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  "You’ll let them know that we’re stuck here, right?" – she asked him. I sighed in relief. It seemed that my words had an effect on her, after all.

  He clicked his tongue and shook his head: "Have it your way. If you want to stay here – don’t let me stop you. I don’t have time to break it down to you why you’re making a mistake, but in any case, you'll see it for yourself soon."

  "Don’t do this" – I warned him. "You’ll be needlessly risking your lives."

  He rolled his eyes and turned around: "Ot’yebis[7]".

  He turned around to leave, but I stopped him: ‘Wait! That walkie on your belt – you’re going to use it to contact the military, right?"

  "Yes, I will" – he told me. "I’ve tried it already, but they aren’t picking up. Guess I'm out of range here..."

  "What frequency are you going to use?" – I inquired.

  "What is it to you?" – he wondered.

  "I’ll be listening. I have a radio of my own" – I explained to him. "If you get there safely we’ll know that we can follow. And if anything happens to you on your way there… We might get you some help" – I suggested.

  "We won’t. Need. Help." – he told me through his teeth. "I can take care of myself, and I don’t need anyone to rescue me."

  "Please" – Natasha interfered, putting her hand on his shoulder. The man leaned back from her touch as if it burned him, but eased up a moment later when he saw the begging look in her eyes. "We just want to know what’s going on out there. We’re scared."

  He gave her a condescending look – no doubt the anger he felt toward me was still affecting him. But then his features eased up and looked away: "You’d be wiser to go with us – that way you won’t waste any time with this coward. Fine" – he sighed. "I’ll tell you the frequency. When we clear the town we’ll let you know."

  "Thank you" – Natasha said. The gratitude in her voice was sincere. The man reluctantly told me the frequency, asked me twice if I got it – no doubt just to gloat and rub it in my face that I’ll be just a listener to his heroics - and then headed inside his apartment.

  "Why didn’t you go with him?" – I asked her. She shook her shoulders: "He doesn’t seem like the kind of person who thinks before acting. He’s more bent on having it his way. Out there, I’d have to be dependent on him, and I don’t think that it’s a good idea."

  I nodded in understanding. As much as I wanted her to say that I sounded more reasonable it was not the time to be vain.

  "Come on" – I urged her to hurry up. "Let’s finish what we’ve come here for and head back. We have ten minutes, tops, before he leaves."

  CHAPTER 5 - A New Path

  When we reached the first floor there were only three men - all of them in their late forties or early fifties. One of them had an open can of beer in his hands. They seemed to have a friendly chat and did not share the mood of the rest of the people upstairs.

  "...so I am not sure, but since this is an emergency I think our salaries will be covered by the government" - one of them said.

  "So it's like a vacation?" - the one with the beer can asked.

  "Yes, yes, I guess you can put it that way" - the other one laughed.

  "Oh, look at these lovebirds" - the third one pointed at us. "Looking for a way out of the building? This door is sealed as well, don't try it" - he laughed.

  "We guessed as much" - Natasha said, seemingly irritated by the man's description. "We're just looking around."

  The men whispered and snickered to each other but Natasha passed them without giving them any more attention. I grunted and followed her.

  "Bunch of idiots" - I heard Natasha whisper when I got closer to her. "They think this is all is very fun."

  "Don't pay them any attention" - I told her. "I think they're just dying from boredom."

  "I know" - she said, coming closer to the door. "I’m just not in the mood to crack jokes with them." She traced the welding seam with her finger and then gave the door a slight push.

  "Look" - she told me. "The welding seams are on our side. You've said that our doors have been welded shut from within as well?"

  "Yes" - I nodded in agreement.

  For some reason, the mysterious welder had gone through the extra effort of welding all the doors from within. Even if he wanted to seal himself in along with the rest of the tenants, it would be much easier to walk from door to door with a welding stick in hand, before coming inside and welding the last door after him. But instead, he made sure to weld all of the doors shut from within. Taking extra time to get from one door to the next through the roof instead of through the street.

  I could see only one possible explanation for such behavior: the welder was aware of the dangers outside. And he feared them to such a degree he didn't risk going outside even for a few seconds it would take to walk from one door to the next. Perhaps the beasts were already outside our walls during the night? Or maybe the threat outside was even bigger than we'd thought before?

  "Hey, don't push yourself too hard, girl, you'll hurt yourself" - one of the men told us. I was ready to tell him to mind his own business but it didn't seem like he was teasing her: he seemed genuinely concerned. "We've tried that already; the door won't budge. Whoever welded these doors did a lousy job, but it’ll do the trick."

  "How do you know that?" - I asked the man. "Did any of you see or hear him?"

  The man straightened out and puffed his chest out. His eyes lit up with pride and excitement at a chance to gloat about himself: "Son, I've been working as a welder for over twenty years. I can read those seams as if they were a book. The man who welded those doors had a steady hand, but he did make a few mistakes here and there - mistakes someone with experience wouldn't have made."

  "So, if you're a welder, don't you have any tools at home?" - Natasha asked him. "Perhaps something we can use to weld these doors open?"

