I led Sissy past a pair of stone-faced frères to an empty compartment near the back wall, took a jacket from her and laid it on a bench next to me. She drank her Manhattan and made a grimace. It's good. If I continue to supply her with a drink that she does not like, she will not be able to pump enough so that I had to carry her out of here in my arms.
“It's just amazing here!” She cried.
- Do you like?
- Sure! Oh, I can't believe I'm really here! Oh my god, Lee, you're the best!
I don't tolerate compliments very well.
- Fine, fine. Why are not you dancing?
Only that was what she needed. Throwing her bowler on the table, she galloped rushed to the dance floor. After a minute I lost sight of her; but I was not worried about this. “Dialton” is a completely reliable place, especially when Fatty Eddie personally takes care that no sweet-talking trastafari tries to drag her to his home.
I sipped my cocktail and looked around. As Eddie said, there were a lot of uniforms - here, in the depths of the club, there were no less than at the door. Libertines did not appear too often in “Boul 'Disney”: they were too busy trying to become real Communards - they arranged for sharing and showdowns, and, in my opinion, they didn't wash often enough. However, sometimes it happened that a few frères descended to drop in here, where the rich played bohemia.
The ones sitting here were tough guys, seasoned street fighters. One of them turned to me in profile, so that I could make out his earrings - these abnormal ones wear them instead of medals - and I was impressed. This Pierre was an old veteran: twenty confirmed dead, and the Battle of Versailles in addition. I began to think about leaving; a bell rang in my brain.
I had to leave. I did not do this. Sissy was amusing herself, she jumped up and down to me, and after the second Manhattan she switched to plain water (she did not recognize soda - she was obviously afraid of cellulite). I sat thinking about the intricate task of my work and methodically exterminating the spare pack of Zhitan when suddenly it was all over.
The speakers fell silent.
All lamps flashed at full power.
Fatty Eddie stumbled through the doorway, thrown away like a rag doll, and, falling, barely managed to roll over.
A man dressed in a power shell entered inside after Eddie, leaving dents in the floor.
Frères all over the club jumped up and folded their arms over their chests. I mentally kicked myself - I should have seen it brewing. As a rule, frères were held together by one harsh Puritan group, but this evening they were evenly distributed throughout the territory, and I was too busy to notice a change in their usual location. I tried out of the corner of my eye to spot Fat Fat Eddie, while not taking my attention from frères. At first, I did not see him at all, but then he showed up at the door leading to the old, half-abandoned Dialton kitchen. He looked stunned. I was distracted for a moment to look at him. He met my gaze with a preoccupied smile, put his finger to the tip of his nose and disappeared outside the door.A second later, one of the frères blocked the exit to the kitchen, standing in front of the very door behind which he had just disappeared. I thought that I would like to be able to roll around under the blows like Fatty Eddie did.
The loudspeaker in the power shell suddenly wheezed and came to life, amplifying the voice of the inside of the pierre to a furious rumble:
- Messieu'dames [25], please attention! - The pronunciation of the siloviki was not bad: just moderately soft to charm the ladies.
One of the trastafar with a red rooster hanging on his side with a rooster of hair on his head suddenly rushed to the fire exit, but the strong frère, carelessly waving his hand, dumped him on the run. The guy was flat on the floor and left to lie. A scream rang out, and after a minute everyone was screaming around me.
The silovik fired at the ceiling; a plaster shower fell on his shell. The screams subsided. The loudspeaker thundered again:
- Attention, please! This building was nationalized by order of the Provisional Revolutionary Committee of the Sovereign Paris Commune. You are all invited to come to the call center of the third section, where your suitability for revolutionary service will be evaluated. For your convenience, the Provisional Revolutionary Command of the Sovereign Paris Commune has organized transport that will take you to the call center. You have to line up one at a time and proceed to the buses that are outside. I ask you to line up in a column.
My thoughts frantically fluttered, my heart was beating somewhere in my throat, and a cigarette, rolling off the table, burned through the floor. I did not dare to bend over her, afraid that someone from frères would decide that I wanted to get a weapon. I managed to look out for Sissy: she stood frozen in place in the middle of the dance floor, but looked around - obviously, thinking something, weighing the situation. Trastafara hastily moved toward the door; I took advantage of the general turmoil to break through to her, holding her hat and jacket in my hands. I grabbed her elbow and led her to a man in a power shell.
“Monsieur,” I said. - I ask you for one minute. “I spoke my best French, who kept in reserve for meetings with arrogant Swiss bastards who pay me big enough money to tolerate them.”
The silovik looked me up, reflected, then unfastened the telephone receiver from his chest plate and handed it to me. I brought it to my ear.
- What do you need?
