While Alfred was totally drunken at Wilden`s New Year`s Eve party, Frank stayed at home - alone. Today he was not in celebratory mood at all. Any hope, concerning the political struggle and also his private life, seemed to be lost. It was a disaster. And this dark winter was particularly harsh. Not only in Frank`s soul, but even in reality. A brutal cold wave had swept over Russia and the surrounding lands. The Baltic countries were buried under a thick layer of snow, since the end of February 2034.
In this terrible time, thousands of homeless people and beggars froze or starved to death in the cities of Eastern Europe. And the number of those, who could not afford a roof over their heads and had no more chance to find a job, was still growing. It was similar in large parts of Europe, but the situation in Eastern Europe was worst. A black cloud of discontent came over the land, as it had never been before.
In addition, the new year had started with a massive tax hike, in order to briefly fill up the ever-empty coffers of the sub-prefecture “Baltic-Belarus”. However, a large part of the funds was spent to pay debts and was issued just as quick as it had been taken, while the “Global Bank Trust”, the international fiscal authority, increased the pressure on the sector without mercy.
Slowly, Belarus and the Baltic states became a large fertile soil for unrest, but Artur Tschistokjow seemed to have vanished. He was still somewhere in the background and shunned the public for obvious reasons. Instead, he wrote a book called “The Way of the Rus” in which he described his political goals. Furthermore, it was also some kind of biography. In this months, the young politician wrote down his thoughts like one possessed, and soon his book had more than 1200 pages.
And Artur Tschistokjow was willing to come back. The wave of persecution and the brutal destruction of his organization, had only temporarily demoralized him, but then his visions of a free Russia and his fanatical will had returned again, leaving him no longer time to rest.
Meanwhile, his parents and his older brother had been murdered during the last great execution campaign of the GSA after a long time in prison. One of his comrades had told him about the fate of his family. It had happened at the beginning of the year.
Apparently, the autorithies had allowed his relatives some kind of last respite before they had finally killed them, because they had hoped that Tschistokjow would leave his hiding place to search for them. But he had not been that stupid and after a while, his parents and his brother had not been useful anymore – in the eyes of the GSA.
Artur Tschistokjow`s hate had grown to the extreme during these winter months, and he had increasingly become aware that his life would only make sense, if he would fulfill his political mission. Finally, he built up a rock-solid, fanatic resoluteness to fight now with all the consequences. Victory or death – this was Tschistokjow`s new credo.
Frank, Alfred, Wilden and Sven were already waiting in HOK`s study since half an hour, eagerly longing for the ringing of the phone. This morning, Artur Tschistokjow had contacted the computer scientist on a well encrypted line and had asked for Wilden. HOK had explained that he needed to get the village boss first, and the rebel leader had promised that he would call them at 13.00 o`clock again.
“It`s end of February! Where has this guy been all the time?”, asked Frank the others.
“Don`t ask me such things. But hiding has been the only chance for him. We should be glad that the authorities haven`t found a trace so far which leads them to Ivas”, said the village boss and stared at the phone.
Now it was 13.20 o`clock, the display lit up brightly and a ringing ended the expectant silence.
”Hello?”, Wilden took the call with the hidden ID.
“Thorsten, it`s me!”
”Ha, ha! You`re alive! Where have you been all the time?”
”I was hiding. I will come to Ivas. Tomorrow!”
“Great! We all look forward to see you. When will you come?”
”About 15.00 o`clock – if it`s okay...”
“Sure! See you tomorrow!”
The elderly man hung up and happily looked at the others, while Frank let out a cry of joy.
“Thank God, he is still alive!”, said Kohlhaas with ease and sat down again.
“If they would have caught him, we would already know it from TV. What do you think?”, returned Alf.
“That`s certainly true! Damn, I`m just happy!”, said Frank who rose his fist like an Olympian.
Artur Tschistokjow bowed politely and winked at Mrs. Wilden who had opened the door. Then he came up the stairs and entered the study of the village boss, where a dozen men welcomed him joyfully.
“I`m among the living. Back from exile!”, joked the Russian.
“Where have you been?”, asked Frank.
“Near Khoyniki, in southern Belarus. There, the police do not believe that I am. They were searching for me mostly in the north of Belarus!”
“Ha, ha! Peter has organized it again, right?”, said Wilden and contentedly leaned back in his chair.
“Yes, he and other friends!”
And now? Will you continue your struggle against the system?”, asked Sven.
Tschistokjow paused for some seconds, staring at the men in front of him with a severe look. Then he answered: “Yes, of course! Now harder than ever! Do you understand?”
