Balázs Pataki - S.T.A.L.K.E.R. - Northern Passage

An excited Bandit appears. “Sultan! Someone has whacked Zhyogal and two other Chechens!”

Sultan darts an angry look at Jack. “What the hell is going on in your outfit?”

“Dunno, boss,” Jack says looking up while wiping Nooria’s vomit from the metal plate. “Must have been that darkie who whacked Zhyogal’s brother.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Nooria’s buddy did it. A darkie looked at her in the wrong way, or so the man told me.”

Sultan grimaces. “Chechens, huh? The air smells much better without them. I could never trust them… one can’t turn away from them without the feeling of getting stabbed in the back the very next moment.”

He turns to Nooria who has more or less recollected herself in the meantime. “You all right, Margarita?”

“Yes, Sultan,” she replies avoiding his eyes.

“Good. Tell your buddy he has my gratitude for that Chechen job. Where is he?”

Before Nooria could even think about a fitting reply, a voice in English bellows at the ramp.

“What the fuck happened here?”

Sultan gives the tall man in a Stalker suit a curious look. His steel-blue eyes sparkle with anger under dark, bushy eyebrows and gray hair. Another Stalker is standing next to him, barely reaching to his waist but with a similarly defiant look on his young face.

Sultan’s bodyguards have already aimed their rifles at them. “Step back!”

“They are with me,” Nooria quickly says and gives the Top and Pete a faint smile to let them know she is all right.

“Was it this big guy who broke that Chechen’s neck?”

“No.”

“I wonder what this giant would be capable of,” Sultan says looking the Top up and down. ”It’s good to see that you are in safe hands. You still have my present, I suppose?”

Nooria has to cough. “The gun? It is… a friend is taking care of it.”

“Good God, that was expensive! Don’t give it to anyone. It might get stolen with all this cutthroat scum around!”

Respectfully, Knuckles touches his boss’ arm. “Sultan, the chopper’s ready to take off.”

“Excellent. Margarita, I’ll insist on seeing that friend of yours when we have more time. I always have a good business proposal for men who can easily whack three darkies. And as you see, I keep my word — the helicopters will bring you and our brothers to Minsk first and then a cargo airplane to the New Zone. I hope you were right and we’re not running into trouble at Charikhar.”

“It should be safe, Sultan.”

“I trust you will also come up with your end of the deal. Matter of honor, yes?”

Nooria suddenly turns away from the kingpin to wretch once more. Jack slaps his face and cusses in Ukrainian. Amused, Sultan claps.

“Let’s get moving, patsani! Davai, uhodim!”

Seeing Sultan and Knuckles moving down the ramp, Nooria calls after him. “You don’t come with us?”

Sultan waves his hand, smiling. “See you soon, Margarita!”

Lined up in long rows the Bandits move into the Mi-26. The cavernous cargo compartment is only dimly lit by the three bullseye windows on either side and the slightly domed, dark grey fuselage appears like a church interior. Their helicopter is a version designed to haul vehicles and goods, and therefore lacks any seating, causing the Bandits to exchange a few swears as they hustle for space. A Belarusian aviator, probably the crew chief, attempts to keep order but is brusquely pushed aside.

Among the Bandits comes Tarasov with the balaclava pulled over his face. He quickly joins Nooria and the two Americans flanking her. The three of them were lucky enough to occupy a place by the two bigger windows behind the pilots’ compartment.

“You… what were you thinking, huh?” Tarasov says in a low voice when he takes his place next to Nooria. “Don’t give me that look! I know what you were up to!”

“I hate him,” Nooria whispers.

“What if you succeed and his henchman tear you to pieces?”

“I had a plan.”

“Did you want more than a hundred Bandits to start shooting at us?”

“No.”

“Did you forget that this is the only way back to the New Zone?”

“For a moment, I did. I’m sorry, Misha.”

“Gospodi,” Tarasov sighs and shakes his head. “Never ever do that again, please. You scared us shitless!”

“Aw mate, ye know how wimin are,” Pete says with a smile, imitating Finn Sawyer’s accent.

“Guess there’s no flight attendant to serve us breakfast,” Hartman says. He smiles, apparently amused over Tarasov’s half-hearted attempt to reprimand Nooria, and takes a dry sausage from his rucksack. “ Havchik, anyone?”

The Mi-26’s massive twin turboshafts begin to howl.

“Your Russian is improving,” Tarasov says accepting a slice of sausage. He is about to bite into it but then offers it to Nooria who gladly takes it.

“Yeah… but that’s about it. Chances are I won’t hear your lingo for a long time,” Hartman replies.

The Bandits break out in loud cheer when the helicopter lifts off. Compared to the stomach-knotting ascend of the Mi-24 gunships that Tarasov is used to, the giant helicopter’s take-off can barely be felt. The feeling of flying in a helicopter only sets in when the Mi-26 gains an altitude of two hundred meters and the accelerating engines make it tilt its nose slightly downwards.

Ferret is sitting not far from them. He asks a Bandit for his guitar and begins to tune it. Expecting a spirit-lifting song, everyone cheers around him.

“Freedom’s secret weapon!” Buryat snorts next to him. “He’ll kill us all with that racket!”

The others browbeat him into silence and Ferret begins to sing. He does his best to make himself heard in the noise of the engines, and the song is known well enough to make more and more Bandits join in.

“What’s that song about?” Pete asks.

“It was written when we moved out of Afghanistan.”

Tarasov looks at the singing Bandits with a bitter grin. They seem to ignore that this song with a powerful melody is actually full of pain, fittingly for a song about the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan; although a second thought tells him that for Bandits, who were after all loathed and hunted by every faction in the Exclusion Zone, going into the wastes of the New Zone must appear like a ride into the promised land. Probably for many Stalkers who joined them as well — some tired of a Loner’s perilous fate, others weary of the pointless and never-ending faction wars. He begins to translate the lyrics, occasionally thinking over an odd word for a heartbeat.

“From the once conquered celestial heights we are descending to earth, down the charred stairs… Through the salvos of slander and lying—we’re leaving, we’re leaving, we’re leaving! Farewell mountains, only you can see to tell who we were in that remote land, it is not up to a one-sided judge or mere bureaucrat… to judge what makes up our pain and glory.”

“Outstanding,” the Top quietly remarks.

“My friend, let’s have a toast tonight, first to those who made it through the latest raid, the second to the dead, for whom the wind is silently grieving—we’re leaving, we’re leaving, we’re leaving!”

“It sounds beautiful,” nods Nooria.

“Farewell mountains, only you can see to tell who we were in that remote land, the price we’ve paid and what sorrow, which friends we’ve had to leave behind, what enemy escaped the finishing blow, and tell how our sorrows, hopes and pain will mark and form future people’s mind.” Tarasov swallows. “Well… that’s it.”