“That might be so, but first we have to get there so that he can make up his mind.”
The Stalker who gave him the artifact looks at Tarasov and the grim-looking, battered soldiers approaching behind him. “It’s your lucky day, man. Call me Squirrel — I am a guide and a very good one too! ”
“This guy is looking like a pot-head to me,” Zlenko says under his breath. Tarasov nods in agreement. Oh God, he thinks, am I really to trust a junkie from Freedom, even if he’s obviously a Loner now? It can’t get lower than that.
“Come, on, man! Don’t look at me like that. Believe me, I can lead you there straight as the crow flies, avoiding zombies and all that shit,” he says licking his lips. “Our raid is blown anyway with Misha and Vitka dead.”
He was directing his last words more to his fellow Stalker than to Tarasov. But his mate resists.
“Are you out of your mind, Squirrel? Guiding the military to Bagram? For free? You charged me eight hundred rubles for the trip to Hellgate!”
“See, Danya, first you didn’t save my life. Second, they have half a dozen weapons pointed at us which puts them into a pretty good bargaining position. Why not be friendly with them? Chill out, man!”
“I have a bad feeling about this. My stomach turns at the thought of getting involved with the army’s business!”
“Ask Lobov for something that helps you with your nausea,” Tarasov jerks his thumb in the medic’s direction. “And don’t worry about guiding us. You will only assist us carrying the stretchers.”
Then the Major remembers Degtyarev’s words about making friends on their way. He pats the rookie on the back. “It’s all right,” he tells him with a wide smile. “We are here to protect you from this place, not this place from you.”
The Stalker returns his friendly look with a scowl. “Damned boyevoychik… you have the smile of a jackal. I’d prefer you shouting at me.” But Tarasov doesn’t have to comply with his wish as the young Stalker reluctantly falls in line.
With him giving the stretcher-bearers a helping hand, they proceed much quicker through barely trodden paths and shortcuts through the forest. Either because the intensive fighting scared them away or because they are less active during daytime, no mutants harass them. But Tarasov is still worried about the enemy who ambushed them.
“Those were zombies, you said?” he asks the guide called Squirrel, who is marching beside him.
“Nah, just a manner of speaking. I call them zombies because they’ve got no brains. Imagine, you are peacefully enjoying the scenery or looking for artifacts, and then they come at you out of nowhere, shouting allaaaaah and stuff like that. One can shut them up with bullets only.”
“They are Taliban then?”
“Call them whatever you want… we just call them dushmans, for old times’ sake, if you follow my meaning.”
“I do,” Tarasov nods.
“For us, they are just another kind of mutant. And they look like mutants too. You’ve seen their faces?”
“I did and they weren’t pretty. They looked like they had a serious case of radiation sickness. No surprise, with the pajamas they wore for armor.”
“Well seen, man. They don’t value their own lives too much. The problem is, neither do they value our lives.”
“Are there many of them around here?”
“One can never know… their den seems to be somewhere to the south, down the road to Kabul.”
“So Kabul still exists?”
“In a way. See, instead of Kabul I should have said Kaboom, because that’s what happened there. Anyway, sometimes they make it up to Bagram but we have an Outpost to keep an eye on the road. It’s a funny place.”
“How come?”
“Well, Captain Bone is an asshole but he values discipline. If a Stalker is caught stealing or something like that, he is sent to the Outpost for a few days. If he survives, he can come back and stay with us. If not — good riddance.”
“This Captain Bone… I heard he is from Duty.”
“Dunno, maybe he was. But with all the former Freedom guys around, he won’t turn the place into a barracks. No way we will be doing morning drills man!”
“Why are there so many Freedomers here?”
The Stalker laughs. “Bhango, man.”
“What’s that?”
“Try to think harder. What has always been the Afghan delight?”
“Weed and opium, or so I’ve heard.”
“You’re super-duper smart for a boyevoychik. Now, tell me what happened to plants in the Zone after the CNPP accident?”
“Polyploidy… some plants grew to unbelievable proportions.”
