Books

I'm looking for some really terrible literature for a project, and i'd like to use stuff in the public domain. Can anyone recommend some stuff you'd never recommend? Stuff on the level of My Immortal, except i'm pretty sure that one is protected.

— What about the monks?

— What about them? — The gray-haired man turned to his partner, giving him a bewildered look.

It felt as though they were continuing an interrupted conversation, even though the old man hadn’t breathed a word about monks. The younger man looked sheepish.

— Well, you mentioned a monastery on an island the other day. Do monks live there?

The old man smirked into his mustache.

— You’re a funny one, Yurka. What do you need them for? Who are you? You, Yurka, are a scavenger. Your job is to go out and haul goods back home. That’s what I’m teaching you. Now, when we go to Barnaul… that’s the place… there’s plenty to find there. — The man rolled his eyes dreamily.

— Uncle, you said yourself that nothing’s left of Barnaul. What’s there to gather? Just charred stones. Life only survived in the mountains. Our community, for instance…

— You’re right about that. If we find anything, it’ll be in the mountains. You want me to tell you a story?

Yurka fidgeted impatiently on his rock.

— I see you do.

The older man rolled a cigarette and lit up. The pause stretched on, until Yurka hesitantly prompted him:

— The story…

— I was young then, just a bit older than you. It was a terrifying time. Right after the Strike, nature seemed to go mad. Storms, nothing but snow. That’s when it happened. I was coming from the city.

— From Barnaul?

— If you keep interrupting, I won’t tell you a damn thing. From Barnaul, of course. Where else? How I survived is a story for another time. Но I realized right away that I had to head for the mountains. Where else would anyone be left alive? And then, all of a sudden, as if by a wave of a hand, the sky cleared and a low rumble echoed… I went face-down into the snow. “That’s it,” I thought, “those bastards launched a rocket just for me, to finish off the last man standing.” I’m lying there, looking at the heavens. And there’s a ball of fire flying across the sky… with a trail of smoke behind it. It disappeared behind the mountains…

The old man took a drag and fell silent. Yurka couldn’t help himself.

— And then?

— That’s it… end of story.

— But what was it?

— How should I know? There was no explosion. So, it wasn’t a rocket. Maybe a UFO—aliens coming to look at the mess we made—or maybe a meteor burning up. I didn’t care much back then. I stayed alive, and for that, I was grateful.

— And after that?

— What about after that? I had other things to worry about. Who’d be interested in that? Except maybe the monks, they’re the ones who collect all sorts of tall tales.

— So there are monks?!! — Yurka practically jumped.

The old man grunted, embarrassed that he had let it slip.

— Yes, there are monks, there are… You think our medic goes to the mountains for nothing? Well, yes, for medicinal herbs. Но where does he get them? From the monks. There’s an island on the river up in the mountains; that’s where they live.

---

This conversation lodged itself in Yurka’s restless head and wouldn’t budge. It wasn’t just the lure of uncharted distances and untrodden paths filled with mysterious beasts—that was the curse of an entire generation already tethered firmly to the community—but now, there was a secret. Why were the elders hiding it? A whole secluded community of monks living on a remote island in the middle of a river. Why live so isolated? And why did everyone know about them but keep it quiet?

These questions had kept Yurka awake for three nights now. He tossed and turned on his hard bench that served as a bed, occasionally lifting his head from the pillow to make sure his uncle was deep asleep, snoring loudly and snuffling.

“No, I can’t take this anymore.” He sat up on the bench, dangling his long, spindly legs. Yurka considered himself a very experienced scavenger. True, every run he had under his belt had been done under his uncle’s watchful eye, but there had been nearly twenty of them, which was no small feat. He could even take pride in a couple of outings where he’d pulled his more experienced partner out of a jam. Of course, he modestly remained silent about how many times his uncle had pulled him out of whatever mess he’d stumbled into—usually thanks to a certain “sharp itch” in his backside that kept him from living a quiet life. Ultimately, if his uncle didn’t talk about it, then it didn’t count.

Having convinced himself of his own mastery, Yurka decided he was ready for a solo run. He wiggled his bare toes in the chill air, as if the movement confirmed it was time to go. He had long ago decided where to go—the Monastery. Since it was his run, the choice of route was his too. Yurka even smirked in the dark, feeling his own importance. Visions danced before his eyes: him returning in glory from the monks with a backpack full of medicinal herbs for the healer; and more importantly, the admiring, slightly bashful gaze of Katka, the prettiest girl in the community…

These thoughts chased Yurka out of bed. There was nothing left to ponder—he was an adult now and had the right to be his own master. He quickly pulled on his trousers, wound his footwraps, and shoved his feet into oversized kirza boots. He stomped once, then turned toward his uncle in a panic. But the man slept on, breathing peacefully under the blanket. Risking no further noise, Yurka crept into the entryway, grabbing his canvas jacket and a rucksack from a nail on the wall. He paused by the gun cabinet, tempted by his partner’s Kalashnikov, but decided his familiar double-barreled shotgun was more reliable. He took it along with a bandolier stuffed with shells. That was it—all that was left was to step out into the forest!

At that thought, Yurka froze on the threshold, looking around in confusion. The village was enclosed by a two-meter-high palisade. The fence had served them well, more than once protecting the community from over-curious wild beasts and desperate men. Yurka still remembered the bandit raid the adults had fought off five years ago. Of course, he could have easily scaled the fence from the inside, but he felt it was beneath his dignity to flee the village like a naughty schoolboy. With this firm conviction, he headed confidently toward the gates.

He was in luck. Grandpa Mityay was on guard duty today. Not a particularly old man, but possessed of a shaggy gray beard, Mityay loved to fuss over the children in his spare time, telling them stories of life before the war. The nickname the kids had given him stuck like glue. Now even the adults older than Mityay occasionally called him that.

Yurka approached the gates and sat down beside the guard with a sigh, resting the butt of his shotgun on the ground.

Mityay glanced at the young scavenger. — You’re up early today…

Yurka shrugged, as if to say he was shocked himself but it wasn’t his fault, and let out another heavy sigh.

Grandpa Mityay gave a knowing smile. — What, did they drag you out of bed but forget to wake you up? — He ruffled Yurka’s messy hair. — Where’s your partner?

— Getting dressed. — Yurka looked at the fence with a bored expression. — Grandpa Mityay, let me out the gate. While I wait for my uncle, I’ll go pick some raspberries.

Outside the walls, the palisade was heavily overgrown with wild raspberry bushes. The brambles served as a decent substitute for barbed wire, so the patch was never cleared. Moreover, during the day when the gates were open, children were often allowed to pick berries under the watchful eye of the guards. It was a rare treat. Yurka knew this and had made it the cornerstone of his escape plan.

— You crazy? — Mityay tapped his temple. — It’s too early. I can’t open the gates yet.

— Yeah, it’s early, — Yurka agreed, sighing heavily again.

Grandpa Mityay squinted at the sun rising over the forest. — Fine, you’ve got your gun. But stay right by the gates. I’ll keep the doors ajar… if anything happens, fire both barrels immediately.

— What do you mean, “if anything”?

— Nothing specific… a bear, for instance. Or don’t you want to go?

— No, no, I do! — Yurka jumped up and grabbed his shotgun. — I’ll be right here, right by the gate. I’ve got a full bandolier. — He slapped his belt for emphasis. — I could take down a whole herd of bears.

— Get going then, — Mityay laughed, — before I change my mind.

He groaned as he stood up from the stump that served as his bench and slid back the heavy wooden bolt. Peering outside, he grunted. The forest edge was shrouded in a damp mist.

— I don’t know why you’re so keen at this hour… — Yurka didn’t stay to hear exactly what he was keen for. He slipped through the gates and vanished into the nearest thicket of raspberries.

There it was—freedom! Intoxicating and dizzying.

---

Yurka ran down the path as if being chased. The main thing was to get far away from the community; then no one could interfere with his plans.

“Plans… Do I even have a plan? Where am I running?” This thought stopped the guy more effectively than a concrete wall. He was breathing heavily, looking around. “I need a plan. I could run all the way to Barnaul like this, but I wouldn’t get any closer to the monks. What did Uncle say? In the mountains, on a river island, where the medic went.” Yurka stepped off the path and pulled out his map. A river? The nearest river was the Chemal to the south; to the east was a huge lake, but that was too far—the medic wouldn’t have returned so quickly, he’d been absent from the community for about three days. So, it had to be the river. It was only about ten kilometers away, but a river is a river; you can go both with the current and against it… And Yurka didn’t know these route details. “Might as well go back.” The boy looked doubtfully at the path leading back to the community. No, if he returned, he could forget about the expedition forever, and about scavenging too. They wouldn’t let him outside the fence again. He looked at the map one more time. “Alright, I’ll get to the river, then I’ll figure out the direction. If the medic went to the monks alone, it can’t be that far. Maybe I’ll find his tracks.” The thought calmed him. He, a seasoned scavenger, could give the medic a head start in forest travel—surely he could manage?

Having decided on his direction, Yurka didn’t hesitate for another second. The morning forest breathed freshness and squelched with moss underfoot. Fog settled on the leaves in large drops that, rolling down, loudly splashed onto the brown wet bark, dispersing into a watery spray, only to collect again on the level below. A heavy drop hit Yurka on the crown of his head and rolled down his closely-cropped neck, getting under his collar. The boy cursed, trying to reach the runaway somewhere around his shoulder blades. It was no use. The cold water droplet quickly reached his lower back. Shuddering from the unpleasant sensation, he cursed again, pulled the hood of his jacket over his head, and quickened his pace. The moss beneath his boots squelched loudly, greeting the traveler, and the trees sheltered him from the gloomy heavens, which ceaselessly shed moisture. The forest was weeping, it always wept. As Uncle used to say: the taiga is our sad neighbor. “He came up with a strange name for the forest, taiga. As far as I’m concerned, a forest is a forest even in Africa. Although, if Uncle is to be believed, this forest stretches north for thousands of kilometers, to where there’s nothing but solid, never-melting ice.” Yurka tried to imagine how far several thousand kilometers was, but even Lake Teletskoye, less than a hundred kilometers from the village, seemed like it was on the other side of the world.

