I've been in Moscow before. But back then, in 1991, I had arrived in the – then Soviet Union – to commit a crime. The crime was to distribute Bibles. I was religious back then.

Now, according to the Soviet Constitution the Soviet Union had freedom of religion but it also had the freedom to be an atheist. To protect the rights of the atheists certain laws existed, among them a ban on the sale and/or distribution of Bibles. Of course, where there are laws, there are lawbreakers and for decades individuals and small groups had copied Bibles by hand or on old manual typewriters, squeezing a sheet and one or two carbon copies in at once, to pass on to trusted friends.

But in 1991 change was in the air, even in the Soviet Union - Stagnation Land, as its own citizens called it. The Cold War was over, the Premier of the Supreme Soviet; Mikhail Gorbachov had declared America to be a friend.

So, in light of the new openness, they called it “Glasnost” in Russian, the International Bible Federation decided to try to deliver printed Bibles to the new, or at least we thought and hoped and prayed that it was a new, Soviet Union. But old laws die hard and as I was to find out, old habits even harder.

I had been given a list of people to memorize, who through various ways, we knew had been interested in acquiring the Holy Book over the years. I was to contact each of them and ask them if they were still interested and then also, if they knew others who wanted the Book and would they be willing to receive multiple copies and pass them on. For the safety of everyone concerned, the rule that was most impressed upon me was that these people were not to be put in touch with each other directly however. We, that is: I, would be the central clearinghouse, I with the American passport to protect me. Of course, only a short time earlier, an American passport would not have been much protection, in fact quite the opposite. But that was before the Soviet Premier actively declared that he wanted to have good relations with the United States.

My main contact was a man named Oleg, who lived in the Moscow suburb of Vorobyovy Gori, the Sparrow Hills. A professor of Geography at the Moscow State University, he and his wife Laura did everything to be helpful including feeding me lunches and dinners, which was not unimportant in a place where one had to stand in line for two hours to buy a loaf of bread and another two hours for maybe a piece of meat. If it hadn't been for them, I couldn't have survived here for a week, much less gotten anything done. Coming straight from the United States I found the inefficiencies incredible, particularly the “three line system”; all products were behind counters and first there was one line to pick the product at which point the clerk gave you what I guess could be called a bill, the second line was at the cash register, centralized for the whole store, and then, with the bill and the cash register receipt in hand, one stood in the third line to pick up the product. Oleg and Laura also had a daughter: Aleksandra, whom I met once for ten seconds as she swept through. Oleg introduced us and she gave me an impish smile as she said hello and then disappeared trailing a mane of waist length brown hair. He apologized but explained that she was nineteen and a first year student at the University and as he said, “they are always going somewhere”.

I also arranged to meet other people, which was not so simple for me. Oleg offered to help and no doubt his help would have made things a lot faster and easier, but I remembered the safety rule that had been impressed upon me and I think Oleg understood too. And each day I made a trip to the University library.

The moment of reckoning came on the sixth day. Two Volga cars, which were considered luxury vehicles in the USSR, though they reminded me of the cars in 1950s movies, suddenly pulled up, one in front of me and the other behind. First one man jumped out of the lead car and blocked my way.

“Please come with us,” he abruptly ordered in English.

“Who are you?” I quite logically responded.

“Inspector Fadeyev of the Moscow police,” he replied.

“Can I call my Embassy?” I replied. I didn't really think that would stop him but at this point anything was worth a try.

“Of course, you can use my telephone,” he responded, “at my office”.

I could feel someone coming up behind me too.

“Perhaps I could just use a zheton-phone” I replied; a zheton is what they call a token and that is how the Soviet payphones operated.

“I am afraid not”, Inspector Fadeyev answered, “please get in my car”. His tone was not that used for either a request or a question.

I glanced behind me; there were two burly men in suits standing there.

“Do I have a choice?” I said.

“No” he replied.

I got in the back seat as directed. The Inspector sat on one side of me and one of the burly men on the other.

“Am I being arrested?” I now asked.

“No, I just want to talk to you” Inspector Fadeyev responded.