“And you still don’t get it? Oh, you guys really miss all the fun in life…”
Despite the pain in his chapped lips, Tarasov has to smile as he imagines drug-addicted Freedom soldiers flocking to the New Zone to smoke weed made from marijuana buds as big as a fist.
“Now you got my meaning, man. Give it a try in Bagram because you need to get high. You’re as pale as a vampire!”
“Thanks, but no thanks. You know, in the army we stick to bum-bum,” Tarasov replies, adding an explanation when the Stalker gives him a curious look. “You take brake fluid, add some raisins and sugar, then let it ferment for a few days in the sun. Gives a pretty good kick.”
“That explains why there were no usable vehicles in the Old Zone… Hey, wait a minute! Where are you going? I’ll need to upload this recipe to my PDA!”
Tarasov, who was about to check the column’s rear, turns back to the guide.
“Listen… after your comrades died I guess you stripped them naked?”
Squirrel shrugs the question off.
“Once dead, a Stalker doesn’t need his kit anymore, does he?”
“I could use their PDAs.”
“Difficult, man,” Squirrel replies scratching his head, “difficult. Ashot pays a good price for used PDAs. They’re always in demand by rookies.”
“Give one of them to me and the other to Sergeant Zlenko. Tell him to provide you with one of our rifles and a few mags in exchange.”
“That’s robbery!”
“No. It’s charity. Think about it: you get a mint condition Kalash for two lousy PDAs.”
The guide sighs and looks at his battered submachine gun. “Actually, I wouldn’t mind a weapon with more punch… all right.” Squirrel draws the devices from a pouch on his ammunition vest. “Which one you want?”
Switching on the devices, Tarasov finds that all data has been deleted from the memory units. It could have been done out of respect for a dead man’s privacy, but the major rather suspects that Squirrel wanted to keep the location of any personal stash for himself. However, Tarasov only cares about the map mode. The PDA is not as tough and sophisticated as his own army-issue device had been but the digital map seems accurate enough. To his surprise, there are no indicators on the screen to show the position of fellow Stalkers and important locations.
“No signal beyond a ten-kilometer radius around Bagram,” the guide explains. “Only Bone has gear that covers the whole area. He’s the only one with access to the outside world too.”
“Damn!”
“I agree, man. But about your end of the bargain — where’s that sergeant?”
“Keeping his eyes on our rear. And when you give him the PDA, don’t forget to tell him how to use it.”
Southern Shamali Plains, 2014, 16:56:21 AFT
Tarasov and his squad might have saved the two Stalkers from death, but as the sun starts setting beyond the snow-capped mountains, he admits to himself that they saved his squad from getting completely lost in the forest in return. The Stalker guide has led them through the wilderness on pathways only known to him, until they now emerge onto a road littered with vehicle wrecks. They have left the forest behind and a wide, sandy plain opens up in front of them. Electro anomalies fizz around ruined utility towers that look like the steel skeletons of fallen giants. Exercising a little caution
sees them through. After another half hour’s march, at last Bagram appears.
Or what’s left of it, Tarasov muses.
Degtyarev’s words come to his mind as he scans the ruins through his binoc, taking in the sight of steel containers thrown across the mass of concrete and sand that must have once been the runway, the broken masts from which no ensign flies and the gutted airplanes and helicopters — most of them dating from the Soviet war, others left behind by the Western allies when they too had abandoned the country — like enormous bugs that had survived every cataclysm to hit this cursed place.
“It’s a sad sight, Major.”
“I didn’t take you for an emotional man, Viktor,” Tarasov replies.
“I don’t mean shedding tears. But… imagine, it’s 1986 and you’ve been drafted to the army from Kiev or Pripyat and deployed here. Then you hear the news about what happened at the CNPP. And you still have to fight that senseless shit of a war without knowing what happened to your kin at home.”