About two hours later, he found the right trail, which snaked between trees, disappearing into bushes and reappearing between the thick trunks of cedars and firs. The well-trodden earth was more suitable for hiking than the springy moss, and Yurka quickened his pace. The shotgun tugged at his shoulder, the strap constantly slipping, pulling down the rucksack strap with it, forcing him to keep adjusting them. Finally, the boy couldn’t take it anymore and carried the weapon at the ready. The forest didn’t inspire fear. Of course, hungry predators occasionally wandered in here, but even they knew that the territory belonged to humans, who were still the most dangerous in this world, and that the desire to feast on human flesh could cost them their lives. Wolves and lynxes roamed the vicinity, and bears rarely wandered in. But wolves were only dangerous in winter when they gathered in packs and hunger drove them towards any danger. Lynx were very cautious themselves. A massive cat, dangerous and stealthy, it could take off a head with one powerful swipe of its paw. To see one meant to certainly bid farewell to life. Yurka was very afraid of this beast, but thankfully, they lived further north, closer to the contaminated territories. Yurka had never actually seen a bear. Uncle said that this giant lived somewhere beyond the river in the mountains, in caves… and hadn’t appeared near the village for the last five years.

Yurka trotted along the path. His tracker’s gaze noted the tracks of wild boars and roe deer. “There’s a wolf paw print… And this one…?” Yurka didn’t know whose track it was. It looked like… a bird’s, three-toed, but the size of a hand. Sharp claws had dug up the soil, as if the creature was chasing someone or, conversely, running away itself. Yurka straightened up and looked ahead. The trail was clearly an animal one, but people used it too: here was a print from a kirza boot on a moss-covered fallen tree across the path, and there—a wool thread caught in the branches. Yurka remembered that the medic’s knitted hat was exactly that color. So, he was on the right track. Cheered, he continued on. The path again disappeared into dense bushes; the boy pushed aside the branches with the barrel of his shotgun and found himself in a small forest clearing. In the middle of the open space, clear of thickets, stood an enormous black moose, its broad, branched antlers, about a meter and a half long each, turned threateningly towards the uninvited guest. Yurka froze in his tracks. It seemed the beast occupied the entire clearing, surpassing a tall man in height at the shoulders—it turned its muscular neck and stared at the scavenger with intelligent, brown, and for some reason, sad eyes, thoughtfully chewing the succulent grass for which it had wandered into this forest meadow. The staring contest lasted about five minutes, and the moose was the first to break. It snorted loudly and stomped a long leg, as if saying it wasn’t going to give up its dinner table to anyone, not even a man with a shotgun. Yurka slowly backed away. The shotgun, pressed against his chest, seemed like a small twig that would do this forest giant no harm. The moose watched its guest with a stern gaze, and as soon as he disappeared into the branches, resumed its interrupted meal.

Circumventing the meadow, Yurka with difficulty found the desired trail and, like a frightened rabbit, scurried along it. He only stopped after about five minutes. Breathing heavily, the boy looked back. He couldn’t shake the feeling that the gaze of the moose king was still boring into the back of his head.

From then on, Yurka walked cautiously and no longer rushed ahead thoughtlessly like a madman. One lesson from her majesty the taiga was enough, for instead of a peaceful moose, it could have been a wolf, or a cat, or even the master of the forest—a bear.

By the time the sun, painted as a bright spot on the thick clouds, was overhead, the boy finally emerged from the thicket onto a road marked on his map with the meaningless words “Chemal – Uozhan.” The old road, when he stumbled upon it, almost disappointed him—perhaps in old times it had a smooth surface, but time, neglect, and wild vegetation spreading with greedy force had utterly broken and shattered it. Nevertheless, for someone who had never seen asphalt before, it was a miracle. People once drove on it, hidden in iron machines. Yurka knew this; he had seen photographs of such machines at home, and on his scavenging trips with his uncle through abandoned villages, he had more than once come across rusty hulks on deflated rubber wheels. As if rejoicing, the sun peeked out from behind the clouds, illuminating the road and painting the forest with bright colors. Yurka stood on the roadside, unsure which way to go. The path to the left was no better than the path to the right, and the old asphalt bore no tracks like those the medic left on the trail. Somewhere below, the river roared. Yurka crossed to the other side and peered into the ravine from which the sound of splashing water came. The river wasn’t wide, only about ten meters. A turbulent current rushed over wet stones at furious speed, disappearing around a bend. It was hard to imagine an island here where monks would live. All that was left was to walk along the river until it became wide enough. Yurka looked at the map again. The river, winding among the rocks, ran to the northwest, and a road accompanied its bank. Like two friends, one living and one fossilized, they disappeared beyond the edge of the map—what lay beyond, Yurka did not know. He had never ventured so far.

---

Walking along the stony road was physically easier, yet somehow more taxing: Yurka felt as exposed as a man naked in a bathhouse—open and defenseless. Constantly looking back and jumping at every sound from the forest, he had to force himself not to break into a run. Sometimes he would step to the edge of the cliff if an inconspicuous path seemed to lead that way, but he saw no more of the medic’s tracks. The river rushing below remained just as narrow, noisy, and fast. There wasn’t even a sign of an island. Well, there were tiny islets, of course, but only a single monk could fit on them, provided he made no sudden movements that might send him tumbling into the rapids.

But what weighed on Yurka most was a strange sensation, like a heavy burden resting on his shoulders. If the forest lived its own life and accepted the boy as part of itself, the road was dead. Perhaps that was what kept him from relaxing—he felt like an intruder upon it. A living man was not meant to be among the dead. More than once, he caught himself wanting to bolt back into the saving canopy of his native thickets. There, everything was clear: yes, you might be eaten, but your fate was in your own hands. But here… The houses standing by the road were just as lifeless, watching the lone traveler with the empty eye sockets of their windows. He reflexively quickened his pace, trying to outrun that dead stare.

Only once did Yurka veer from his path. Two identical rivers merged into one, forming a narrow peninsula. A turnoff led there from the main road—which the boy was thoroughly tired of—and a faded billboard, where the face of a blonde beauty could still be discerned, read: “Sunny Haven Resort.” Yurka couldn’t resist. His legs were already throbbing from the long journey, and the phrase “resort” amplified the exhaustion weighing him down.

A short path led him to a parking lot in front of a two-story building. The house itself was a ruin of ash: skeletons of crumbling brick walls with rusted iron roofing sheets fallen inward, eaten away like an old coat by moths. Yurka lingered near the ruins, looking hopefully at a couple of cars parked there, but their condition was little better than the resort’s, so he went on his way. His desire to rest vanished instantly. From then on, he ignored the beckoning billboards that appeared more and more frequently, passing them by and even picking up his pace. Along the road, he was now constantly met by old ruins where the forest was already reclaiming the territory once cleared by men.

Yurka felt he was approaching his goal. The flow of water to his left grew larger and deeper, until finally, the young scavenger reached the bank of a wide river into which the Chemal flowed. The day was already tilting toward sunset—Yurka hadn’t noticed it ending. The journey had swallowed the day like a hungry wolf, gulping it down before even tasting it. The high bank offered a magnificent view of the river: somewhere to the right, barely a kilometer away in the middle of the water, stood a rocky island where buildings could be seen. The monotonous, mournful tolling of a bell drifted across the surface of the water.

— I made it, — Yurka said aloud, not realizing he’d spoken.

As if someone on the island had heard him, a small boat appeared from behind the bushes. A black silhouette inside worked an oar skillfully, switching from side to side. The boy suddenly felt a prickle of anxiety; this approaching, silent monk, wrapped in a strange black shroud, looked far too unlike an ordinary person. But this was why he had come—to see the peculiar inhabitants of this secluded island hidden on the river. He began hopping down the rocks toward the water.

— Hello, — Yurka said politely to the stranger in the hood.

— And greetings to you, young man. — The monk peered out from the black fabric as if from a burrow. His thick gray beard and mustache twitched as if in a smile. — You aren’t the medic… and you don’t look like a stranger, either. Why have you come?

— For herbs. I was, uh… sent.

— Oh, you’re a healthy liar, boy! Lying is a sin. No matter, get in anyway; a sinner as great as you won’t sink the boat.

Yurka jumped from a rock into the flat-bottomed boat, nearly capsizing it, but the old man, used to handling his craft, easily steadied the tilt and pushed off from the shore with his oar. Waves lapped against the sides. The traveler huddled fearfully in the stern, not so much because of the unfamiliar movement over the water, but because of the monk’s gaze, which had become invisible once more. The shadow of the hood hid his face, leaving only the tip of his beard in the light. The strange clothes and words unsettled the boy.

— Why do you wear such a robe? — The long habit, belted with a rope, looked uncomfortable, but its owner didn’t complain; it was clear he was used to it.

— It’s warm, and what else does an old man need? I suppose I could put a windbreaker over it; the wind is always blowing on the river. Look under the bench, there’s one there. Put it on, or you’ll catch a cold. You were running, weren’t you?

Yurka, who had been sweating profusely, didn’t feel cold, but he didn’t want to wrap himself in someone else’s rags. He turned his head, watching the receding shore and the high island looming overhead like a dark giant. The remnants of a suspension bridge that once connected it to the world still jutted over the cliff like laundry piers. Yurka shivered. From the thickets on the island’s shore, the sad stone face of a woman holding an infant looked down at him. The boy shifted on the roughly hewn wooden seat.

— Do not fear, lad. Our Guardian will not harm you, — the monk said with a broad gesture, crossing himself toward the miraculous image emerging from the rock.

A wooden staircase with rope railings led upward from the pier. The monk climbed it with practiced ease—the steps creaked, and the wind pressed him against the rock as if supporting him to prevent a fall. Yurka froze, looking around with hungry curiosity.

— Why are you standing there? Come in, since you’re already here. — The old man was putting his fishing gear into a small shed. It seemed he had been just about to leave, which was why the boat had come so quickly after the bell signaled a person on the bank.

From the height, the view of the river and the forest opened up—endless, thick, and green. From here, the way back through it was impossible to discern. The enchanted Yurka had to be pulled away from the edge to finally face the skete. There they were, the herbs… Small garden beds were tufted with greens; he recognized carrots and beets, but the rest weren’t grown back home. Two figures in black robes stood in the garden, carefully pulling weeds. A wooden chapel, old and blackened by time, stood near the living quarters, glowing softly from within with candlelight and the glint of icon frames. The door was open, and an elder with a staff stood on the threshold.

— We have a guest, brothers. What is your name?

— Yurka… — the boy introduced himself hesitantly.

— Come in, Yuri, servant of God, to the refectory. We shall feed you whatever God has provided.

The food was hearty; a pile of roach fried in vegetable oil lay on a platter. But the scavenger hadn’t come for dinner, and it felt strange to sit at a table with these brothers in black robes. He hadn’t yet found the moment to state the true purpose of his journey. The elder, as ancient as the oak tree outside his community’s palisade, looked sternly from under bushy gray eyebrows.