Artur opened his briefcase and took out a huge stack of papers. He gave them to Wilden.
“What`s that?”
”That is manuscript of my book, which I have written in the last months. It is called in German “The Way of the Rus”, my political manifesto. You can read it, if you want. One day I`ll let it make...”
“Print!”, added Frank, winking at Tschistokjow.
“Yes, I will let print the book!”
“Seems to be very interesting”, murmured Wilden. “Let`s see if my Russian is really that good.”
“The crisis of economy is growing in Belarus. It is getting worse”, said Tschistokjow.
“Yes, there is probably more potential for us than one year ago”, remarked the village boss.
“Right! Even more poor people, more problems in all the land!”
”But your organization has been destroyed, hasn`t it?”, asked a young man in the background.
“It is not broke, many structures are still there, my friends. I will now fight to win. No longer will I hide!”, grumbled Tschistokjow full of bitterness.
“They have said on TV that you have committed suicide, some weeks ago. The report about your death has also been on the English-speaking channels”, said Sven.
“Oh, I haven`t noticed this...”, marveled Alf.
“But it is true. I have seen it!”, returned Frank too.
”No, I`m still alive. Suicide? Pah! They lie! They are still lying on television! They have killed my parents and my brother in January. I know it from one of my friends”, hissed the blond man and bared his teeth.
Frank inwardly winced, when Tschistokjow told this. He knew too well, how he had to feel now. The same cruel calamity had come over him, a few years ago.
“They have arrested my parents and my brother to get me out of hiding. Do you understand, what I mean?”, continued Tschistokjow.
”Yes! I know what you mean!”, whispered Frank, feeling the burning hatred inside his mind. “They have done the same to me! Those fucking rats!”
“This is our “disaster”...in English”, said Artur with a cynical smile.
“Fate! This is our fate”, answered Frank and nodded approvingly.
”They will pay! If we ever have the power in Belarus, those bastards will pay! I will spill their blood! I swear it!”, muttered the Russian with staring eyes.
Meanwhile, the situation had calmed down a bit. At least, concerning the immense pressure that the authorities and the GSA had put on the supporters of the Freedom Movement of the Rus in the last six months.
Apparently, Medschenko and his staff thought that the organization had completely been destroyed, after they had detained or shot thousands of suspect
s in the whole country. But they had not caught the head of the movement, and that had become an even more radical and resolute fanatic and revolutionary than before. Now, Artur Tschistokjow was ready for anything and was not afraid of the thought to be led to the scaffold one day. He knew, deep inside, that a man like him had to make his peace with God early enough, before he started to walk the path of resistance against an almighty enemy.
In the first week of March, Artur and Peter made their way to Minsk. In a suburb in the west of the city, they had rounded up about hundred members of the organization. It was Tschistokjow`s first attempt since months, to gather the disoriented men under the banner of the dragon head again.
Many had been beside themselves with joy, when they heard that the rebel leader was active again, and would visit them in Minsk. Finally, they met in an empty sports hall in the outskirts of the city.
About a dozen men had rifles. They stared through a dirty window at the rain-wet parking lot in front of the building. If the police would dare to show up today, then some people would die. Tschistokjow had already said this to his men, because the new way should be the violent one.
The politician briefly talked with some of the group leaders from the largest city of the sub-sector “Belarus-Baltic”, then Michael Tcherezow, one of the section commanders, went to the speaker`s desk at the and of the hall. After he had welcomed the activists, it was Tschistokjow`s turn. The blond man paused of some minutes, and stared at his followers with a black look, feeling how a fanatical will began to grip his heart. Finally he started his speech and his pervasive voice slowly became louder.
“My comrades! My friends!
When we started with our struggle, a few years ago, we were nothing but a tiny band of barely 300 men across the whole country, despaired of the present and driven by sorrows, frustration and distress. We came from all parts of society with one common aim: We wanted to safe the future of our nation, and make it free and independent!
Now we are almost destroyed. We have almost been wiped out from history - they have just made us anonymous. The system has fought us with all its weapons, arrested and murdered our men, inundated us with lies and propaganda. They have tried a lot to destroy us – and obviously our name and our symbol have already been enough, that the system had to use such desperate measures.
In our helplessness, we stand up again now. We defend, what is perhaps already fallen, and then we go from the defense to a new impetuous attack!
Give us back our freedom! Give us back our country! We will not rest until the world system is dead or we are!
We have nothing to regret and we will not give up! We will continue our fight! Even with more fanaticism and selflessness as our enemies can imagine!
