The colonel grabbed the automatic, and jumping out of the train car, knocked over two of the attackers with rounds. The other two managed to hide themselves behind the train car. Kost pressed his bitten hand into his chest and swore. The colonel and I walked around the train car from both sides but could no longer see the monsters. Maybe they were hiding in the bushes and were waiting again for the right opportunity.
“Everybody, we have to get moving,” said the colonel. “Lead out the madmen. And don’t forget to grab your poles.”
After several minutes we made our way to the southwest, all the further from this horrifying place. And we hadn’t made two dozen steps when they attacked us again. This time it was the rat-people and the children, as well as the rats. It’s true there were very few of the latter; however, I counted about ten of the monsters and about two hundred of the children. In addition they attacked us all mixed together, so the colonel was forced to shoot above the children’s heads in order to kill any of the rat-people. But they figured it out very quickly and stooped down.
After several seconds an indescribable confusion began. Those of us who had weapons mostly were occupied with the rat-people. Though the little boys were not less of a danger for us, but for some reason our hands wouldn’t rise up to shoot at them.
The rats scampered beneath our feet, and we didn’t notice them. With the poles in our hands, we created a path for our retreat. Unfortunately, in such a situation we were already no longer capable of protecting the madmen, and they pressed us away from them. The children, armed with whatever they could pick up, set on us even more tenaciously. The rat-people, in the meantime, attacked the madmen, knocked them over onto the ground and chewed through their throats. And we couldn’t help them. Finally Kost, with a threatening roar, broke his way through the children and began to strike the monsters with his pole. But their heads, evidently, weren’t made of melon, because he wasn’t able to knock a single one off his feet. On the other hand, they knocked him off his feet and assaulted him in a threesome.
This was already too much for my nerves. I grabbed the pistol and shot twice in front of me. The children began to shriek, blood splashed, but I no longer paid any attention to anything and using a staff, made my way through to Kost. A tangle of bodies rolled along the ground. Kost was all bloodied. I seized the moment and shot one of the monsters in the ear. That was all I was able to do for my comrade, because in the next moment the rat-people also attacked me. There were two of them and each one of them got a bullet in the gut from me, but this didn’t slow them down. I shot once again at one of them and after this the cartridges in my pistol were spent. There were cartridges in a box in my pocket, but there was not enough time to reload. The rat-people, from whose stomachs blood was flowing, were coming at me, stretching out their arms, baring their fangs. It would have been senseless to beat them with the staff, and I, turning it to its sharp side, stuck the point into the monster’s stomach, right into his fresh wound. The rat-person raised his head in a horrifying scream and became petrified on the spot. I plucked the staff out, and in the same way, drove it into the stomach of the other attacker. Now that one raised his head, bellowing a dying scream. But to my surprise and to my horror neither of them fell to the ground.
Then several seconds were enough for me to reload the revolver and shoot the monsters right into their gaping maws.
These were evidently the very bullets they needed to make them fall to the ground and die in convulsions.
I looked around and saw that the colonel and Viola had finally chased away the children with their shots and were backtracking to me now. Kost was battling now just with a single monster. I had shot one of them, and he had strangled the other. Knowing now how to kill the rat-people, once again I placed the revolver to the predator’s ear and killed him with a single shot.
Kost got up all bloodied.
“These scoundrels are really strong,” he spat. “I thought they’d tear me apart.”
“Good that you’re alive. Do you have any serious wounds?” I asked.
“It looks like no.”
A machine gun round echoed. This was the colonel firing after the escaping monsters. There were just three of them left. They had completed their task—all the madmen were lying on the ground with slashed throats.
The children stepped away to a safe distance and deliberated. More and more rats came to them. It was evident they were preparing for a new attack.
Kost washed off the blood and didn’t look as awful as before the assault. But several wounds were still bleeding and Viola, pulling out a bandage from my knapsack, bandaged him up.
“Just the last clip left,” the colonel said, nodding toward the machine gun. “We have one chance—to go toward the swamp. I know that road well, but if something should happen to me, remember that before you take a step, be sure to thrust your staff into the ground. Otherwise you’ll end up in a swamp-hole.
“Attention!” Kost shouted out. “It looks like a new attack.”
And indeed, among the group of children, the hairy heads of rat-people had appeared again. The three of them, who had escaped. While the children started out at us in a single body, tightly gripping cudgels in their hands, as well as shovels, rakes, and pitchforks.
The colonel shot above their heads, but this didn’t stop the children, and the rat-people bent over, hiding behind the children’s backs.
There were about thirty meters dividing us. We had to dare to do something, otherwise they’d crush us.
“We have to shoot,” I said, and shot at the legs of one of the boys. He let out a scream and fell.
But the rest of them kept moving with a fierce expression in their eyes. You’d just be amazed at their stamina.
The colonel also struck a hard blow at their legs, but the boys walked through the wounded and continued their assault. Here and there the rats rushed out, and moved past and in front of our noses like light cavalry, simulating an unexpected assault.
