Beyond the Breaking Point - Chapter 5

Chapter 5.

Finn was looking out the window again. He wasn't watching trees this time, though. He was watching the clouds; picking out patterns and similarities between them.  

Finn was sitting on the third-to-last seat on the (empty) private jet and was eating from a bag of peanuts that he had found on his seat when he sat down, almost nine hours ago.

Finn had also noticed that each of the other seats had tiny little bags of peanuts as well. That is why, when Finn was finished eating his current bag, he threw the plastic onto a constantly growing pile of about twenty-five bags on the empty seat next to him. He always ate a lot during flights. Finn guessed it was a little like stress eating. Finn mused at the thought: being afraid of planes but not heights. The doctor had said that his fear of planes had to do with the lack of control he had. When he was mountain climbing, or scaling some building, he was in complete control. In a plane, there was very little he could do, should something go wrong. Finn began looking out the window again.  

Cassie had changed. Finn didn't really know how, or why, but she had changed dramatically. Finn hoped for the better. Hopefully, she wouldn't end up like him, fiery, spontaneous, thick-headed, lonely…  

“This is your captain speaking, the plane will land in roughly two minutes,”  

***

The plane actually landed in five minutes and forty seconds. Finn was counting. Another thirty seconds after it landed, Finn was standing on the pavement of another privately owned air landing strip. A man was standing with his hands behind his back about twenty feet away. Finn decided that he was the man he was supposed to see and Finn began calmly walking towards him. Finn had crossed half the distance to the man in question when he could make out his features. He was smiling an absurdly large smile. Showing a row of perfect, white, teeth.  

“Borus! My son! How are you feeling? Was the flight too much?” All this was spoken in Russian. Finn fluently spoke russian, thankfully. Zach had taught him.  

Finn looked a little perplexed as he crossed the final few feet between the man and him and offered a hand to the jolly man, which is exactly what the definition of jolly would be; cheeks that were almost constantly red, mostly bald forehead, clean-shaven chin and eyes that danced and laughed along with the man.

“Hello… Father?” Finn remembered what Finch had said about impersonating a boy named Borus.  

The Russian, impossibly, smiled even wider and ushered his son into a limo that pulled up right as he mentioned it.  

***

Finn loved limos. He didn't know why, but he did. That’s what he thought as he looked at the red velvet that covered the ceiling and floors. He was sitting on a seat that was right across from the jolly Russian, who deemed the situation: smile worthy. Finn wondered if the man smiled in his sleep.

“Is your real name Finn?” This came from the Russian.

“Yeah, what's yours?” Then Finn saw the flaw in his statement, “I mean, errr, you don't have a fake name do you?” Finn started to blush, it had been awhile since he screwed up a sentence that bad. The Russian’s seat, going sideways, was perpendicular to Finn’s and when the Russian (Finn still didn't know his name) leaned forwards, Finn thought he could have touched the man’s bald forehead.  

“My name is Andrei Sokoloff,” The man nodded solemnly as if affirming what he said. Finn looked the man in the eyes.

“Why did you call me Borus?” Finn immediately remembered that he had already knew the answer to that question. He was impersonating someone, although, now that he thought about it, he didn't really know who that someone was.

“The person you are supposed to impersonate.” Andrei smile became a sad one. “My late son… his name was Borus… he was killed during a bank heist…” Finn’s mind reeled. He had just seen someone in a bank heist, he remembered this because the boy had looked exactly like him. This couldn't just be a coincidence could it? Finn interrupted Andrei.

“This is going to sound crazy.” Finn warned, “but, did he look like me?”  

“He was almost an exact replica of you! You even sound the same!” Finn was beginning to understand Finch’s Blackmail. Finn took a deep breath, calming himself. He didn't like harping over things that had already happened. Finch had tricked him, this whole thing was a big, tragic coincidence/misunderstanding. And it seemed there was nothing Finn could do about it.

“Can you tell me why I’m here, in Russia?” The man frowned, his eyebrows nearly disappearing in his eyes and his normally smiling face now did the exact opposite.  

“The CIA didn't tell you anything did they?” Finn shook his head. The whole thing was so sudden. Finn mused to himself. Secret spy missions? He was still trying to get his mind around Zach dying.  

“Not really,” The man scoffed.  

“I never liked the CIA… They are just so…” The man searched for the right word. “Mechanical! YES, that’s what they are,” The man’s smile was back. “So, from what I know, ‘Vandal’ sent a threat to the CIA, and now you are here to get information on his whereabouts from me!” Maybe this would be easy, straight in, straight out. Finn had a flicker of hope.  

“So… Where’s Vandal,” Finn remembered playing “Where’s Waldo?” as a kid, maybe it would be as easy as that.  

“It’s much more complicated than that,” Finn felt the tiny flicker of a flame go out and began to look out the window again.  

***

The first thing Finn noticed as the limo pulled into Andrei’s extravagant driveway was the house itself. It looked like the White House. Andrei, reading Finn’s mind, gave an explanation.

“When I went to DC, I fell in love with the exterior of the White House. So I had a smaller version built right here in Tuva,”  

“What’s that?” Finn noticed the lack of pain in his leg; his wounds from the incident with the burglars seemed to be fading.  

“Tuva? Tuva is a Russian province… a little like what you have in America... States,” Andrei unbuckled his seatbelt and waited for the driver to get out and open the door for him. Finn also unbuckled and followed Andrei out of the limo. Andrei then led the way up the driveway while the driver drove the limo away.

Andrei opened an enormous set of glass doors and held them open for Finn to pass through. Finn stepped through and immediately caught his breath. The inside was magnificent, ceilings that must be twenty feet high stretched up, bearing flags and trinkets from all sorts of different nations. Finn took a step further into the manor and stopped counting the magnificent things he saw. Finn probably inherited as much money as Andrei owned but he had never used any of it. Finn got the impression that this was the kind of man that would spend millions on a daily basis and not flinch.

“You like?” Andrei was beaming.  

“It’s not like anything I’ve ever seen before,”  

“Rei! Borus is back!” Finn wondered who Rei was but tried to keep confusion from showing on his features. “Your girlfriend has been waiting a long time for you to come home from… wherever you disappeared to,” Finn silently thanked Andrei for clearing that part up as a girl walked into the room and greeted Andrei in Russian. The girl that began giving Andrei a girlish hug was stunning. Bright blue eyes, dark brown hair and a body that would have made a model look pale in comparison. The girl was wearing a short gray and white dress and had her phone in her hand as she finished hugging Andrei and walked over to Finn.  

“Borus… I’ve missed you so much,” Finn thought the girl had a slight tear in her breathtakingly blue eyes as she gave Finn a hug similar to the one she gave Andrei. Finn just stood there limply; obviously dumbfounded. “How was your trip?” Finn opened his mouth to reply. No words came out. “I’m so glad your back... we're going hunting today, will you join us?” Finn never liked hunting, killing things never came easily to him. But again, he couldn't respond, not with Rei looking intently into his face like she was now. “What was I thinking, of course you’ll come! You love hunting!” Finn stopped trying to talk. He knew he wouldn't be able to. Tatina left Finn’s personal space and began walking towards a hole in a perfectly white wall. “I’m going to go get dressed…” Rei stopped, she turned around, the edges of her lips turning upwards, creating a smile that filled Finn with a wonderful feeling. “Welcome home Borus,”