- Listen, this girl - she is my mother's niece; I arrived just yesterday. She is young and she is scared.
- Here everyone is young and everyone is scared.
“But she's not like these guys - she's passing through here.” She has a plane ticket from Orly for tomorrow morning. Let me take her home. I give you a word of honor - tomorrow morning I will first appear at the recruiting station (I will come to hell with two!); as soon as I put her on a plane ...
I was interrupted by his laughter, rolling out with a bizarre echo inside the shell.
- Well, of course, monsieur, of course! No, I'm sorry, but I have to insist.
- My name is Lee Rosen, I am a personal friend of Major Ledua. Contact him - he will confirm that I am telling the truth.
“If I get in touch with the commandant zero-three-hundred, it can be very expensive for me, monsieur.” My hands are tied. Maybe someone can arrange a meeting with you tomorrow morning.
- I think a bribe is unlikely to interest you?
“Yes, that is unlikely.” I was given quite clear instructions: all those present in the club - to the call center. Don't worry, monsieur, everything will be fine. Glorious times are coming in Paris today!
He turned off the phone with a click, and I hung up just at the moment when his loudspeaker was revived, stunning me with its roar:
- Quickly, my friends, quickly! The sooner you find yourself on the bus, the sooner it will all be over.
Sissy stared fixedly at the clutter, overcome by gloomy forebodings; the knuckles of her fingers clinging to my shoulder turned white.
- Everything will be settled, don't worry! I shouted to her, muttering to myself: “Well, glorious times are coming in Paris!”
It is better not to describe this trip to the call center in too much detail. We were pushed into the bus tightly, like cattle; some of the more hollowed-out trastafaras were cut down along the road, and at least one tried to empty my pockets. I held Sissy tight to my chest, flattening her hat and jacket between us, and whispering something comforting in her ear. Sissy fell silent and only shook, buried in my chest.
A hundred years later, the bus drove up to a stop, a hundred years later, the doors hissed open and the trastafar began to roll out. I waited for the bustle to settle and took Sissy out of the bus.
“What's going on, Lee?” She asked finally. There was an expression on her face that I recognized - it was the same thoughtful look that I had when I began to think about the next work task.
- It seems that frères decided to recruit new fighters. Don't worry, I'll settle everything. You don't have time to blink an eye, as we get out of he
re.
A group of frères drove people into two doors: women in one direction, men in the other. One of them came up to us to take Sissy from me.
“Please, friend,” I told him. - She's scared. This is my mother's niece. I have to take care of her. You are welcome. I would like to speak with your commander. Major Ledua is my friend, he will deal with this matter.
Pierre acted as if he had heard nothing. I didn't even try to offer him a bribe: from such a bastard it would be quite possible to take all my money, and then pretend that he saw me for the first time. The siloviki were an elite, they still met some grains of decency; these same guys were simply mentally retarded sadists.
He simply dragged Sissy by the hand until he tore it from me, and then shoved it to the other women. I sighed, comforting myself with the thought that at least he hadn't kicked me in the balls for opening my mouth. Women were driven somewhere around the corner - where? Was there a separate entrance for them? Sissy was out of sight.
It took me a considerable volitional effort to abstain from smoking while I stood in line; but I had a feeling that I could stay here for a long time and I should save cigarettes. After an eternity filled with shuffling legs, I found myself face to face with a sergeant in a hard-starched uniform, with a jaw that was shaved to a blue and a professionally wary manner of holding.
“Bonsoir,” he said.
Obeying a sudden impulse, I decided to pretend that I did not speak French. Now I should grab hold of all possible levers - my occupation teaches such things.
- Uh, hello! I answered.
- What is your name, monsieur? “He had an electronic notebook with him - judging by the logos, libertized from the Val Mart department store [26] on Champs Ellipses [27].
- Lee Rosen.
He quickly scribbled something in a notebook.
- Nationality?
- Canadian.
- Place of residence?
- Ryu Texas, thirty, number thirty three.
The sergeant smiled.
- The quarter of the trastafar.
- Yes it is.
“And you yourself - are you a trastafari?”
I was wearing a white linen suit, my hair was cut short and neatly, and I was about four dozen. However, it was not worth offending his mental abilities.
“No sir.”
- Aha! He said, as if I had somehow particularly successfully parried his attack.
A shadow of a smile appeared on his lips. I decided that I probably like this guy. It felt a style.
“I'm a researcher.” Independent Researcher.
“Jean-Marc, bring a chair,” he ordered in French. I pretended to be surprised when a thug sticking out at the door set an excellent oak armchair upholstered in chrome leather next to me. The sergeant pointed me to him, and I sat down. - Researcher? And what kind of research are you doing, Rosen?
- Corporate research.