I took my pistol with both hands and aimed at a rat-person, but I missed; instead, one of the boys shouted and fell.
“Daddy,” Viola whispered, “they’re going to kill us right now.”
“Well, that’s it,” the colonel responded. “No more time to wait.”
The automatic round chopped down several of the boys; I recall, I also shot three times, and this time managed to wound a rat-person. Only after the second round did the boys dive vigorously in all directions.
We walked up to the children who lay killed and wounded in the grass. Suddenly Kost shouted out and fell on his knees next to one of them:
“God! Slavka!”
“What’s this?” I didn’t understand. “Do you know him?”
“That’s my son,” Kost moaned.
The boy, wounded in the stomach, looked at us with wide-open eyes, without expressing his pain with a single sound. Just tears ran down his pale cheeks.
“This is your son?” I asked, and hid my pistol in my pocket in a way that it appeared as if I had wounded him.
Kost drew his hand along his face, wiping away the tears, and asked:
“Is it painful for you?”
Perhaps at that moment he didn’t think about the stupidity of his question, he simply didn’t know what to say to his son, who just recently had written a denunciation of his father and had had him locked up in the psychiatric hospital. I don’t know if I would have conducted myself in the same way at that moment, but a knot rose up in my throat.
“Son, do you recognize me? I’m your father!”
The boy looked as if he were looking right through him, without reacting to his father’s words with either a single movement of his lips or eyebrows. Then Kost bent over closer, attempting at least to see something in those glassy eyes.
It happened in a single second—the boy pushed off his hands and grabbing his father by the neck, pulled him over to himself. This looked like a fervent embrace from the side. In reality something else was underneath it. Kos
t began to scream and darted back. Blood was gushing from his bitten artery.
“A rat!” He uttered hoarsely. “A rat! A rat!”
A smile of contentment illuminated the bloody, ravenous mouth of his son. And he breathed his last with bared teeth.
We didn’t manage to get to Kost to help him, as he had picked up someone’s abandoned pick-ax off the ground. He threw himself with a wild animalistic braying at the boys who again had already gathered together in a group. This stunned them so much that they, having themselves now gotten used to attacking, now froze without moving and just tried to defend themselves at the last moment. But the children did not interest Kost; jumping into the densest part of the group, he lopped off the head of one of the rat-people, drove his pick-ax into another all the way up to his shirt-cuff. A third one darted to escape, but just as he had jumped out behind the boys, an automatic round mowed him down.
The children ran from Kost in every direction, and we saw him weaken quickly, drop the pick-ax from his hand, fall down, and grow motionless.
“We have to escape,” the colonel said and pointed at the river. There a new defense militia was moving with the same weaponry.
The children, having seen the reinforcements, joyfully began to wave their arms. From all of this it was evident that this had added to their resolve.
We ran amid their chiding and whistling.
“Quicker! Quicker!” They shouted. “They’re escaping!”
And further they themselves started after us on the run, picking up stones and tossing them at us.
Unexpectedly, Viola shouted and began to roll along the grass. A stone had hit her in the leg. We grabbed beneath her arms, but she no longer was able to run, just limp.
“Escape,” the colonel said. “I’ll hold them off.”
“I won’t abandon you!” Viola threw herself onto his neck.
“No, no, you have to run. I’ll catch up to you. I’ll definitely catch up to you. The swamp is quite close, it’s there beyond the grove. Well... be well...”
“Daddy, take my pistol. Though it doesn’t have shells. Marko, do you have any more shells?”
“Right away,” I scrounged in my pocket.
“Don’t have to, I have some too,” the colonel said, putting away his pistol. “You might also need them.”
He stood on one knee and shot at the children’s legs; the children threw themselves onto the ground and began to crawl.
Without paying attention to Viola’s protests, I picked her up on my back and carried her off, grabbing her legs with my arms. The reason I like thin girls is just the fact that in a tough jam it’s not really hard to be chivalrous for them.
From time to time we could hear the crackling of an automatic behind our backs. And when I had made my way to the grove and had lowered the girl onto the ground to rest for a minute, I saw that the children had succeeded in surrounding the colonel, and now they were narrowing their circle.
“Why isn’t he shooting?” Viola was getting nervous.
As if he had heard her words, the colonel cut loose a round above their heads and broke away from being surrounded. But the children once again ran around him in a horseshoe and pulled him into the circle.
One of the boys threw a shovel, but the colonel managed to step aside. He ran clicking the automatic; but it was evident that there were already no more bullets. Then he hurled the automatic at his persecutors and hit somebody in the head. This infuriated the boys even more, who now ignored the danger for themselves and who already were tossing whatever they could reach at him.
“My God!” Viola screamed. “Help him!”
“I’ll help, but you have to go away. Limp any way you can, but try to disappear into the grove. We’ll catch up to you.”
“Why are you chasing me away? That’s my father!”
“And what of it? Don’t you understand that you’re getting in the way? Go into the grove, and I’ll run to help him.”
She, however, didn’t move from the spot.
“Well?!” I said. “I won’t go either, till you disappear. Think about your father!”