“They didn’t know about it… remember, Moscow tried to keep it secret. The folks in Pripyat learned about it last. Those bastards didn’t even tell them what happened when the KGB was already out on the streets taking radiation measurements in full protective suits. Imagine — Dynamo Kiev thrashed Atletico Madrid when the disaster happened, and our football players learned about it from Spanish journalists! But one more thing…” Tarasov points at a junk yard full of wrecked, Soviet-made helicopters and airplanes. “You see those wrecks?”
“Yes. Gospodi, it looks as if we left half our air force behind!”
“Bagram was the base of our best helicopter pilots. When Chernobyl happened, they called them back to take measurements, extinguish the flames and drop chemicals to block the discharge of radioactivity from the reactor… no other pilots could do that. They took off from the very same spot where we stand now. It is a place where our two fatal disasters meet: Chernobyl and the Afghan war.”
The sergeant frowns. “Honestly, komandir, sometimes I felt sad about the USSR collapsing… nostalgic even. But now, seeing those wasted helicopters over there, I get your point.”
Tarasov is surprised at the change in the young sergeant’s expression. His lean, handsome face has become like a cold piece of metal in an instant.
“I can guess the rest of the story, Major. Once the job was done, they were given a medal and sent back to this godforsaken place to die. Do you know what I think now? Fuck the USSR. Fuck its damned war.”
The major has seen many people change in the Zone. Usually it was terror turning their hair grey after a night spent in the underground laboratories. Sometimes, it was rage over a fallen friend that caused the change. Other times, greed over an artifact that was supposed to make one a millionaire outside took over. But he never saw anyone slaughtering his own illusions so palpably like this young soldier right in front of him, and it leaves him at a loss, not knowing how to reply. Suddenly, the photograph comes to his mind: Yuriy and the Gang.
“Well… whatever lies in the past, here we go again,” he finally replies. “This is our little war now and this time we’re not here to lose it. What’s the name of that trooper carrying the grenade launcher?”
“Vasilyev.”
“Give Vasilyev a hand. He can barely keep it on his shoulders.” Tarasov looks at Zlenko who is still staring at the ruins. “Come on… Let’s move, son.”
Shamali Plains, 17:20:15 AFT
Among the bushes spawning from cracks in the asphalt where heavy airplanes had once landed and the rows of ruined buildings that seemed to stretch endlessly along the former runway, the Stalkers lead them towards a veritable bastion erected from steel shipping containers with sandbags on top. One bullet-riddled container blocks the entrance, the word MAERSK still visible in faded white letters. A loudspeaker crackles from inside.
“Stalkers! Veterans and rookies from the far north! If you’ve had enough of dust storms, mutants and dushmans, come to the Antonov — we have all comforts the New Zone has to offer!”
The invitation comes from tantalizingly close by. Tarasov swallows hard.
Two huge chains run up from the container blocking the entrance and disappear into holes in the metal rampart above. A sentry rises to his feet and emerges from under a shady camouflage mat, casually turning a fixed machine gun towards them.
“Halt! Who goes there?” he shouts down.
“Yo, Grisha! It’s us, Squirrel and Danya!” the guide shouts back waving his hand. “Try not to shoot us, fellas!”
“And those dirty zombies you have in tow?”
“Er… they look like military, but that’s only a birth defect! They are cool, I swear it!”
“What? You brought the military here? Are you out of your fucking mind?”
“They saved us from two bears! And then we routed a squad of freaks together!”
The sentry hesitates. “Wait… I need to ask Bone first,” he replies, and disappears behind the sand bags. Squirrel sighs and looks at Tarasov with doubt written all over his face.
“Stalkers! Visit the Antonov! Chilled vodka, deer steak salted with potassodium iodide, and all kinds of shiny new weapons await!”
“If he mentions chilled vodka one more time, I’ll take this damned place by storm,” Ilchenko moans. “I swear it.”
Tarasov has a queasy feeling in his guts. Back in the Old Zone, he did everything he could to ensure a fragile coexistence between his soldiers and the Stalkers, and the military had always been on good terms with Duty fighters. But that might as well have been on a different planet.
“Do you think they will let us in?” Zlenko asks with concern.
