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Dolbushin and his daughter disappeared into Gomorrah at around seven thirty. At quarter to eight Vtorov with uneasiness pressed his headset with a finger, answered something curtly, and gave the sign to his people. Security began to bustle. Two ran up to the jeep and, having jumped into the body, pulled off the tarpaulin. Under the tarpaulin turned out to be a combat arbalest of an intimidating size.
One of the men – swarthy, with a healthy bald spot similar to the rind of a watermelon – having jumped into the jeep, took aim and looked uninterruptedly at the bright red dot. The tip of his tongue, stuck out, with bluish veins on the underside, slid along his lips. His partner – with a crew cut and a complex spider tattoo from the wrists up to the elbows – set in motion the pneumatic windlass and put into the trench an arrow with a three-edged tip. According to its shape, this was precisely an arrow and not a shorter and more massive bolt.
“Estimated time: thirty… twenty-five… twenty…” he muttered, continuously looking at his wrist. The watch intertwined with the tattoo, disrupting its intricate figure. The red dot of the reflex sight poked into the breaks of the endless violet cloud like crumbled cotton, unhurriedly creeping in the direction of Pechatnikov. The forefinger with the phalanx blue from pressure froze on the trigger. Broth-like drops of sweat on the melon-like bald spot flowed together into islands and continents.
Suddenly a voice, like many splinters glued together, began to rattle in the headset of the shooter. The voice squeezed into the ears, cut into the brain. “Yes, Guy!” not taking his eyes off the sight, the arbalester reported. “An observer at Strogino spotted him fifty seconds ago. He’s probably flying in our direction. Yes, looks like the same screwy one, which… Ooph!!! Here he is!” The steel “arms” of the arbalest straightened. The tattooed fellow was working like a robot. The pneumatics barely had time to cock the bowstring and a new arrow was already lying in the trench. The cat-and-dog-like chief of security flew to the jeep, “Well? Got it?” “Something flickered… Seems it shouldn’t have missed the mark!” the arbalester answered doubtfully and suddenly bent down, saving his head.
A column of water shot up the Moscow River about fifty metres from Gomorrah. Terrible, soundless, glassy black. It seemed the river had grown a terrible finger piercing the clouds. The glass finger stopped in the clouds and, shattered, came down onto Gomorrah shuddering from the impact. It swept the security along the parking lot. It plucked the shooter and his assistant off the jeep, flipped them over, and almost drowned them in the shallow, furiously seething water ru
The chief of security got up, holding onto the side of the jeep. Water was flowing from him. There was blood on his right cheek. A siren howled. Ten cars on the edge, on which most of the weight of the water had come down, had their roofs crushed. Contrary to expectation, Gomorrah suffered little damage. Several hatches were knocked out, the dome of the winter garden sagged, and the gangway was torn off. The Moscow River had already licked clean its wound and was ru
The tattooed fellow, limping, approached Vtorov. “Something splashed!” he said uncertainly. There were bags under the bulldog eyes. The upper lip began to tremble like a dog baring its teeth. “Splashed?!” “Already after the explosion,” Tattoo hurriedly added and drew with a finger from top to bottom, as if tracking someone’s path. Vtorov squinted. “Verify!” he ordered. Tattoo did not want to climb into the water. “Such a current there! Even if something fell, already carried away!” “Verify, you’re told!” The fellow went, uncomfortably looking around. It was heard how he yelled and demanded a boat. A motor began to clatter somewhere behind Gomorrah.
Vtorov coughed for bravery and turned on the microphone, “They dropped an attack marker on us… It passed. You can go, Guy! They won’t reach a new marker today!” said Vtorov into the microphone. “Sure?” “I guarantee it! The arbalesters think that they could bring it down.” “Stake your life on it?” a voice tinkled in the headset. The chief of security swallowed. His Adam’s apple rolled like a small apple and again emerged above the collar.
After about ten minutes, two automobiles crept out of the park, dodging along the twisting road. A massive SUV with blue flashing lights blinking silently, and immediately behind it, glued to its bumper, a long armoured Mercedes. Both cars easily broke the security chain and drove up to the gangway of Gomorrah. The doors of the SUV opened while still in motion. Four men with Chinese army-model crossbows with cartridges sprung out onto the asphalt. In some ways, they resembled wooden boxes and evoked a questioning smile, but only to those who had not seen them in action. Bolts with recessed plumage slid into the trench under their own weight. The crossbow was cocked with the movement of a lever. The arbalesters moved to the Mercedes and surrounded it. Two squatted down to their knees. Those who remained standing took aim at the sky. The other two aimed at the bushes. Vtorov, blue from diligence, courteously opened the rear door.
From the automobile, a sinewy, lithe man of medium height slipped more than walked out. He raised his hands above his head. He snapped his fingers. The jumping reflection of a blinker picked up his face at random from the semidarkness. It was similar to a deflated ball, having lain in a room at night. There were bags and bumps. It was swollen in one place and it sunk in unpredictably in another. The mouth was small, capricious, feminine. The lips were chubby. It seemed a teaspoon could not even push through, but with a smile, the mouth suddenly widened, extended. And it became clear, not only an apple but also a whole person could swallow dive in there and disappear without a trace. The teeth were bluish, close together. The hair was curly, to the shoulders. The eyes were not visible: dark glasses like round saucers. And this was Guy.
Gomorrah (formerly the triple-decker cruiser Dmitrii Ulyanov, retired by the Volga Steamship Line at the end of the last century) was eternally docked at one of the picturesque places of the Moscow River. Since then it had changed hands many times. It had been a casino, a nightclub, and a floating hotel, until the next owner with the last name Zhora opened a restaurant here. His business did not go badly, but then he became gloomy and nervous. Either he laughed for four hours straight so that they were afraid to visit him in the cabin, or sobbed, then before the very eyes of everybody cut his own veins and shouted for them to save him because he did not do this. It all ended when Zhora stumbled here on the deck, hit his head and died, they say, even before he fell into the river.
Soon after Zhora’s funeral (for some reason everyone was embarrassed to place a cross, and they also only briefly wrote “Zhora” on the headstone without a last name or dates), it turned out that Gomorrah had a new owner, who purchased it almost on the very day of the old owner’s death. The new owner was a man wearing scent, with a pleasant voice, wore tight suits, ridiculous ties, and was constantly smiling. His last name was in its own way more striking than Zhora – Nekalaev, with an “e”.7 He brought very beautiful chrysanthemums to Zhora’s grave and stood for a long time, wiping his eyes with a handkerchief. Despite his never shouting at anyone and even extremely politely calling the mute seventeen-year-old maid Faride Ayazovna, waiters and cooks feared him to the point of trembling. At the same time, Gomorrah became Gomorrah. Prior to this, it was called something in Italian, with a hint of the southern sun and languid women in hats with a wide brim.
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“Nekalaev” is very similar to the common last name “Nikolaev” and the pronunciations of both are almost the same. “Nekalaev” can even be “Nikolaev” misspelled.