  "You don't weld things apart, you weld them together" - the man snickered and gave his friends a look. They smiled back at him, rolling their eyes. "You need a gas torch or a metal saw to cut it open now."

  "Alright, do you have any of those tools?" - Natasha patiently asked again. I could tell that, considering how much she wanted to get out, she was already at her limit.

  "No. What for? They are heavy, they smell…I keep them in my garage, where I do my work" - the man explained. "Besides, why would I unseal the door? You've heard what's going on out there. We should stay put until the army has it all under their control. They have a base nearby, somewhere in the forest. So they should swoop in soon."

  "Right" - Natasha said with thinly disguised sarcasm. "Leave it to the army."

  "Exactly" - the man either didn't notice her sarcasm or didn't bother to dignify it. "We're not just any town, remember? We used to hold great strategic importance. Whatever it is going on out there, they're going to get it back under their control very soon - they don't like it any other way."

  Natasha crossed her hands and turned around to examine the door again.

  "And no one heard anything?" - I looked at the other two men to let them know that I was talking to them.

  The one with the beer can shook his shoulders: "I didn't hear nothing. It might be because of my pills."

  "Hey, Yuri" - I heard Natasha call for me. "Take a look at this."

  She showed me something she'd picked up from the floor - an orange cigarette butt. It was burned right up to the filter, but luckily the flame had stopped just in time to spare the name of the brand at the base of the filter: "Soyuz-Apollo."

  "I know these" - I said, leaning back from it: even though I was an occasional smoker the smell of that brand always made me retch. Despite its fancy name, that brand of cigarettes was among the cheapest, most vile cigarettes there were on the market. If there was hell then the Devil himself must've been smoking those to torture his victims some more.

  "Is this one yours?" - Natasha asked the men, lifting her finding so that they could see it.

  "What, are you
going to scold us for littering now?" - one of them asked before the one with the can interrupted him: "Ain't nobody littering here, alright? We have a paint can the flight above for cigarettes, all the butts go there. We're keeping it clean here, alright?"

  "I've found it near the door" - Natasha explained. "It seems it was left there recently - it's not dirty yet. I think it was left by the one who welded these doors shut. Do you know anyone who smokes these?"

  "What brand is it?" - one of the men asked.

  "Soyuz-Apollo" - I said, almost gagging just from the associations I had with that name. The man mirrored my behavior, frowning in disgust: "God, no. They are awful."

  "I see" - Natasha said, curling her fist around it. "I'll throw it out on our way back."

  "Much obliged" - the man with the beer can saluted her with his drink and then finished it in one go.

  "Do you really think it was left by the welder?" - I asked her. "It could be a coincidence, you know."

  "I know," - she nodded. "But we can't dismiss that possibility, either. At least it's something."

  I didn't want to argue - it wasn't an argument I saw fit to be arguing over. Even if it was an unlikely clue, it could theoretically turn out to be correct. Either way, it yielded us nothing.

  "Let's go" - I told her. Those people are going to leave soon. I want to listen to how it goes… And I hope I'm wrong about this."

  ***

  We didn't talk until we got all the way back to our stairwell. The disturbing silence that had haunted us there before was now set aside by the sounds of a car alarm going off - something must've set it off in the short time we were inside the building, and I had a few guesses as to what that was.

  We started our observation from Natasha's apartment - only her windows were facing the town, and we wanted to see the beginning of that small expedition with our own eyes.

  We weren't the only ones: somehow, the rest of the people had either found out over the grapevine or heard the people climb down the makeshift rope made out of bedsheets because when I stuck my head out the window I saw many more heads below doing the same. Despite the chilly weather outside, they wanted to see it with their own eyes, and I was sure that many more people were looking through their glass panes.

  It felt just like in the primordial times when men hadn’t yet shed their fur and couldn’t walk upright. The entire tree had gathered to see their tribesmen climb down to the surface and was staying silent so as not to attract the tiger.

  No one was talking: though I was sure that many of those people had something to say, none of them made a sound. The people who were climbing down the rope were doing their best to stay silent, too. One of the women coming down grunted when she almost slipped, and the rest of the people shushed her. Even though they were confident that there was no threat outside, they were careful not to make a sound. Just in case.

  A few minutes later, all of them had descended. A group of ten people - mostly men, but with a few women as well. Most of them old enough to be my parents. Some of them were puffing out their chests and putting extra effort into standing straight, to show that they weren't afraid, but nobody was buying it.

  They were but a small group, venturing into the world that had stopped being familiar just an hour before, and from the height of the fifth floor, they seemed even smaller than usual.

  Their leader, the man who organized their great escape, was also silent. His confidence was gone: whether he believed that the creature existed or not didn't matter anymore. The quiet that had descended on the town was unsettling enough to make anyone nervous.

  He looked up and stared at us for a few moments. For a moment our eyes met: I didn’t know whether he could see me behind the glass pane, but the next moment he lifted his fist in a display of strength. A promise to the rest of us that he wasn’t going to perish. That he was going to return to our harbor from his voyage with help.