“I couldn’t blame them if they don’t… It was not so long ago in the Old Zone that we had orders to shoot Stalkers on sight.”
Dark clouds gather on the southern horizon but the sun still shines down mercilessly on the exhausted soldiers. At last they hear a generator starting up and the MAERSK container is pulled up by the heavy chains. As the gate opens, a dozen Stalkers step forward from the swirling dust, all wearing heavy armor with an exoskeleton-clad figure in the middle. Their Russian-made Groza assault rifles are aimed at the soldiers.
Tarasov frowns. Veteran Duty fighters. We wouldn’t stand a chance against them… not in this condition.
“No fooling around, men,” he tells his soldiers and raises his arms to signal his peaceful intentions.
“Now look at this miserable bunch of boyevoychiks,” the Stalker leader says with a mocking laugh. Then he turns to Tarasov. “What the hell are you here for, assface?”
Assface?
Tarasov is sure he has heard this insult before, spoken in the same disdainful tone. However, the exoskeleton’s visor hides the leader’s face and the voice, distorted by the gas mask, is not recognizable.
“Captain Bone,” he replies, “even if we’re on strictly neutral terms, I was hoping to receive a slightly warmer welcome from a Duty officer. I am Major Tarasov from the Ukrainian Armed Forces, and these are my men. We have no hostile intentions and need your help.”
“I would sooner put my dick into a snork’s mouth than help you.” Bone looks at his gunmen. “This is not the Old Zone and we are not bound to Duty or their alliance to the military. We are our own masters here and don’t want any interference in our affairs.”
“We are not here to bother your business. We have many wounded who need medical assistance. Let us rest for one day, then we’ll leave you in peace and never come back.”
“Even if you paid for it, and you don’t look like someone who could, we haven’t enough resources to patch you up. You are not welcome here. Go back to the desert and get eaten by jackals, I don’t care a damn.”
“Stalkers! Enjoy…”
Tarasov considers his less than favorable options and is about to order his men to charge down the arrogant captain and his troopers, choosing to die a soldier’s death when the looped message in the loudspeaker is interrupted by a cheerful voice.
> “Yo, Captain! Why dontcha let’em in? They must be thirsty like a bloodsucker with no necks around. It would be good for me business!”
“Ashot, you bozo,” Bone snorts into his intercom, “stay out of this. It’s adults talking here.”
A trooper with telecommunications gear on his back comes up running to Bone and holds a speaker to his commander. “It’s the Outpost, captain.”
Bone listens to the message and orders his men to lower their weapons.
“A solution has just come up. We have a few men stationed to the south. They are about to be attacked by dushmans. You take your men and help them defend their position. Survivors will be permitted to enter our base.”
The Major gives Bone a scornful grin and darts a freezing glance at Zlenko, who is about to shout something back, his face burning with anger.
“I understand that Duty needs assistance from us professionals, but with half of my men barely able to walk we wouldn’t be of much use now. I heard you have a doctor in the base. Have him patch up our wounded and maybe we’ll give you a leg up.”
“You overestimate your bargaining position, Major.” Arrogance still lingers in Bone’s voice but he seems less sure of his ground. “All right, here’s the deal. Your wounded can stay. Those who are still able to lift a rifle go to the Outpost at Hill 1865.” Tarasov wants to interrupt but Bone has not finished yet. “Of course, you’ll leave those exoskeletons here, together with half your remaining ammo. Don’t look so angry, Major: you’re making a valuable contribution to the future defense of Bagram!”
Tarasov bites his lips. What he just heard is equal to a death sentence. If I ever get back to the Zone, I’ll lead a strike force against Duty’s headquarters and burn it to the ground. I swear it.
“You bastard. Why don’t you shoot us right here, right now? A damned big victory for you, with half of my men wounded!”
“Ah yes, that’s the cocky major speaking now. To answer you properly: first, we save our ammo for mutants and dushmans and don’t waste it on cockroaches like you. Second, I am actually being generous. You can survive at the Outpost after all… your chances are a hundred to one. Go for it!”
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Southern Comfort s-1 Page 12
