Александр Конторович - Predator - Escape from Tarkov

Apart from the fresh corpse, there’s nobody else about on the street. Stepping carefully out of the front door with my gun at the ready, I quickly cross the road. Throwing a glance at the corpse, I see that on the fence just a little to the left of where he’s hanging strange symbols have been scrawled using something dark. They seem both very familiar but also completely incomprehensible. I turn a corner, press against the wall and look around. There it is – Mishka’s house. I can see the roof from here. I only have just over a kilometre to cover – or only four hundred metres as the crow flies – and I’ll be where I need to be.

Satisfied with the death of the guy on the fence, the unknown thugs who killed him are sleeping it off somewhere. Or at least nobody bothers me on the final stretch of my journey. Once again I take off my boots, once again I climb the staircase in only my socks. Who knows who might be visiting my old friend? I’ve seen all sorts at his flat in my time, so it would come as no surprise to find some wasted junkie hanging round there now. For a while, I stand on the landing and consider the situation. There’s no getting round the likelihood of an unpleasant encounter. The sort where I open the door and someone bashes me over the head with all their strength. So, no, I’m not going straight into his flat. Not because I particularly fear a blow to the head. After all, if someone hits me, I can always shoot them in response. But what if that someone turns out to be my old friend Mishka, off his head from the withdrawal symptoms from whatever junk he’s currently using? Who am I going to talk to then?

I look around. All the flat doors on this staircase have been smashed down in the crudest way. Somebody clearly tried to break some of them in with their shoulder, while others were rabidly hacked to pieces with an axe. And I think I can guess who did it. No doubt my old friend was looking for a hit. Frankly, the building he lived in was hardly an upper-class establishment. The residents were ordinary workers. Mishka himself ended up here after three or four changes of address, gradually moving down in the world from the luxurious flat he once owned to this tiny studio on the second floor. I doubt very much that his desperate searching uncovered anything useful. Even during normal times there’d have been nothing here to take. Examining the doors, I notice some shreds of paper with an official stamp on them. Clearly, they tried to evacuate this building properly, even going so far as to officially seal the flats. That means by definition there couldn’t have been anything of value inside. At some point, Mishka must have realized this. If that’s the case, then my friend must be suffering the most unholy torment right now. That’s terrible, of course – he’s really not a bad guy. On the other hand, he’ll be ready to do anything to get his hands on that syringe of morphine.

You think that’s wrong of me? Cynical and calculating? Well, have you got any better ideas?

Still… I remember how he would look at us sometimes. There we were, successful and well-dressed, with our new cars, while he was slumped unshaven in a pile of trash and squalor. The contrast was striking back then. What would it be like now?

I’m relatively comfortably dressed, carrying a good gun, and reasonably well-equipped. What about Mishka? Might my old friend not have the desire to knock me on the bonce with something the moment I turn my back to him? Then there’s the trip to this new shopkeeper, which is also beset with risk on all sides. Considering how well I use it, can I really rely on my gun? No, in all honesty I can’t. No matter how fearsome I might look, I’m not really a dangerous opponent. On the other hand, I might easily provoke a defensive reaction, which could involve firing first and asking questions later. I therefore take a few more steps and walk into a looted flat. It’s a mess in here. Everything’s been turned upside down. All the clothes have been ripped out of the cupboards. I take a good look round, then remove my waistcoat and stuff it along with my shotgun under a pile of rags. After thinking for a while, I pull down my trousers, take some sticking plasters from my first-aid kit, and use them to tape my pistol to my leg. Pulling it out from here won’t be easy, and I certainly won’t be able to do it quickly. However, nobody’s going to find it without a very thorough search. Moving a couch away from the wall, I place behind it my backpack and most of the goods I have with me. Now I don’t look like someone who’s worth mugging. I do still have the two syringes of morphine and a few other bits and pieces that I can try to sell to the shopkeeper. This way, it’ll also make perfect sense why I’m coming to see him. It’s one of his old clients who’s brought me, and I’m in desperate need of just about any food or kit available. One look at me and that’s easy enough to believe. I’m unarmed, and I don’t have any proper clothes.

So, now I can go pay Mishka a visit. I step out onto the landing and give the front door of his flat a firm shove. Against all my expectations, his place turns out not to be a complete shitpile. Either he’s already sold everything, or he never had anything in the first place. Glancing into the kitchen, I notice a picturesque mess of open tins and empty bottles – just what you’d expect in this type of flat. If I remember correctly, it’s always been like this here. Now let’s take a look in the room.

Mishka, thank heaven, is alone. He’s spread out on the mattress he uses for a bed, fast asleep. It would appear the withdrawal isn’t bothering him too much. Interesting. I won’t wake him yet, I’ll just take a little look round the room.

On his desk, I find the first major surprise almost straight away – a powerful professional laptop with cables connecting to some sort of unknown device. I open the lid and see the battery light winking at me in a welcoming green colour. In other words, the battery’s fully charged. How, I wonder? It’s a fair time since there’s been mains electricity in the city. This is not what I expected.

I close the lid and sit down next to Mishka, gently tapping him on the shoulder.

“What the…? Get the fuck off me!”

“Mishka! Hey, Mishka! Time to get up. Mother’s brought your glass of milk.”

He rolls over onto his back, opens his eyes, and gawps at me in astonishment for a while.

“Denis? What are you doing here?”

“I thought I’d pop in and visit an old friend.”

Grunting, Mishka gets out of his bed, wanders over to his desk, and pulls out from under it an open bottle. Judging by the label, it’s mineral water. He takes a few gulps and then turns back to me. He’s also trying to throw the jacket on the back of his chair over the laptop without my noticing.

“How the hell did you get here?”

Strange, but Mishka doesn’t look anything like a drug addict. Still half asleep he may be, but I know him well. I’ve seen him in all sorts of conditions. Something isn’t right here.

“It is a kind of hell outside, and there’s only a few reasons to brave it, as you know. I need to eat, and I could do with getting a little better equipped. You can see for yourself what I’m dressed in. If it rains, I’m fucked. I’ll be soaked through, and it’s not like there’s a pharmacy anywhere.”

“That’s clear enough. But why come here?” asks my old friend in surprise.

“Well, you always did know where to get stuff from.”

This time I see a spark of interest in his eyes.

“And let’s say I still do. My stuff isn’t what you’re looking for, is it? Or have I missed something?”

That’s a strange thing to say. Out of the corner of my eye I see an axe with a damaged blade in the corner of the room. In all probability, that’s the weapon that Mishka used to smash in the doors of the neighbouring flats in search of anything he could exchange for a hit. That wasn’t so long ago, but what I see before me now is a comparatively normal guy asking some very unwelcome questions. I don’t like it one bit. It’s a rarity to find Mishka in this state. As a rule, he’s only this together when he’s doing an important job. He takes his dose and then he’s completely clear-headed. For a while, he looks like a perfectly normal person rather than a drug-addled degenerate. Then, of course, he starts to come down. From the look of him, he must have taken the drugs several hours ago, after which I imagine he did a long stretch of hard work, tired himself out, and went to sleep. And then an old friend came to visit. In theory, there’s nothing strange about that. But why is he being so wary with me? We’ve always had a good relationship. I respected his remarkable talent, and he saw me as a friend. I don’t understand what on earth’s going on here.