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suavemente · 01-14-2020, 09:36 PM

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Post Operational Debriefing: Codename “Thin Ice”

Asset: Valentín Kalashnikov (Валатйн Калашников).

Background:

Born shortly after the fall of the Soviet Union in the rough-and-tumble streets of Grozny, Chechnya. Valentín was the son of a run of the mill peasant who worked in the Grozny steel mill supplying the Red Army with military supplies. With the fall of the CCCP the factory quickly fell into disarray. Seizing the opportunity, Kalashnikov’s family filled the power-vacuum and restored the factory to working condition and helped bring many jobs back to the destitute city. They were quickly elevated within the local politics and began wielding their soft-power around the region. After securing the second local parliament elections the Kalashnikov clan starting consolidating their authority and began running the Chechnyan underworld. Valentín was chosen by his family to begin running heroin from their compound in central Grozny to Helsinki, Finland where it could then be easily exported to the rest of the EU.
Valentín was never asked but commanded to do this task. He undertook the job knowing what would have happened had he refused, and the money was too good to say no to. The heroin was stored in an abandoned Soviet hockey ice-rink on the edge of town. When there was little to do Valentín and his men would hold fight-clubs to build comradery and let out pent-up angst. One of the best fighters from Valentín’s crew was a good friend of his, Igor, who would accompany him on many of the runs into Finland which normally only took 12 hours round-trip. Igor was a huge Red Army hockey fan and had memorabilia from the glory days. He introduced the long history of Russian hockey to Valentín. Although Valentín had the opportunity to skate he never did - finding it a pointless hobby and a waste of time.

The drug-runs were done under cover of darkness and used small back-roads with SUV’s. On his fourth run through the country they were ambushed in an isolated part of the road by corrupt Russian Federal Police who opened-fire on his convoy, attempting to seize the heroin for their own exploits. The ambush ended up with Valentín wounded and killing his best friend Igor.
Valentín was able to roll down to a nearby frozen river where he found a pair of worn out Soviet ice-skates like the ones Igor had in his house, real sheep leather, knowing turning back would mean certain death. Having never ice-skated before, he had to learn how to navigate the river by skates or die. 15 hours later he was found by an ice-fisherman (REDACTED) on the Finnish shores of Lake Ladoga. Valentín upon recovery, immediately went to the Helsinki airport and purchased a ticket back to Grozny, it had been 4 days since he had left with his shipment. In the Helsinki airport terminal Valentín was approached by an MI-6 agent monitoring Russian movements on the border. The MI-6 agent heard radio chatter from the same corrupt Russian Federal Police gloating about their raid and how they were going to collect more than the street-value by returning it to the Kalashnikovs and blame Valentín as a traitor. Valentín was as good as dead if he boarded that plane home. Having nowhere to turn, he asked the MI-6 agent for refugee status and if they could perhaps use his insider knowledge of the Chechnyan Mob.

At this point Valentín was handed over to us, first class ticket to Langley, VA. We used him a covert informant for 2 weeks before his safe-house was fire-bombed by a Chechyan Mob cell in the states. At this point we knew his identity had been compromised. We immediately stopped using Valentín as an asset and needed to make a plan to protect him from attacks. Agnt. Bettman came up with plan codenamed “Thin Ice”. We needed to make Valentín Kalashnikov a well known figure, we needed him to be a household name domestically and even internationally. Having the world’s eye upon you makes it harder for would be assassins to execute their revenge. We realized that Valentín could not be a Hollywood triple-A lister due to his lack of English skills. We also learned that star-chef or critic could not be a choice as he lost his sense of smell in the attack on the convoy. We approached Valentín seeing if he had any preferences on what his new path to stardom would be. He looked around the room distraught and panicked knowing we had basically run out of ideas to keep him safe. Then he froze, staring at the corner of the interrogation room made temporary bedroom. He was staring at a duffle bag with all his remaining belongings, Valentín got up from his seat went up to the bag, opened it and held up a pair of old Soviet skates and gestured towards us.

Mission Progress:
11.30.19 - Established Contact with SHL leadership.
[color=#000000]12.11.19 - Unanimous Approval of Valentín’s participation in the league with the caveat he must prove himself in the minors first.
1.13.20 - Valentín Kalashnikov has been registered for the s52 SMJHL Entry Draft

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