  "Let's go" - he told his group and slowly headed into town. One by one, people started following him. Looking around and trying not to lag behind, they didn't make an impression of people who were confident that their trip was going to be safe. They looked like people who were desperate to get out.

  Looking at them, I started having second thoughts: if they were scared to go outside yet still decided to do so, then perhaps it wasn't such a bad idea? Perhaps they weren't as reckless as I'd thought them to be, and wanted to get out before things turned to worse?

  Maybe they were right and I was wrong?

  "Godspeed" - one of the women looking out the window told them, and some people hushed her.

  The man at the front of the procession pulled out his radio and started quietly whispering something into it. No doubt, he had already started trying to contact the military to let them know that they were coming. Perhaps he hoped that they would meet them halfway there, and spare them from having to walk the entirety of their nightmarish path.

  After a minute or two, their slow procession disappeared behind the building. We could neither see nor hear them. The tenants, however, stayed where they were, looking into the distance. Some of them were probably second-guessing whether they should've gone with them. Bravery was always a good way of setting an example, even if a bad one.

  I didn't have to guess about their fate, though. I had the means to be with them on their path. I just had to do what I’d always done best. I just had to catch the right frequency and listen.

  "Come on" - I told Natasha. "Let's hurry."

  ***

  We hurried to my apartment, and a minute later, we were already sitting near my radio. I noticed that Natasha was looking at it with great interest - before that, she had only heard about my hobby, and even when I was telling her and Nikita about it, I was keeping the details sparse. I had never wanted them to think that I was a weirdo. I felt flattered: even though she was only interested in it because it ended up being useful, I still felt proud that my hobby drew her attention.

  "Here it is" - I said anxiously, tuning to the frequency the man had given me before. There were no voices, no sounds - nothing. For a moment, I felt worried: what if the man gave me the wrong frequency?

  "Is the frequency correct?" - Natasha wondered, leaning closer to the radio, her thoughts seemingly mirroring mine. "Say something, maybe he'll answer."

  I just impatiently shook my head - to say something over the radio could put them in danger. Those people were doing their best to evade being detected - to have their radio suddenly start spouting questions about whether they could see anything dangerous would negate their efforts at keeping a low profile and put them at risk.

  Provided there really was something dangerous outside, of course.

  Natasha didn't say anything else. We both listened to the white noise in silence afterward, straining our hearing as if that would help hear something. As one minute followed another one, I started wondering: why were they silent? Did he give me a random frequency, after all? Or there was some other, more sinister reason for the radio silence?

  "Military base, come in," - we both jerked when the man's voice suddenly came through the static. He sounded quiet and careful - it seemed that just as I was worrying if there was something outside so did he start to consider such an option. "We're coming from Novoyarsk. There was a siren and we didn't evacuate in time. There are eleven of us. We would appreciate it if someone come to meet us or give us some instructions."

  He didn't sound as confident anymore - perhaps he was just doubting that the military would come to save them. Or was there some other reason?

  "Military base, come in," - he whispered into the radio again. "There are eleven of us, and we're heading for the main road out of town. We urgently need someone to come pick us up."

  "Do you think they've seen or heard something?" - Natasha whispered to me. Even though they couldn't hear us unless I pressed the button down she was still hushing her voice. It was clear that she was concerned for their well-being.

  "I don't know," - I told her. "
I hope not."

  "Military- hold on, I'm talking on the radio" - the man whispered to someone. This time, when he pressed the button, I could hear that people around him were quietly talking to each other and to him. They didn't sound as composed as him - something had agitated them. I was hoping that it was just the town's unusual serenity.

  I didn't hear what the person next to him told the man, but I could guess the content of his words from the man's answer: "It's too late to turn back now. We'll be just wasting time." It seemed that he forgot to take his finger off the radio's button.

  "How far away do you think they are?" - Natasha asked me.

  "Can't be too far," - I told her, furrowing my eyebrows. "Stubborn fool. He just doesn't want to appear weak in front of the people here if they come back."

  "You've made the right choice to stay here," - I told Natasha.

  She just raised the finger to her lips: "I want to listen. We can talk later."

  "Military base, come in!" – the man whispered into the radio quickly. "Come in. We urgently require your assistance. Have someone pick us up. Come in goddamn it!"

  Something was going on there - that much was clear. Something's gotten him worried and made him start requesting the military's help. He wasn't thrilled with just walking to the base on his own anymore.

  Natasha couldn't just stand by quietly: she rushed to the radio and, before I could stop her, pressed the button down and whispered into the mic: "Come back to the building! It's not worth it!"

  I tore her hand off the button and threw her a disapproving glance. She didn't back down and instead glared back at me.

  "Don't give me that look! We have to do something!" - she told me. Just as I was about to reply, the radio spoke again.

  "Who is this?" - the man asked the radio. People in the background were still restless. It sounded like they were right next to him, banding together into one small group. Personal space wasn't a priority anymore.

  "Military base, is that you?" - he asked the radio again. I glared at Natasha again: now the man was thinking that someone from the base could hear him, after all. "Military base, repeat! I didn't get it."