Chapter 16 Chapter 5

The TV tower is not closed yet.I bought a ticket, specially bought a ticket to visit the restaurant, and walked along the green lawn that surrounds the tower.The last fifty meters were covered under a broken awning.Curious to know, why build an awning?Will shards of cement be thrown from ancient buildings? At the end of the awning is the sentry box leading to the checkpoint.I showed my ID and I went through the horseshoe type metal detector - which happened to be broken.All of this is just a formality, and this is the so-called security system set up for strategic goals. Now I have doubts.Anyway, the idea of ​​coming here is strange.I was unaware that dark forces were gathering nearby.If they're already here, it's well hidden—meaning I have to run afoul of second- and third-level magicians.This is totally suicidal.

Command.The combat headquarters of the Sun Watchers patrol team was set up to cooperate with the hunt. Where should inexperienced dark magicians report the news of the prey they have found? But to break into the headquarters where no less than ten dark emissaries, including experienced combatants, stick their own heads in the noose - is also stupid, it's not heroism, even if there is some chance of surviving .And I very much hope there is still a chance. Viewed from below, from beneath the concrete petals of the pillars, the TV Tower is much more impressive than from a distance.You know, it is true that most Muscovites have never climbed its observation tower in their lives, but only regard the tower as a necessary image in the sky, a practical and symbolic image, and in any case not a A place to relax.Here, as in the wind tunnel of some ingeniously constructed building, there was a howling wind, and a barely audible drawn out sound—the voice of the tower itself.

I stood for a while, looking up, at the fence and the holes in the doors and windows, at the cement with holes in it, at the extremely graceful, soft silhouette.It's also really soft: rings of concrete strung on taut steel cables.There is strength in softness.only in it. Then I walked through the glass door. Strange, I thought there would be many people who wanted to see the night view of Moscow from a height of 337 meters.It seems that this is not the case. I was the only one who took the elevator, to be precise-me and the lady who drove the elevator. "I thought there would be a lot of people," I said with a friendly smile. "Is this always like this in your place at night?"

"No, it's usually very lively." The elevator lady replied calmly, but I still felt a bewildered tone in her voice.She pressed a button—the two elevator doors closed.In an instant, the ears seemed to be blocked, and the person was sinking to the ground—the elevator was rushing upwards—quickly, but very steadily. "About two o'clock, the flow of people subsided." two o'clock. Close to the time I ran from the restaurant. If by this time a combat headquarters had been set up in the tower ... it would not be surprising that many who were planning to climb up to the dining room soaring into the sky on a sunny spring day should suddenly change their plans.Even if people can't see the tower, they can feel it.

They, even if they had nothing to do with what happened, would be fully aware and not to approach the dark forces. Of course, my current image is that of the Dark Mage.The question is, is this pretense enough?The guards will compare my appearance with the records in his mind, and even if everything will match perfectly, he will still feel an unusual force. Will he then press further?Will he check from the side?Will it find out if I'm a dark or light mage and what level I'm at? Both possibilities are fifty percent each.On the one hand, this is necessary.On the other hand, guards look down on similar jobs wherever and whenever.Unless they're unbearably lonely or they're just starting out, there's plenty of enthusiasm.

When it comes down to it, half the chance is a lot, much, much more than the chance of dodging a Sun Watch patrol on a city street. The elevator stopped.I didn't even have time to think it through.It only took about twenty seconds for the elevator to go up.If only the elevators were this fast in ordinary multi-storey buildings. "Here we are," said the elevator lady, almost cheerfully.As if I wasn't the last to visit the Ostankino TV Tower today. I came to the lookout. Usually there are many people here.You can quickly distinguish the people who just came up from the people who have been there for quite a long time: according to the hesitant and cautious movements when approaching the circular window, according to their expressions hovering beside the circular floor-to-ceiling windows— —they were timidly testing the tightness of the window with their toes.

