“Who was smarter?” I thought I must have misheard him.
“Well, that’s what she said. They told me that’s how she introduced herself.”
Oh, that Vika. Although…maybe that was a good move. She’d at least proved that she could make decisions and follow through with them.
“She gave us all the information we need, so our people are already on it. They may stop by your place, so don’t be afraid to let them in.”
“Of course.” His tone had relaxed, which I found immensely reassuring. “I’m sorry I didn’t call; my brain is a little scrambled.”
“Oh, about that.” I could hear through the phone how he snapped his fingers. “Our doctor will be coming to check you over in a couple hours.”
“I’m fine.” I tried to brush him off.
“And that’s what he’s there to make sure of.” Zimin was barely listening to me anymore. “You’ll feel better; we’ll all feel better.”
“Thanks.” I really was touched. Sure, you have to take care of the pig before you chop it up for bacon, but it was still nice of him.
“And remember, you’re under our protection. Vika, too, by the way, so give her my phone number. I already trust her more than I trust you when it comes to your safety. Just don’t forget to invite me to the wedding.”
“Ah, it hurts to laugh,” I said. Zimin chuckled and hung up.
The doctor came by and impressed me. He was much better than your everyday clinician, and he made sure I was okay. My ribs weren’t broken, all my cuts and scrapes were taken care of, and no abscesses would be showing up. I was supposed to sleep and take some vitamins, though you can never get enough of either, as it is. He declined 1,000 rubles and left.
An hour later, the security officers stopped by. They weren’t alone. With them, were the trio who’d attacked me the day before, and they dropped them—already not in the best shape—on my floor.
“Here they are,” said a hefty gentleman by the name of Evgeny, nodding in their direction. “They’re the ones who beat you up yesterday.”
“Wow, they really are young. Even younger than I thought,” I replied. “It was dark, so I didn’t get a good look at them, and then once they started, I had other things to worry about.”
They looked to all be between 18 and 20.
“It’s the kids that are the most dangerous,” said the second security guy, who was short, equally hefty, and didn’t introduce himself. “They wouldn’t think twice about slipping a knife between your ribs. That’s just what gets them going in the mornings.”
“So, what do you want us to do with them?” asked Evgeny.
“What do you mean?” I shrugged reflexively before gasping from the pain. “Take them to the forest, dig a hole, bullet to the brain, call it a day. Just make sure they give my money back first.”
“Got it. We already got the money, by the way.” Evgeny held out an envelope that was greasy and seemed to have lost some weight. “Well, what was left, at least. That’s it then?”
He kicked one of the three.
“Up, you trash, it’s time for a quick trip out of the city,” he said to them, as they sat meekly on the floor. “Although, you only have a one-way ticket.”
That’s when I realized that they were actually planning on killing them. I’d been joking, but they weren’t. Raidion gets points for discipline, at least!
“Hold on,” I said to Evgeny. He stopped and turned around with a look on his face that wondered if I’d changed my mind.
“There was a lot more money than this,” I said angrily. “Three times as much.”
I had to save the trio from their appointment with the firing squad. It wasn’t that I felt bad for them. My conscience wasn’t the cleanest as it was, but I had no desire to add three lives to it.
“We’ll give it back,” one of the three suddenly said in a passionate tone. “We’ll give back the money. We’ll give you more. Just don’t kill us.”
“I don’t need more,” I replied. “Just mine.”
“So, you’re just going to let them go?” asked Evgeny sharply.
“Of course not,” I answered, squatting down with a slight grimace in front of the one with the all-too-familiar features. “Why would we do that? We need to teach them a lesson. Hi there, Raville.”
He cast an appraising glance at me but kept his mouth shut.
“Oh, come on, this is all your fault. If you had just offered to fight me one-on-one for your sister’s honor instead of all jumping me at once, I would have let it go, if you hadn’t threatened me, mocked me, stolen from me. But now you have to answer for it. Are you a man?”
His mouth remained shut.
“Don’t want to say anything? Good choice; there’s nothing to say.”
“Don’t kill the guys,” Raville said. “They’ll give you the money—I swear.”
The security guys laughed.
“Of course they will. What choice do they have?” asked one of them.
This one’s not as rotten as he seems. He said not to kill the other two, but he didn’t say anything about himself, I thought.
“So, what’s the plan?” asked Evgeny.
“Well, they’ll give me back the money, and we’ll call it a day.”
“No punishment?” asked the nameless hulk, all business.
“Of course!” I grunted and assumed the dark voice of a Very Serious Villain to make it perfectly clear I wasn’t joking. “Break a limb, whichever one you want, for those two and snap Raville’s fingers. But, please, leave their spines alone; I don’t want them invalids.”
“Got it,” said the hulk with a laugh. “Let’s go, you clowns.”
I closed the door and noticed that what I was feeling wasn’t fear. It was an unpleasantly sticky feeling that told me I’d gotten involved in something I couldn’t understand or handle on my own.
