The Yak-40 jet lifted off the tarmac with a roar, shading the ground with the ease of an eagle and the noise of an angry bear. Elcin Rasheed grimaced. He set aside his newspaper, favoring stuffing his fingers in his ears over reading. The effort did little good for the noise, but it made him feel ever so slightly better.
The plane leveled off, and the roar of it's engines dulled. Sighing, Rasheed freed his hands, and kicked back in his seat, staring at the white, featureless ceiling of the jet which was closer than he was entirely comfortable with, and thought.
How long had it been? A year, maybe a little more, since he and Jakob Luganov had told him of the cue de ta that had shifted the destiny of the Republic. He'd been worried, worried that the old General would lead the nation further into militarism, albeit an inward looking form. He'd been wrong then... and he readily admitted it, though few would take him for his word. Somedays, he wondered why he had ever doubted his old friend... and the he remembered what had happened after that faithful meeting.
He'd gone from working directly with Luganov to slow being pushed down the political ladder. He'd wound up as Secretary of Health, more as a place holder than anything else. Not long after, that young banker-type had started to spend time cozying up to Jakob. At the rate that boy was going, he'd be President. Rasheed sighed. He supposed that being wounded in a terrorist attack was enough to get anybody off the hook for ethics violations, but still... what the heck did that man think he was doing, waiting around for the kid to weasel his way into power? He'd know Jakob for twenty years now, and yet still, he could never tell what he was planning.
The plane shuddered, as it beat it's way through turbulence, the towering peaks of the Caucasus looming below. Rasheed grabbed for his paper cup of tea, and downed it in a single, throat-burning swig. But unpredictability wasn't the most irritating thing about old Jake. No, the most irritating thing was that he was right. Right about moving the Mountain Republic back towards party doctrine, right in allowing the return of the Socialist Revolutionaries, and most of all right about this new assignment.
Health, other than his own, had never been Rasheed's concern. It was a low ranking ministry, not the kind of post you'd give to an experienced politician... not unless you wanted rid of him and hadn't anywhere else to put him. No, since he was small Elcin had dreamed of traveling the world, speaking to other Islamic peoples like himself, and making new friends for the USSR. This new posting, as a Consulor-General to Kurdistan, then, was perfect. Jakob would be rid of him, Elcin could finally achieve his goals of strengthening relations with culturally similar nations, and the USSR would gain a more experienced diplomat in Kurdistan pending it's independence.
Elcin chuckled, but no one in the cabin heard him over the roar of the jets. Yes, this assignment in Kurdistan would be the best for the both of them.
For no one country was big enough to contain the two friendly political rivals.