Well, that was at least somewhat hopeful, I thought.

“What do you want to talk to me about?” I continued, “Perhaps we could discuss it here in the car”.

“No”, Inspector Fadeyev replied.

That stopped the conversation cold, I couldn't think of what to say next and Inspector Fadeyev also said nothing more. The man on the other side of me never spoke at all, but then I suspect he didn't know any English.

The car was waved into a cavernous garage of a large and imposing building, but then all of Moscow's official buildings were large and imposing. The Inspector motioned me out of the car, making me wonder if he had suddenly lost his power of speech or at least, his English. We walked up to what I presumed would be his office without a word. The other car had followed us all the way and now the two goons who had been in that one brought up the rear. I couldn't help but think, why bother. I was inside what was a completely strange building to me, no doubt a police station or, the thought made me shudder, even a prison. Where would I have run, I didn't even know where the doors were. Finally, we stopped at a door. Inspector Fadeyev ushered me in and in a moment I realized my worst fears had come true. There was no telephone, not even a typewriter or a desk. The room was empty except for a table with some chairs behind it and a single chair in front: no doubt for me.

“Please sit down”, Inspector Fadeyev now said and motioned to, I had guessed it, the single chair in front of the table.

I sat down.

“I would now like to call the embassy as you promised,” I firmly declared.

“All in good time” he responded, “but first let’s talk.”

“No, first I will call the embassy,” I stated even more firmly. I was glad I could still manage a firm voice, because inside, actually I was shaking.

“Very well, then I will talk first and I suggest you listen carefully,” the Inspector now lectured me. “First of all, please do not waste time telling me stupid stories that you are a tourist who simply got lost. You came here to arrange the distribution of your bibles. That, as you were well aware before you came here, is a violation of our law. And whatever you may think of our laws, while you are here you are subject to them. However, as we Russians and you Americans are now friends or at least so they now tell me, we will be prepared to overlook your intentions and simply send you back home”.

I think the relief on my face was unmistakable, too bad it was premature.

“The only thing we require of you is your written statement honestly admitting the purpose of your, shall we call it: “visit”, and a complete list of the people you were planning to contact.” Inspector Fadeyev continued.

There was a long silence as I collected my thoughts. “Inspector, you are very well informed, I am indeed here concerning Bibles, but it is not for distribution. Russia has an outstanding collection of very old Bibles; they are in fact the history of the printed word in Russia. It is not for nothing that the man who created your alphabet is a Saint. I am not interested in distribution as you call it, but in seeing your old Bibles. My contact, as you call him, is a professor at the Moscow University and I have been going to the library every day…”

The Inspector ended my improvised monologue by slamming his fist on the table with a loud bang, “I told you not to tell me stupid stories! Yes, you were at the library: 32 minutes on Tuesday, 146 minutes on Wednesday, because you applied for a temporary library card that day, 22 minutes on Thursday, 10 minutes, approximately, on Friday and exactly 7 minutes on Saturday.”

This time there was an even longer silence.

Finally I got up the courage to speak, “I want to call the embassy now”, I said.

“For your information, we have 48 hours to notify your embassy.” The Inspector declared.

“So what do you do in the meantime, beat me for 48 hours?” I retorted, trying to sound brave and hoping that speaking openly would perhaps scare them from actually doing something like that.

“No. We don't do that. Beating a prisoner has been forbidden in our country since 1953,” the Inspector said and half smiled.

The smile scared me more than anything.

Then he said something in Russian to one of the goons. My Russian was not that great but, to me it sounded like, “Camera 37”, in Russian a ‘camera’ is a cell; it’s a derivative of the word: chamber.

“Now take everything out of your pockets, take your watch off and put everything on the table” Inspector Fadeyev said.

Here it comes, I thought; but I did as I was told; next the goon motioned me to get up and frisked me. My heart was pounding and I think my shaking was plainly visible but I did get up without falling down even though my legs felt like rubber.

“When you are ready to write the list, just shout and tell us.” Inspector Fadeyev, said as his last words and got up to leave.