— It is the wrong season for herbs. But take a small bag of chamomile with you regardless; it is good for poultices on wounds, and so as not to suffer from the stomach.

— Well, I… people say that you don’t just collect herbs, but stories too.

— They speak the truth. But for that, you must see the chronicler… Finish your meal, and you will be taken to him.

No one even wanted to hear the story of the fireball in the sky! Yurka didn’t understand it, but he had to follow the familiar monk-boatman into the far rooms. The scent of wax candles and oil lamps permeated everything: the walls, the furniture, and the inhabitants themselves, who called their home by a strange name—the Obitel (the Cloister). Perhaps it was only right; monks couldn’t live like everyone else. Icons of saints hung in the corners, looking at Yurka as if with reproach: Have you come on worthy business? Do you disturb the peace of the cloister for nothing?

The chronicler lived as if in a stone cave: a cellar had been carved into the rock, where the scavenger was led. There were so many books in the room that Yurka didn’t immediately notice the man among them. The monk was short but broad-shouldered, and seemed younger than the other brothers, though just as graying. His gaze reminded Yurka of the head elder—piercing and all-knowing. Would someone like this even need a fireball story? He probably wouldn’t even believe it. Having read so many books, he must already know everything in the world. And yet, Yurka began his tale.

The hermit’s face first darkened, then cleared, and he listened with a strange smile, as if he had already known about it yet had never seen such a miracle himself. He opened a large notebook and wrote something down with a pencil. Yurka exhaled with relief, having finally fulfilled his plan to the end.

— Why do you write it down?

— Do you know the word “obedience”? Not in the sense that you are quite disobedient yourself, by the looks of it. Did you come here without the permission of your elders? Don’t pretend, I can see it; otherwise, you would have come with the medic.

What strange people these monks were! Now the young scavenger saw that they were completely different, extraordinary in some way. Their herbs grew like nowhere else, and they lived on an island for some unknown reason.

— Why do you live so far away? It’s hard to reach you… You could live with us; it’s more convenient together.

— “You are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world…” Or to put it simply: be in the world, but not of it. Did you understand any of that?

— Nope, — Yurka shook his head.

— We deliberately withdrew from people, but not into exile—that is, not to be away from you, but to be closer to God. And if we find Him here, then so be it. It means He Himself willed it, and it is not for us to argue with Him…

— Is God closer to the island? Why is He hiding from people? — Vague concepts of religion learned in childhood stirred in his head, but his knowledge was clearly insufficient for theological debate. Especially since that wasn’t what Yurka wanted to talk about at all. It felt as though a game was being played with him, a test, and he had to see it through to the end. Like how he overcame his fear on the road, or how he decided to come here in the first place. It was terrifyingly interesting! He didn’t regret a single adventure; even this conversation with the hermit felt like part of it all.

— God is everywhere, but everyone has their own path to Him. As for the place… we didn’t choose it. He showed us the place Himself. Did you see the image of the Mother of God on the rock? Anyway, that’s not why you’re here. Thank you for the story. I didn’t know people had seen such a thing, and now the chronicle will preserve your words.

— You should come visit us too! Well, if you can, of course… — Yurka glanced at the ceiling, as if expecting guiding instructions from above to descend immediately.

— Perhaps we will, — the hermit smiled. — I haven’t been in the world for a long time. And I was once further from it than anyone else among the living.

His detached dark eyes seemed to swallow the light of the rushlights, and again it seemed the chronicler differed from the rest of the brotherhood—and not just because he was slightly younger. After the frail elder and the brisk old fisherman, this man more closely resembled the village hunters—strong and unbroken by the passing years, tempered and hardened by the forest like bog-oak.

— In the meantime, I’ll see you out. The elder has probably already gathered the herbs. And there will be food for the road. You’ll leave in the morning; you’ll spend the night with us. Who would let you into the forest at night?

The hermit stood up. Yurka’s gaze darted across the bookshelves. Taking advantage of his host’s preoccupation, he snatched a small notebook wedged between the books. Not to keep forever—he would definitely return it. In the morning. He had to stay the night anyway…

Brother Ioann—as the young scavenger now knew the old man with the boat was called—took away the rushlight, wishing him peaceful dreams and blessing him with the sign of the cross. Yurka settled by the small window and examined the cover of the notebook. It had some kind of picture on it: it looked like a globe, like the ones in school, and next to it was a strange thing that looked like either an unusual airplane or a weather vane made of grids, like the one installed on the roof of the village headman’s hut. Rather than guessing at the unknown, the boy opened the notebook carefully so as not to crease it. On the yellowed pages, things were written in ink, in the same clear, legible handwriting—easy to read, for the night was bright. The entries turned out to be quite short; evidently, they had once been marked with dates and headings, but those were now carefully crossed out and renamed…

Three days before the Day…

Finally, the station. How can I describe this sense of space after the cramped cabin of the Soyuz? It’s as if you were tied up and stuffed into a tiny crate, with two other fellow sufferers squeezed in beside you. Of course, later on, the ISS modules will feel like wide-open fields. It’s a good thing the docking followed the short six-hour, four-orbit program… I don’t understand how they used to fly for two or three days to rendezvous. I wouldn’t have made it. The short two-week program is far too packed, and the “hosts” give the rookies no peace. I never would have thought that hazing flourished in space. It’s understandable that they’re bored with the monotonous work after three months—but for us, and especially for me as a first-timer, everything is a wonder. Zero gravity turns ordinary movements into an intricate game, but what struck me most was the Earth. That enormous blue sphere, majestically turning beneath you… And though I like to think I’m educated on the gravity of celestial bodies, for some reason I find myself wanting to look for the string that this sphere hangs from. I never tire of looking at it. The Commander has already dragged me away from the porthole a couple of times. And yet he himself, despite always having mountains of work, would freeze, watching the white tufts of cyclones spin their carousel, while on the night side, restless people wove a glowing web of electric lights.

Two days before the Day…

Our tight-knit group now consists of three Russians, two Americans, and a Canadian. The old crew of two Americans was led by our Commander; the new expedition brought the Canadian. And although de jure he didn’t belong to the glorious United States, the astronauts immediately hauled him off to their module. What can you say: a “relative,” however distant. Even though we’ve been flying together for over ten years and speak practically in a mixed Russian-English, we never truly became friends. There were always secrets and things left unsaid. On those rare occasions when our cosmonauts managed to get into the American module, they—smiling sheepishly—would put their tablets with documents into the safe and cover the panels with some plastic clip-folders. On our Zarya, we have nothing to hide—look as much as you want. You won’t figure it out anyway. After the Great Union of United North Americans withdrew, the Commander laughed and told us how he had intentionally left a formula on the monitor with an indecent word plugged into it—using an X, a Y, and another Slavic letter quite incomprehensible to them. He laughed quietly as the astronaut, looking around like a spy, copied it onto his tablet. There’s almost no time for boredom, but in those rare moments, everyone amuses themselves as best they can.

One day before the Day…

The astronauts have locked themselves in their module. At first, it was amusing. The Commander said this happens to them when secret data comes in from their MCC. It’s a shame that when they have a connection, we are out of range, and we have to wait another fifteen minutes until we fly into our sector. The Canadian appeared once, looked at us as if we were lepers, and crawled back behind the airtight hatch of the Unity; we only heard the latches click. I have a persistent feeling they are being “friends against us.” When will our MCC respond? Finally… the call signs echo through the enclosed space of the module. The duty officer’s voice is anxious. He speaks of escalating global tensions, of a possible war. It’s clear the Americans have started moving—what’s a war without them? A finger in every pie, as they say. Fine, let them sit there; it’s quieter for us without them. Who knows, maybe they’ll start “Star Wars.” If they do, we’ll organize a local guerrilla war for them on an orbital scale, complete with combat sorties—we’re used to it.

The Day…

Flashes of white fire are visible even from here—tiny, like spots on a dark surface, resembling drops of whitewash on a wall. Then they darken, and the flames, as they cool, take on a red color—threatening, alarming—and then everything is blanketed by a black suspension. It rises up, completely hiding what is happening below. There are dark spots, so many of them… The blue surface is turning gray. I am trying to grasp what I am seeing, and I cannot.

Everyone is pressed against the portholes, not believing their own eyes. It is impossible to believe! This doesn’t happen! It shouldn’t be. Never. But I see it, and I still hope that I am having a nightmare. A hallucination isn’t collective, even in space. They don’t send people here who are capable of seeing things that don’t exist in reality.

Smoke and dust spread out, encircling the Earth—or is it the rotation creating this effect? She tries to shake it off, to rid herself of it, but the gloom envelops the planet in almost even bands. We can still see gaps—nuclear mushrooms don’t grow on peaceful lands. But I fear the blue sphere below will soon turn completely gray. Only the poles are clean and white, as they were before us. And as they will remain after. All right, the jokes are over.

This was Day One. The first day…

Day Two…

Not long ago, it seemed our eyes were deceiving us, but now our hearing confirms it: we are alone. Silence on the airwaves; the Center is silent. No one answers our queries. If there are survivors left below, they cannot help us. They themselves are calling out to the heavens for help right now… and here, there is only us, even more helpless and lost.

The American module has opened its doors. They too want to be near other people; it is so terrifying to be left alone in the middle of infinite, black, cold space. We all share the same burden now. And we do not know who is to blame. What does it matter now, when there is nothing left below but smoke and dust? Houston Control shows no signs of life either. We are in the same boat—perhaps together it will be easier to come up with something. The Commander glanced at the holster on the American’s belt and pointedly placed his own Makarov back into the emergency kit. We have little time as it is; there is no need to speed up the process. Unlike those who died below, where death came unexpectedly, we know exactly the day and hour when the station’s resources will run out. The onboard computer is a reliable prophet. First the water will dry up and the food will run out—there’s only enough for a couple of months—then the air, or rather the oxygen and the regeneration cartridges, and finally the fuel. Without fuel, the station will be unable to correct its orbit; it will start to lose altitude, and in a couple of years, whatever doesn’t burn up will crash onto a void earth, forming yet another crater on the surface. It is a good thing we won’t be around to see it.

Day Three…

The experiments haven’t been shut down yet—probably to give the crew the illusion of a goal. But the Commander underestimates us. I don’t know if it’s “healthy” laughter when they start calculating the caloric value of the protein in the laboratory animals and plants. In any case, people haven’t lost heart if they are still capable of joking.