“Yeah,” he repeated again. Smiling favorably at me, he pulled a pack of Marlboro from the table and offered me a cigarette.
I took it and lit it, trying to keep my face calm.
- For all the time that I live in Paris, for the first time I see an American cigarette.
“Serving in the Interim Command offers certain, uh ... advantages,” he took a deep drag, then smiled at me again, fatherly. Yes, he was great.
- Tell me, what exactly are you called to research, performing the duties of an independent corporate researcher?
What the heck! Anyway, sooner or later it will come out.
- I work in economic intelligence.
“Yeah,” he said. - I see. Espionage.
“This is not entirely true.”
He raised a brow doubtfully.
- Trust me. I do not crawl through bushes with a camera or listening devices. I do analysis of models.
- Here's how, models? Please continue.
My subsequent speech was perfected by a million ignorant relatives, so I switched to autopilot.
- Let's say I make soap. Suppose you are my competitor. Your head office is located in Könice, and production is transferred through a subcontractor to Azerbaijan. I want to be constantly up to date on what you are doing, so I spend a certain amount of time weekly looking at job listings in Könice and its suburbs. I also track everyone who has changed their place of residence to an address in Könice. These data are collected in one array, which I provide with cross-references to the registration registers of graduates of the first hundred chemical and technical educational institutions and to the index of articles in industry journals in chemical engineering.Keeping track of what kind of people you hire and what their specialty is, I can presumably determine what projects you are going to develop. When I find you have a large number of hired employees, I undertake to follow especially carefully, and then expand my business.
Since you and I are in the same business, there will be nothing extraordinary if I call your subcontractor manufacturer and ask if their company is interested in taking on a certain amount of work. I will arrange so that these works allow me to control what stage of readiness each type of product they produce is in: liquids for washing dishes, toilet soap, lotions and so on. In the same way, I can conclude contracts with your packers and carriers.
As soon as I determine that you are going to release a series of, say, detergents somewhere next month, I am already armed. I can go to major retail stores and offer them my competing laundry detergents at discount prices, provided that they enter into an exclusive six-month contract with me. In a few weeks, when you launch your new series, none of the major stores will be able to put your products on their shelves.
“Yeah,” the sergeant said. He thoughtfully looked somewhere over my shoulder, in the doorway, behind which, in exhausted silence, the lined up trastafar waited. “Yeah,” he said again. Then he returned to his notebook, and for several minutes I watched his style creak across the surface of the screen. “You can pick it up.” Treat him softer, ”he said in French. - Thank you, monsieur Rosen. It was very informative.
Day 2: Bend down and say “Ah!”
I was taken to an improvised barracks - it was some kind of office center with bolts fastened on the door - and stuffed into one of the rooms where four trastafaras were already sleeping dead on a gray industrial linoleum. I rolled up my jacket, made a pillow for myself, put my boots under it and after some time also fell asleep.
I woke up from a sleepy shuffling of my legs in the corridor, interspersed with the plumbing steps of the security officer. When frère in the power shell opened the bolt and opened the cabinet, I was already waiting outside the door.
The silovik turned on the spotlight on his shoulder, flooding the room with a stream of sharp light. I forced myself not to squint my eyes and stood calmly, waiting until the pupils got used to it. My cellmates were moaning on the floor.
- Climb! - ordered the security official.
“Raise your horse-radish,” one of the trastafar muttered, covering his head with a sweater. The silovik with mechanical agility moved towards him, grabbed his shoulder and pulled him into the air. Trustafari howled. - Oh you, your mother! .. Yes, I'll rip your ass off! I'll drag your ass in the courts! Well, lowered it!
The silovik dropped it and turned to the others. Everyone was already struggling to their feet. Fel words rubbed his shoulder, throwing furious glances at him.
- On the run ... arsh! - the silovik ordered and followed us into the corridor.
Saying about “running” was not a joke either. He drove us up the stairs at a fast trot, easily setting the pace for us. When I first arrived in Paris, this building was completely empty and could be seen through. A few years later, some developer advertised it, updated it, and went bankrupt. And now it has finally been populated.
Having run a good six floors, we eventually found ourselves on a roof surrounded by barbed wire, overlooking the dome of one of the cathedrals and the rows of dilapidated residential areas. Other recruits were already here, both men and
women, but I did not find Sissy among them.
Well-fed frères stood at the edges of the roof in a ready position, with pistols in their hands. In addition, there were several vehicles for installation work with baskets raised by several meters, in which there were arrows with rifles on tripods. They turned their weapons from side to side, taking their sights on the roof, then the street below, and then the roof again. I was surprised - how did they actually manage to drag cars here? - but then he noticed the frères group in power shells and guessed: it was enough for these guys to simply take each of their corner and jump. The system of hoists and blocks is resting!
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