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UNDERGROUND 24
- Terrorists?“Well, ISIS or something like that.- And what can be captured on Ilyich Square?- How do I know! I'm just saying we don't know everything.Kharitonov again caught up with Pustovalov.Are you sure we are on the right track?– Do we have a choice?- I'll go back. Katya stated.- Are you joking? Roman was surprised.“What makes you think they need us?”“This is a shock,” Victor “explained”.- It's not a shock! Do you think they're sitting there waiting for us? They have some business there. We just got caught in a hot hand.- You squealed all over the subway!“What, you want to go back to those monkeys?” Kharitonov turned to her.- The monkey is you!“So, back in the carriage, I was right about you?”- Yes, you went!Victor quickened his pace, caught up with Pustovalov, who was quickly moving away from everyone, who took out a Simon Coll chocolate umbrella from his backpack and began to unwrap the wrapper.- Listen, on the "Ploshchad Ilyich", in that room, what did you see
UNDERGROUND 25
Pustovalov crossed the tracks, climbed onto the platform from the tunnel side, peered through the grated door into the opposite portal, the only place that bothered him. However, he understood that it was foolish to set up an ambush there.Pulling up the strap of his backpack, he tucked the Walther into his belt, then climbed over the railing and climbed onto the platform. Silently stepping, he reached the first opening. Looked into the hall. On the marble column opposite, a bright blue sticker pointed with an arrow "exit to the city." It was from there that music and a mechanical rumble rushed, which, as Pustovalov now understood, was emitted by a working escalator.Leaning his back against the wide end of the wall, he began to shift to the left, gradually opening up a view. Silver-crystal, like corkscrews, lamps of the main hall and a row of pylons appeared before my eyes. A double staircase led from the center of the hall into the space above the opposite paths. The deserted hall e
UNDERGROUND 26
“There is nothing upstairs. Nothing that you so aspire to - all this simply does not exist anymore. But you exist and you are not alone. And the sooner you understand this and stop resisting, the better for you.Pustovalov bit his lips, as he always did when deep in thought.At that moment, the front escalators turned on. This time all three and all downhill. And immediately in front of them grew the rays of lanterns - judging by the power of the light fluxes - professional ones. Someone was already running up the escalators.Turn around without dropping your hands. – Quietly said Pustovalov.The fat man turned to the escalators with a fixed smile. The wind from the tunnel blew his dirty hair.Pustovalov inaudibly stepped back. Opposite the transition to the Taganskaya, he clung to the column, not taking his eyes off the fat man.He stood motionless with his hands raised under the dome of light of the only chandelier that worked in the hall.Pustovalov looked into the passage - the st
UNDERGROUND 27
“Did that guy at the station say that?”Don't worry, he's crazy.But Dasha could not "not pay attention." When Pustovalov came out of the toilet three minutes later, Dasha went up to him again.Did he talk about what's going on upstairs? she asked, glaring into his eyes.Pustovalov felt a faint, refined aroma of exotic flowers - far from the banal perfume heaviness emanating from Katya, and thought that this girl, like him, was a rare guest in the subway. In the semi-darkness he saw only the outline of a handsome face and sparkling eyes.I told you he's just a psycho. You should have seen his drawings.Dasha silently looked into his face for several seconds, as if she was evaluating, and finally said:- I want you to take a look.- For what?The girl looked around and took out an outlandish device from her bag, which Pustovalov immediately recognized, although he saw it for the first time in his life. Eyebrows habitually crawled up - the brick-like phone "Fairy Tale-2" looked so unnat
UNDERGROUND 28
- In case of a nuclear attack?“There are the same ones at the stations,” said Pustovalov, “but they are covered with sheets. I saw on Marksistskaya in front of the escalators.- Not the same, - Victor objected, - they are retractable or lifting, but this one is rare.Almost immediately outside the door, the tunnel doubled in size. The flashlight beam slowly illuminated the new space. They were at the fork. The tunnel went further, but from it, forming an acute angle, another branch grew.- Vityan is right, this is definitely an inter-linear, - said Romik, limping on his bruised leg, - one to the ring, the second to Taganka.- Where?The sound of a hammer was the answer.“This way,” Pustovalov headed for the neighboring tunnel.Kharitonov nodded to Roman and followed Pustovalov, pulling Katya after him.Victor avoided looking at the girl, he was ashamed of his impotence in his inability to somehow influence Kharitonov. But Pustovalov didn’t seem to care at all, although he could influ
UNDERGROUND 29
Opposite there was a small breakdown, which went far - thirty meters deep. Warm air came out of it, but the junction itself was so narrow and cramped that it was only possible to pass through it by bending over strongly. A couple of meters from the entrance lay a rail cart without one wheel.“Most likely, there is also a fan,” Victor suggested, “so why don’t you want to ...”- Can you get out of there?- Well, this is not just a ventilation duct, since nothing is visible there, at the end, perhaps the fan itself is somewhere higher or lower, which means that it serves not only this duct, so ... Let's go back?“If you don’t have enough problems, you can return. I have no such plans.- But…Victor again wanted to object, wanted to say that there .... And who exactly is there? People he didn't know a couple of hours ago. Perhaps danger, shared stress and all that bring together, but definitely not like this man in an expensive jacket and boots from Roberto Morelli. Actually, who are thes