She turned and walked lamely to the grove, and I ran to meet the colonel. He had already pulled out his pistol, and had shot himself loose from the boys while moving. It was just in time, because just a little more and the circle would have closed again.
The children continued to throw stones and sticks at him. From time to time they hit the mark, and the colonel fell headlong several times.
Those rear cover shots that he permitted himself mostly had the aim of frightening his persecutors. The boys figured this out quickly and came at him with all the more zeal.
Suddenly the colonel fell and rolled along the ground. Then someone got him with the pick-ax. The boys all at once flew at him from every direction, waving their weapons. Two more gunshots echoed, but then their shovels and pick-axes gleamed in the sun.
I stopped. There was no sense in running further. From here where I stood the bullets couldn’t reach them. Anyway, how could I help him?
I threw myself into running back. When I looked back, I saw that the children, having done their work, had now started off after me.
All of this appeared to be immeasurably stupid—the deaths of each of us one by one and the inability of others to help in any way. Now I had to save myself and Viola. There were only two of us left who knew about Ratburg and about the horrifying danger that the rat-mutants were preparing for the world. We didn’t have the right to die. I ran thinking about the fact that I would have to inform the girl of the death of her father. I decided to say nothing until we ended up in safety, because who knew if she’d get stubborn and want to go back.
The boys little by little were catching up to me; but the distance was fairly great, and I didn’t dare to shoot. I saved my bullets. The band of rats caught up to me in the grove; they weren’t attacking, but just scurrying at my feet. Evidently they were making sure that I didn’t disappear.
I caught up to Viola quickly. She was walking lamely along the path, leaning against a pole.
“Well, how’s your leg?” I asked.
“It’s already better, it’s stretched out. But where’s Daddy?”
“He took another road, we’ll meet in the swamp.”
“Which road?” She stopped and anxiously looked at me.
“There’s no time to talk nonsense,” I cut her off and dragged her by the hand.
“I can’t walk so fast!” She shrieked. “Don’t drag me!”
“Hang in there! We have to make our way to the swamp soon before they catch up to us.”
“And Daddy?” She couldn’t calm herself down.
“Maybe he’s already there,” I lied.
The voices of the boys grew louder behind us. The grove became less dense, a little bit more and we’d run out into the swamp. It’d be just in time, because Viola had already lost all her strength. The water began to gurgle beneath our feet. The marshes had begun...
I told Viola to walk on alone, and that I was going to walk back and chase away the boys. I pulled out my pistol and shouted to them:
“Stop! I’m going to shoot!”
But my words didn’t have any more effect on them than the chirping of a sparrow. In answer, sticks and stones that they had grabbed and carried with themselves flew at me. Several of them hit my chest. I began hissing from the pain and no longer could stand on ceremony. I tried to shoot them in the legs and although not all the shots hit the mark, four of the boys were already writhing on the ground.
Having shot several more times, I turned back and ran through the marshes to Viola. The marshes were becoming more and more sticky, and the girl had to thrust out her stick at every step.
I didn’t think that the children would be bold enough to follow us into the swamp, but they ran there anyway. Once again I began to shoot, and two more of them fell. The rest of them were surrounding us in a small circle.
In the meantime we had wandered into a swamp so thi
ck we were wading up to our knees in mud. I only had four bullets left in my pistol.
“Oh, oh!” Echoed somewhere off to the side, and I saw a boy mired up to his waist in the swamp. He began to be sucked into it even further. Someone offered him a pole and tried to pull him out, but in that very spot he too fell into the very same swamp-hole. In front of our eyes in just a few seconds only ripples on the dark sorrowful water remained where both boys had been.
From the other side the same kinds of shrieks echoed to us. The boys, wandering without thinking, ended up in sticky slime and disappeared in it faster than anyone could come to help them.
Finally, fear arose in them and they stopped. Several returned, others began stamping their feet in indecision. The horrifying death of their comrades had really rattled them.
They stood this way until we entered the reeds and disappeared from their sight.
Further during the course of this entire journey through the swamp, I had to lie in order to calm down Viola. Toward the end, I was doing this so unpersuasively that when we finally stepped out onto dry land, she, without saying a word, fell into the grass and began to sob.
After several days we made our way to Lviv, and I took the girl to my aunt. My aunt lives alone. It’ll be better for her there.”
Marko grew silent and drank up the rest of his coffee.
“That’s all?” I asked.
“That’s all,” he responded.
I turned off the tape recorder and at that very moment heard a rustling that reached me from the knapsack.
“What’s there?” I poked it with my finger.
“I don’t know.”
“Something’s rustling.”
Marko stretched his arm to the knapsack, and from there suddenly with a piercing squeal a big rat jumped out and scampered to the open door. Marko took a look into the knapsack and pulled out an entire handful of tattered paper from it. Just dust remained from the rat bible.
“No!” He shrieked. “How’s this possible? It turns out that while I was speaking that monster was gnawing on the book!”
The Fantastic Worlds of Yuri Vynnychuk Page 23