It was very clear that if I made a single wrong move or bad decision, I’d have that same Evgeny dropping by to pay me a visit and put a bullet in my head. He’d made it clear how willing he was. It was his job, and that was that. Sure, I was under their protection for the time being, but that was because they needed me. What will happen when they don’t need me anymore? They’d probably give me some reward and cut me loose, or maybe give me some cushy job in the company. Here, you just keep editing the paper. But that would be only if I didn’t make a mistake. So, I had to be ten, twenty times as careful about everything I did. My best interests were at stake.
There was only one problem; how does one never make a mistake?
Chapter Two
In which the hero finally heads north.
There was no time for me to catch my breath. No sooner had the group tramped out the door than Vika called, clearly worried that I might start yelling at her for taking matters into her own hands. Once she figured out that there would be no reprisal, she filled me in on what was going on at work and sent me the draft issue. I gave her a few pointers.
Next, my underlings called to express their sympathy. Certainly, they had no idea what had actually happened. Instead, Vika had thought up and told them an “official” version, that I had sprained an ankle. Their social calls were well done; they were starting to figure out how the world works.
A few hours later, Evgeny showed up yet again—this time alone—to give me a stack of money. He asked me to count it and give him a call immediately if any was missing. I promised I would.
That night, a tired Vika returned, spent a good while looking me over, clucked, and nodded in satisfaction. I told her about the doctor and assured her that he cut quite the impressive figure.
“Hey, so you don’t mind that I called Raidion?” she asked a couple of hours later, obviously making up her mind to just ask me if I was mad about what she did. It clearly weighed on her.
“Vika, you did what you thought needed to be done. Why should I be mad about that?” I said in a neutral tone. “Zimin asked me to thank you and give you his direct number. That way you can call him
if anything else happens to me.”
“Give me Zimin’s number?” said Vika in surprise. “Wow.”
“Yup. You picked up your 100 reputation points today,” I continued. “It sounds like they trust you more than they trust me. Women are always more level-headed than us men, so there you go.”
“I think you’re still judging me,” muttered Vika, a touch insulted.
“Sweetie, let’s leave the romance novels at home, ok?” I asked. “You did what you did. I would have taken care of the problem a bit differently, but that’s water under the bridge at this point. And, honestly, Raidion was more effective than I would have been. Regardless, let’s call that issue settled.”
Vika sighed in relief, and I decided to change the subject.
“By the way, does your sister wonder where you are? I mean, sure, you’re an adult, but still…”
“My sister?” Vika’s brows arched. “No, she’s fine. I told her that I moved in with my boyfriend.”
Well, isn’t she the decisive one? As usual, nobody asked for my opinion. It was the hallmark of our emancipated times—if you get tired of waiting for something to happen, do it yourself.
“What did she have to say about that?”
“Nothing, really. ‘But you just met! You barely know each other!’” Vika’s hands flew to her cheeks as she mimicked her sister.
“There’s something to that, to be fair,” I noted loyally. “What did you say?”
“Me?” Vika giggled. “I told her that I live and sleep with a normal, live man, while all she has is her digital creations in the game. And she’s thirty!”
“That was kind of harsh…”
“It’s fine. She told me she has someone now, too, though she made it sound like they met in the game.”
“That happens. You meet online and then take your relationship out into the real world.”
“Oh, who needs her?” Vika snorted. “She’s been like that her entire life—a quiet, boring nerd.”
“Sounds like you guys have a great relationship.”
“Oh, forget her. Instead, why don’t you tell me—”
Vika was interrupted by our landline ringing. I was about to get up when she stopped me and got up herself. Half a minute later, she glanced in from the hall, which was where my grandfather’s old fossil of a rotary phone was (I certainly didn’t need a city number in the digital age, so I’d just let it sit there). She had a strange look on her face.
“It’s for you.”
I walked over, picked up the phone, and almost went deaf.
“Nikiforov, you bastard! You know what I’m going to do to you for what you did to Raville? You’re going to be sorry you were ever born! You—”
“El, why don’t you be quiet for a second and listen to me?” I had to interrupt her stream of consciousness with a sharp shout. A more delicate and refined approach would have been steamrolled into oblivion.
“So, now you’re going to shut me up?” The shriek was deafening. “You loser deadbeat—”
“Listen to me!” I could feel my blood starting to boil. I’d had enough of the whole Gizmatullin clan over the past couple days. “If you don’t shut your hole right now, I swear to God that I will make you regret your words, and oh, how sincere that regret will be.”
“What are you going to do?” Her tone was the same, though her voice had dropped a couple decibels. “Sic your dogs on me like you did with Raville?”
“You think I just did that to Raville?” I guess he’s more of a rat than I thought. “Right. What did he tell you happened? Just so we’re on the same page.”
“He hasn’t said anything. But I imagine he went over to talk to you man to man, like normal people. I don’t know why; I didn’t ask him to do anything. But you didn’t want to talk, so you had some of your jailbird friends break his arm. They even took a hammer to his fingers!”
