«The boss has an alibi,» I said. «Indisputable. For two incidents he has four witnesses. And for one—almost the entire Watch.»
«Was that the hunt for that Dark One who went crazy?»
«Yes.»
«Well, in theory, you could have killed the Dark Ones. Quite easily. And I’m sorry about this, Anton, but every one of the killings happened when you were in an excited state; not completely in control of yourself.»
«I didn’t do it.»
«I believe you. What shall I do with the file?»
«Delete it.»
Tolik thought for a while.
«I don’t have anything valuable on here. I think I’ll run a low-level format. The disc’s long overdue for a clean-out.»
«Thanks.» I closed the dossier on the boss. «That’s it, I’ll deal with the others myself.»
«Gotcha,» said Tolik as he overcame the computer’s righteous indignation and it began digesting itself.
«Go check on our staff,» I suggested. «And look stern for a change. I’m sure they’re playing patience in there.»
«All in a day’s work, I suppose.» Tolik agreed willingly enough. «When will you be through here?»
«In about two hours.»
«I’ll come back.»
He went off to our «girls,» two young programmers who basically dealt with the Watch’s official activity. I continued working. Semyon was next up.
Two and a half hours later I tore my eyes away from the computer, massaged the back of my neck with my palms—it always cramps up when I sit there hunched over the monitor like that—and turned on the coffee machine.
Neither the boss, nor Ilya, nor Semyon fitted the role of an unhinged killer of Dark Ones. They all had alibis—and some of them were absolutely rock solid. For instance: Semyon had managed to spend the entire night of one of the murders in negotiation with the top management of the Day Watch. Ilya had been on assignment in Sakhalin—they’d screwed things up so badly over there that they’d needed help from the central office…
I was the only one left under suspicion.
It wasn’t that I didn’t trust Tolik, but I went through the data again anyway. It was all very neat. Not a single alibi.
The coffee was disgusting, sour; the filter couldn’t have been changed for ages. I gulped down the hot swill, gazing at the screen, then took out my cell phone and dialed the boss’s number.
«Yes, Anton.»
He always knew who was calling him.
«Boris Ignatievich, only one of the four can be suspected.»
«Which one exactly?»
The boss’s voice was dry and official. But somehow I suddenly got this image of him sitting semi-naked on a leather couch, with a glass of champagne in one hand and Olga’s hand in the other, holding the phone in place with his shoulder, or levitating it beside his ear…
«Tut-tut,» the boss rebuked me. «You lousy clairvoyant. Who’s under suspicion?»
«I am.»
«I see.»
«You knew it,» I said.
«Why do you say that?»
«There was no need to get me to process that dossier. You could have done it yourself. That means you wanted me to be convinced of the danger.»
«That could be,» the boss said with a sigh. «What are you going to do, Anton?»
«Start packing my bag for jail.»
«Come around to my office. In… er… in ten minutes.»
«Okay.» I turned off my phone.
First I went to see how the girls were doing. Tolik was still there with them, and they were hard at work.
The Watch didn’t really have any need for these two worthless programmers. Their security clearance was low, so we still had to do almost everything ourselves. But where else could we find work for two sorceresses as weak as these two? If only they’d have agreed to live ordinary lives… no, they wanted the romance of working for the Watch… So we’d invented jobs for them.
They mostly just whiled away the time, surfing the Net and playing games; their greatest favorites were the various kinds of patience.
Tolik was at one of the spare PCs—we had plenty of hardware around the place. Yulia was perched on his knees, twitching the mouse around on its mat.
«Is that what you call computer skills training?» I asked, gazing at the monsters hurtling around the screen.
«There’s nothing better than computer games for improving skill with the mouse,» Tolik replied innocently.
«Well…« I couldn’t think of any answer.
It was a long time since I’d played any video games like that. The same went for most other members of the Watch. Killing some evil vermin in a cartoon stopped being interesting once you’d met it face to face. Unless, that is, you’d already lived a couple of hundred years and built up huge reserves of cynicism, like Olga…
«Tolik, I probably won’t be back in today,» I said.
«Aha.» He nodded, without any sign of surprise. None of us have really strong powers of prevision, but we sense little things like that immediately.
«Galya, Lena, see you later,» I said to the girls. Galya twittered something polite, trying to look entirely absorbed in her work. Lena asked:
«Can I leave early today?»
«Of course.»
We don’t lie to each other. If Lena asks, it means she really needs to leave early. We don’t lie. But sometimes we might just leave something unsaid…
The boss’s desk was in a state of total confusion. Pens, pencils, sheets of paper, printouts of reports, dull, exhausted magic crystals.
But the crowning glory of this incredible jumble was a lighted spirit lamp, with some white powder roasting over it in a crucible. The boss was stirring it thoughtfully with the tip of his expensive Parker pen, obviously expecting it to produce some kind of effect. But the powder seemed to be doggedly ignoring the heat and his stirring.
«Here.» I put the disc down in front of the boss.
«What are we going to do?» Boris Ignatievich asked without even looking up. He wasn’t wearing a jacket; his shirt was crumpled and his tie had slid to one side.
