading from his grandfather's note, though the note said nothing specific. "The general helped you with a... personal matter."
Silence. Then, softer: "What do you want, Alexei Dmitrievich?"
"To meet. Tomorrow morning. Your office."
"That's not—"
"Nine o'clock. I'll have documents you'll want to see."
"What kind of documents?"
"Documents about the future of banking in Russia. And how you can profit from it."
Another pause, longer. Alexei could almost hear the calculations—the banker's mind weighing risk against curiosity, fear against opportunity.
"Nine-thirty. Back entrance. Ask for Comrade Ivanov's appointment."
The line went dead.
Alexei set the receiver down. One contact made. One fragile connection established. He looked at his lists, his calculations, his maps. The plan was like a house of cards built on a shaking table. One wrong move and it all collapsed.
He needed more than a banker. He needed believers.
January 21, 1991, 9:28 AM
The back entrance of the Gosbank building on Nevsky Prospect was exactly what Alexei expected—a heavy steel door painted bureaucratic green, a small security window with wire-reinforced glass, and a uniformed guard who looked like he hadn't smiled since Brezhnev died.
"Comrade Ivanov's appointment," Alexei said, his school uniform swapped for his one good suit—a dark wool thing he'd worn to his father's funeral, now slightly tight at the shoulders.
The guard looked him up and down, unimpressed. "ID."
Alexei produced his internal passport. The guard examined it, then him, then picked up a phone. A minute later, the door buzzed open.
Inside was a different world from the crumbling city outside. Marble floors polished to a high shine. Brass fittings gleaming. The air warm and smelling of furniture polish and importance. This was where the Soviet Union kept the illusion of stability alive—here, in the temples of finance, where the numbers were still made to add up even when the factories weren't producing.
A clerk escorted him up a wide staircase, down a corridor with portraits of Marx, Lenin, and—incongruously—a bland-faced current bank official, to an office at the end of the hall.
Boris Lebedev was younger than Alexei expected—late thirties, with thinning blond hair and intelligent blue eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses. He stood behind a substantial oak desk, but he wasn't sitting in the chair. He was pacing. When Alexei entered, he stopped and gestured to a visitor's chair.
"Alexei Dmitrievich. Please."
The door closed behind them. The office was quiet, soundproofed against the city outside. Bookshelves lined with financial reports. A framed photograph of a beautiful woman in a ballet pose—the expensive wife.
"You have ten minutes," Lebedev said, not sitting. "My next meeting is at nine-forty-five."
Alexei remained standing as well. "Your gambling debts. How much?"
Lebedev froze. "I don't know what you're—"
"Don't waste my time. My grandfather wrote that you owe forty thousand rubles to a syndicate run by a man named Arkady in the Moskovsky district. The interest is compounding weekly. Your salary as deputy director is four hundred rubles a month. Even if you gave them every kopeck, you'd never pay it off."
The banker's face went pale. "Your grandfather had no right to—"
"My grandfather is dead. His notes are mine. And I'm not here to blackmail you." Alexei leaned forward, placing his hands on the desk. "I'm here to offer you a way out."
Lebedev sank into his chair. "What way?"
"Sit down."
After a moment's hesitation, Lebedev sat. Alexei took the opposite chair.
"The Soviet Union is ending," Alexei said quietly. "You know this better than anyone. You see the foreign currency reserves. You see the debt payments coming due. You see the inflation numbers they don't publish."
"That's treasonous talk," Lebedev whispered, but his eyes said otherwise.
"It's mathematics. And mathematics doesn't care about treason." Alexei opened his briefcase—his father's old leather briefcase—and took out a sheet of paper. "This is a projection of the ruble's value over the next twelve months."
He slid it across the desk. Lebedev glanced at it, then looked again, his eyes widening. The numbers showed a collapse—hyperinflation, devaluation, eventual redenomination.
"Where did you get these figures?"
"I calculated them. Based on money supply growth, budget deficits, and political instability." Alexei leaned forward. "The men who survive what's coming won't be the ideologues. They'll be the ones who understand value. Who control assets. Who have hard currency."
"And you?" Lebedev asked, his voice barely audible. "What are you?"
"I'm sixteen years old with no money and a notebook full of names. But I have a plan. And I need a banker."
"For what?"