Now I estimate the total number of visitors to be twenty.Not a single child, but somehow I imagined children suddenly going into hysterical fits at the point of access to the tower, and imagining irritated and panicked parents.Children are more sensitive to dark forces. And those on the lookout seemed restless and depressed.They were not at all interested in the Moscow that lay beneath the towers--lit, bright, gorgeous Moscow that had long been the norm.Even if it was a feast in the time of the plague, it was a beautiful feast after all.This didn't make anyone happy.There is a dark atmosphere around me, and I can feel it even if I don't feel it. It seems to be odorless and colorless gas, which makes people feel oppressed.

I looked at my feet, found the shadow, and stepped in.A guard stands nearby, two steps away, on glass mounted on the ground.He stared at me -- friendly, but kind of weird.He wasn't too confident staying in the Twilight, and I understood that far from the best forces were sent to defend Combat Command.He was young and muscular, wearing a plain but elegant gray jacket, white shirt, and a dull tie—like a bank worker, not a dark force. "Hello, Anton," said the magician. For an instant I was out of breath. Am I that stupid?Appalling, unbearably childish? Everyone was waiting for me, luring me, and threw another pawn on the chessboard, and even attracted them—somehow they attracted someone who had already entered the Twilight Realm.

"Why are you here?" The heart pounded and returned to its rhythm.It's simple, very simple. Killed Dark Mage is my namesake. "One thing was discovered. It must be discussed." The guard frowned.Probably the way of talking is not right.He didn't understand anyway. "Anton, assassinate me, or I won't let you go, and you know it yourself." "You will definitely let it go," I guessed rashly. "In our patrol team, anyone who knows the location of the command headquarters can go there." "Why all of a sudden?" He smiled, but his right hand started to move down.

The scepter at his waist is full of energy.The bone scepter was artfully whittled from a calf bone and topped with a small ruby ​​crystal.Even if it can escape and resist—then this throwing of power will also alarm all others around. I raised my shadow from the ground and entered the second level of the twilight. It's chilly. Clouds of rising smoke, to be precise, are not smoke, but clouds.Moist, thick clouds that move over the ground.This is no longer the Ostankino TV Tower. This world has lost its last appearance of the human world. Along the clouds, along the swelling raindrops, along the invisible path, I took steps forward.Time passed slowly - I actually fell, but so slowly, don't worry about that now.High in the sky, piercing through the clouds like cloudy specks, three moons shone—white, yellow, and blood-red.A bolt of lightning formed in front of it, swelled, and shot out needle-shaped lightning bolts, climbed up through the clouds, and split into another bolt of light.