Their terror just makes us hard. And one day, we will not forgive! We won`t give them mercy, as they have never given mercy to us - to us, our entire nation and also the rest of the world! It will be a brutal fight till death, and we are ready to carry this burden till the end! The time for compromises is over!
I have spoken with many of our comrades in the last days. Some had been imprisoned, others had been tortured, in order to disclose more informations about me.
However, some of our brothers had not even had the pleasure to be detained at all, they had been killed immediately. We will see them again, one day in heaven, and then we can hopefully tell them: “We have finally won this endless fight, down on earth. Now, our children grow up as free men and women, in a country that belongs to them!
Who is not ready to join this fight to the last bullet, shall go now, and may never come back! Who loves his own life more than the life of our nation, shall disappear forever!
All the others may come with me, follow me. Even if I have to lead you through hell. But I know, that at the end of this terrible way, a new day is waiting for us!
We will not surrender! We will not give up! They have to kill all of us to silence us again! And we will kill them all too, if the balance of power will change one day! There are no more compromises to make, my brothers! All that remains, is one single way: Victory or death!”
Thunderous applause followed. These were exactly the words, Tschistokjow`s men wanted to hear. At least, most of them. A few of his comrades, however, were disturbed, because Tschistokjow radiated an uncanny resoluteness and a fanatical willpower on this day. His words seemed to sound pathetic and exaggerated, at first sight, but he meant them deadly serious.
The leader of the Rus spent the rest of the month with a tireless journey through all major cities of the country, where he summoned his followers, hammering the principles of the new phase of his struggle into their heads.
Many of his former comrades had left the organization, but those who had remained loyal to him, were sworn to the new, hard way with almost insane stubbornness. Now Tschistokjow wanted to take the gloves off, and make his organization to a mass movement. Meanwhile, the economic situation had dramatically deteriorated and now it was time to harvest. However, this harvest should become bloody.
In Ivas, life went on as always. Artur`s visit had built up the morale of the villagers and Wilden stayed in close contact with the Russians. The group of young men under the leadership of Sven, which had supported the Freedom Movement of the Rus in the last months, became once more active and soon all were enthusiastic again. In the rainy April, they started a new publicity campaign for the Rus with feverish eagerness in Lithuania and Belarus. Sven`s group left Ivas for weeks, to help the Russian comardes in several cities.
But Frank and Alfred observed Tschistokjow`s return to the political stage still from the distance, and only visited some smaller meetings of his organization.
At the end of April, Artur Tschistokjow led a rally through the streets of Brest. About 1000 of his followers came and marched through downtown for an hour. There were heavy clashes with the police and two dozen people were killed.
One week later, the men of the freedom movement appeared with about 300 men in Pinsk, in front of a factory, in order to encourage the workers to start a strike. Two spontaneous protest marches followed in Slutsk and Begoml.
The media reported nationwide about the re-appearance of Tschistokjow and the authorities stroke back with arrests, interrogations and even executions. This meant that Artur finally ordered his followers to use violence as well now. In return, two newspaper editors, who had been loyal to the regime, were shot by masked men on open street in Minsk.
Furthermore, a judge who had sentenced several Rus to death, was killed by an unknown hitman a few days later. All in all, many desperate Belarusians were impressed by the courage and resoluteness of Tschistokjow, and the ranks of his movement slowly filled up again. His decision to accept the challenge, to fight a brutal and completely overpowering system, even caused some admiration among a part of the Belarusian policemen. When his men eventually managed to march through three towns simultaneously, the media gave the Rus more attention than ever before. In reverse, the rebel leader publicly shouted out his claims and attacked the Medschenko government with hard words. And this was more than uncomfortable for the regime.
Now, tens of thousands of people got to hear unpleasant truths, the media had always kept under wraps. Medschenko and his politcal staff were openly exposed and their crimes became public. The most Belarusians who heard Tschistokjow`s speeches started to think and in some parts of the country, the television propaganda had more and more problems to convince people of the “evil character of the freedom movement”.
Apart from that, the Belarusian industry collapsed in spring 2034, in an dimension, nobody had expected before. Tens of thousands of Belarusian workers lost their jobs, whole factory complexes were closed and outsourced to other countries. In return, the food prices and fees continued to increase. A dark cloud of wrath was subliminally pulsing in the minds of many people, and there was no hope that the social situation would become better in the next years.