"For the first private bank in St. Petersburg. Not a state bank. A real bank. One that lends dollars, not rubles. One that finances trade, not ideology."
Lebedev laughed—a short, sharp sound with no humor. "You're insane. The licenses alone—"
"Can be obtained. Through connections. Through bribes. Through the right applications at the right time to the right people." Alexei tapped the address book in his briefcase. "I have the connections. You have the banking knowledge. Together, we get the license."
"And why would I risk everything? My position, my safety, my—"
"Because in two years, your position won't exist. Gosbank will be broken up. The state banking monopoly will end. And you'll be just another unemployed economist with a gambling debt and a wife who likes ballet tickets." Alexei paused. "Or you can be the co-founder of Volkov Bank. With an equity stake. And a salary in dollars."
Lebedev stared at him. "You don't have any dollars."
"Not yet. But I will." Alexei took out another sheet—the Kazakhstan operation plan, stripped of specifics but showing revenue projections. "I have a business starting next month. It will generate hard currency. Not much at first. But enough to capitalize a small bank. Enough to make loans. Enough to start."
The banker studied the projections. His fingers, Alexei noticed, were trembling slightly. "What do you need from me now?"
"Three things. First, information on private banking license applications—what forms, which offices, who to bribe."
"Easy enough."
"Second, introductions to people in the import-export business. People who need dollars and have goods to sell."
Lebedev nodded slowly. "Also possible."
"Third." Alexei leaned forward. "A short-term loan. One hundred thousand rubles. Thirty days."
Lebedev's head snapped up. "Impossible! That's—"
"Possible if you authorize it as a commercial development loan. To a new transport company. With collateral."
"What collateral?"
"The company's future receivables. And my grandfather's name."
"That's not collateral! That's—"
"That's what banking is going to become, Boris Alexandrovich. Lending based on relationships, not collateral. On potential, not past performance." Alexei held his gaze. "You're either a banker of the past or a banker of the future. Which is it?"
The room was silent. Through the window, Alexei could see snow beginning to fall on Nevsky Prospect. People hurried past, heads down against the cold, unaware that the world beneath their feet was shifting.
"I can get you fifty thousand," Lebedev said finally. "Not from Gosbank. From... other sources. Personal loan. Twenty percent interest. Thirty days."
"Fifteen percent."
"Eighteen."
"Seventeen. And you handle the license paperwork as your equity contribution."
Lebedev studied him for a long moment. "You're not sixteen."
"Today I am. Tomorrow I'll be older."
A ghost of a smile touched the banker's lips. "Seventeen percent. And I want five percent of the bank. When it exists."
"Three."
"Four."
"Three and a half, vested over three years."
Lebedev extended his hand. "You drive a hard bargain, Alexei Dmitrievich."
Alexei shook it. The hand was cool, dry, precise. A banker's hand. "We both do."
As he stood to leave, Lebedev asked, "What's the transport company called?"
Alexei paused at the door. "Neva Transport. We move things from where they are to where they need to be."
He left the office, walked back down the marble corridor, past the portraits of dead philosophers and living bureaucrats. The guard buzzed him out into the cold.
The snow was falling harder now, blanketing the city in white. Alexei stood on the steps, breathing in the frozen air. Fifty thousand rubles. Not enough, but a start. A banker on his team. A fragile alliance built on mutual desperation.
He looked at his watch. Ivan would be gathering more veterans today. Vasiliev would be cleaning up, if he hadn't drunk the money first. Markov was waiting in Kazakhstan. The clock was ticking.
He descended the steps and turned toward the Petrogradsky district, toward the warehouse he'd rented with the last of the medal money. The headquarters of an empire that didn't exist yet.
As he walked, he calculated. Fifty thousand rubles would buy three trucks. Fuel for the trip to Kazakhstan. Food for the men. Bribes for the border guards. Maybe leave ten thousand for the copper purchase itself, though he'd have to negotiate credit with Markov.
It was thin. Dangerously thin. One breakdown, one bribe demand too high, one double-cross, and it all collapsed.
But it was a start.
He remembered his corporate training from another life—the first rule of entrepreneurship: Start before you're ready.
Well, he wasn't ready. Not even close.
But he was starting anyway.
The snow fell. The city went about its business. And a sixteen-year-old orphan with a notebook and a plan walked toward a warehouse, building the future one fragile connection at a time.