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

“Then why do you take me for a fool?” If the Colonel was yelling at him before, he is screaming now. “Don’t you think I know everything about your liaison with Fedorka, including your perverted practices?!”

Maksimenko feels his face blush. He swallows and stares straight forward, standing stiff like a statue.

“Did you think you could keep anything secret from me? Did you forget where you work? Who I am? I looked the other way while you appeared a capable officer. Now you are not just a failure but a laughingstock as well, and I will not tolerate ridiculous idiots in my Service!”

“Sir, the only thing I ask for is to give me a chance to kill Tarasov and his… partner. I have nothing left but my desire for revenge.”

The Colonel shakes his head and steps to the window, looking out into the rain. Several minutes pass and Maksimenko already hopes that the Colonel’s rage is spent.

“Idiots! Useless, incapable idiots!”

Kruchelnikov turns around to Maksimenko and the Spetsnaz. His face is red from anger.

“You will bring no more disgrace on my Service. Both of you will go to the New Zone and hunt down Tarasov, his woman, everyone around him! Even his pet mutant if he has one! From this moment, you are off our payroll until you bring me the renegade’s head on a silver plate. You have twelve hours to assemble a squad from the strafbat cleaning up Balaklava submarine base. Those are men who brought as much disgrace on our forces as you did. Nobody will miss them if they die with you, and you dying in that irradiated desert would be very much to my liking!”

“Sir! Will we be reinstated if we succeed?”

“Come again, Maksimenko?” Kruchelnikov makes a face as if not hearing well. “Reinstated? The only thing you can hope for is that I will not tear your head off with my own hands! Get your useless ass to Logistics and make your mission arrangements! Useless bastards…”

Maksimenko and the Spetsnaz perform a perfect salute and turn on their heels.

“We’re screwed,” Sergeant Vlasov says matter-of-factly when they have left the Colonel’s office.

Captain Maksimenko doesn’t reply. He sets his teeth but fails to prevent the mix of despair, shame and anger appearing on his face. They march down the corridor, avoiding the glances of other SBU staff. Maksimenko only opens his mouth to speak when they face an office door signposted Transports and Logistics .

“Tarasov,” he shouts and hits the wall with his fist, ignoring the pain. “Tarasov! I will not only kill you and your bitch, I will fucking exterminate you!”

Sergeant Vlasov grabs his Captain’s hand where the knuckles are already bleeding.

“Count me in, komandir , but don’t make this worse for you than it already is!”

“Damn!” Panting and with his face distorted from rage, Maksimenko bashes against the wall once more. “I will find the bastard. I will find and eliminate him even if I’ll have to hunt him for the rest of my life!”

“Sir—we will find him, but what’s good in finding him if you can’t pull the trigger with a broken hand? Let’s arrange things and begin the hunt!”

Both Mac and Ahuizotl had spent a long time in the New Zone, but its vastness still makes them feel lost and fragile with every step they make.

The weirdly gnarled trees and ruins in the post-apocalyptic landscape were not really new, neither the remainders of life that had once thrived in the forsaken villages — wrecked trucks and abandoned homes. Walking the paths of the Exclusion Zone before had hardened their hearts. The low but constant crackling of their Geiger counters is the best proof of civilization being all but vain when nature’s rage becomes unleashed by accident or malevolence.

“Look at that peak,” Mac tells her companion. “It has a halo around it.”

“Must be the altitude,” Ahuizotl replies. “Light is dispersed somehow differently here.”

“Still weird.”

“Watch the surroundings, not the peaks.”

Deadly silence is all over the ruined village they are passing through. Holding her rifle cradled and ready to shoot, Mac watches Billy sniffle at the debris inside what had been a roadside shop, then adjusts her sunglasses that protect her eyes from the harsh sunlight and walks on. The sniper follows her steps at a distance of twenty meters, anxiously looking around every corner.

Mac stops and checks the map on her PDA. Unlike in the Exclusion Zone, no signal shows her current position and if she didn’t know the New Zone well, she would have a hard time keeping on track. The thought of new arrivals being confronted by the vast wilderness without any help to find their way makes her aware of how important their mission is.

“The hills aren’t far away now,” she says. “Yar’s closest marker is next to an abandoned airfield to the north.”

“How far?”

“Ten kilometers.”

“What’s your radiation reading?”

“Forty microroentgen per hour,” Mac says glancing at her Geiger counter. “Half of what’s in Pripyat on a dusty day.”

“Piece of cake.”

When they have left the village behind a few minutes later, Mac hears the sniper cuss in a low voice.

“No hay ninguna maldita diferencia…”

“What is it?” she asks.

The sniper halts and looks around before replying. “I was just looking at you, wearing that heavy armor, the intercom on your head, the sunglasses, the cradled weapon and all that — and your anxiety while moving through that godforsaken place. I guess the good guys were passing through the same way before the bad guys nuked the place.”

“What’s your point?”

“This land had it coming,” Ahuizotl sighs darting a wary eye around. “All it offers is peril. Always been like that—with or without the nukes, it’s all the same.”

“At least we know that anything that moves will move to kill us,” Mac says. “Without people around, there’s no false friends to fool us.”

It is dark, and white stars are shining, when Tarasov and his companions come at last to the abandoned industrial area that Stalkers call Rostok. The small Duty detachment guarding the southern road didn’t bother to question them; to them, the four travelers were just another band of Stalkers seeking shelter for the night.

Their passage has been smooth throughout the day. Tarasov nonetheless sighs with relief when they enter the maze of grey warehouses and factory halls.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” the Top asks looking up to a Russian inscription written in bright yellow letters on a warehouse façade: Территория Долга. Применение оружия в пределах лагеря Запрещено! Нарушителей ждет РАССТРЕЛ!

“Duty Territory. Use of weapons is forbidden. Disobey this order and you will be shot.”

“Now we know who the local tough guys are.”

As if to echo the Top’s words, a loud announcement crackles from the intercomm.

“STALKERS! PROTECT THE WORLD FROM THE ZONE! JOIN DUTY!”

“Tough or not, I don’t mind them keeping mutants away,” Tarasov says entering the warehouse. “Duty knows how to keep this place safe, I give them that.”

To their left, beneath a large window where the glass has long been replaced by plywood boards, a row of rusted pressure tanks is lined up along the wall. To their right, a lonely guard watches them from a catwalk. He is wearing a full combat suit with his gas mask on, even though Tarasov’s meters show no signs of any dangerous substance nearby. Noticing the four travelers, he shouts down from the catwalk.