Moreover, a growing number of Belarusians had a violent
aversion to the non-European foreigners, the Medschenko government had brought into their country. So the tensions between the native Russians and the immigrants increased, especially in the bigger cities. Criminal gangs from the non-Russian parts of the old Soviet Union, Anatolia or even Africa were still flooding the country and became a talking point, because of robbery, murder, drug trafficking and other crimes. Some neighborhoods in the larger cities of Belarus had meanwhile become dangerous ghettos full of poverty, crime and violence. The explosive mood in the country heated up, inching its way towards a big explosion.
“We`re going to demonstrate in every bigger city in the country now”, said Tschistokjow and took a sip of tea.
Today they had met in Frank`s house. Wilden was also there and had brought a map of Belarus. Warm sun rays came through the kitchen window and lit up the old, still dilapidated room in a pleasant light.
“And you want to hold a rally here?”, asked Frank, pointing his finger at Verkhnedvinsk, a small town near the Lithuanian border.
”Yes, I start in the north of Belarus and then go to the south, till the border of Ukraine”, explained the leader of the freedom movement confidently.
“But then, the authorities will always know, where you will appear next...”, said Bäumer, still puzzled.
“What`s about Minsk?”, questioned Frank.
“They shall know it, no more hiding. In the small towns are only a few policemen and we will be more and more people. Then there will be a confrontation! So what?”, remarked Artur grimly.
“And Minsk?”, returned Kohlhaas.
“In Minsk, we will not demonstrate. It`s too dangerous! Not even in the other very large cities, such as Vitebsk, Gomel and so on...”
Artur furthermore explained some details of his plan. He wanted to callenge the power of the system at first in the rural regions of Belarus. Wilden liked the idea and praised the resoluteness of the young politician. Nevertheless, Frank and Alfred were still not completely convinced of Artur`s ideas.
On 05.03.2034, the Rus started with a first protest march in Verkhnedvinsk, a sleepy little town with barely 15000 inhabitants in the north of Belarus. About 2000 men could be rounded up by Tschistokjow, who delivered a speech which lasted over two hours.
The response of the population was enormous and the politician was welcomed by many people as a liberator, while the small number of policemen abstained from attacking the protesters and just filmed the rally from the distance. This was an initial success.
One week later, the Rus marched through the streets of Disna. Sven and the other young people from Ivas had distributed thousands of leaflets around the town and had earned a lof of sympathies from the farmer`s families who were fighting for their livelihood here. Finally a rally with over 800 people followed. Frank and Alfred were also there this time. Again, everything went smoothly, because the few cops avoided another confrontation with the Rus.
Two weeks later, there were demonstrations in Kobylnik and Dokshitsky in the northwest of the country. The rallies took place simultaneously and one of them was led by Tschistokjow himself, while the other had been organized by Michael Tcherezov from Minsk.
A total of about 3000 people had come to both events. In Kobylink, it finally came to a first clash with two squadrons of the regional police. An officer and three demonstrators were shot, dozens of protesters and policemen were wounded. Furthermore, some Rus were arrested this time.
At the beginning of June, Artur Tschistokjow made a last demonstration in Lepel, a rundown town in the south of Vitebsk. Frank and Alfred accompanied the march of about 1000 men and women as armed guardsmen. It all went quiet and the Rus earned much sympathy from the inhabitants of the city.
After that final event for this month, the leader of the freedom movement disappeared for some weeks and continued to work on the inner structure of his organization.
Occasionally, he came to Ivas and discussed various things with Wilden. Meanwhile, the restless Russian dissident had found a new, secret printing office for his newspaper and published the paper, with Wilden`s financial assistance, in an increasing circulation.
Apart from that, his movement had recovered during the last months and was growing again. All new members were now definitely obliged to appear at meetings and rallies with gray shirts and black trousers - to demonstrate the unity of the Rus. Finally, Tschistokjow even published his book “The Way of the Rus” which he had written during the winter months.
He sold it not only to his followers who were eager to read it, but also sent it anonymously, in printed form or as electronic file, to thousands of senior officials, police chiefs and high rank administrators to give them a closer look on his worldview.
The media immediately reacted on the campaign and warned the people about Tschistokjow`s “delusions” and his “poor piece of workmanship, full of hatespeech and deceitful propaganda”.
Nevertheless, he had some success. During the next rally in the small border town of Surazh, some of the few police officers, who observed the march of over 4000 demonstrators, were unusually friendly and behaved conspicuously courteous. Even Frank and Alfred were impressed by the bold appearance of their Russian comrades and flanked the crowd this time again as armed guardsmen. One day, as they hoped, also a part of the underpaid and frustrated Belarusian policemen would join their movement. This would really be a great thing.
Special Forces Frank