I stole a glance at the couch. Olga wasn’t in the office, but there was an empty champagne bottle standing on the floor, next to two glasses.
«I don’t know. I haven’t killed any Dark Ones… not these Dark Ones. You know that.»
«Sure, I know.»
«But I can’t prove it.»
«By my reckoning we’ve got two or three days,» said the boss. «Then the Day Watch will bring a formal charge against you.»
«It wouldn’t take much to arrange a false alibi.»
«And would you agree to that?» Boris Ignatievich inquired.
«Of course not. Can I ask one question?»
«Yes.»
«Where does this information come from? The photos and videos?»
The boss paused for a moment.
«I thought that would be it. You’ve seen my dossier, Anton. Was it any less intrusive?»
«No, I suppose not. That’s why I’m asking. Why do you allow information like that to be gathered?»
«I can’t forbid it. Monitoring is carried out by the Inquisition.»
I just managed to bite back the stupid question: «But does it really exist?» My face probably said it all for me anyway.
The boss continued looking at me for a moment or two as if he were expecting more questions and then went on:
«Let’s get to the point, Anton. From this moment on you must never be left alone. Maybe you can go to the John on your own, but at all other times—you must have two or three witnesses with you. If we’re lucky there could be another killing.»
«If I’m really being set up, the killing won’t happen until I’m left without an alibi.»
«And we’ll make sure you are not left without one,» the boss said, laughing. «What kind of old fool do you take me for?»
I nodded, still not sure, still not understanding everything.
«Olga…
«
The door in the wall—the one I’d always assumed led into a closet—opened and Olga came in, smiling as she straightened out her hair. Her jeans and blouse sat really tight on her body, the way they do only after a hot shower. Behind her I caught a glimpse of an immense bathroom with a Jacuzzi and a panoramic window right across one wall—it must have been one-way glass.
«Olya, can you handle this?» the boss asked, obviously meaning something they’d already talked about.
«On my own? No.»
«I didn’t mean that.»
«Oh sure, of course I can.»
«Stand back to back,» the boss ordered.
I didn’t feel like arguing, but I had a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. I knew something really serious was about to happen.
«And both of you open yourselves to me,» Boris Ignatievich demanded.
I closed my eyes and relaxed. Olga’s back was hot and damp, even through the blouse. A strange sensation, standing there touching a woman who’s just been making love… but not with you.
No, I wasn’t the slightest bit in love with her. Maybe because I remembered her in her non-human form, maybe because we’d become friends and partners so quickly. Maybe because of the centuries that separated her birth from mine: What did a young body mean, when you could see the dust of the centuries in the other person’s eyes? We’d become friends, and nothing more.
But standing next to a woman whose body still remembers someone else’s caresses, pressing yourself against her—that’s a strange feeling…
«Right, let’s begin…« said the boss, perhaps a bit too sharply. And then he uttered some words I didn’t understand, in some ancient language that hadn’t been used for thousands of years.
Flying.
It really was like flying. As if the ground had slipped away from under my feet and I’d become weightless. An orgasm in free fall, LSD mainlined straight into the bloodstream, electrodes in the subcortical pleasure centers…
I was swept away in a torrent of wild, unadulterated joy that came out of nowhere, and the world dimmed and blurred. I would have fallen, but the power streaming out of the boss’s raised hands held Olga and me up on invisible strings, making us arch over and press ourselves against each other.
And then the strings got tangled up.
«I’m sorry, Anton,» said Boris Ignatievich, «but we didn’t have any time for hesitation and explanations.»
I didn’t answer. I was dumbfounded, sitting there on the floor and staring at my hands, at those slim fingers with the two silver rings, at my legs—those long, shapely legs still damp after my bath, in jeans that were clinging too tight, at the blue and white sneakers on my little feet.
«It’s not for long,» the boss said.
«What the…« I almost swore, jerking forward and trying to jump to my feet, but the sound of my voice made me cut my oath short. A low, vibrant, soft woman’s voice.
«Calm down, Anton.» The young man standing beside me reached out his hand and helped me up.
If not for that, I’d probably have fallen over. My center of balance had completely changed. I was shorter, and the world looked quite different…
«Olga?» I asked, looking at what used to be my face. My partner, now the inhabitant of my body, nodded. Totally confused, I gazed into her… into my face and I saw I hadn’t shaved properly that morning. And there was a little, angry red pimple on my forehead that would have done credit to any teenage slob going through puberty.
«Calm down, Anton. It’s the first time I’ve ever swapped sexes too.»
Somehow I believed her. Despite her great age, Olga might never have found herself in this particular ticklish situation before.
«Have you got your bearings now?» the boss asked.
I looked myself over again, first raising my hands to my face and then looking at my reflection in the glass doors of the shelves.
«Let’s go,» said Olga, tugging at my arm. «Just one moment, Boris…« Her movements were as uncertain as mine. Maybe she was even less steady. «Light and Darkness, how do you men walk?» she suddenly exclaimed.
It was then that the irony of the situation struck me and I started laughing. They’d hidden me, the target of the Dark Side’s plot, in a woman’s body. In the body of the boss’s lover, who was as old as the hills.
