Виктор Пелевин - Babylon

Morkovin pulled over the red phone.

‘Hello? This is Morkovin from the anal-displacement department. Open the root directory for terminal five. We’re doing some cosmetic repairs. All right…’

‘That’s done,’ said Morkovin. ‘Just a moment. Alla, Semyon wants to ask you something.’

Velin grabbed the receiver. ‘Alla, hi! Could you check the hair density for Chernomyrdin? What? No, that’s the whole point, I need it for the poster. OK, I’m writing - thirty-two hpi, colour Ray-Ban black. Have you given me access? OK, then that’s the lot.’

‘Listen,’ Tatarsky asked quietly, when Velin was back at his terminal, ‘what’s that - hpi?’

‘Hairs per inch,’ Morkovin answered. ‘Like dots per inch with those laser printers.’

‘And what does that mean - "the anal displacement department"?’

"That’s what our department is called.’

‘Why such a strange name?’

‘Well it’s the general theory of elections.’ Morkovin said with a frown. ‘To cut it short, there should always be three wow-candidates: oral, anal and displacing. Only don’t go asking me what that means, you don’t have security clearance yet. And anyway I don’t remember. All I can say is that in normal countries they get by with the oral and anal wow-candidates, because the displacement has been completed; but things are only just getting started here and we need the displacing candidate as well. We give him about fifteen per cent of the votes in the first round. I think I can write you a clearance if you’re that interested.’

‘Thanks,’ said Tatarsky, ‘forget it.’

‘Dead right. Why the fuck should you strain your brains on your salary. The less you know, the easier you breathe.’

‘Exactly,’ said Tatarsky, noting to himself that if Davidoff started making ultra-lights there couldn’t possibly be a better slogan.

Morkovin opened his file and took up a pencil. Out of a sense of delicacy Tatarsky moved away to the wall and began studying the sheets of paper and pictures pinned to it. At first his attention was caught by a photograph of Antonio Banderas in the Hollywood masterpice Stepan Banderas. Banderas, romantically unshaven, holding a giant balalaika case, was standing on the outskirts of some abstract Ukrainian village and gazing sadly at a burned-out Russian tank in a sunflower chaparral (from the first glance at the crowd of droopy-mustachioed villagers in their cockerel-embroidered ponchos, who were squinting at the reddish-yellow sun, it was obvious that the film had been shot in Mexico). The poster wasn’t genuine - it was a collage. Some anonymous joker had matched up Banderas’ torso in dark leather with a heavy-assed pair of girl’s legs in dark-brown tights. There was a slogan under the image:

SAN PELEGRINO TIGHTS FASHIONED TO RESIST ANY STRAIN

Sellotaped directly on to the poster was a fax on the letterhead of Young and Rubicam. The text was short:

Sergei! Essence correction/or three brands:

Chubais-green stuff in the bank/green stuff in the jar

Yavlinsky - think different/think doomsday (‘Apple’ doesn’t object)

Yeltsin - stability in a coma/democracy in a coffin

Hi there, Wee Kolya.

‘It’s a weak idea for Chubais.’ said Tatarsky, turning towards Morkovin, ‘and where are the communists?’

‘They write them in the oral displacement department.’ Morkovin answered. ‘And thank God for that. I wouldn’t take them for twice my salary.’

‘Do they pay more over there?’

‘The same. But they have some guys who are willing to slave away for free. You’ll meet one of them in a moment, by the way.’

Hanging beside Banderas was a greetings card produced on a colour printer, showing a golden double-headed eagle clutching a Kalashnikov in one taloned foot and a pack of Marlboro in the other. There was an inscription in gold below the eagle’s feet:

SANTA BARBARA FOR EVER! THE RUSSIAN IDEA DEPARTMENT CONGRATULATES OUR COLLEAGUES ON ST VARVARA’S DAY

To the right of the greetings card there was another advertising poster: Yeltsin leaning over a chessboard on which no figures had been moved. He was looking at it sideways on (the setting seemed to emphasise his role as the supreme arbiter). The king and the rook on the white side had been replaced by small bottles labelled ‘Ordinary Whisky’ and ‘Black Label’. Next to the chessboard there stood a small model of a seashore villa looking more like a fortress. The text was:

Tatarsky reached for his notebook - an idea for another poster had suddenly occurred to him.

He wrote down: ‘A view from inside a car. The president’s sullen face with the window behind it. Outside in the street - poor old women, street urchins, bandaged soldiers, etc. Inscription in large letters at the top of the poster: "How low can we go?" In tiny print at the very bottom: "As low as 2.9 per cent intro. Visa Next."‘

There was a knock at the door. Tatarsky turned round and froze. So many meetings with old acquaintances in the same day seemed rather unlikely - into the office came Malyuta, the anti-Semite copywriter he’d worked with in Khanin’s agency. He was dressed in a Turkish-made Russian folk shirt with a soldier’s belt supporting an entire array of office equipment: a mobile phone, a pager, a Zippo lighter in a leather case and an awl in a narrow black scabbard.

‘Malyuta! What are you doing here?’

Malyuta, however, gave no sign of being surprised.

‘I write the image menu for the whole cabal,’ he replied. ‘Russian style. Have you ever heard of pelmeni with kapusta? Or kvass with khrenok? Those are my hits. And I work in the oral displacement department on half-pay. Are you in dirt?’

Tatarsky didn’t answer.

‘You know each other?’ Morkovin asked with curiosity. ‘Yes, of course, you worked together at Khanin’s place. So you shouldn’t have any problems working together.’

‘I prefer working alone.’ Malyuta said drily. ‘What d’you want done?’

‘Azadovsky wants you to finish up a project. With Berezovsky and Raduev. Don’t touch Raduev, but you need to boost Berezovsky up a bit. I’ll call you this evening and give you a few instructions. Will you do it?’

‘Berezovsky?’ Malyuta asked. ‘And how. When d’you need it?’

‘Yesterday, as always.’

‘Where’s the draft?’

Morkovin looked at Tatarsky, who shrugged and handed Malyuta the file with the printout of the scenario.

‘Don’t you want to talk with the author?’ Morkovin asked. ‘So he can put you in the picture?’

‘I’ll figure it out for myself from the text. It’ll be ready tomorrow at ten.’

‘OK, you know best.’

When Malyuta left the room, Morkovin said: ‘He doesn’t like you much.’

‘Nor I him,’ said Tatarsky. ‘We had an argument once about geopolitics. Listen, who’s going to change that bit about the television-drilling towers?’

‘Damn, I forgot. A good job you reminded me - I’ll explain it to him this evening. And you’d better make peace with him. You know how bad our frequency problem is right now, but Azadovsky’s still allowed him one 3-D general. To liven up the news. He’s a guy with a future. No one can tell how the market will shift tomorrow. Maybe he’ll be head of department instead of me, and then…’

Morkovin didn’t finish his train of thought. The door swung open and Azadovsky burst into the room. Behind him came two of the guards with Scorpions on their shoulders. Azadovsky’s face was white with fury and he was clenching and unclenching his fists with such force that Tatarsky was reminded of the talons of the eagle from the greetings card. Tatarsky had never seen him like this.