Александр Конторович - Predator - Escape from Tarkov

Stepping up to the rear of the cabin, I bang hard on the wood with the butt of my pistol.

“Someone’s got a fucking nerve! Have you not had a good punch in the face recently?”

“Greetings from the Predator!” With these words, I step back behind the open door of the neighbouring cabin. Now, even if the leader strains all his senses, he’s not going to be able to see through the cracks in the walls where I’m standing. He’ll still be able to hear my whisper, though.

“Who? Ah, I see.”

“Don’t come out. Stay sitting where you are. Did the convoy come past?”

“The former cops?”

“That’s the one. They should have given you something.”

“That they did. They chucked some ammo and a couple of guns our way.”

“Did they say who it was from?”

This was a worrying question. The captain could well have decided that it was better to get the bandits’ gratitude for himself, rather than passing on a favour from a mysterious stranger.

“They did. Give him all our thanks.”

“See, I told you we’d come in useful. How’s your business going?”

“We’ve got some new lads, and we took control of a couple more streets.”

“Was there any resistance?”

“There was some trash loitering around, but nothing serious.”

“Good work. Do you need anything else?”

“We need guns. We’ve got a little ammo, for now.”

“Alright. We’ll do what we can. Now, count to a hundred.”

Returning to my observation post, I had the opportunity to watch how the boss tore strips off his negligent sentries. Springing out of the cabin as soon as a minute was up, he dashed straight into the barracks, and literally a few seconds later his flustered men came running out. The last to emerge was the leader himself. I couldn’t hear what he was saying, but from his gestures alone it was easy enough to get the gist of the speech he was giving.

The change of guard trotted off, and a few minutes later the three sentries were standing before the boss.

It makes for quite a scene. If only I had a video camera to record it. Still, however entertaining it may be, I need to think about myself. Choosing a very obviously looted flat, I crawl out onto its balcony, which faces into the courtyard. On the way, I grab a rolled up blanket and rip pieces off it to shove carefully between the veneer of the balcony and the floor. That way nobody can see me from the balconies next door, and certainly not from downstairs. As for anyone who runs into the flat, one look at the desolation and destruction will be enough. The bandits aren’t that great in number right now, and they just won’t have the time to search all the nearby buildings thoroughly before nightfall.

It’s simple logic – anyone who shits right on your doorstep will do anything they can to get as far away from you as possible. So, from the bandits’ point of view, I should be running hell for leather out of here right now. That’s what a normal person would do, but there’s a reason why they say that all system administrators are a little fucked in the head. I can confirm it’s quite true, although there may be some exceptions. Nonetheless, that’s exactly why I’m not running anywhere, and instead lying on this balcony and listening to the bandits swear as they search the courtyard and the surrounding buildings.

As I expected, they don’t have time to finish their search before darkness comes, and they go on running round the houses, making considerable noise in the process. They’ve already been up and down this staircase, by the by. But nobody bothered even to peak inside the flat I’m in. I guess they know that it was looted long ago and there’s nothing useful inside it. Waiting until the sound of footsteps has died down below, I get up and slowly walk down the stairs. I hear voices in the courtyard and on the next door staircase somebody is recklessly smashing down a door – basically, everyone’s busy.

Looking out of a ground-floor window, I see the dark figure of a sentry who, gaze fixed intently on the surrounding darkness, marches up and down along his path. If my predictions are correct, when darkness has completely fallen he will, as before, move into one of the ground-floor flats and keep watch from there. His view from there is more limited, but on the other hand he’s completely out of sight from any encroaching bad guys. After ten minutes, the sentry turns and heads over to the corner. Now he’ll turn round it, take twenty steps forward, and then turn again. He won’t have much further to go after that. It’s unlikely that he’ll go into a flat in the first entryway. No doubt he’ll get at least as far as the second. So in other words whatever happens I’ll have a full minute at least. Time enough to run to the cable duct.

Once I’ve lowered the heavy metal cover back in place, I barely have the strength left even to move along the tunnel. Fuck it, I’ve done the main part. Now I can just sit and rest.

Today’s the day I visit Mr. Ogryzko. I dig around in my stuff and choose what’s suitable to trade. I twirl the memory stick in my hand thoughtfully. Would it be better to palm it off on the shopkeeper, or should I try to read it by myself?

Let’s say, now I’ve got Dronov’s laptop, I try. There’s some other bits and pieces that go with the computer and it’s high time I got round to sorting them out; it’s just I keep having more important things to do. The time has come, though – when I get back from the shopkeeper’s today I’ll get down it. Once everything’s set up, I’ll have a go at the memory stick while the laptop has some battery left. I certainly won’t be selling the computer for now. There’s no chance Misha would be using some shitty laptop. If it was on his desk, you can be sure it was loaded up with everything you could possibly need, and the chances of finding another computer like it round here are more than a million to one.

I didn’t find all that much stuff to take to the shop. On the other hand, trade in goods wasn’t what I was hoping to profit from this time. One way or another, I’d completed the shopkeeper’s task. You could say I’d gone above and beyond, in fact. And I’d sent him some pretty good customers. It’s fair to say he owes me one.

The street greeted me with a piercing wind. It raised dust from the ground and tossed around scraps of paper and other rubbish. Pressing close to the walls as always, I walk the familiar route. Say what you will, but my tramping around the city has brought results – I see my surroundings with completely different eyes now. Here’s a good place to set an ambush, and that window’s perfect for shooting down the street. I guess I’m a different person now, too. The calm and peaceable guy who used to live in my flat has disappeared. I guess he died along with his workmates that day when the unknown soldiers started shooting and set fire to the car. Or maybe he died later, at the moment when I pushed the beam carriers out of the landing window. One way or the other, he’s gone now, and in his place there’s a completely different person – cunning, suspicious, cynical, and mean. There’s plenty more bad words you could use to describe him, and all of them would be true. Quite unexpectedly, I don’t see the people I’ve killed in my dreams. Pangs of conscience and other torments don’t bother me. Take just the last guy that I killed, simply because he didn’t manage to pull the trigger first. The only thing that bothers me is that I didn’t manage to take his assault rifle.

Cynical I may be, but you try walking in my shoes. How else can I survive in this world? My moral compass and everything else I was guided by before all went down the drain in an instant. Nobody round here needs a peaceable systems administrator, but mean and predatory beasts are in high demand. There’s just no other way to survive.