Chapter 8 Escape from death. First night ( B )

I was the first to get out over the wreckage of the bridge to the steep bank and began to help the girls up. At some point, I even had to go down and drag the stretcher with the wounded Lisa up the slope. And then I heard from above the surprised and frightened cries. Is there an alien spaceship? In two big jumps I was at the top. However, the alien hunter turned out to be nothing to do with it, the reason for the unrest was completely different ...

***

Somehow I didn't think about that. To the left of the road stood the old city church. And now several girls at once ran not to high-rise buildings, behind which it was possible to hide from flying death, but in fact in the opposite direction to the church. Among the fugitives, with some surprise, I recognized a plump girl with a doctor's case. Did Mila also disobey my order? Strangely, the doctor girl seemed quite adequate to me. I looked around. In front of the church stretched a wide, completely open area, where there was absolutely no place to hide from danger. Very bad place. I cursed sweetly.

Fortunately, the vast majority of the girls did not lose their heads and had already disappeared around the corner of the high-rise building, finding themselves in a yard closed on all sides in relative safety. After making sure that everything was in order with them, I rushed after the fugitives. I also noticed from a distance that the fleeing girls, one after another, for some reason, stop at the gate to the church territory, not daring to come closer to the church building for some reason. Coming up with the stopped schoolgirls, I saw with my own eyes the cause of their confusion. The entire church yard was a continuous hodgepodge of charred corpses and fragments of human bodies. Especially many bodies were piled in front of the very door to the church. It seems that over the past 24 hours, many residents of the city have sought refuge in the temple. And they didn't find it.

- It's closed. Let's go to the others! I said to the fugitives as calmly as possible.

I didn't seem to be heard. Then I reassuringly touched the shoulder of one of the girls, offering to turn around and leave. But the girl abruptly pulled away and rushed forward. She ran to the locked door and began to beat on it, screaming hysterically and begging to let her inside the church.

The black ship is back! - came from afar the frightened cry of Gali, who continued to regularly perform her duties as a sentinel.

I turned to the frightened girls standing nearby and said:

- You can stay here. And then you will die like Kotova Masha. But I'm going to live. And if you want to live too, run with me!

Mila and another girl obediently nodded and rushed across the road after me. The third girl stood for another five seconds in indecision, then shouted something to her friend, who was stubbornly knocking on the door of the church, and also hurried after the others. I didn't look back anymore, as I already noticed a dark triangle descending in the night sky. Hope now was only on the speed of the legs. Managed! Only after hiding behind the corner of the building and making sure that the three girls who had obeyed me had also escaped, I caught my breath a little and decided to find out the fate of the last fugitive. He crept up to the corner of the house and cautiously peered out.

I noticed a girl who almost ran to the shelter, and a hunter who had already descended, hovering in the same place near the hotel. The girl still had twenty meters to run to the shelter in the open space. My heart sank, too vividly I imagined what was about to happen. But the seconds ticked by, and for some reason the hunter did not shoot at the running target. Can't see in the dark? Too far for his weapons? And then I realized that the girl at the very last section was covered by the high dome of the clothing market, blocking the view of the alien ship. This fool is just lucky to be alive.

When the out of breath fugitive caught up with me and was safe, I could not restrain myself and gave her a slap in the face. Actually, even at school, I never raised my hand to the girls, but now, from the emotions that overwhelmed me, I didn't hit so much that the girl even flew off and rolled head over heels on the asphalt.

- Idiot! Stupid chicken! The fact that you are still breathing is a miracle. You want to die, to hell with you! But you could bring danger here. Because of you, our entire group almost died!

Several girls, although they were visibly afraid of me - an angry, barely familiar man, nevertheless stepped forward and blocked their fallen friend. I got embarrassed and dropped my fists. And he was already very sorry that he could not restrain himself.

Victor, calm down. Zina Krylova will be severely punished, - Liza Svyatova intervened and added that all four girls who disobeyed the order would be punished.

Zina silently stood up and ran her hand over her face, checking to see if blood was flowing. The girl's palm was indeed covered in blood. All my anger vanished in an instant.

Zina, I'm sorry! I couldn't resist, I was too worried about you. It seemed to me that you have no chance of surviving. I was afraid that the story with Masha Kotova would repeat itself.

"It's all right," the girl smiled slightly from the very corners of her lips. But I didn't want to die at all. Vice versa. It seemed to me that I saw a way to salvation. Easier than the road to our distant boarding school. Yes, I was wrong and I admit it. But I'm the only one to blame, the rest of my friends just ran after me. There is nothing to punish them for.

"No one will be punished," I announced. "I think that this case has served as a sufficient lesson for all of us."