“Oh, wow.” I nearly sat down on the floor in surprise. First, because I was stunned by her version. She’d always had a vivid imagination, but that was pretty far out there even for her… Second, I was sure that Evgeny realized I was joking about the second point. Apparently not. They took me seriously, and the unlucky trio paid the price. “Really? So that’s how it happened?”
“I’m sure of it,” announced El grandly. “I know you, you bastard.”
“You shouldn’t have trusted your intuition this time,” I answered. “It was pretty much exactly the opposite of that. He met me at the entrance to my building yesterday with two of his friends and lit into me. Then, as if that weren’t enough, they stole my money right out of my pocket and promised they’d be back soon for more. I wasn’t a big fan of that idea, so I asked my new employer for help. Their security, as you can see, explained to your brother and his friends that stealing isn’t right, and beating people up isn’t great either. Believe me; they got off lightly. Though I didn’t think they were going to break anything. Apparently, people like that don’t have a sense of humor.”
“You’re lying like you always do,” said El with conviction.
“Oh, God. Hey, babe, hand me my phone,” I said to Vika.
“Oh, she’s already ‘babe’?” El said mockingly. “You aren’t married yet?”
“Not yet,” I answered, glancing at Vika as she gave me my phone. “So far, we’re just living together, but I think we’ll be stopping by the ZAGS[1] soon. You’d be surprised, but it turns out there are women in this world who do more than yell and fool around. They cook, clean, and iron, too. Incredible, right? How can you not marry someone like that? As it turns out, being full and clean is better than being hungry and dirty.”
Vika’s eyes gleamed triumphantly. Hearing something like that and humiliating my ex at the same time? What a day!
El said nothing.
“Babe, take a picture of me from the waist up. Hold on, let me take off my shirt.” I put the phone down on the shelf. Vika pressed a button, and I saw the flash go off.
“I’m sending you the proof,” I said into the phone as I sent her the picture. “Take a look and see how much fun your brother had.”
“I don’t think I need to see any nude shots from you.”
“I’m telling you, just look,” I added a cold edge to my voice. “You may not need to see the picture, but I could check with the police. Maybe they need to see it.”
There was silence on the other end of the line until I heard El’s voice cut back in. She was, of course, a bitch through and through, but she wasn’t an idiot. I knew that much.
“Raville really did this?”
“Naturally,” I confirmed. “And he really did take my money.”
El was skeptical. “How do you have money? Is there something I don’t know?”
“It just so happens that there is,” I answered, “since, just recently, I’ve been doing more than just work at the paper. I’m now involved with a much larger corporation, though I won’t say which, and they’re paying me quite a bit. You know how it is, big company, big pay…”
“Sounds like you’re telling the truth,” El said slowly. “They got Raville good, and Uncle Anas said we should leave you alone.”
“I’m telling you; he got off easy,” I assured her. “You should be thanking me that he’s there with you right now.”
“Oh, you just wait!” announced El sharply. “Tomorrow, I’m going to make sure everyone knows what you did. I’m—”
“A landmine ready to go off—that’s what you are. Your Uncle Anas was right. Do you realize that I could have your brother thrown in prison right now for stealing? It would even be aggravated since he was with a group and planned it in advance. And just look at what he did to me. We’ll find witnesses, so you don’t have to worry about that. That should be enough to give him five to seven, easy. But I have a different idea. I want to put this behind us, and I’ll even forget about the money your brother still owes me. I’ll forget the whole thing. But you have to promise me that I’ll never again see or hear anything from you or yo
ur brother. You have your life, and I have mine. Let’s just leave each other alone.”
“You really are a bastard,” I heard from the other end of the line. “I had no idea.”
“You reap what you sow,” I answered. “Or did you think I was just going to kiss your ass while I’m getting yelled at, beat up, and robbed? You still didn’t answer me, woman. Do we have a deal?”
“Yes,” El answered before hanging up.
I breathed a sigh of relief, leaned up against the wall, and complained to Vika. “That family will be the death of me.”
She was standing there with a satisfied smile on her face and winked at me. “So, we’re heading to the ZAGS soon?”
I decided not to take the bait. “I’m hungry. Want to order a pizza? Maybe with ham and pepperoni, something nice and filling?”
***
The excitement of the week’s beginning faded into the past, and I had a great Thursday. I couldn’t play yet since my body still ached, but I watched more TV than I had the previous few years combined. As it turned out, there’s plenty to watch during the day—who needs evening or weekend TV? I got the feeling that “prime time” is just a concept thought up by TV bosses to get more people watching their shows.
That evening, I read through the third release of the Fayroll Times and was very happy with my team’s work. A recognizable face and style were emerging with each subsequent issue.
***
On Friday, I saw Vika off on her way to work and closed the door behind her with a quietly happy feeling, ready to jump back into the capsule—life in Fayroll was pretty good. It was certainly quieter and more welcoming. Although to be fair, you never knew where to look for the next arrow flying at you… Maybe it was the fact that you could rely on yourself more in the game, rather than being so dependent on the people around you? Who knows…?
Winds of Fate Page 2
