Ensign Glyzin wasn't thinking anything, he was covering the chief, but Shultsev, who still had not decided where to put this damned mop, yes, he was thinking. And here is what he thought: “I'll throw it, say, under “shishiga”, while it's noisy and insane here. And I’ll find this poacher later.”
– Sergey Borisovich, it is a suicide to evacuate me and my daughter, – said the young lady, smiling kindly. There were dimples on her round cheeks with a curl near the nose. The word “evacuate” she denoted as a quote by intonation. – Because for you this is the abduction, and for us this is resistance and then certainly your untimely death. Why am I sure of that? Me and my daughter are not able to leave the Zone. And we will fight for our lives. – The girl hugged the Father by the neck and leaned her head on her shoulder. – The main thing is that it’s not about me and Yana. We just came to hand you an invitation. There is an opinion that you are going to be a commandant here for a long time. You will have a good nickname. I was asked to call you. So I strolled under your surveillance camera. – The Father thoughtfully nodded with the stump of the trunk on the gas mask, and the lady continued: – I was nearby, and this is not a big favor, here in the Zone we have plenty of time. On other days, even in buckets. Will you go to talk?
– With whom? – asked Blinchuk hoarsely.
– With responsible and knowledgeable people.
– Here, in the Zone?
– No-no, – said the Father through his daughter. – Sergey Borisovich, Comrade Colonel, personally you cannot go out into the Zone at all. You will perish, and your death will be very violent. You have it written on the face. Even one step into the Zone will kill you. And this will be a pity. A pity not even because of you: death is a girlfriend in the Trouble. But a pity because you seem to be the very useful man as the commandant of QZAI.
– How did you say? What is “QZAI”?
– Kapustin's Qarantine Zone of Abnormal Intensities. This is how it will be called… The Zone. And you will be called Pinya.
– Why – “Pinya”?.. – Blinchuk asked dumbfounded. – Where did you get all this…
– Here is what you have to understand right now… – the young lady continued very seriously, and the Father made a gesture, stopping and apologizing at the same time. – One second, – the lass said in a baritone. – Forgive me for interrupting. – The Father took up his trunk and lifted the mask on his forehead, revealing the face. Blinchuk jumped back, almost stumbling on his sprained leg. However, he would probably have stumbled also on the healthy one. – Here's my face as a sign of trust, – the girl said. – Even my daughter hasn't seen me. And will not see. In the Zone, everything that appears to you, according to personal observations or to the words of eyewitnesses or witnesses, any miracles, any wild assertions that you do not dare to repeat officially on the outside, on the Earth, in reports, at night in a bed to Lubov Antonovna, confidentially at the president's ear, is all true. This is real. Khrushchev's five-storey buildings fly, the dead live, the air is harder than steel, and there is only one step to the moon. Next year, on December 25th, President Gorbachev will resign on the eve of official collapse of the Union. Be prepared for this, by the way. You are now a politician. You have a great power, great influence. Big money. You will be hunted.