I am not writing anything down on paper; I’m just trying to organize the important thoughts in my own head. Only the most important ones.

Day Four…

It seems to us that there must be survivors left below. Surely there are wild places they never even intended to bomb. Man does not yet know how to destroy entire planets.

A gray shroud has covered the Earth. If lights are still shining anywhere, they are no longer visible from here. The airwaves are silent… on all frequencies, there is nothing but the crackle of white noise. Truly, if you listen to it long enough, you begin to hear the voices of a dead world. To keep from going insane, we take turns at the radio station.

Day No…

I know what day it is, but I’m tired of counting them. They say that sometimes counting becomes an obsession. We look for signs of abnormality in ourselves and others; everyone fears the clever syndromes the doctors on Earth used to scare us with. Но aside from homesickness, which we all share, we feel nothing. And that is not a pathology—it would be strange if we didn’t feel it.

I know the onboard computer is capable of calculating landing parameters; we can do it ourselves, though no one ever thought it would actually be necessary. For that, the almighty Center existed. No one doubts the necessity of it, but we cannot choose a location. Some want to be closer to home, while others search for “clean” land. To start everything over? Is that even possible? Is it worth landing near a major city where radiation levels are off the charts? Or is it better to land in the deserted taiga, where it is now winter in the middle of the calendar summer? We have many questions, and we don’t know how to solve them. The onboard computer is no help to us here. It was not designed for such tasks.

I’ll name it after all. Day Twenty-Seven.

I haven’t written anything for a long time. It’s hard to convey what we’ve been through. But after all the arguments, our crews decided to part ways. Each on their own path… We have three ships: two Soyuzes and the American Dragon. The cargo Dragon isn’t designed for crew rescue, so we loaded it with everything of value—documents, experiment results, station blueprints. This may never be needed by anyone, but it contains our life’s work. Having calculated the orbit, we decided to land it in Antarctica, so that descendants—opening the capsule years or perhaps centuries from now—might appreciate the scale of our stupidity: that having reached such heights, we destroyed everything to the foundation with our own hands. The remaining equipment was split equally between the ships. We don’t know where the Americans are heading—they hid their landing coordinates; to be honest, we don’t care. Shaking hands and saying our goodbyes, we floated off to our respective docking ports. We calculated a landing in the Altai region—it seems no explosions were observed in that area, and if there are survivors anywhere, it will be in such remote places.

The Soyuz undocked from the ISS. On the opposite side of the station, the Americans’ second Soyuz was pulling away. In my mind, I wished them luck. What do we have to fight over? We aren’t enemies now—we’re victims. Every survivor has their right to luck, wherever they may be.

Second Day on Earth

Already the second… on the first day, there was so much to do that there was simply no time to sit down and make a record. The automatic landing system worked perfectly, and we descended as if onto a soft cushion. The landing spot we chose was quite successful. The valley between high mountain ranges was preserved as if there had been no nuclear strikes across the planet. A small but swift mountain river provided us with drinking water, and our food supplies should last for another week. But that, perhaps, is all the good news.

The place is absolutely deserted, and we need help more than ever. The Commander is in a very bad way—almost half a year in orbit, despite diligent training, has taken a toll on his health. He requires a long rehabilitation program in high-tech medical centers, and all we have for amenities is a parachute tent and a first-aid kit. We are not much better off—the flight engineer and I barely managed to pull him out of the descent module, after which we spent an hour hugging our native planet, unable to stand on our feet.

Now we have a campfire and a tent where the Commander lies on a pile of spruce branches. I’m no medic, but I think he has a fever. When we were pulling him from the ship, we couldn’t hold him, and he fell… Cosmic osteoporosis, damn it. I think he broke his hip… He’s breathing very heavily, maybe ribs too… Vladimir, our flight engineer, took the pistol and went downstream the river to look for people, while I stayed with the Commander.

Third Day on Earth

Vladimir has been gone for over a day now. I launched signal flares, but they are unlikely to rise above the surrounding mountains. After another flare, the Commander suddenly stirred behind my back, scaring me half to death.

— Go, Yurka, don’t sit with me. It’s over for me; I won’t make it.

For the last few hours, he had only been moaning, unconscious, and now… I turned around in surprise and met his meaningful, feverish gaze. No, I wasn’t going to leave. I had to wait for Vladimir; not much time had passed, and he couldn’t have abandoned us.

Fourth Day on Earth

The Commander fell back into unconsciousness. I, on the other hand, grew stronger each day. I no longer felt like a helpless infant. There wasn’t much to do: gather firewood and keep the fire going; it wasn’t hard work. I think the antibiotics are doing their job. The Commander started breathing steadily, and his fever subsided. Though he hadn’t regained consciousness since that moment he scared me. Vladimir is still not back. He should have returned by now—with help or without…

Fifth Day on Earth

The Commander died! I missed the moment. I must have fallen asleep by the fire, and when I approached him, he was no longer breathing. Now, nothing holds me in this valley. I buried him in his spacesuit. It took some effort to pull the Sokol suit onto the dead body, but I believe he deserves it. That’s it; I have fulfilled my duty. I am leaving this cozy corner that became a tomb for my Commander. Someday I will return here. Someday…

Eighth Day on Earth

I found Vladimir. What was left of him. A torn, bloody jumpsuit with our crew’s emblems, shapeless chunks of meat, and a ripped backpack. I hope he fell from a height, and only then did wild animals tear at his dead body. There was nothing left to bury. My supplies were replenished with a pistol and a small amount of ammunition. Thank you, Volodya, for your last gift. So, I am left alone. The last one to have seen the promised heavens.

…

I don’t know how much time has passed. Judging by my overgrown stubble, more than a month. I found my way to people! By all rights, I should have perished in the mountains: fallen into an abyss, been eaten by predators, but I made it out. I must have been delirious, because I don’t remember how I ended up here. Around me are people dressed in black chiton-like robes. Monk Eremey explained to me that I am in a monastery on Patmos Island. They found me in the forest, exhausted, at my last breath. Perhaps this is atonement—to descend from the heavens only to find myself in a monastery.

The pages that followed were blank, untouched by ink. Yurka realized that the chronicle was far from over; it simply continued in thick journals like the one he had seen before the hermit. And so, the man had remained far from the world on this holy little island—as remote and unreachable as a spacecraft—where people in total seclusion still performed work essential to all mankind, growing medicinal herbs and asking the Lord to bless all those who had survived. Not every word in the diary was familiar, but even a boy born in the depths of the taiga understood almost everything, in his own way.

Carefully closing the notebook, Yurka looked out the window. A nearly full moon shone there, illuminating the jagged silhouette of the forest and the mountains. Now he knew where the true “promised heavens” were: far, far away in the black void where the Earth looks small and the Moon large; the place man had always reached for, and where, with God’s help, the International Space Station had been able to spread its silvery wings of solar panels. And if someone has been there, they will inevitably want to go back. You only have to want it enough… and one day, you might even fly to the heavens!

The Kitten By Leonid Elsakov

Pitch blackness…

Soul-piercing drafts…

Indistinct sounds echoing from afar…

A tiny ball of fur shuddered at every rustle coming from the outside. His mother had left two days ago, and all that time the kitten had been waiting for her, hiding inside a bureau and listening to the silence. He was exhausted and starving. His left ear was half-torn, his fur stuck out in ragged clumps, and bare patches on his side revealed long furrows of scratches left by someone’s claws. A cold—not biting, but constant and relentless—gnawed at the strength of his emaciated body. Over the last two days, the kitten had endured immense trauma: the home where he was born had been ravaged by an invasion of unknown creatures that snatched and devoured everyone in sight. Loud screams, shrieks, and death rattles were forever seared into his memory; the world he grew up in had shown its wicked snarl and unthinkable cruelty.

The feline pride had been destroyed, but his mother had managed to save her cub. She had scooped him up and, by some miracle, escaped the deadly trap, fleeing from their pursuers. She found a new refuge, hid the kitten inside, and went out to search for food. She had not returned since.

The kitten’s one intact ear suddenly twitched upright; he tensed as an indistinct noise came from outside. These were not the sounds of his mother returning. Someone was creeping, trying to step silently, but his sharpened hearing clearly caught a presence.

Soon it became clear there were several intruders. They stopped hiding and began to roam nearby. One approached and went quiet. A moment later, the half-open door of the cabinet was yanked wide, and a huge black paw began fumbling through the shelves, throwing everything out. The kitten froze—the monster’s fingers were inches away from his whiskered face… and a second later, they touched his tightly pressed front paws.

Hoping his mother would hear his call and come to the rescue, the kitten let out a long meow and launched a desperate attack. With his tiny teeth, he bit fiercely into the monster’s rough skin. The terrible paw jerked back, shook the little creature off, and vanished from sight. The kitten pressed his belly to the shelf and raised his hackled tail high, bracing for defense. His huge eyes flashed in the gloom.

Suddenly, a bright light flared. The kitten squinted and let out a thin squeak. The poor thing was grabbed and dragged out into the open…

---

“Grigoryev, hold the ladder! Borzov, Yashchenko—scout the room!”

The Major pointed to a doorway at the end of the corridor, and two soldiers equipped with night-vision goggles moved forward cautiously, rifles at the ready. A door creaked, and a minute later, a beam of light cut through the darkness—the signal that no danger had been found.

The office was in chaos: dust-covered sheets of paper, broken electronics, and overturned furniture littered the floor. A large cabinet standing in the corner looked more or less intact. The commander headed toward it while his subordinates scattered, searching for anything worth carrying back down into the Metro.

Trash crunched underfoot; drafts ruffled the scattered documents, trying to lift them into the air. The Major grabbed the handle of the cabinet door and pulled…

Inside were stacks of papers, thick folders, and various office supplies. The commander began rummaging through them, hoping to find something useful.

Suddenly, he cried out and recoiled, jerking his hand back. His subordinates immediately leveled their weapons, flanking the commander and aiming at the source of the danger.

“Don’t fire! Lower your barrels! Lower them, I said!”

After a second’s hesitation, the well-trained soldiers lowered their weapons. The Major switched on his chest-mounted flashlight and reached into the cabinet again, pulling out a pitifully squeaking ball of fur.

“It’s a kitten!” someone blurted out. “Where did he come from?”

Indeed—the commander’s strong fingers were holding a wounded kitten by the scruff of its neck. A real one. People hadn’t seen them for… well, for twenty years they hadn’t seen so much as an adult cat, let alone a kitten. They were certain the species had gone extinct.