Olga literally pushed me into the bathroom—I couldn’t help feeling quite pleased I was so strong—and bent me down over the Jacuzzi. Then she squirted a jet of cold water straight into my face from the shower head she’d left lying ready on the soft-pink ceramic surface.
I snorted and twisted free of her grip, suppressing the urge to smack Olga—or was it me, really?—across the face. The motor reflexes of this other body seemed to be coming awake.
«I’m not hysterical,» I said. «It really is funny.»
«Are you sure?» Olga screwed up her eyes, looking hard at me. Was that really the expression I had when I was trying to look benevolent and doubtful at the same time?
«Absolutely.»
«Then take a look at yourself.»
I went across to the mirror, which was on the same massive scale as everything else in this secret bathroom, and gazed at myself.
The result was strange. As I looked at my new form, I began feeling completely calm. The shock would probably have been worse if I’d been in another man’s body. But this was okay; it just felt like the beginning of a fancy dress party.
«Are you influencing me at all?» I asked. «You or the boss?»
«No.»
«I must have pretty strong nerves then.»
«You’ve smudged your lipstick,» Olga commented. She chuckled. «Do you know how to put lipstick on?»
«Are you crazy? Of course not.»
«I’ll teach you. It’s not that tricky. You’re really lucky, Anton.»
«How’s that?»
«One week later, and I’d have had to teach you to use panty liners.»
Chapter 2
After I stepped out of the office I paused for a moment, fighting the temptation to go back in.
I could reject the boss’s plan at any moment. I only had to go back in and say a few words, and Olga and I would be returned to our own bodies. But in half an hour of conversation I’d been told enough to make me accept that switching bodies was the only way to handle this provocation by the Dark Ones.
After all, it doesn’t really make much sense to refuse life-saving treatment because the injections hurt.
I had the keys to Olga’s apartment in my purse, together with her money and credit card in a little billfold, makeup, a little handkerchief, a panty liner—what for, when I wasn’t supposed to need it?—a little box of Tic Tacs, a comb, a layer of small items scattered on the bottom, a mirror, a tiny cell phone…
But the empty pockets of the jeans made me feel like I must have lost something. I rummaged in them for a second or two, trying to find at least a forgotten coin, but was soon convinced that Olga carried everything in her purse, the way most women do.
You might have thought I’d just lost things that were a bit more important than the contents of my pockets. But it was a detail that irritated me, so I transferred a few bank notes from the handbag to my pocket and that made me feel a bit more confident.
It was a shame Olga didn’t carry a Walkman, though…
«Hi,» said Garik, walking toward me. «Is the boss free?»
«He’s… he’s with Anton…« I replied.
«What’s happened, Olya?» Garik asked, looking at me closely. I don’t know what it was he’d sensed: a different intonation, hesitant movements, a new aura. But if a field operative that neither Olga nor I had ever spent much time with could sense the swap, I wasn’t doing too well.
And then Garik gave me a timid, uncertain smile. That was entirely unexpected: I’d never noticed Garik trying to flirt with the Watch’s female employees. He even has trouble getting to know human women, he’s so incredibly unlucky when it comes to romance.
That was my cover story for the Night Watch—in the highly unlikely event that we had one of the other side’s agents among us. As far as I know, that’s something that’s only happened once or twice in the entire history of the Watch, but you can never tell… Might as well let everyone think Boris Ignatievich had a falling out with his old girlfriend.
There was a plausible reason, a good one. A hundred years of imprisonment in his office, without any chance to assume human form, partial rehabilitation, but with the loss of most of her magical powers. That was more than enough reason to take offense… And at least the story relieved me of the need to play the part of the boss’s girlfriend, which would have been going just too far.
I walked down to the third floor, thinking things through as I went. I had to admit that Olga had made things as easy for me as she could. She’d put on jeans today, instead of her usual matching skirt and jacket or dress, and sneakers instead of high-heeled shoes. Even the light perfume she’d used wasn’t overpowering.
I knew what I was supposed to do now; I knew how I was supposed to behave. But even so, it was still hard. I had to turn into the modest, quiet side corridor instead of going toward the door.
And take a plunge into the past.
They say hospitals have their own unforgettable smell. And of course they do. It would be strange if the mixture of bleach and pain, sterilizing unit and wounds, standard issue bed sheets and tasteless food didn’t have some kind of smell.
But tell me, if you can—where do schools and colleges get their smell?
Not all our subjects are taught on the Watch’s own premises. Some things are easier to teach in the morgue, at night—we have our contacts there. Some things are taught out in the field; some things are taught abroad, on tourist trips paid for by the Watch. During my training, I spent time in Haiti, Angola, the USA, and Spain.
But there are still some lectures that can be given only in the Watch’s own building, securely sealed off from its foundations to its roof by magic and protective spells. Thirty years ago, when the first Watch moved into this building, they set up three small halls, each for fifteen trainees. I still don’t know what was most important in that decision—the optimism of my colleagues or the fact that the space was available. Even when I was in training—and that was a very good year—one hall was enough for all of us, and even then it was always half empty.
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