(OOC: Post cleared with Braet)
A switch had flipped. That’s what he kept thinking. It was strange, despite his the circumstances surrounding him, he was surprisingly cool about the entire affair. Maybe the police officer was right, maybe he was mad. That would certainly justify the paranoia that was running through his brain right now. The paranoia throughout his entire life. He’d been honourably discharged from the military… on a medical basis. One interview with a therapist; that was all it had taken and all because he’d had post-mission jitters and had pulled a gun on someone. Two hours later and he had a report, labelling him with PTSD and severe paranoia. They didn’t know, none of them. They’d ignored him throughout his entire life. It’d started with his mother, he wouldn’t stop talking about the key, ranting about the key, he’d nicknamed it his “lucky key”. A sick and twisted joke on the fact that it haunted him. He always felt it there, in his combat jacket, his jeans as he lay in bed at night and now, during civilian life, its permanent presence never failed to leave him. He'd couldn't lose it. He'd tried to throw it away, he had. "Attachment issues." Is that what they call your hand seizing up as it's holding it over the bin? Even then, when it slips out your grasp and you scrabble desperately to find it in the trash and the rubbish because you can't bear the thought of losing it and your mum pulls it from her pocket a few days later and says she found it lying next to the rubbish bin? That hadn’t mattered to get into the military, he’d lied and forged his medical records, a task that hadn’t been easy but that had been made easier by some friends his mother had certainly disapproved of him associating with he’d entered the military and, for a while, it had been better. He could live with the key, the paranoia, he fuelled it into an inordinate anger at the enemy, an anger that drove him to be better, stronger, faster with quicker reactions and precision marksmanship. The key though, it wasn't normal... and it loved to remind him. It had followed him on a flight home from Iraq, sitting in the bullet wound of a hostage they had extracted. Paperwork didn’t care; a key could not disappear and then magically turn up. Luck existed. That was that. This wasn't luck though. But magic didn't exist, only insanity and the paranoid delusions of a spec ops officer who had been pushed to the brink serving on the front line of duty.
As Cynthia stepped out he observed her silently. The other officer was still unconscious and so as the first officer spoke to him he came to a decision. He had gone down the path of no return a long time past. Should he relinquish his weapon now… he was captured or, worse, dead. Muttering an apology under his breath in Russian he slammed the ammo chamber of the handgun (and his fist) into the head of the first officer, rendering him unconscious. Standing up, he nodded at Cynthia. “You’ve got nowhere else to go, so I assume you’re likely coming with me. Whatever mobile you called me on, leave it, there’s no way to know they can’t track it. The gun returned to its holster in his jacket and he briefly considered tying up both the policemen before deciding against it. “I’m going to trust you… because I think I know you and because what you said… sounds like the truth. The events of today may well have rendered me mad but it’s too late to turn back on that now.” He spoke to Cynthia, his tone authoritative as his military side took over, taking control of the situation as if he were barking instructions. “Now then, you won’t be needing that.” Boris reached over and snapped the bracelet in two on her wrist before throwing it away. “That should hopefully ensure we draw less attention. Now, wrap your arm around my waist and let’s go.” Waiting for the girl to do as instructed, he would return to his bike which was still intact and still where he had left it. Upon doing so he would get on it and tap the space behind him, indicating for Cynthia to get on. When she had done so, he would remove the chains that he had placed upon the motorbike and return them to their box in a practiced series of motions that took less than half a minute before backing the motorbike out of the space and turning the engine on, before driving out of the aging motel.
Boris did not return, however, to his apartment. It was compromised now, that much was certain. Instead, he decided to head out to one of his safe houses. The place was a one bedroom flat in the ‘ghetto’ of the city. Situated in a tower of concrete apartments it had cost next to nothing to purchase under a false identity and the local criminal syndicate ensured that the CCTV was never in a fit state. As Boris pulled up on his bike before the row of flats, he parked his bike in a hiding place he had discovered on his second visit in a small dug out section under a hedge where it would not be found by anyone who did not know that they were looking for. Leading Cynthia up several flights of stairs he selected a key from his key ring and opened the door.
There was no alarm fitted to the apartment but that had never particularly concerned him. He motioned to the bedroom, a small squalid thing that went led off from the sitting room/kitchen they were currently in; the apartment was sparse besides a sofa that had seen better days, a kitchen unit consisting of a stove and an oven and a well-stocked fridge. The bedroom was in a similar space with a bed and an en-suite bathroom which had a toilet, a shower, a sink and a cupboard that was stocked to the brim with medical supplies. Whatever this place was, it was apparently built to last the apocalypse or something. “You can take the bedroom; there should be some clothes in the wardrobe that are your size. I’d also recommend you get washed up and maybe get some rest. We’ll hole up here and, when the drugs clear out of your system, we can have a proper talk about what you know because I get the feeling that this spiral only goes deeper.” With that, Boris moved over and found a radio in one of the cupboards, plugging it into a wall socket he turned it on and tuned it to the local radio station. The news segment should be on in the next couple of minutes if he remembered the timings right, that would give him a good idea as to whether he’d become a big event or not. It was now simply a case of information gathering and trying to figure out where the next enemy was coming from. As far as he was concerned, he was deep in enemy territory and the situation could only get worse from here on out.