The soldiers gathered in a tight semicircle, watching the little miracle in silence, smiles spreading across their faces. They hadn’t expected this, and even seeing it with their own eyes, they could hardly believe it.

“Is it… a mutant?” someone asked tentatively.

“No…” the commander unzipped his jumpsuit and carefully tucked the find against his chest, sliding it into an inner pocket to warm it with his body heat. “Just a regular kitten. Battered and starving, though. Life’s been hard on him. No matter—they’ll patch him up and feed him at the base. I’ll give him to my daughter to raise; she’ll nurse him back to health. Alright, men, let’s wrap it up! We’re going home.”

---

“Kostya, what are we going to feed him? And what if Dashka gets tired of looking after him? She doesn’t have a sense of responsibility yet.”

“Well, she’ll learn,” the commander said, gently placing the little creature on the floor. The kitten immediately began sniffing a pillar, stretching his neck comically. “I’m sure Dashka will be thrilled, and that’s what matters, Nadya. And the kitten won’t perish—he just needs food; he doesn’t need much else. Look at him eat that pork—he’s devouring it!”

“Is he contagious, though?” Nadya asked suddenly. “You brought him from the surface, and who knows what kind of diseases are roaming up there!”

“He’s clean. The doctors already checked him.”

“Fine, then,” the woman sighed, waving a hand. Honestly, she had agreed from the start, but she had to grumble for the sake of order. “But you’re the one who’s going to house-train him! Let’s go wake Dashka…”

An oil lamp cast a flickering light through the tent, dancing across the pale face of the sleeping girl. Kostya smiled: the pillow was at her feet again, the blanket hanging off the edge… He walked over to the cot and sat on the edge. He looked back at his wife; she shrugged as if to say, It was your idea, you do it.

“Dashka, get up…” Kostya said softly. Then again, louder: “It’s morning, wake up, sweetie.”

The girl mumbled something unintelligible, winced, and turned toward the wall.

“Meow.” Dasha’s eyes flew open. She turned toward her father and sat up.

“Oh, Daddy, what was that?”

“I have a surprise. I want to introduce you to someone.” Kostya placed the kitten on the bedsheet. He was no longer the emaciated creature found on the surface; his wounds had healed, and during his quarantine, he had been treated and fed.

The girl stared, her mouth slightly open in surprise. The fluffy guest moved and lifted his head.

“Me-a-ow!” he squeaked thinly. Dasha took a breath of wonder.

“Daddy… WHO is it?”

“It’s a kitten, honey.”

“Is that his name?” Dasha moved closer to her new acquaintance. He watched her every move intently.

“Uh… no. Kitten is… that’s what he is. Like you, me, and Mommy are humans. Each of us is a person. And his name… uh… his name is Vasya.”

“Vasya?”

“Yes, Vasya. But that’s for friends. His full name is Vassily.”

“Can I call him that? Am I a friend?”

“Of course! He came specifically to visit you. When I told him about you, he wanted to be your friend right away. Be polite to our guest—introduce yourself and say hello.”

“Hello, Vasya. My name is Dasha. I want to be your friend too.” The girl reached out her hand. The kitten didn’t shy away or jump back in fear; instead, he touched her fingers with his whiskers and rubbed his face against them. Nadya smiled—her daughter had a new friend. A satisfied Konstantin chuckled and summarized:

“Well, excellent! Now let’s all go for a walk and show Vasya the local sights.”

---

The kitten sat and watched the people scurrying between the tents. It was a fascinating activity: besides the familiar residents of the station, strangers occasionally appeared, bringing new smells from unknown distances. Some were in a hurry, others strolled leisurely, discussing the latest events. People shared news, talked about their problems, joys, and sorrows. Vasya liked watching the commotion. Right now, he was comfortably settled near the tent, his tail curled neatly around him, watching the passersby with a curious gaze, his ear twitching at every sound.

“…we’re leaving today. The tunnel is quiet, we’ll get there fast, shouldn’t be any problems on the way…”

“…gave birth to twins! Almost no mutations, both healthy, look just like their dad—bald and loud-mouthed!”

“…has anyone seen Kolya? My Kolenka? He went on guard duty yesterday and didn’t come home. The brass says he’s missing…”

“…cheap! Where else are you going to find a deal like this…”

“…a trader I know brought me such a great book…”

The kitten already knew some words. His favorites were “eat” and “dinner”—usually, after those words, Vassily was fed well. His growing body constantly demanded fuel and movement, so his main hobbies were eating and playing.

Having seen enough of the passersby, Vasya ran home to play with a hidden ball of yarn. Slipping inside the tent, he dragged a messy spool of thread from the corner. He dropped it on the floor, tilted his head, then gave it a little nudge with his paw… A stand on his hind legs, a pounce forward—and soon the little animal was chasing the toy all over the home, enjoying himself immensely.

The tent flap opened, letting in light from the station. The kitten froze, then leaped aside and hid under the cot. His mischievous eyes gleamed in the shadows—he saw it all as part of the game.

The tent grew brighter as Nadya lit the lamp. Vassily crawled out, tail held high, and enthusiastically rubbed against her legs.

“Vasya, you little rascal!” Nadya saw the yarn. “And I was wondering where my thread went! So it was you who dragged it off.” She bent down and picked up the shredded ball. She turned it in her hands, looking at the kitten; he was looking up at her expectantly. She felt like scolding him, but couldn’t bring herself to do it—not with him looking at her so devotedly.

“Purr-rr!”

“Are you hungry? Wait a bit.” The ball of yarn fell softly to the floor and rolled away. “The thread is ruined anyway; you can keep playing with it.”

A few minutes later, Vassily was happily devouring the contents of his bowl. Nadya sat tiredly on a folding chair, exhausted after her shift.

The kitten finished the last bits of meat and walked away with a sated gait, licking his chops. Jumping onto Dasha’s cot, he began to groom himself: licking his paw, rubbing his face, then cleaning his belly… soon, he was completely tidy. He glanced at Nadya; she had drifted off, her head resting on her chest. Vasya licked his nose one last time and trotted toward the exit. The mother of the family woke from her nap and watched the departing pet with a groggy gaze.

“Vasya, going for a walk? Go on then, I’ll get to the chores,” she sighed, heavily pushing herself up.

Vasily could wander the station quite freely, but he never managed to get past its borders. Vigilant sentries stopped all his attempts to slip away unnoticed, but the little animal didn’t give up—he desperately wanted to know what was hidden in the depths of the tunnels.

Today, Vasya decided to try his luck again.

Stepping silently, he crept toward the checkpoint located a bit further from the blast doors. Whenever a sentry moved or spoke, the kitten froze. How was he to know that his eyes were signaling brightly in the darkness, reflecting the light of the campfire?

“Petrukha, hand over a cartridge! I won, he came to try his luck again today!” A young man with a thick mane of red hair stood up from a crate and waved a greeting to the “intruder.” The kitten realized he had been spotted and trotted away, occasionally stopping to look back. The failure annoyed him, but it didn’t lessen his resolve to break out of the station.

But that could wait. For now, he could find something else interesting to do. For example, investigating this handcar loaded with heavy bags of unknown contents. The loaders had stepped away, which meant no one would interfere with his inspection.

Now, what do we have here? A worn suitcase, locked up tight, and it smells of something sharp and unpleasant… Yuck, we don’t need that. Next? A large sports bag, stuffed to the brim, but the zipper won’t let him in. A pity—there’s surely something worthwhile inside. Let’s move on to this checkered bag. Which, wonderfully, is left open!

A quiet rustle, and the kitten’s tail gave one last flick before vanishing into the depths of the bag. Inside were many interesting things: woolen socks, mittens, and gloves were piled together. Vasya pushed through them, burrowing deep. Tired of digging through the laundry, he went still, listening to his surroundings. It was warm and cozy in the bag. The kitten exhaled, closed his eyes, and fell into a deep sleep.

---

He was awakened by the zip of a fastener. A raspy voice gave a command to depart, and the bag swayed slightly. Vasya hid; the only sounds were the rhythmic clatter of wheels and the rustling of clothes. Then the handcar slowed, sentries shouted—they hopped onto the transport and began rummaging through the cargo. Finishing their check, the guards hopped off, and the traders continued their journey.

Slowly, a conversation began. One of the speakers was definitely a resident of Vasya’s home station—the kitten recognized the deep baritone of a chubby man who lived nearby. The other travelers were strangers.

Soon the chatter died down, and a tense silence set in, broken only by the heavy breathing of the pair of men working the levers. After some time, the handcar arrived at the next station, where part of the goods was unloaded, and the expedition moved on. Then came another station, where more bags were dropped off.

At the third station, it was time for Vasya’s bag. It was carried somewhere and dumped onto the floor a minute later.

The porter left. Vasya waited a while and then began looking for a way out. There was none: the zipper was shut tight, and a kitten could not unfasten it from the inside.

After a few minutes, Vassily grew tired of struggling through the clothes. He stopped squirming and went still to save his strength. It was very stuffy and hot. The socks and mittens surrounding him were no longer fun; he wanted to get out and breathe fresh air.

Just as Vasya was reaching his limit, ready to cry out for help, quiet footsteps approached. Someone walked right up to the bag, stood there for a moment, and then suddenly hoisted it up. Everything inside tumbled; the kitten was buried under the laundry.

The bag swayed for ten minutes of walking, then it was thrown to the floor again. The bag was opened, and fresh air rushed in. The kitten squinted against the dim light from outside.

“Tolyan, look at all this stuff!” a nasal voice rang out. “A whole pile of gear! I know exactly where we can hawk this. We’re gonna make a killing, bro.”

The owner of the unpleasant voice reached blindly into the bag and pulled out the first thing he touched. He caught the kitten. For a full second, they stared at each other in shock, and then the nasal-voiced man let out a loud shriek and threw Vasya away.

“Tolya-a-an!!! Tolyan! It’s a mutant! A-a-ah!”

“Where?!!” A grim-faced man appeared, clutching a piece of rebar. He raised it to strike at Vassily, who was huddled in the corner, but suddenly he calmed down and lowered the iron bar.

“Valik, you idiot… It’s just a kitten! How is that a mutant?”

“A kitten? What’s that?” the scared thief climbed down from the table he had jumped onto in his panic. “Does it bite?”

“Kid, you’re hopeless,” the grim man muttered condescendingly. “Right, you were born after the war, you’ve never seen a cat. But I remember them…” he said thoughtfully. “Hey, I should congratulate you, Valik. Happy holiday!”

