Grisha stared intently at the pile of massive wooden crates in the middle of the dimly-lit common room, taking a hefty swig of the cheapest, strongest alcohol he could find at the local market, though nothing sold by the impish eclectic merchant down the street could even begin to match the concentration of pure vodka which was in the kitchen cabinet of every God-loving Soviet citizen. Other than the poor liquor and lack of anything entertaining to do, the muggy humidity of Myitkyina killed his spirits even further. He wasn’t used to wearing only a tank top with camouflage shorts, it ruined the prim military uniformity that he so adored about his nation — the brimmed caps and long cotton trenchcoats; it was a nice aesthetic that he would be glad to return to in Mongolia as soon as possible. He sat backward in a rickety wooden chair he had found in the otherwise empty room, continuing to glare at the reason why he was present here with clouded, drunken eyes. A faint and quiet knock at the door relieved him of his exhausting ponderings, for he knew on the other side was a man who could finally be responsible for this abortion of a donation.

————

Pyay Myo Sein was met by a bearded, balding man about double his size in both height and width who wore nothing but a stained muscle shirt and patterned shorts which were about two sizes too small for his massive features. The bottle of Bhutanese liquor indicated the disposition of the Russian almost immediately, though the smell of his breath also helped reveal the man’s current attitude; Pyay hadn’t met a Russian until today, but he had heard of the stereotypes — this man was the greatest example of such stereotype. He held out his gloved right hand in an expression of gratitude, though the large emissary paid no mind to it and left the open door to Pyay, not even inviting him in.

Pyay surmised that this long-abandoned building complex in the outskirts of Myitkyina used to be something of an inn — perhaps a brothel; it was large enough to hold several hundred individuals in its various rooms and gardens, and would make an effective enough headquarters for the infantile Burma Socialist Group. After surveying the several ground floor rooms of the new office of the Party he glanced in the commons area to see the Russian sitting in a crumbling chair, chugging wistfully at one of his various spirits. Beside the Russian were several dozen unlabeled wooden crates stacked four or five high in cluttered rows — none were open. Pyay did not speak Russian, and he figured that the feeling was mutual for the Russian man and Burmese. The Russian simply stood from his chair upon seeing Pyay’s observation and unceremoniously threw the unsealed covering of one of the nearby crates across the empty room in a loud crash, revealing several neatly-arranged Russian handguns and their respective cartridges of ammunition packed in straw, with other assorted translated literature squeezed between them. Pyay rushed his eyes over the firearms and looked at the apathetic drunken Soviet who towered over him, unable to verbalize the contradictory emotions that brewed within him. He could not utilize these guns for anything; he could not sell them, trade them… He certainly could not use them for anything; he was not a revolutionary, he was a politician!

————

Grisha glared at the Burmese revolutionary — he believed the Foreign Affairs Bureau had said his name was Piya or something to that effect — with an unflinching gaze. Piya seemed oddly unsatisfied with the old, rusted Nagants which had been sitting in some warehouse for however many decades before being shipped downriver to Myitkyina to probably be used in some pointless unwinnable guerilla war. He took another swig of the awful vodka and sat back down in his derelict chair to silently observe the pondering well-dressed socialist politician. Surely this is what he wanted; firearms; tools of war. No revolutionary could commence their revolution without weapons, and nobody in Burma seemed to have any these days, so Piya would probably find some success in whatever he planned on doing with the ancient Bolshevik revolvers. He just hoped this meant he got to go back home and put on his uniform again.