I approached the indistinct figure that was leaning very slowly towards the waist, toward the staff, and tried to grasp the staff, but my hand was heavy, stiff, and cold as ice.I can't hold the scepter, I have to go back to the first layer of the twilight and fight him for some chance of victory. Light and darkness, I am not yet a combat member!I was never in a rush to get into the front lines!Leave it to me the kind of work I love and do! But both light and darkness are silent.Even when you called them they were as silent as ever, and all I could hear was that jeering voice that occasionally rings in every heart: "No one promised you a clean job." I looked under my feet.The steps under my feet were about ten centimeters lower than the Darkbringer's, so I fell, and here, I don't have any support, there's no TV tower or anything like that - no such pointed columns and such tall trees. How I wish to have a pair of clean hands, a warm heart and a calm mind.But why can't these three elements co-exist.never can.Wolves, goats, and cabbages—did the ferrymen in that place go crazy, stuffing them all in the same boat? Where does a wolf, after killing a goat, refuse to taste the boatman? "God knows," I said.The sound disappeared in the clouds.I lowered one hand to catch the shadow of the dark messenger, an old rag that was smeared in the space, from below.I pulled the shadow up and flung it at him - pushing the Darkbringer into the second layer of the Twilight. He let out a scream as the world around him lost the familiar sense of security.Probably, he never had the opportunity to sink into the deeper twilight world.It was I who had expended energy to send him on this journey, but he wasn't used to those feelings. I stepped on the Darkbringer's back and pushed him down.And I climbed up myself, kicking his crooked back relentlessly. "Great magicians always climb on the shoulders of others." "Bastard! Anton, bastard!" The Darkbringer doesn't even know who I am.He didn't figure it out until he turned around and was already lying on the ground on his back as my footrest, and glanced at my face.Here, in the second tier of the Twilight realm, of course the silly disguises don't work.His eyes went wide, and he let out a short gasp and howled while grabbing my foot. But he still doesn't understand what I'm doing and why I'm doing it. I hit him several times, stomping on his fingers and face with the heel of my shoe.All this is nothing to the other, and I have no intention of harming his body.I just want him to go down, down, down, down, down the layers of real life, through the human world and the twilight world, through the loose fabric of space.I don't have the time, and I don't have the ability, to have a real fight with you, by all the rules of the Patrol, by the rules that young Lightbringers who believe in good and evil, that fundamental principles cannot be violated, that revenge is inevitable, have a real fight with you. duel. When I decided that the Darkbringer had sunk enough, I kicked off the crushed body, and with a leap up through the damp cold mist freed myself from the Twilight. Enter the human world at once.Suddenly came to the observation deck. I went to the glass floor, squatted down, panting, coughed suddenly and violently, and was wet from head to toe.Rain in a strange world smells of ammonium chloride and cinders. There was a soft exclamation all around—people avoided me. "Everything is fine!" I said hoarsely. "Did you hear that?" How could it be impossible for their eyes to agree.A man in uniform standing by the wall was a guard, an honest and experienced clerk of the television tower, and now he was stern-faced, drawing a pistol from his holster. "It's for your benefit," I said, coughing violently again. "Do you understand?" I allow the inner magic to rush out and touch their consciousness.Their faces began to unfurl and calm down.People turned their faces slowly and leaned against the windows.The guard put his hand on the open holster and stood still. Only then was it possible for me to look under my feet for myself.So I froze. The dark emissary is here.He cried out, and his eyes were like two black five-kopecks with pain and terror.He was hanging under the glass window by the fingertips stuck in the glass, his body swaying like a pendulum under the blowing of the wind.The sleeves of the white shirt were soaked with blood.The scepter was still in his waist—the magician had forgotten it.There was only me for him now, on the other side of the three-story special glass, in the dry, warm, bright shell of the lookout, on the other side of good and evil.I, the Lightbringer, sat above him, looking into his eyes, bewildered with pain and fear. "Do you think we've always been so aboveboard when we fight?" I asked.For some reason I feel like he can hear me, even through the glass and the howling of the wind.I stood up and tapped the glass with the heel of my shoe once, twice, three times—even if I didn't hit my finger stuck in the glass. The Dark Messenger shuddered, pulled hard, and moved his hand away from the heel of the shoe that was approaching, subconsciously, out of instinct, not out of reason. The body couldn't hold on anymore. In an instant, the glass was stained red with blood, but the wind blew the blood away.All that remained was the shape of the Darkbringer, shrinking, somersaulting