“What holiday?” Valik didn’t understand.

“A feast for your stomach! Today, we’re eating meat,” Tolyan said with a crooked grin, eyeing the kitten.

“Oh! You mean we’re gonna eat that?” Valik realized. “Is it edible? Did people eat them back then?”

“Edible. We didn’t eat them, though. When I was a kid, we played with them differently,” the thug scratched his protruding belly thoughtfully. “But you can eat ‘em, for sure.”

“Sweet!” Valik rubbed his hands in anticipation of a hearty meal. “I’m sick of rats… Tolyan, I’ll be quick, I’m getting water—back in a flash!”

“Wait. Tell me first—did anyone see you when you swiped this bag?”

“Nah, come on! Valik knows his business! I snatched it right from under those losers’ noses, they didn’t even notice!”

“Alright, beat it,” Tolyan waved him off. “But let’s catch it first so it doesn’t bolt.”

However, they didn’t have to “catch” him. Vasya hadn’t been taught to fear humans; in his short life, he had seen only kindness from them, so he didn’t run when he was grabbed and thrown into a wooden crate. A piece of plywood was placed over the top to prevent escape.

It was then that Vasya realized it was time to get out.

But how? He couldn’t squeeze through the gaps in the crate, and the board on top blocked him. Tolyan, having locked the door after Valik, was already rummaging through bags scattered around the room, pulling out cooking pots.

The prisoner meowed pitifully, asking to be set free.

“Don’t scream, won’t help,” Tolyan replied, continuing to fiddle with the utensils.

There was a knock at the door.

“What now?” the bandit frowned, set aside a pot, and went to the entrance. “Who is it?” he asked tensely.

“Tolyan, it’s me, Valik,” a muffled, wheezing voice came from outside.

“Back already?” Tolyan was surprised and slid back the bolt.

At that very second, the door burst open, hitting the grim man square in the forehead. Armed men rushed into the room, pinned Tolyan to the floor, and twisted his arms behind his back. Valik was visible in the doorway, standing in handcuffs, looking at his senior partner with an extremely guilty expression.

“Aha, here’s the stolen goods!” one of the attackers noticed the open bag. A minute later, the room was empty: the stolen property was taken, and the criminals were led away under guard, the door closed behind them.

One problem was gone, but now he had to get out of here. The unlucky traveler walked from one corner of the crate to the other, trying to move the plywood with his paw. The wood lifted slightly, but Vasily didn’t have the strength to push it far enough to climb out. He tried again—no, it wouldn’t work. Then the kitten moved to the opposite side and found that the plywood didn’t fit tightly there, leaving a small gap. Vasya stuck his paw into the crack and pushed hard. The plywood shifted a little; he shoved his head into the opening, widening it with his body. A bit more effort, a push from his hind legs—and there it was, long-awaited freedom!

But getting out of the room was much harder. Jumping to the floor, the kitten went to the door. He rubbed his whiskers against the frame, tried to catch it with his claws, but nothing happened. After several attempts, he turned and surveyed the room with a puzzled look. His wish had come true—he was outside his station—but what to do now was completely unclear.

The table with the crate, a stool nearby, a rickety sofa in the corner, a pile of junk on the floor… The kitten began to inspect it all methodically. Reaching the sofa, Vasya looked behind it and saw a small hole in the wall.

A smell of dampness and rot came from the burrow. Sniffing cautiously, the kitten poked his head inside and listened. Sensing nothing suspicious, the fugitive ventured further.

For a while, he walked relying solely on instinct, as nothing could be seen in the pitch darkness. Then he began to come across strange plants that glowed faintly in the dark. For a cat’s vision, this was enough to see his surroundings reasonably well, and the kitten took heart.

But at a bend in the tunnel, a large rat suddenly leaped out from around a corner, rushing toward the victim with a fierce squeak. The kitten bolted, but this only delayed the end—the rodent quickly caught up and opened its jaws to grab Vasya by the tail.

At that moment, another rat appeared from a side tunnel and collided with the first. Both locked together in the narrow passage, fighting over who had the right to the prey. The kitten didn’t wait to see who would win; he ran as fast as he could. The wild shrieks of the fighting rats followed him.

Half an hour later, Vasya crawled out of the hole into a main transit tunnel. To the right, a flickering light from a guard post’s campfire was visible, and the voices of sentries drifted over. Vasily looked toward them: there were people there; they could feed him, protect him, and keep him warm.

The kitten turned away and resolutely trotted into the darkness of the tunnel. He knew clearly—his home was in the other direction.

The glowing plants he had seen in the burrow were here too. They hung from the ceiling, clung to the tunnel walls, and grew between the rails. Their deathly glow was enough for the kitten; he jumped confidently over the sleepers toward his goal, ignoring the water splashing under his paws.

Soon Vasily reached a lit branch leading to technical rooms. The source of light was a lantern on a miner’s helmet; a man lay motionless nearby. His clothes, with pockets turned inside out, were soaked in blood, and he was barefoot. But the man was still breathing—the kitten caught the raspy whistle of air being exhaled through his teeth.

When Vasya approached the wounded man and sat by his head, the man felt someone nearby and opened his eyes.

“Who is it?.. Help… I’m dying…” a soft whisper came. Then the man gathered his strength and turned his head. Squinting, he looked at the kitten, who was watching him expectantly.

The man took a deep breath.

“Well, now. Where did you come from?.. Or is this just a hal…” a short sob. “…a hallucination?”

The kitten stood up, walked close to the dying man, and placed a paw on his shoulder. The man exhaled noisily and swallowed blood-salted saliva.

“Real… I never thought I’d die in such company. I won’t make it, will I?”

The kitten climbed onto the man’s shoulder, lay down, and turned his face toward the wounded man.

“You know, when I was very little, at home… we had a cat. She was so beautiful and… kind. She put up with me, my antics. Even when I tried to catch her tail, she never snapped. If I bothered her too much, she’d just step aside. We loved playing ‘fingers under the pillow’…” the man paused for a moment to catch his breath. “You know, when I woke up, she was already by the bed, waiting for me to play. She walked me to kindergarten, then to school. She loved me most in the family…”

The wounded man talked to the kitten for a long time about his life. About his parents, his first love, his college days. About the people he had wronged and now regretted not being able to ask for forgiveness, and about the deeds he was ashamed of. About those he helped sincerely and selflessly, and those who betrayed him—and those he himself had betrayed. About his wife and children, whom he loved dearly and for whom he was ready to do anything. He spoke—and his voice grew quieter as the light from the lantern faded. At some point, the lantern finally went out, and the man went silent. His fingers, which had been gently stroking the kitten’s paws, went still.

Vasya bowed his head and climbed down to the floor. He touched his whiskers to the dead man’s cheek one last time, saying goodbye to the friend he had found and lost in the same hour. But Vasily himself was still alive—and undoubtedly, more obstacles and deadly dangers lay ahead.

---

The smell of meat made his head spin and sharpened his appetite. The guards at the checkpoint were careless; they didn’t notice the scout slipping past them.

Vasya followed the smell, running from cover to cover and hiding in the shadows of pillars, boxes, and stalls. The busy residents of the station paid no attention to the little animal; they were absorbed in buying and selling, making deals, begging… In short, they were engaged in active business, and they had no concern for some kitten.

Dodging passersby, Vasily reached the source of the alluring aroma. It turned out to be a local cafe. He slipped between the hanging threads of the doorway curtain and found himself in a smoky room filled with tables. At some of them, patrons were eating. Looking around, the kitten saw a well-dressed fat man gnawing on a large piece of schnitzel.

“Me-a-ow!”

The fat man stopped eating and looked at Vasya in surprise. The kitten was already sitting by the table, looking the man directly in the eyes.

“Oh!” was all the man could say. He put the schnitzel on his plate and straightened up. The fat man looked at him with amusement and even sympathy—the kitten felt the friendly attitude and tried again:

“Meow!”

“Well, you’re hungry, aren’t you!” the man realized, then cut off a piece and threw it to Vasya. The kitten didn’t hesitate and immediately started on the treat. While he ate, the people around watched the performance with interest: for them, it was a rarity, both for those who hadn’t seen a cat in years and those who, due to their youth, were seeing a kitten for the first time. Vasya paid no attention to the spectators and quickly ate the pieces of meat being tossed to him.

A cook came out from behind the kitchen curtain and stared thoughtfully at the new “customer.”

Soon Vasya was full; he stood up and stretched, arching his back. Licking his chops, he went to the fat man and rubbed against his legs.

“Aren’t you a furry one!” the man scratched the kitten behind the ear. “Waiter, the check, please!”

The waiter approached the table:

“Here is your bill, Andrei Denisovich.”

The fat man paid, got up from the table, and after giving the kitten one last pat, headed for the exit. The waiter waited until the client had left, then walked over to the grooming kitten and kicked him in the side:

“Get out of here, you fleabag!”

The blow sent Vasya flying, but he immediately scrambled up and bolted. Racing past a bouncer who had burst out laughing, the kitten flew out into the station. There, he barely managed to dodge a cart loaded with mushrooms and leaped aside. Suddenly, a sharp pain shot through his tail: someone, without noticing, had stepped on it with a boot heel. Shrieking, the kitten tore away; the startled owner of the boot pulled back his foot, and Vasily ran through the market stalls as fast as he could. People saw him, and noise rose from all sides—some shouted, some laughed. One heavy old woman even tried to splash the kitten with boiling water from a kettle, but luckily, she missed.

Escaping from all this horror, Vasya hid in a dark corner and began licking his bruises—his tail and back left leg hurt. The kitten was also completely bewildered: for the first time in his short life, humans had treated him so poorly. Even the two bandits who wanted to eat him hadn’t left bad memories (mostly because they didn’t have time to do anything to him, and he hadn’t understood their intentions; they just kept him locked up for a bit, but maybe they were just playing).

Regardless, nothing held Vasily here anymore. After cleaning himself up, he went to find an exit from the station.

Soon Vasya reached the blast doors. Of course, for the sake of communication between stations, they were open and were not an obstacle. Slipping past a dozing sentry was also not difficult. Beyond lay the familiar darkness of the tunnel…

About fifty meters later, the kitten saw the lights of a checkpoint. Their colleagues hadn’t noticed Vasily sneaking into the station recently, so he wasn’t particularly worried about crossing the border unseen.

“Valerik, shine the light over there!”