Fat chance, I muttered under my breath. That was the one thing I would not do.

Now both goons flanked me as we marched off and my fears and understanding of what had been said, proved to be correct. After a while we came to a steel door with the number 37 stenciled on it, at the end of a short hallway, with what was unmistakably a viewing slit and lower down a larger slit, no doubt for a food dish. The door opened, I was given a shove and the door slammed shut with a clank as the locking bar was thrown. The viewing slit briefly opened and then closed again.

I sat down to view my new reality. The cell appeared to be about 8 foot long by 6 foot wide; along each of the walls was a sleeping slab of bare wooden boards with a narrow, maybe a little more than a foot wide, walkway between the slabs. While there was room for two, I was alone in the cell, at least for now. In front of one of the slabs was a bucket with a sealable lid: no doubt the toilet. The lid was to keep the smell in. And there was one touch of civilization, a roll of toilet paper. Suddenly, I needed the toilet very badly. Actually, thinking about it, I was glad I hadn't shit in my underwear while I was with that inspector. Now I did what was necessary, I had never done it sitting on the edges of a bucket before but it really wasn't that bad. I cleaned myself up and re-sealed the lid. Now what? Fortunately what the inspector said about not beating me was probably true, certainly they wouldn't do it here: the place was simply too small.

I could hear movement in the hallway in front of the cell. Presently the viewing slit opened and a pair of eyes looked in.

“Come and see” the voice behind the eyes gruffly said.

I came to the door, timidly approaching the viewing slit. I was afraid I would get something thrown into my eyes, but the man, the guard who had said that, had stepped back and left the slit open. Apparently they really did want me to see what was happening, or going to happen, beyond the door. I looked out.

Coming up the hall towards the door of my cell were two guards, marching a completely nude girl between them. The girl’s arms were twisted up behind her back, leaving her front totally exposed. Even though I had only seen her for a moment, I recognized her instantly; the professor’s daughter, Aleksandra.

The three of them stopped a little distance in front of my cell door. Aleksandra stared blankly at the grey metal door in front of her and even though the guards weren't holding her arms any more she made no attempt to cover up her intimate zones, in fact she did not move her arms at all; evidently her wrists were firmly chained or tied behind her back. Everyone stood there for several minutes; as if the guards were deliberately displaying Aleksandra’s nude body to me. And I could not help but see that she was a very pretty young woman. As she was now only about ten feet away, I could see every detail of her face and figure. She had a very cute, wide, face, with high cheekbones, a straight nose and a small mouth. She was perhaps a little too stout and a little too short to be a model, but there wasn't any flab on her perfect body. Her breasts were on the small side but firm and nicely shaped without the need for any bra. Her tits were brown with medium sized aureole and small, slightly darker, nipples that stuck out like little daggers in the cool air. She had a nice looking belly button and an appropriately flat stomach and which ended above an ample triangle of pubic hair whose color matched her waist length mane, which someone had now tied back into a rough ponytail with a length of brown twine. While one of the guards was holding a standard, Soviet Army brown leather officer’s belt with a double claw buckle, in his hand the whole time, Aleksandra’s naked body bore no visible signs that up to this point she had been beaten or whipped.

While, considering her situation, outwardly she appeared incredibly calm to me, after a while I could notice that her chest was rhythmically heaving from deep breaths she was taking to stay that way. Her expression alternated between a poker-faced hopelessness and barely suppressed rage.

Minutes ago I had felt helpless and completely terrified when they were taking me away, even though I still had all my clothes and my hands were free. I could not even begin to imagine what Aleksandra must have been feeling, standing there completely nude, chained and waiting. But I suppose if one could do it and Aleksandra seemed to be pulling that off quite well, anger would be a better emotion to have at that moment than raw fear.

