“Dobraye utro,” he grumbled at the intercom as smoke poured from his mouth.
“Yes, good morning,” the gruff, tinny male voice from the intercom responded in Russian. “Pick up or delivery?”
“Delivery,” Dublin replied, matching the petulant tone of the Russian voice. “Vending machine.” He calmly smoked his cigarette as a long moment of silence passed. Finally the heavy entry gate began to open as the intercom crackled to life.
“Main service door,” the voice replied tersely.
“Spasiba,” Dublin responded, flicking his cigarette out the window before rolling it up. He cast a quick look at Tall Tommy as the truck rolled past the gate.
The same mustached man they’d witnessed earlier appeared again as the truck groaned to a halt next to the service door. Tall Tommy stepped down from the cab and smiled stupidly as the man barked out a question in Russian.
“He can’t understand you,” Dublin responded irritably in perfect Russian as he rounded the back of the truck. “My comrade is Swedish.”
“What the fuck is a Swedish brat doing here in Kaliningrad?” the man asked, his small eyes fixed suspiciously on Dublin as Tall Tommy quickly unlocked the back gate of the truck.
“Delivering your fucking vending machine,” Dublin shot back with a sneer.
The stout Russian glared at Dublin, then shrugged and nodded his head. “Yes, of course,” he muttered. He watched impatiently as the two men quickly unloaded their cargo before gesturing with a petulant wave of his hand for them to follow him into the service room.
Dublin and Tall Tommy quietly followed as instructed.
The massive interior of the service room was cold and poorly lit. Around them, large square frames of rusting steel were haphazardly stacked, and Dublin grimaced at the heavy, garlic-like smell of welding-torch acetylene that filled the room. The mustached Russian led the two men towards a gray, desk-sized device in the corner of the room and then stepped aside and pointed.
“Take it over there,” he ordered.
Dublin and Tall Tommy exchanged a brief look. “What is that?” Dublin asked the Russian as he lit a cigarette and nodded at the machine.
“Scanner,” the Russian replied as he watched them. “Everything that comes in gets scanned for security.”
Tall Tommy rolled the large vending machine up to the scanning device and lowered it gently onto the floor before stepping out of the way. Dublin gave him a quick hand signal as the Russian walked over to the scanner and immediately began typing onto a small keyboard. Tall Tommy nodded and moved quietly towards the Russian.
“So how the hell do you scan something this big?” Dublin asked indifferently as he took a drag of his cigarette. The Russian said nothing as he picked up a small device attached by a cord to the large machine and glanced at a small monitor mounted on top. He then stepped over to the vending machine and began slowly running the handheld scanner across the front.
Tall Tommy took another step towards the Russian.
“Chto za huy,” the Russian grumbled as the image on the small monitor suddenly flickered and went dead. He angrily slapped the handheld device with his palm a few times, then cursed and walked back to the machine. Tall Tommy glanced at Dublin with a questioning look as the Russian punched at the keyboard. Dublin gave him a hint of a smile.
“Is there a problem?” he asked the Russian.
“Fucking thing just died,” the Russian replied gruffly as he continued
punching keys.
“Does this happen often?”
The Russian paused and looked up. “No,” he said as he glared at Dublin.
“Not often.”
Dublin nodded, taking a long final drag of his cigarette. “Are you thirsty?” he asked as he dropped his cigarette butt onto the concrete floor and slowly crushed it under his boot.
“What?” the Russian man replied.
Dublin walked around to the back of the vending machine, unraveled the power cord, and handed it to Tall Tommy to plug into the wall.
“What would you like, comrade?” Dublin asked as the lights on the vending machine flickered to life. The Russian man’s mustache twitched with confusion for a moment before his mouth suddenly drew into a smile.
“Kvass,” he said eagerly as he walked over to Dublin.
“A kvass it is,” Dublin replied as he fed coins into the machine and punched one of the large buttons. Almost immediately, a can of the fermented, mildly alcoholic drink dropped into the dispensing tray.
“Spasiba,” the Russian said as Dublin handed him the drink.
“Pazhalusta,” Dublin replied as he lit another cigarette. “So comrade, since nothing gets in without being scanned, should we sit here and wait for the scanner to fix itself, or should we load the vending machine back into the truck and come back next week?”