in the draft of air.He was dragged towards the Three Little Pigs bar, a trendy tavern next to the TV tower. The invisible clock that was ticking in my mind snapped, cutting the remaining time in half. I step away from the glass and walk slowly in a circle, not looking at the people who are voluntarily moving out of the way, but looking at the twilight world, no, there are no more guards here.Need to judge, where is the headquarters.On it, in the TV tower where the equipment is placed?I don't think so.Mostly in the most comfortable environment. There was also a guard standing by the stairs leading down from the dining room.One glance was enough for me to understand that he had been hypnotized by the Other, and had been so recently.Fortunately, only very shallow. Well, the amount of influence is just right.After all magic works like two ends of a stick, pros and cons. The guard opened his mouth, ready to scream. "Shut up! Let's go!" I ordered briefly. The guard walked behind me without saying a word. We went into the bathroom—a free little facility in the TV tower, the tallest urinal and two toilets in Moscow, bad luck leaving my mark high in the clouds.I waved - a pimple-ridden teenager buttoning his pants briskly out of a single room, a man standing by the urinal making a duck-quacking sound, but he stopped, Then he ran away slowly, with a dull and lifeless look in his eyes. "Take it off," I told the guard, and started pulling off the wet sweater. Still half-holstered, a Desert Eagle pistol much larger than the antique Makarov.However, this didn't particularly disturb me.Importantly, the uniform almost fits well. "If you hear gunshots," I said to the guard, "then you go down and do your job. Do you understand?" He nodded. "I advise you to turn to the light," I uttered a recruiting phrase, "abandon the darkness and defend the light. I give you the ability to distinguish between good and evil. I give you the faith to follow the light. I give you the courage to fight against the darkness." I used to think that I would never be able to use mana to attract volunteers.What would freedom of choice look like in true darkness?How is it possible to involve people in our game, since the Patrol itself has been set up in opposition to this practice? But now I act without hesitation.Taking advantage of the passage left by the dark forces, they entrusted guards to guard their command post, well, this is just in case, just like people keep a puppy at home, it can't bite, but it can bark .This act of the dark forces gave me the right to drag the guard to turn in another direction and make him follow me.It should be noted that he is neither a good person nor a villain, but a most ordinary person with a moderately doting wife. He will not forget to help his elderly parents, a young daughter and his first marriage. An almost grown son, a shaky belief in God, a tangle of moral principles, a few popular ideals—an ordinary good man. A cannon fodder between the armies of light and darkness. "The light is with you," I said.Then the little poor man nodded, and his countenance brightened.There was a look of admiration in his eyes.Just like a few hours ago, he looked at the dark emissary who gave him random instructions and showed him my picture. A few minutes later, the guard stood by the stairs in my wet, smelly suit.I headed down, trying to figure out, what would I do if Zaburon was in command?Or was there another magician of his level? If so, I would be spotted immediately. Copper Hall.I walked out the door and took a look at this eerie circular "carriage restaurant".The large ring rotates slowly with the dining table placed on it. I don't know why, but I think the dark powers will have their headquarters in the Golden Hall or the Silver Hall.I was even slightly surprised by the scene unfolding before my eyes. The waiters floated like dead fish, serving each table the alcohol normally forbidden here.Directly across from me, next to two dining tables is a computer terminal connected to two mobile phones.I noticed that the cables hadn't been run into the tower's innumerable ducts, that is, the headquarters hadn't been around for long.Three young men with long hair are engrossed in their work—fingers moving across the keyboard, lines of text appearing on the screen, cigarettes smoking from the ashtray.I've never met a dark programmer, but the three of them must have been ordinary computer operators, not system administrators.They're no different than any of us magicians sitting at headquarters and hooking up to the laptop network.Perhaps, even seem more polite than some of our personnel. "The Eagle District is completely surrounded." One of the boys said.His voice was not loud, but it rang throughout the circular restaurant, so the waiters trembled and lost their steps. "The Tagansk-Krasnopresnesk line is under control," replied another.The boys exchanged glances, then laughed.Presumably they have a little competition: who can report the situation of the road section they are responsible for faster. catch me, catch me! I walked down the restaurant towards the bar.Don't mind me.A helpless human guard who, by the way, someone puts him in the role of watchdog.I'm just one of them, and now this guard is craving a beer, he's completely lost his sense of responsibility...or he decides to check on the security on the new