Suddenly one of the guards turned Aleksandra towards himself and delivered a vicious little punch into her solar plexus. She let out a low moan, doubled over and fell to the floor gasping for breath. At that moment I also saw what had been holding her hands so immobile in the middle of her back: her wrists and forearms had been firmly locked together horizontally from opposing directions by a wide, solid metal, two cuff shackle. The other guard now swiftly looped the belt he had been carrying, several times around Aleksandra’s ankles and buckled it in place while a third guard, the one who had called me to “come and see”, dropped a chain from a pulley in the ceiling of the hallway and looped it around the middle of the belt between Aleksandra’s feet.

With a shock, I realized that I hadn't even noticed the chain and pulley practically in front of my eyes. I wondered if Aleksandra had noticed what had been in store for her.

There was a whirr and a clicking sound as the third guard started reeling in the chain by a winch fastened to the side wall. As Aleksandra gradually recovered her breath, the chain starting hoisting her feet in the air, and her body was relentlessly pulled directly underneath the pulley. As she realized what was happening, she bent herself at the waist to try to prevent her torso from being dragged across the cement floor. At one point she succeeded and her body swung free but evidently that hurt too, as she immediately dropped what parts of her body she still could, back on the floor. The winch however inexorably did its work and Aleksandra’s nude body gradually uncoiled and stretched out full length as she was hung by the ankles in mid-air. The winching was stopped when the belt holding Aleksandra’s ankles reached the guards eye level, at which height Aleksandra’s head was at about knee level off the floor and her pony tail barely swept the floor. Her arms of course were still firmly locked behind her back.

When the third guard was finished winching he came back to my cell door. “Now, you see. When you ready make list, you call. When list done we let girl down.”

Meanwhile, the guard who had the belt said something in Russian to Aleksandra. Then both guards laughed; Aleksandra did not laugh. I didn't hear all of it and my Russian isn't that great either, but I thought the gist of it was advice for her to cry, beg and plead loudly. As he went away, the third guard walked up to Aleksandra and ran his hand up the inside of her thigh; when his hand reached her vaginal slit, she twisted violently to get away from it. I couldn't see how well she succeeded, if at all, but the twisting left her body swinging like a pendulum, a motion she was now helpless to stop. Finally, he too made a last comment about coming back for her later, laughed merrily and left.

I stood there in silent shock and horror, watching Aleksandra’s nude body slowly swinging, head down, in the otherwise empty hallway in front of me. The only sound was a soft, rhythmic, creaking of leather from the belt binding her ankles. As they were at eye level, I couldn't help but notice that she had good looking feet, not a mean accomplishment in the Soviet Union, where getting decent shoes was not easy and being able to get the appropriate size shoes at the appropriate age for a growing child was a real trick. Her parents had taken good care of their daughter… and now, for what?

We were alone, except for the hidden microphones in every corner of course. And the laws of physics dictated that eventually the swinging would stop, if she didn't struggle.

What was I to do now? I knew enough about history and first aid to know that what had just been done to Aleksandra was the beginning of a very slow, but ultimately lethal, torture. The American Indians among others used this torture. The human heart and circulatory system isn't really designed to adequately pump blood through the body without some help from gravity. For short periods, a few minutes, it doesn't matter of course and isn't even that uncomfortable; the body is designed with the possibility of having to do something upside down for short periods. For a healthy person, even a couple of hours hanging upside down will result in nothing more than a nasty, but temporary, headache; but after that, the increasing amount of blood that collects in the cranial cavity starts putting intolerable pressure on everything in the head. A really strong and healthy person can last up to the 48 hours like that - in agony - before having a fatal stroke.

Initially Aleksandra had been hanging at an angle to my cell door but somehow she had managed to turn herself slightly, so now she was facing me. Of course, while she may not have, probably didn't, notice someone peering through the vision slit earlier, after the guard had said what he said, she was well aware that someone was behind the door and given that he had spoken to me in English, it wouldn't take a genius to figure out whom, either. And if Aleksandra was a student, well probably at this point more accurately, had been a student at the University, she was no dummy. I wondered what she had studied, but then looked at her nude body hanging from the ceiling of the prison hallway and realized that now it no longer made the slightest difference. I looked down at her face. It wasn't flushed, yet, but how long had she been hanging like this, a couple, maybe five minutes, that was nothing.