UNDERGROUND 30
“What the hell, why don’t they come down!” We saw them both on Ilyich Square and here ... They are everywhere and feel very at ease.“Yes, yes,” the man whispered, “it was this stretch that was captured. The Tretyakov Gallery was also there, but it was recaptured. I myself… barely survived. My colleagues were kidnapped, and I hid in the locker room behind a manual hermetic door.But what are they to do here?“They just have nowhere to go.- Wait a minute, but why are the doors on Ilyich Square closed?- You were there?- Yes.“So they made their way there, too.” The man frowned in thought.- Did you get through?- The station was closed down.So you closed it?- It was closed by the station workers to cut off the tracks. After all, they have already tried to do something similar on Kievskaya and Turgenevskaya. They were silenced there. Here is the last step. Man two hundred. You need to go to Novokuznetskaya.-And you?- I know a shorter way.- Well, then we'd better go with you!- No
UNDERGROUND 31
"Wait here, I'll check," he said.Victor wanted to ask something, but Pustovalov quickly nodded.Sergius slightly opened the door, darted inside, closed it behind him.“It’s strange that this adit…” Victor began, but Pustovalov interrupted him, putting his finger to his lips:- Shh, remember our agreement?Victor opened his mouth, but did not have time to say anything. Sergius appeared from behind the door, sighed somehow wearily.“It's all right,” he said, stepping aside, turning to Pustovalov, “go first. There are stairs ahead...Sergius did not agree. The barrel of the "Walter PPKS" rested against his wrinkled forehead.- How?Sergius was speechless. Victor, judging by the slack jaw - too.- How many are there?- D-two.- Open it.“W-why…” Sergius’s gray eyes looked frightened, as they had done in the tunnel. Nearly. Now the fear was real. Pustovalov knew that look very well – open the door. Victor, go back.But Victor remained where he was.- What?- Get back!Viktor backed away t
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- UNDERGROUND
Epilogue
From the panoramic window, Victor can see the San Francisco Bay, but the waters no longer impress him. He still can't get used to the Golden Gate, but the views are much duller in his research center. Somewhere out there, beyond the countryside, he discovered Sunnyvale Pond. This place reminded him of the Moscow region at all. However, this is rather a minus, Victor is too young to be nostalgic for his homeland.Out of habit, everything comes surprisingly easily to him. A psychologist friend said that there was nothing extraordinary in his phenomenon, he just pulled out a lucky lottery ticket called "beautiful parents." Victor won an international competition, and while still a student, he got a job at the Ames Research Center, and on Sunday he met the daughter of emigrants from Lithuania who work in Los Angeles. Dimon without exaggeration would put "ten". Victor never gave grades to girls. Dimon knows that Victor was born with a golden spoon in his mouth and tries to reach for him. Vi
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209
An old photograph, hitting the slimy walls, slowly spinning like an autumn leaf, slowly falls into a deep well. The well is so deep and bottomless that the round hole at the top has long turned into a bright dot, and is about to completely disappear. And the photo keeps falling and falling. It depicts three boys, three of them are twenty-nine years old. One of them, dark-haired, with curly hair, stands in the middle, hugging his friends. It is slightly lower and seems to hang slightly on their shoulders. All three are smiling. The photo is old, you can see it not only in the crumpled corners, scratches and faded palette, but also in stretched sweaters and old-fashioned shirts with rolled up sleeves.The photo keeps spinning and spinning, and in one of the turns, the image on it changes. Now there are only two boys. They also hug each other and look into the camera with smiles, but the black-haired man standing between them is no longer there. It's like it never happened. Maybe it's a
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208
The old man, Makarov, rushed after him, and only after them did the special forces pour out.Still running up, Boris saw a square hole in the center of the site - not at all like what he saw on the day of his last visit to the plant. Perfectly smooth, carved into cubes that were stacked near the tractor. Next to them lay a completely black device, which he saw in the photographs sent by the Special Metals Research Institute.Boris was the first to run up to the edge of the hole.Below, he saw what he had seen before - the shaft of the mine, only at the bottom of the bowl there was now a well. There was absolute bedlam going on: corpses, blood, weapons, overturned chairs, pieces of collapsed stairs and galleries. He did not immediately notice living people, but when he saw a figure crawling away from the wall, he immediately recognized it, although he had never seen it alive.- Daria! he shouted. - Daria Afanasyeva!The girl raised her head.Makarov, running up, heard Vindman's scream,
- UNDERGROUND
207