owner's side.A platoon was sent by order to search for the Night's Watch patrol.Talam-bang-bang, tala-la-la... A woman of not young age was mechanically wiping wine glasses with handles in front of the wine cabinet.When I stopped, she silently poured me a glass of beer.Her eyes were hollow and dark.She became a puppet at her mercy, and struggled to quell a brief flare of rage.No, no right to be emotional.I have to be like a robot too.Puppets are emotionless. Then I saw a girl sitting on a tall swiveling ottoman across the bar, and my heart sank again. How did I not think of this? The establishment of any combat command requires notification to the enemy.An observer will be sent to each combat command.It's part of the deal, it's one of the rules of the game, and there are benefits -- even if the benefits are illusory to both parties.And if it is our side that sets up the headquarters, someone from the dark forces will also be sitting there. Xiaohu is sitting here. At first, the girl's eyes glanced at me without interest, so I thought that everything would pass. Then her eyes rolled back. She has seen the human guard whose face I have adopted.There are some places that don't quite match the existing memory characteristics.There was a panic.She looked at me across the twilight immediately. I stood motionless, not trying to hide. The girl looked away and looked at the magician sitting opposite.A not weak mage, estimated to be about a hundred years old, with no less than three levels of magic power.Not weak, just a conceited magician. "Anyway, what you're doing is a divisive act," she said in a calm voice. "The Day Watcher Patrol has known for a long time that the wildlings—not Anton." "Then who is it?" "A completely genuine light magician that we don't know about. He belongs to the light force, but is controlled by the dark force." "Why, girl?" the magician wondered really. "Please tell me. Why do we ruin ours, though not the most valuable." "'Not the most valuable'—the key sentence." Xiaohu said sullenly. "Suppose, we want to create an opportunity to eliminate the head of the Moscow Light Force, then he will always be free from suspicion as usual, and we will not succeed. And we will lose our twenty people for a mid-level light magician huh? That's not serious. Maybe you think we're fools." "I regard you as a smart person, perhaps much smarter than me." Xiaohu smiled slyly, "But I am just a combat member. Others will draw conclusions, they will draw conclusions, there is no need to doubt. " "Nor did we ask for an immediate death sentence!" The dark magician smiled. "We don't even rule out the possibility of being wrong now. Courts, experienced and fair trials, justice—that's all we want!" "It's strange that your boss can't catch Anton with the 'Xiaba Teng'." The girl shook half a glass of beer with her fingers, "It's strange. His favorite weapon, he is skillful in his hands It's been a hundred years. It doesn't seem like the Day Watchers are interested in capturing Anton himself." "My dear girl." The dark magician leaned over the table, "you are a contradictory person! How can you accuse us of hunting a law-abiding light magician through no fault of his own, and say we don't want to catch him? What about him?" "Why not?" "That kind of pervert." The magician chuckled, "I really got a lot of fun from the conversation, don't you think we are crazy, bloodthirsty, perverted robbers?" "No, we think you are cunning villains and robbers." "Let's start to compare our methods." The dark magician seemed as proud as he stepped on his favorite horse. "Let's compare the losses that the actions of the patrol team have brought to humans and our feed base." "People are fodder for you." "What about you? Maybe the Lightbringer comes from the Light now, instead of standing out from the crowd?" "For us, people are the roots, our roots." "Let's just call it a root. Why fight over a word? Then humans are our roots too, girl. And people are sending us more and more elites. I won't hide. There's no secret here." "A lot of people come to our side. It's no secret." "Of course. The turbulent times, the stressful state, the burden of work - people live on the verge of mental breakdown, and it is easy to lose control and fall. At least in this respect, we can come to a consistent conclusion." The magician Hehe laughed. "Our conclusions are consistent," agrees Xiaohu.She stopped looking in my direction, and the conversation entered into an unresolvable and eternal subject, on which philosophers on both sides were ardently arguing and racking their brains, not just two lonely and boring magicians, dark and bright.I get it, Xiaohu has said everything that is necessary for me. Perhaps she felt the need to say everything. I picked up a glass of beer in front of me, and drank several bars in a few gulps.I really want to drink it. Is the hunt fake? Yes, I already understood that.It is important for me to know that our people understand this too. Was the Savage not caught? certainly.Otherwise they would have come out and contacted me.There was no difficulty for the boss by telephone or telepathy.If the murderer had been brought before the courts, Svetlana would not have been heartbroken for wanting to help but not being able to join the fight.And I might smile in Zaburon's face. And how, how could it be possible to find someone in