She was looking back up at me. In a moment I felt panic, what had I done, she was being tortured to death and I was staring at her and checking out how nice her body looked. No, I shouldn't be looking at her, not on display nude like that. But therefore, should I just turn away and leave her all alone, to face pain and death staring at an empty grey wall? No, I had to do something to stop this.

The problem was, if this was what they did to get information, I could perhaps save Aleksandra; or perhaps not, that guard had said she would be let down when I talked, but what kind of guarantee was there to his words? However the other people, families, on the list in my head, had daughters too, or sons, or brothers or sisters, people who could simply be put in Aleksandra’s place. Of course they wouldn't make me watch that. How simple, out of sight, out of mind and while I was at it, I should just turn away, step back from the vision slit and erase Aleksandra’s plight as well.

I suddenly had the desperate need to use the toilet again. Well, the bucket was close. I dropped away from the door to take care of my physical needs. Right after my eyes disappeared from the vision slit I thought I heard a strange noise. As I sat on the bucket doing the dump I tried to figure out what, if anything, I had heard. I tried to listening for it again but there was nothing. But just for a second, it had sounded to me like there had been the whimper of a dog in pain. Listening intently, I could hear Aleksandra breathing deeply; of course, she was suffering only some ten feet away, on the other side of the door. I found her self-control incredible. Maybe my mind was just playing tricks on me. Or, just maybe, had Aleksandra quietly cried out for just an instant? As I cleaned myself up I had resolved that I would look at her again and I would remain looking at her. It was the least I could do; ha, what a bitter laugh that was, it was all I could do and it was nothing.

I stepped back to the vision slit and looked down at Aleksandra’s face; it was beginning to get a little red. She looked back into my eyes and even though her face was set in an expressionless stone mask I thought that for an instant her green eyes smiled as she saw mine had returned. We looked at each other for a long time; by now Aleksandra’s body had finally stopped swinging. If it seemed like a long time to me, I wondered how long it must have felt like to Aleksandra, hanging in her private hell. Every so often her stone mask cracked for just a little bit and betrayed that she was in some pain. At this point Aleksandra’s primary source of pain was probably still her ankles where the belt she was hung by, cut into them. In time that source would disappear, numbed by time and lack of circulation and overtaken by an ever more insistent feeling that her head wanted to explode. I wondered if her head had started hurting by now. Her legs were getting whiter and her upper torso and particularly her face were getting redder.

Aleksandra’s nude body betrayed her suffering too. Her chest heaved from her heavy breathing and I could see her stomach muscles ripple as she constantly tensed up her body. Because she was showing her front the whole time, I could not see what her hands were doing, but every so often I could see from her shoulders that she was pulling at her shackled wrists, as if hoping that ‘this time’ she could free herself. Pulling on the wrist-irons must have hurt too, but maybe causing pain somewhere else made the constant pain easier to bear, by detracting attention from it for a moment. It appeared that she could not move her feet at all because of the belt around her ankles, but she regularly moved her toes. She also kept twisting to remain facing my cell door, though the price of that was to start swinging again.

The longer I looked at her nude body hanging in front of me, the more I felt I had to do something, but what? I wanted to ask her what to do. But was that right? Sure, then I could just pile all moral responsibility, as well as the physical torture, on her. But was it right not to ask? I was the one who was deciding that she had to endure the torture. And finally, we both knew there were microphones everywhere; every word we would say to each other would be instantly heard by Fadeyev and his henchmen. But I couldn't take it any longer.

I looked Aleksandra right in the eyes and said, “What do you want me to do?”

I waited, but there was no reaction, even her stone mask did not change for a moment. I thought maybe she hadn't heard me. It could be that the blood pressure in her head was making her ears ring.

“What do you want me to do?” I repeated louder.

Once again I had to wait, Aleksandra’s reaction was delayed, but then, for an instant the expression on her face changed from grim resignation to red hot anger; “stay silent!” she hissed at me and then turned her face away.