Before saying goodbye to life, Dasha managed to become a witness to strange events that replaced each other with kaleidoscopic speed. First, something flew from above right in the center and with a disgusting thud plopped behind the makeshift spectator box. Dasha could not see anything in such a short time, but for some reason she was sure that this was a human body. More terrible than the blow itself were the frightened cries.And here is how a deaf-mute worker jumped from the upper gallery, and with inhuman speed slipped somewhere into the darkness, she saw very well.Just then, a strange movement began. On the right, something overturned with a crash, and someone very frightened shouted something in an incomprehensible language. Apparently it was a command, because right there from the depths of the hall there was a coordinated stomp of feet.Dasha saw four of the six burner paws, above her, the other two were located on either side of her head. From above, the bright light of hang
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206
Only one person directly looked at her - a stern, gloomy old man from the gallery on the second floor. She had seen him before, I think in the ninth block - an ordinary mute worker with the right of free movement. He seemed to her out of his mind, but in his current “hawkish” look there was some kind of repulsive meaningfulness, without a hint not only of compassion, but even of curbed hatred. He looked at her just like a log, dissatisfied with the fact that the log was too thin and would not give the required warmth. There was no life in that look, only cold. This is how a dead man who managed to challenge life itself would look.However, all this, even the dumb old man, she saw fragmentarily, as in a painful dream, and then completely disappeared, only the darkness above her head remained - real or in her imagination. She stopped hearing conversations, footsteps, and the creak of the wheels of the gurney; only dull pops were heard in her head, reminiscent of explosions of a gas-air
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205
- Stole?Boris nodded, pointing to the picture.- On the day of the visit to Novikov, Colonel Basurov, a well-connected former member of the procurement commission of the Ministry of Defense, was with Pustovalov. Most likely, he played the role of an intermediary. He went missing that day. Since Pustovalov himself is a ghost and it is impossible to track his movements, we tracked Basurov's movements before he disappeared in the warehouse. And through him they came across a certain Dementiev. We interrogated him. Dementiev is a professional safecracker, it was he who helped Pustovalov steal the installation. He also said that there were two installations. That is, one working sample, and a spare case without filling - in fact, a dummy. But it looks like the real one. He confirmed that Pustovalov was going to sell the unit to Yasin after learning that he was behind her order on the black market. In addition to Basurov, another person went missing that day, previously in contact with Pus
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204
The car ran into a minibus lying on its side, Boris opened the door, leaned half out of the passenger compartment, exposing his haggard face to the frosty wind. There was a false peace here. Distant screams and shots were drowned out by unobtrusive music, but this tiny lane adjoining Frunzenskaya Embankment bore little resemblance to the island of former life. Rather, the coldness of the future blew from him - the very one that none of them would ever find. Desolation oozed from the planed poplars gathering darkness, from the mangled cars sprinkled with snow, forever left after yesterday's accident, from under the architraves of the shifted "stalinok", from the black windows of the buildings deprived of power supply.Boris looked at the piece of paper with the address and saw how it was distorted by a five-centimeter wall, carved from a dark space ice floe. With a crackling, cascading arc, the wall passed through Windman and, outlining the front facade of a two-story Chinese restauran
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203
He appeared on the bridge in a couple of minutes. Maurice, who was sitting under the window of a high tower, calmly rose and aimed his rifle at him:- One, two, three, and well, freeze! - He said cheerfully.Pustovalov obeyed and, without raising his head, said:“Using your man as bait?” Clever.“You used yours to get out too, didn’t you?”Pustovalov raised his head. Maurice saw through the eyepieces of the night vision device that Pustovalov was without night vision devices and knew that he only saw the outline of a dark silhouette in the window.- Komsomolskaya, - Maurice nodded with a smile, - now I understand why Daniker began to be so lucky before his death.- You're confusing me with someone else. I happened to be there.“Just a subway passenger?”- Exactly.Maurice burst out laughing and at that moment Pustovalov disappeared. He quickly figured out that he just jumped through a hole in the bridge.Still laughing, Maurice jumped lightly onto the bridge and called out:"You're br
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202
Coming up to him, Maurice found a crumpled fireman's heat-reflecting suit and smiled. We must pay tribute, although Maurice was not upset at all. He could have guessed right away that the trick with heat guns only made sense if you were already inside. It didn't matter now. Maurice knew that infrared sensors would not be a problem for him, like everything else that they had already prepared. He knew that the one they were waiting for would go very far, perhaps even manage to reach the very end. Of course, to the end, to which he is allowed to reach. That's why Maurice was here. And Maurice was rather upset if the one they were waiting for deceived his expectations.After walking a few more meters, Maurice saw a shining helmet with a visor-mirror in the bushes, and his smile grew wider. No, as long as he did not deceive his expectations.***Having reached the northern section of the bypass route, Kruchina quieted down and took a step. Moving along the trodden path, he soon came to two
