By now he'd memorized every lump and indentation in the thin mattress, every crack in the bare plaster walls. Nothing helped. In desperation, he lay awake and silently begged his body to fall asleep. It didn't listen.
He'd gone to the infirmary and begged for samples of every sedative they had, but all they did was make the night vanish. First it was dark and then it was morning, and he felt as if he hadn't slept at all.
He'd tried to persuade, then bribe, then blackmail anyone (ANYONE!) into swapping sleeping quarters. And Ocelot had a lovely room, really. Nice scenic view; every morning he watched the sky lighten as the sun rose over the mountains. More pleasant than sharing a barracks with a horde of drunken Russians. Certainly more pleasant than wherever they locked the scientists at night.
But oh no, it was the Major's honour, his right, they wouldn't dare. They said it with such sincerity, too. Ocelot wasn't sure whether to be honoured or indignant that they dared to lie to him, of all people.
It figured, really. You could send them out to die in a forest swarming with God (and that's the God that Ocelot didn't believe in, by the way, because what God would allow this) knew what. You could send them out into the hottest desert or the world's bleakest, most frozen wasteland and they wouldn't sweat or shiver. Ocelot had once ordered a man to shoot his own brother for desertion. He'd barely even blinked, taken the shot, and left crimson footprints on the asphalt as he tread silently through his kin's blood. They'd do anything he asked, but not this one thing. This one, tiny little thing. And damn their eyes for it.
What did it take to convince a man that having a bedroom next to Volgin and Raikov's wasn't so bad, really, once you got used to it?
The next morning, Luck stopped spitting in Ocelot's face and gave him a friendly pat on the buttocks instead. Volgin was out on some business. Raikov had flitted off to some far corner of the fortress. The upshot was that Ocelot had the run of the place, for now.
It wasn't much of an opportunity, but he was damned well going to take it. It was a desperate, mad plan, but it was all he had.
In the end, he passed on subtlety and simply took what he needed. You just try striding purposefully through a fortress full of underlings and see if they dare to stop you.
(No, really. Try it. It's fun.)
He felt like an assassin with that blade in his hands. Volgin's door was unlocked; the bastard must've assumed that no one would ever dare to intrude. The room was someone plainer than Ocelot expected; he thought there'd be more brimstone. There was a locked chest in one corner, faint marks from where the headboard had pounded a lasting impression into the wall, faded bloodstains still lingering on the plaster. And that was more or less it.
Ocelot knelt and began his grim work.
The sounds that night were subtly different.
Heavy footsteps in the halls.
Volgin's door clicking shut.
Creak. Creak.
The sabotaged bedframe giving way with a grateful thud, its rusted metal no match for a hacksaw and some determination.
Volgin exploded into the night in search of someone to blame.
Then, silence settled over Groznyj Grad like an old, worn, and oh-so-comfortable cloak.
And Ocelot drifted into the most peaceful sleep he'd had in years.