A searchlight flared brightly. The kitten squinted and backed away; the echo of soldiers’ boots thundered against the tunnel walls. Vasya was grabbed. He struggled as hard as he could, biting and scratching, but it was all in vain: his claws and teeth couldn’t pierce the thick gloves and fabric of their uniforms.

“Aha, gotcha!” someone’s satisfied voice rang out. “The backpack! Where’s the backpack? Give it here, this piece of filth is kicking!”

Vasya was thrown into a canvas bag, and the drawstring was pulled tight.

“Kisly!”

“Here!”

“Take this to the Station Chief’s secretary…”

---

“Maria, I am entrusting this to you,” a stern male voice barked. “I’m giving you one last chance. And let there be no more ‘initiatives’ on your part, is that clear?”

“I understand, Semyon Georgievich,” a calm voice replied. “It won’t happen again.”

“Remember the trust placed in you. And remember that there are many others waiting for your position. Be smarter than your predecessors.”

An older woman in a strict suit merely nodded and adjusted the glasses slipping down her nose. She stood before a large oak desk, behind which sat the chief, a man with sharp, almost rat-like features.

Semyon Georgievich made a contemptuous face and signaled to his bodyguard. The man stepped forward and placed a backpack in front of the woman.

When the guard untied the strings, huge, shiny, frightened eyes peered out from the depths of the bag.

“Don’t be afraid,” the woman said, reaching out a hand. “I won’t hurt you.”

The sad melody of “Moonlight Sonata” flowed through the spacious room. The performer was a twelve-year-old girl in a beautiful dress with a necklace. Her fingers glided over the piano keys, skillfully extracting notes that filled the heart with anxiety and sadness.

“Eleonora, your father sent you a gift…”

The melody broke off. The girl carefully closed the piano lid, stood up, and walked over to Maria.

“Hasn’t my father fired you yet?” Eleonora asked coldly. “I thought I’d have a new ‘nanny’ today,” she emphasized the last word with sarcasm.

The woman looked away:

“Your father decided to give me one more chance.”

“Really? How amusing. Usually, he doesn’t bother with such things. And why didn’t he come to give me this gift himself?”

“He told me to tell you he has a lot of work and won’t be able to see you today. But he promised that tomorrow he will surely take you and your mother to the dinner party at the Baumeisters’.”

“Hmm…” the girl tilted her nose up. “Fine. What is this gift anyway?”

After a short pause, Maria opened the bag slung over her shoulder. The kitten’s head immediately poked out, and he began looking in every direction. Eleonora, squinting, examined the “gift.”

“Is this some kind of new mutant?” she asked. “I’ve never seen one like it. My biology tutor didn’t mention them.”

“No, Eleonora, it’s not a mutant. There used to be animals called cats. This is their cub—a kitten. If you’re interested, Rudolf Vladimirovich can tell you much more about cats than I can…”

“And what can it do?” the girl tilted her head and curled her lips. “Or is it as useless as Silya was?”

“Well, in the old days, these animals were kept to catch rats, mice, and…”

“Don’t make me laugh!” the girl interrupted. “Can he kill even one rat? They’d eat him alive.”

“Rats weren’t the same back then. Besides, he’s still small.”

Eleonora shook her head skeptically:

“I still don’t believe it.” She turned and walked to the wardrobe. The governess followed silently, taking the kitten out of the bag as she walked.

“And so…” the girl opened the wardrobe door and began sorting through clothes, “…people kept cats just because they could catch rats?”

“Not only that,” Maria stroked Vasya’s head. “Cats are very beautiful and sweet creatures; people kept them just to have them, for comfort in the home…”

The girl glanced at the kitten and grimaced:

“He doesn’t look like a beautiful or sweet creature. He’s ugly, covered in scars, and only has one ear.”

“Life hasn’t been kind to him,” the nanny said.

“Fine, throw him somewhere and help me pick an outfit for tomorrow’s dinner at the Bau-meis-ters’,” Eleonora drawled. “I don’t feel like dealing with this ‘gift’ right now.”

---

It was dry and warm in the desk drawer. The kitten was sleeping, his nose tucked into a teddy bear. An hour ago, Eleonora had tossed Vasya in here with the words: “Sit quietly and don’t you dare make a sound!” After scratching at the corners, the kitten had curled up next to his toy companion in misfortune and fallen asleep. Tomorrow promised to be difficult—before throwing the poor animal into the drawer, Eleonora had announced that in the morning they would prepare for the visit.

The kitten woke up because he was tumbling over—someone had pulled the drawer open sharply. Vasya rolled onto his back and squinted blearily at Eleonora.

“Stop sleeping! Today we’re going out! And now we’re going to get you ready…” with these words, the girl grabbed the kitten by the scruff and carried him to the vanity mirror.

First, she put a dress on Vasily. It probably belonged to a doll once, and now the kitten had become the girl’s doll. He was categorically opposed and resisted as much as he could.

But the strength was too lopsided, and soon Vasya was clad in a dress that didn’t fit him at all. He even crouched on bent legs, pressing himself to the table and nervously twitching his tail; he felt so uncomfortable and unnatural in the clothing.

Having received several scratches and bites, Eleonora was now in a foul mood.

“How did your previous owners ever stand you!” she shouted in a huff. “Or are you just a stray, like the ones begging for cartridges at our station?!”

The kitten couldn’t explain to her that he never had owners. And not because he was a stray… It was just that before (it seemed a very long time ago to Vasya), he only had friends; a whole family that considered him a full member.

The bratty girl, meanwhile, didn’t stop there. She took out a comb and a powder box and, according to her ideas of beauty, began, as she put it, “to fix up this slob.”

The kitten didn’t even resist anymore; in that outfit, he couldn’t make a single proper move anyway.

A few minutes later, a slicked-back and powdered Vasya sat on the vanity, sadly looking at his reflections in the mirrors. But that wasn’t all. Eleonora began training him, trying to teach the poor creature to stand on its hind legs and curtsy. Naturally, nothing came of it; the kitten just turned away and tried to crawl away from his tormentor.

In the end, the girl flew into a rage. With hands shaking with anger, she grabbed Vasily and carried him to a metal cage standing in a dark corner. She threw the poor thing onto the sawdust-covered floor and slammed the door with a loud clang:

“Now this is your new home! My father does the same to everyone who doesn’t listen to him,” she brought her face close to the cage and squinted. “Silya lived here before you, and he was bad too. Do you know what happened to him? He was taken far, far away, and now he lives in a Kunstkamera!” Pouting her lips, Eleonora straightened up and went back to the vanity to preen before the dinner party.

The kitten sank tiredly onto the sawdust, lay on his side, and stared longingly at the thick bars of the cage. He spent the rest of the day in that position. Sometimes Eleonora came over and said something, but Vasya didn’t react. He didn’t touch the food and water that Maria brought twice. His dull eyes said that Vasya had lost all hope of escaping.

In the evening, the girl’s father arrived. After kissing his daughter, Semyon Georgievich sat in a chair, crossed his legs, and waited for Eleonora to put on her last pieces of jewelry. He didn’t even look at the “gift.”

Soon they left. Left alone, the kitten slowly stood up and went to the bars. He tried to squeeze through them, but nothing worked. The locked door was also an insurmountable obstacle. After searching all the corners and trying to dig under the sawdust, Vasily was finally convinced there was no way out. In exhaustion, he lay down again and closed his eyes.

The sound of a key turning in the lock came, the handle turned, the hinges creaked softly, and Maria, wrapped in a cloak, appeared on the threshold. She walked quickly across the room to the cage. Keys jingled, the metal of the opening door screeched, and the nanny pulled the prisoner from his jail. She immediately headed for the exit, hiding the kitten inside her cloak as she went.

Maria passed through the guard posts without hindrance and went out to the tracks. A handcar stood on the rails waiting for cargo; a bit further away, a grim-faced trader with a cigarette in his mouth leaned against a pillar. The governess headed toward him.

“Everything is fine, I managed it,” she said instead of a greeting. “Is everything ready on your end?”

“Yeah,” the trader muttered gloomily and sighed. “I can’t believe I’m risking so much for a kitten…”

“Andrey, you’re not doing this for him, but for me. Simply because I asked,” Maria knew that Andrey wasn’t actually risking that much. First, he had years of smuggling experience and a well-established channel; and second, he already had things to smuggle “on the side,” so the presence of a kitten didn’t change much.

But the one who was truly risking everything was Maria.

“Why do you even need this?” Andrey asked. “What for? They could catch you, track you…”

Maria smiled sadly:

“I won’t last long at this job anyway. Eleonora changes governesses like gloves… even if they catch me, what will they do? Fire me?” she suggested tentatively. “Then I’ll just go back to my home station, to my pigs, and everything will be as before. I know it will happen sooner or later anyway. This way, I have a chance to do something good right now.”

Andrey listened in silence, sighed again, and stubbed out his cigarette against the pillar.

“You’re crazy. Fine, give him here…”

---

The smuggler indeed managed to pass all the checkpoints without trouble. During that time, the kitten sat in a secret compartment under the floor of the handcar. When the traders left the guarded territory, Andrey stopped the transport and pulled Vasya out of the “secret,” deciding the “passenger” might suffocate in the airtight compartment.

The kitten’s heart sang. He was free again, and he was heading straight for home! Sitting on the lap of a bearded man with an assault rifle, Vasily enjoyed catching the oncoming air; the bearded man sang something quietly and looked around vigilantly, not forgetting to scratch Vasya behind the ear. Behind him, Andrey and his partner worked the levers of the handcar rhythmically.

The sense of danger came completely unexpectedly. The kitten suddenly realized they couldn’t go forward anymore. There, in the pitch darkness that the handcar’s lantern couldn’t properly pierce, Death was waiting. It waited for them, arms wide, getting closer with every stroke of the levers.

The kitten began to squirm, trying to figure out what to do. The bearded man looked with surprise as the fur on the little animal’s neck stood on end. Vasya let out a long meow, trying to warn the humans that It was ahead and that they must not go there under any circumstances.

Andrey turned at the panicked meow and froze, peering into the darkness. With a quick motion, he pulled his shotgun from his shoulder. Seeing this, his partner also reached for his weapon.

It hit them instantly. The handcar was still rolling along the rails when the darkness suddenly became an unbearable light. The partner slumped over the levers, his whole body hanging off them. Andrey dropped his Saiga and slowly covered his face with his hands, as if trying to shut out the blinding flash that had just taken his sight. The bearded man leaned back against his seat, a thin line of saliva hanging from the corner of his open mouth; in his wide-open eyes, a look of surprise was frozen, which disappeared as his pupils turned red. And all this happened in complete silence, because the surrounding sounds had vanished. No clatter of wheels, no rustling of clothes—it was as if a vacuum had formed.

