Survivor - [n. romanoff]

Breaking the Chains

    The day had started out like any other. Our awakening at five in the morning. The daily ritual of unlocking the cuffs that bound us to our beds, along with our dressing in the uniform of pale blue cotton t-shirts and pants, and ending with the making of our beds with their thin cardboard like blankets, and flattened pillows. At half past five we marched down to the dining room to eat our usual breakfast of bland oatmeal and an overripe apple each. Our meal time ended at six with us promptly standing, pushing the benches back, and heading to our first class, History. An hour and a half lecture on the great Soviet Union and the promise of one the next day on the rise of the KGB. They would teach us only Russian History having to do with the creation of the SSR, our future employers, the KGB, and how our prison came to be. Our next class was World Literature. We had begun reading the Grimm Brothers fairy tales in German and analyzing how men took advantage of women and their naivety. 

    Madame B would say, "This your advantage girls, men will expect nothing from you, which makes you the perfect spies and killers as they will not see past your beauty."

    "Da, Madame."  We would answer, knowing full well what she meant by this.

    We all knew we were nothing more than weapons, a means to an end. But, the key word is weapon, not object, and we were expected to know the difference. We weren't toys as the swine known as man would often use us as. We were deadly weapons that were wielded by our handlers, now the Red Room, later the KGB. Or that was what we believed.

    By now it was nine and we walked to what is considered our first "real" class, Weapons and their Uses. Our unnecessary education is taught in the same classroom. But, this one is taught in our armory. The armory is nothing but a room slightly hidden in case of any thieves, the possibility itself was highly unlikely and nearly laughable. We polished our technique with knives by throwing them at a target. Guns were fired at a human shaped target as well, three shots, quick switch to other hand, three shots again. I was the only one who hit the bullseye in both skills every time. Our next weapon, the katana (Indonesian sword), was added to our growing list of capabilities. 

    These types of classes are all two hours in length and are easier to get a beating out of. The beatings we would get for a dismal performance were the least of our worries. It was the ones we would get for disobedience that held our concerns. You see, the Red Room trains little orphan girls like myself to be what is considered the "perfect spy". We were chosen because we would not be missed, mourned, or even remembered. One of the qualities of the perfect spy is obedience, to do what they're told and to never question the orders of a superior. Another quality of the perfect spy is unwavering loyalty. That under no circumstance were they to defect or divulge any information to do with the Red Room or the KGB. That had already happened once before, and it was disastrous. 

    They would combine the lessons for these qualities together, and give us a beating so bad that we could barely think of questioning orders again. It helped us build a very high pain tolerance so that we would not break under interrogation. Though what they did was nearly always the same for the other girls, they would almost always find a new way to make me scream. Being the Madame's favorite, the other girls hated me as well as most of the other instructors. The fighting instructor in particular, who happened to be in charge of the torture chambers, had a grudge against me for whatever reason. He would enjoy watching me flinch while he ripped off my nails one at a time. Hearing my screams as I hung from the ceiling, suspended in the air by chains wrapped around my wrists, as he whipped my scarred and bare back. He would become excited as he noticed my breath quickening as he would slice my arms, legs, and shoulders open with his dagger. It was one of my first lessons that I quickly learned, never disobey.

    The next class was ballet, an art studied at the academy as an intended form of torture, as well as to build our strength. We changed into our navy blue leotards and short sheen skirts before putting on what a lot of little girls in Russia could only dream of having someday, pointe shoes. Russia is known for its ballet training and companies with the Vaganova Ballet Academy, the Bolshoi, and Kirov Ballet, as well as the Mariinsky Theater. We started with a quick but intense stretch, each sliding into our splits, folding our bodies over our toes, and back to reach for our heels. We would do the standard bar warm up with plies, tendus, ronde jambe, and grande battement.  Then move to the center for an agonizingly slow adagio, unfolding our legs high into the air and holding it for eight counts in the front, back, and sides, twice. We were constantly on our toes, relying primarily on our two big ones to hold our weight. We danced until our toes bled through our shoes and then some, repeating the same exercise in the center over and over again until Ivan, the co-director, declared it perfect.