There; I had asked the stupid question and Aleksandra had sealed her fate. After that I did stay silent, there was nothing more to say.

Aleksandra no longer tried to twist around to face me and now her nude body slowly spun on the chain until, for a while, I was looking at her right side before she began to turn back again. Her manacled hands were tightly clenched into fists. Ever so slowly Aleksandra’s nude body turned back until once again she faced me. I looked down at her face. The look of anger was gone, replaced by something I could not describe; we just looked into each other’s eyes as long as we could; until the chain inexorably spun Aleksandra’s front away again. Even though it was cool in the prison and she was completely naked, her body was beaded with sweat. At this point she appeared to be trying to remain perfectly still, no doubt the slightest move caused her pain. But she made no sound.

This went on and on, as of course it was meant to. Sometimes Aleksandra and I made and maintained eye contact for a while, but other times as she swung in front of my cell, she stared straight ahead at the lower part of the cement wall and steel door that was at her eye level. At those times I just stared at her nude body. Sweat from her thighs had run into her pubic hair which now glistened damply. I kept thinking that perhaps I shouldn't be studying her figure like that at a time like this, but then, not to look at her amounted to pretending her suffering didn't exist at all. So, I looked. By now her feet were acquiring a bluish tinge and her legs were getting paler, while her face was very noticeably flushed. But she still tried to make no outward sign about what she must have been feeling.

I wondered how much time had passed but then realized that that was meaningless. There was no limit they had set for her suffering, Aleksandra had been strung up to hang by her ankles until I gave them what they wanted with whatever consequences that would have to the other people I betrayed, or to hang by her ankles until she died in agony and then her cadaver maybe left to rot for a while to remind me of what I had done.

I desperately wanted to talk, I wanted to write that list, but then even as I saw her face start getting puffy, I remembered that look of flaming anger when I had suggested that perhaps I should give in to save her from this. And of course, if I had wanted to preserve her at any cost, I should have done it at the beginning, before she started suffering the pain and injuries that she had now been enduring for, I guessed, at least several hours. If I gave in now, Aleksandra would be taken down, probably, but with the realization that everything she had suffered was for nothing.

Actually, it wasn't comfortable for me, staring out of the little slit all the time. The vision slit was set a little too low for me to stand up straight and my legs were getting tired and my back had started to hurt. I shifted around uncomfortably. That discomfort made me feel even worse, not because of my back pain, but because it starkly demonstrated what a wimp I was, feeling that, compared to the agony and humiliation that Aleksandra was quietly enduring, dangling upside down, totally nude, in front of me. No doubt her ankles had hurt from the belt digging into them from the moment she had been strung up, her back was in a lot more pain than mine, as it was arched the whole time from the way her arms had been locked behind her and by now her head was in throbbing agony. Yet she quietly swung at the end of her chain and betrayed nothing.

More time passed; there was no clock here, or window to show passing of day or night, just the relentless glare of bare light bulbs hanging from the ceiling to illuminate the relentless torture of the bare female figure hanging from the ceiling. The only sign that Aleksandra was alive was the rhythmic heaving of her bare chest. To me that became like the ticking of a clock in an otherwise completely silent room, a measure of my fear, desperation and hopelessness. Oh yes, mine. I didn't dare think about what she feeling any more. That would have crushed me in an instant.

Aleksandra’s body suddenly convulsed from toe to head. It made her breasts jiggle.

A little while later, she screamed. After hours of silence, the yell was deafening, but its tone indefinable, a combination of a howl of agony and a shriek of anger, but not a cry. The scream didn't last long before ending in a fit of coughing and gagging sounds. I had forgotten, hanging upside down hinders normal breathing too.

Aleksandra let out a grunt as she next did a sit-up which in her current pose caused her torso to come level with the ground and with her head bent forward and her chin in her chest, for the first time in hours her head was at least above her heart. I could see her flat belly ripple as she struggled to hold this pose for what seemed like a long time. Aleksandra was strong, but now her face twisted into a grimace of pain as her stomach muscles were tested beyond human limits against the inexorable force of gravity. Finally she gave up and fell back into the stretched out vertical, head down, pose she had been condemned to, gasping for breath. And her naked body once again swung like a pendulum by its ankles for a long time. She did not scream or struggle again.