***

The rest of the journey went without complications, soon the whole group safely reached the entrance. Lisa had to be carried to the apartment on the eighth floor. Although there was light in the building, but for some reason the elevator did not work, and the long stretcher did not turn around well in the flight of stairs. Therefore, I took the wounded girl in my arms and carried it myself. Climbing eight floors with a heavy backpack, a tent, and a girl in my arms was difficult, but I managed without even stopping for a breather. For some reason, it seemed important to me to cope with a difficult task in front of two dozen wards. Perhaps I wanted to strengthen my authority and impress the girls, or maybe I myself needed it in order to believe in myself.

The light in the apartment was on, but Zhenya was not in the rooms. I carefully placed Lisa on the sofa in my room, after which I immediately closed the window with thick curtains. The windows of this room overlooked the avenue, along which the flying hunter periodically cruised, so it was necessary to play it safe. Closing the window from a possible observer, I looked around. Girls crowded in the corridor, for some reason not daring to go into the room. Fortunately, Lisa explained the reason for such a strange behavior of her friends:

"Victor, you should take those posters off the wall. My classmates are very religious and posters like this hurt their feelings. I at least understand what the rock band "Aria" is, but the rest can be shocked by pictures with demons, pentagrams and inverted crosses. Yes, and pictures of naked women on the wall can also be embarrassing.

I looked at the large colored posters for the Blood for Blood and Calm albums. Demons, gargoyles, hellfire, signs of the Antichrist... I tried to imagine how these posters are seen by the pupils of the church school, and immediately rushed to shoot. At the same time, involuntarily blushing, he tore off pictures of naked girls in overly seductive poses. I crumpled all those papers and threw them in the trash can.

Only after that the girls came in, still timid and uncertain. Although the most nimble quickly grew bolder and immediately occupied the sofa. The less efficient ones sat down on chairs, on the desk, and even on the windowsill. The small room immediately became crowded. And although I brought a couple more chairs from the kitchen, still half of the girls had to stand or sit on backpacks. At that moment, the jingle of keys was heard in the corridor, Zhenya Oparev returned. He stopped at the door with his mouth open.

Don't worry, this is my neighbor. I'll arrange everything now! I said quickly, went out to my friend and closed the door to the room behind me.

Zhenya brought with him a whole box of expensive vodka. Two more boxes full of alcohol were already found in my friend's room.

"I bought Kolka from our neighbor on the floor, who works as a loader in the store," the friend explained, pushing the boxes into the corner of the room. "Today he stole several cases of vodka from the warehouse and sold three cases to me for a quarter of the price, fool. He does not understand that money will soon be worth nothing, and vodka will become the main currency. By the way, Kolyan invites all the neighbors to celebrate his unexpected wealth. He also has a snack there, also stolen from the store. I'm going there now, I need to heal my nerves. If you only knew what I had to go through today! Will you come with me?

My friend smelled strongly of alcohol. It seems that he and Kolka have already managed to wash a successful deal. I refused to go anywhere. Zhenya went to the window and lit a cigarette, then asked in a whisper:

- What kind of harem did you bring to us?

I briefly told the story of my meeting with schoolgirls, as well as that I promised to help them get to Sergiev Posad or build them in a safe place. Zhenya unexpectedly laughed and even dropped ashes on his shirt. Looking with displeasure at the burnt hole, my friend asked:

"And what did you demand for such a service?" A new girl every night?

- Stop sending! – I could not stand it, because I considered such humor now inappropriate. I didn't demand anything from them. It's just that they are boarding schools, completely helpless and do not orient themselves in our world at all. They have nowhere to go, and for one day I brought them here to our apartment. And I have a request for you. If you still go to drink until the morning, can you place some of the girls in your room? Not for long, just for one night.

- Okay, I'll help you out of old friendship. But only an agreement - so that by tomorrow evening there will be no trace of these girls in our apartment! And see that they do not dig into my things and do not touch my vodka. And then I know these boarding schools, they drag everything they see!

Zhenya left. I closed the front door behind him and breathed a sigh of relief. I did not expect that the character of my old friend would deteriorate so dramatically in just one day. I returned to the girls and in a deliberately cheerful voice said that everything was settled, and the apartment for the whole day was at their disposal. Delighted squeals and joyful cries became my reward for my labors. Several girls immediately raced to occupy the second bedroom, another group of schoolgirls took a turn in the bathroom.

But I went to the kitchen and looked longingly at the contents of the refrigerator: half a loaf of already slightly stale bread, three pitiful sausages in an open package, four eggs and an unfinished bottle of beer ... Sparsely, frankly. Especially when divided into twenty-five hungry mouths. But what can you do, I'm not used to stocking up.

Back in my room, I put my phone on charge and turned on the TV. There were news of the capital. Hundreds of black triangular ships circling over Moscow. Flaming cars on the Moscow Ring Road. Burning planes in Domodedovo. Metro train that fell into the Moscow River from the bridge. And everywhere there are corpses, corpses, corpses... I clicked through the channel and got to a speech for the press of the American vice president, which said that the death of the US president in a plane crash was officially confirmed, and that the United States had declared war on the aggressors, whoever they were. ..