The handcar stopped. Staggering, Andrey wandered across it, hands still covering his face, his mouth open in a silent scream. At the edge, he tripped and fell down onto the rails. At that moment, all the sounds returned at once, and Andrey could be heard moaning: he had hit his head hard in the fall. The smuggler stood up with difficulty, held his hands out in front of him, and walked away from the handcar, filling the tunnel with his agonizing wails.

But the kitten was unharmed. At the last moment, he had managed to crawl into the bearded man’s backpack, so the flash hadn’t reached him. Vasya peered out fearfully. He knew it wasn’t over yet: It was gathering strength for the next strike, which meant he had to leave here as soon as possible.

In the distance, Andrey’s scream cut off. Vasily jumped onto the sleepers and ran. He ran as fast as he could; the tension grew with every minute, and fear drove him harder than a whip.

After a few dozen meters, Vasya came across Andrey’s body: he lay on his side, curled in a ball, and many rats were already swarming over him, beginning their feast. The kitten’s appearance was an unexpected but pleasant surprise for them. Vasily was immediately surrounded, and he backed away, looking trapped at the bristling gray mass of teeth.

One rat leaped at the poor thing from behind and bit his tail. This was the signal for the others, and the rats pounced on the kitten, burying him under their bodies.

Suddenly, the pack seemed to explode from within. A powerful electrical discharge turned several rats to ash and scattered the smoking corpses of the others. The air suddenly smelled of scorched fur and burnt meat.

The few that survived fled. The kitten ran with them—he had been saved because, before the anomaly attacked, the rats had unintentionally shielded him with their bodies.

Mad with pain and terror, Vasily raced with the pack. No one cared where they were going; panic pushed everyone to run wherever they could. A burrow, then a ventilation duct… soon Vasya fell behind the remnants of the pack and only stopped when the sky, covered with heavy clouds, stretched overhead and cold air rushed into his lungs.

He fell into the freezing mud exactly where he stopped. His singed sides rose and fell heavily after the mad race; his body was badly bitten. After a while, Vasya finally caught his breath, came to his senses, and stood up with difficulty. He had to keep going; they were waiting for him at home.

The flapping of giant wings came from above, and then a huge mutant body landed heavily in a puddle near the kitten. Splashes flew in all directions, and Vasily jumped away, dodging them. This was what saved him: the monster tried to grab the prey with its teeth but only snapped its jaws in vain. Enraged, the creature turned clumsily and chased after the kitten, who took off along a half-ruined building. A few seconds later, the mutant caught up with its prey, but Vasily turned sharply around a corner, and the predator, running by inertia for a few more steps, stopped.

A shot rang out. Then another, and another, after which the mutant slumped to the ground with a shattered skull. A man who was around the corner had fired. Completely confused, the kitten jumped at the shooter and clung to his leg.

The man jerked his leg and threw Vasily back, pointing his rifle at him. A bullet flew past the kitten, but luckily missed; another kicked up a fountain of mud when he landed.

“Stop!!! It’s Vasya!” the shooter’s partner appeared next to him.

“What?! Who’s Vasya?” the man asked, stunned, his finger still on the trigger.

“The kitten! Our commander’s!”

It was hard to recognize the same kitten in this dirty creature. But the man lowered his weapon.

The two of them approached the little animal; it moved weakly, trying to stand.

“Listen, Yur, it really is him,” the shooter was amazed. “How did you even recognize him?”

“I’m more interested in how he even got here. He disappeared from the station a few days ago, and suddenly he turns up here, on the surface.”

“Speaking of the surface… grab him, let’s get him to the commander. You know what the air is like—he’ll get poisoned.”

“He won’t. In this area, it’s more or less clean, the concentration of gases and toxins is low—it’s like an oasis. The only one of its kind. Though I’m more inclined to think this spot is an anomaly… by the way, we found the kitten around here the first time, too.”

“Still, no reason to linger. Let’s go.”

---

A fine rain fell from the sky. A squad of Stalkers was positioned on a children’s playground: in a sandbox with a leaning wooden mushroom, two soldiers were working on a wounded man, while the others covered them, hiding behind gazebos and carousels.

“Halt! Who goes there?”

“Yurik and Beton. Coming in from reconnaissance.”

“The commander’s been waiting for you. Was that you shooting back there?”

“Yeah, ran into a ‘flier’ on the way. We…”

“Incoming!!!”

Shots rang out. Yurik dropped the kitten to the ground and grabbed his rifle; Vasya landed on his paws and pressed his belly to the mud.

“Machine gunner, ten o’clock, group target…”

Because of the deafness caused by the shooting, the sounds seemed to come through cotton, but the kitten heard that voice and recognized it.

The voice belonged to Konstantin.

And the kitten ran. He put all the strength he had left into this final sprint. Shots thundered all around, killed mutants fell, but the little adventurer stubbornly pushed toward his goal, crossing puddles and dodging falling shell casings.

Right in front of Vasily, a “flier” dove at a soldier whose rifle had jammed, knocking him to the ground. To the right, a shotgun barked twice, and the monster fell over, hit by two large-caliber rounds. Vasya dove under the falling mutant and barely managed to pass before it hit the ground.

Then the kitten ran under a pull-up bar where a downed monster was hanging, jumped onto a children’s slide, and climbed to its peak. Behind the slide, Konstantin was inserting a fresh magazine into his rifle and grabbing the charging handle.

“Me-a-ow…”

The man froze and lifted his head. Right in front of him, shivering from the piercing wind, stood Vasya. He stretched his wet face toward the commander and meowed pitifully, stepping from paw to paw.

It was over; the attack had been repelled, and no one in the squad was hurt. The rain stopped. Not believing what was happening, Konstantin reached his hand to the kitten and touched his whiskers. Vasya immediately began rubbing his head against the fingers, letting out a quiet purr. Then the Major stepped forward and took the kitten in his arms, feeling the trembling of the dirty little body through his protective gloves.

“Commander?”

“Everything’s fine. Prepare the wounded for evacuation. Scouts to me,” as he had the first time he found the kitten, the commander unzipped his jumpsuit and tucked Vasya inside, ignoring the dirt. “How happy Dashka will be,” he thought, turning to the scouts. “She’s been crying for days… Eh, Vasya, Vasya, I’d love to know where you’ve been all this time and how you ended up here…”

It was stuffy and dark in the inner pocket of the jacket, but at the same time, incredibly cozy.

The kitten waited for the upcoming meeting with impatience. All his wounds had been healed, and the week-long quarantine was over.

The zipper hissed, and bright light filled the space around him, not blinding but softly highlighting the surrounding objects.

“Va-a-asya!” the kitten heard a joyful cry. Dasha scooped him into her arms and pressed him to her, her eyes shining with tears of joy. Nearby, Nadya gasped. Konstantin laughed happily, watching them and telling them the story of how Vasya had found him.

Everything bad was left behind. The kitten had returned home.

In two recent interviews, Andy Weir stated his support for AI. The first is in this interview with LA Review of Books, in which he says: "It’s only a matter of time before AI is able to write more entertaining, compelling, and exciting stories than any human."

"Train an AI on all the great works of literature, all the great books that people have loved, and it’ll figure out the commonalities and put together stories that are really awesome, in the same way that it can make art that’s really pretty when properly prompted."

He then said "I’m going to be out of my job eventually." When the interview challenges him on this, asking "isn’t a lot of what people enjoy about art the community experience and the person behind it? The human creator?" he responded:

"Take a tool like Photoshop. It can do all sorts of really cool things, but nobody wants to talk to the program. Nobody wants to talk to Google SketchUp about its process in rendering 3D models. People accept that there are tools that do this."

You can read the full interview here: https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/andy-weir-project-hail-mary-novel-film-interview/

In a second interview with Tom Bilyeu on YouTube, he went even further. It's a long interview, but he says that AI can already make great art and that human graphic artists will go away and be replaced by people who can "refine" AI generated art, that AI is just a tool and that it shouldn't be ridiculed, and that AI will be creating whole movies in the future that's better than what humans can make.

You can watch that interview here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrdVpioZ5dU

Pretty abhorrent stuff, in my opinion. I enjoyed The Martian and Project Hail Mary, but coming out so in favor of art as to say it's going to be better than human created art is just gross. And to not care that it's "trained" on stealing work is ridiculous.

Hello everyone.

I'm interested in books about life without fossil fuels, specifically modern life after fossil fuels.

I know of Life after Fossil Fuels by Alice Friedemann, and the work of Steve Hallett, but I'm struggling to find more books on the topic.

Maybe I'm just bad at searching, frankly... If you know how to best search for books on particular, somewhat specific topics, please also let me know!

Anyway, if you know of books on the topic, please recommend them! I want to learn more about this.

i realized we are losing our privacy so fast that it feels like we are living in a thriller movie from the 90s... so i decided to document the whole transition in my book. its called the final exodus.

here are some of the chapters i focused on to show u how deep the digital grid goes:

chapter 4: the digital identity trap

chapter 9: how they buy ur data without a warrant

chapter 13: reclaiming ur sovereignty in the 2026 grid

chapter 17: the end of anonymous life as we know it

i wanted to share this with the community here because u guys actually get it. u know that privacy isnt a luxury anymore... its a survival tactic.

u can download/read the book here: https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=-0_GEQAAQBAJ

let me know what u think about these topics or if u feel like we are already in the end-game. would love to discuss!

Someone needs to let the team know copyright is a serious big deal. You've read headlines like it before, no? ;)

https://annas-archive.pk/md5/97dc1a7e1726a2cb5bcbc5341c960195

Long ahh title also I added the CAPITALIZATION because I'm cool

They only have PDFs. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry ok

Anyone ever read this wonderful series? It’s got multiple sagas to it.

نُشر تبادليًا من: https://hexbear.net/post/7952320

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I am Abeer, a mother of four children from Gaza. We went through very hard times and lost everything because of the war. These days we are simply trying to survive and meet the most basic needs.

Today we only need $100 so I can buy some essential things for my children like food and milk.

Any help, even a small donation, can make a big difference for us. And if you cannot donate, please share our story so it can reach someone who might be able to help Link in bio or message me privately. 🙏💔🇵🇸

If you read one of these, pick this one. It has some problems, but his realization about his access to certain sources created something truly special.

There is gallery with some images from the book available on website https://www.opencircuitsbook.com/

https://thegreatpretense.org/