We looked in each other’s eyes as she swung by, but her gaze was becoming an empty stare. Whatever advantage in blood circulation may have been gained from her struggle and sit-up was soon lost. Her eyelids and brow were becoming more and more swollen; her eyes were bloodshot beyond anything I had ever seen in her increasingly dark purple face. She did not look at me any more as she, more and more slowly swung by. It took me a while to realize why. Her eyebrows were wet and little rivulets ran across her forehead. Aleksandra was quietly crying, but ever so quietly, so as not to disturb anyone.

That was the final straw; I could not take it any more. But I had been quietly fomenting a plan of my own for a while. I stepped back from the vision slit and looked at the iron cell door. It had been painted dark green, evidently a long time before, because the paint had begun to peel. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, could I really do this? And then I slammed my head full force into the door. There was only a brief moment sharp pain and then a stunned numbness. I looked at the door, no blood yet and slammed my head into the door again. This time I could feel something liquid run down my forehead. I butted the door again, but my body instinctively hesitated, betrayed me and I did not hit my head against the door very hard the third time. It was ironic, but that one hurt worse then the hard hits. But more importantly, I knew I had to hit hard, I had to make noise. I could feel the wetness on my eyebrow, closed my eyes again and ran full force into the door with my head. The shock made me fall to the floor; when I looked up I could see the streak of blood dripping down the door, good! I got up with difficulty, the room, the cell was swirling around me but I knew I had to keep smashing my head into the door somehow. I swung sideways and somehow hit the door with a combination of my shoulder and head. Blood was dripping on the floor. I slammed my head into the door again and saw my blood splatter on the wall. I thought I must do it harder, but I think then the cell door opened and… at some point I passed out.

I woke up in the hospital, they weren't taking any chances. My head was swathed in bandages which made sense of course, but over those had been placed a large rubber helmet and I had been cuffed to the bed, with well padded medical type cuffs. Oh yes, nothing but the best for me; but, for Aleksandra? But before I could dwell on that, an officer from the US Embassy arrived at my hospital bed. He curtly told me that he was here to take me home. The hospital had declared me fit to travel and so I was to leave, immediately. I tried to tell him there was one thing I had to find out first, but he curtly told me that the Government of the Soviet Union had ordered me to leave and that meant immediately. He added that I should realize how lucky I was; in not so distant earlier times things would have been a lot different and not in a good way. To emphasize the point, he demonstratively opened the door out to the corridor: there stood two of Fadeyev’s men, conveniently, the two who had indicated no comprehension of the English language.

When I landed in the United States I understood those pictures we have seen of returned prisoners kissing the ground upon arrival. I didn't actually do that, but I understood. However, whenever I felt relief I also remembered Aleksandra, particularly my last sight of her swollen purple face with tears running up her forehead.

Unsurprisingly, when I asked, no one in the Federation knew anything about Aleksandra, in fact they did not really know she even existed, evidently she had not been “involved”. And Soviet citizens did not involve others unnecessarily. Of course that only left the question of, unnecessary for whom?

Then two months later, it was all over. The August “Putsch” took place and the Soviet Union was no more, the pressure from the stench of the rotting center finally burst the hollow shell maintained by the secret police and Siberian labor camps. And in the “new Russia”, giving, selling, buying, Bibles was suddenly perfectly legal. Specifically for me, there was the news that Aleksandra was alive. I didn't contact the Professor myself, I could not face doing that, but I got someone from the Federation to ask and I was told that she had been released and that yes, there were some residual medical issues but that basically she was alright.

I guess I should have been happy, overjoyed in fact. But in a way that only confused my feelings even more. Two months, two short months and all that suffering was irrelevant. Or, was it? I wanted to contact Aleksandra, to say something to her. I had thought about her constantly after I returned, but it was only then that I realized that actually, I had never spoken to her, well, unless one wanted to count one single sentence.