Flicked the channel again. Two leaders of the factions of the State Duma of the Russian Federation argued how power should be transferred in conditions when there has been no news for a day about the fate of the country's president, who has left on an official visit to China, and the already confirmed death of the prime minister and defense minister.

The next channel had news again, this time live from Washington. The quality of the picture was terrible, but it was still possible to understand. A tired and some kind of rumpled correspondent was reporting live from a meeting of the UN Security Council, where for the tenth hour the diplomats of the leading countries were trying to find at least some kind of consensus on the issue of joint actions. The proposal of China to create a unified international command and transfer all the troops of the Earth to this single center was vetoed by representatives of Great Britain and the United States. The alternative proposal of the Americans to transfer aviation and air defense systems of NATO countries, and then all other countries, to direct subordination to the Pentagon also did not find understanding among the members of the UN Security Council.

Now the representatives of Germany, France and India were promoting the initiative to transfer the functions of a dictator with absolute powers to the UN Secretary General, but other members of the Security Council, in particular Russia and the United States, have already promised to veto ... The correspondent, clearly tired of all this stupid bureaucratic fuss, in in extremely harsh terms broadcast to the audience that the UN Security Council has once again demonstrated its absolute helplessness in conditions when it is necessary to make important and urgent decisions ...

I turned off the TV, threw the remote control down in frustration, and only then noticed how quiet the apartment had become. The girls, it turns out, also watched the news and were now silent, pale and shocked.

I didn't even think it was that bad! Lisa was the first to speak.

– And what are we to do? - Masha-Second was interested.

"I can't imagine yet..." I admitted, getting up and going to the window. "Now we just need to rest and preferably something to eat. How bad that the window overlooks the avenue. Let's turn off the light in this room and not turn it on, since our shadows are visible on the curtain, it's too dangerous.

The girls agreed, one of them flipped the switch, turning off the lights in the room. I cautiously looked out into the street. The avenue was not lit, but in the houses opposite, lights were burning in many windows. And for some reason, the light made its way from the grocery kiosk downstairs. Does the kiosk work? By the way, you can buy groceries there!

- Girls, I'll go outside, I'll try to bring food. You do not go anywhere and do not let anyone into the apartment. I have keys.

Before my resolve faltered, I took out all the cash that was stored there from the desk drawer, rushed out of the apartment and ran down the stairs. I went out into the yard, looked around and in short dashes I got to the stall that was really working that night. I looked into the window, sitting inside the shop, a lonely saleswoman even screamed in fright.

Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you. Can I buy something for food? I asked the older woman.

She nodded, then confessed that I was the only customer for this entire nightmarish day. I looked around again. Broken cars, dead people lying everywhere. It is even strange that this aunt survived in the midst of all this chaos and death.

- Was it scary?

- How scary! When everything here rumbled, I lay down on the floor, covered my head with my hands and tried not to move. I thought I would die too. She prayed, although she had never been a believer. And now it's just scary to go out when this is happening on the street. What are you going to take?

I examined the poor assortment of the counter. Cigarettes, beer, gin and tonic, bus passes... None of that interested me at all. But then I saw chocolate bars, crackers, nuts, seeds, chips, dried fish and squid rings...

"I need everything you have edible. As many as I can carry!

The saleswoman was not even surprised by such a strange order, starting to punch chips and chocolates. I collected four full large packages of products. The available money was not enough. But when I suggested to the saleswoman to wait a bit while I collect the missing amount in the pockets of the dead people lying around, she just waved her hand - they say, no, let's have as much as we can.

- Walk me to my house and consider that we are even. Otherwise, I'm afraid to go alone," the woman admitted.

She lived very close, literally two houses from here, so I easily agreed. True, I had to wait until the saleswoman sealed the cash register, wrote down the balance in the accounting journal, closed the kiosk and lowered the metal blinds on the windows of the stall. I was amazed and surprised by such scrupulousness of a woman - the devil knows what was going on around, and she tried to write carefully so as not to make blots in the inventory log!

- I used to be a local doctor, - this middle-aged, but not yet old woman explained. - She retired from the clinic last year. In the stall and pay more, and less responsibility.

- Tell me, could you apply plaster? - I asked the former doctor, told about the situation with Liza Svyatova and promised to pay the woman for her work.

Help your friend, of course. I'll find a bandage and a plaster. Not now, but when it's light. And then I got nervous today and I fall down.

I gladly agreed and even wrote down the address on a piece of paper so that the new acquaintance would not forget. Having escorted the woman to her entrance, I hurried to my house, because I myself was already simply falling from fatigue.