such a big city who can generate his own magic power?Suddenly appeared - and then disappeared.From murder to murder, from one innocuous victory over evil to another?If the dark forces are really familiar with him - this is also the secret of the highest leadership. And it's not at all a secret among these trifling dark mages. I looked around in disgust. What a farce all this is! The guard, who was so easily killed by me, was excitedly mocking each other with our observers, and had no time to care about other third-level magicians, those young people sitting in front of the terminal and shouting: "Color Boulevard checked!" "Polezhayev Street is under control!" Yes, this is combat command.So unsightly and unprofessional, like the inexperienced dark magician who was hunting me around town.Yes, the net was cast, but so many holes in the net did not disturb anyone.The more often I escaped from the siege, the more I trembled, the better for the darkness.Of course it is the most wishful thinking.Sveta will see the end of it.will break free.When she feels real power coming from within her, she tries to help.None of us could stop her—really.So she will die. "Volgograd Street." I could kill them all right now!Shoot them all!Without exception!These people are dark scum, losers, fools who either have no future or have too many flaws.Not only did their dark magicians not pity them - they even kept them in the way, trying to trample them underfoot.The Watchman's Patrol—not a shelter, and we are sometimes like a shelter.The Day Watchers keep weeding out the excess, usually at our hands, to get the trump card and earn themselves the right to strike back and shift the balance. The ghost of the twilight world who pointed out the Ostankino TV tower to me is a product of darkness, another insurance for the power of darkness. What if I don't guess where to fight? And there is only one other who really manipulates the actions of the dark forces. Zaburon. Of course, he doesn't hold a grudge against me at all.Why bring such complex and toxic emotions into a major matchup?He'd eat bags of people like me for breakfast, remove them from the board, and trade them for his own pawns. When did he think that the game was well coordinated and should end? "Is there no fire?" I asked, setting down my teacup and grabbing a pack of cigarettes on the table.Someone left this pack of cigarettes here, maybe a visitor who left the restaurant in a hurry, or maybe a dark messenger. Xiaohu's eyes lit up unkindly, and she became nervous.I understood that in an instant, this sorcerer would be transformed into a battle.She probably also estimated the strength of the enemy, and had great hopes for victory. But there is no need for this. The self-righteous dark magician casually handed me the lighter. The "Rongsen" brand lighter made a melodious "snap" and spit out a tongue of flame. At the same time, the dark magician continued: "The accusations you often make against the dark forces - double-faced, insidious alienation - have only one purpose, and that is to cover up your inability to survive and develop, your ignorance of the world and its laws, and ultimately your ignorance of human beings! Let it be admitted that the predictions of the dark side are far more accurate, and the instinctive desires of the human soul will bring them to our side—what will become of your morals? What will your philosophy of life be? Huh?" I lit my cigarette, nodded politely, and headed for the stairs.Xiaohu looked at my back in panic.Alas, please understand me, and guess for yourself why I have to leave. Everything I might know here, I already know. To be precise - almost everything. I turned to the short-haired man in glasses who was focused on his laptop, and asked solemnly: "Which areas are we going to lock down next?" "Plant area, the 'National Economic Achievements Exhibition Hall' area." The man answered without lifting an eyelid.The cursor is briskly moving across the screen, and the dark magician is giving orders, relishing his powers, moving bright red dots across the map of Moscow.It is harder to get him out of the operation than it is to get him out of the girl he loves. Know that they will love too. "Thanks," I said, and put the unextinguished cigarette in the ashtray full of cigarette butts. "Very helpful." "Not worth mentioning." The operator waved his hand without looking back.He clicked the next point on the map with the mouse: it was an ordinary dark emissary who came out to participate in the roundup.What's your joy, fool, those throwing parties will never be on your map.You're better off playing the part, with that same power-drunk mood. I slipped down the spiral staircase.That's when the anger in me—to kill or be killed—retired.At some point in battle, perhaps, a soldier maintains such apathetic stillness; so does the surgeon's hand when the patient dies on the operating table. What did you foresee, Zaburon? It was I who would start struggling in the net, and the Lightbringer and the Darkbringer would come galloping to the throbbing of these struggles... All of them, especially Svetlana, right? wrong. I'm going to surrender or get caught, and there's going to be a slow, drawn-out, exhausting legal process that will end with Svetlana going mad in court, right? wrong. Are we going to go to war with the lowly magicians of the Combat Command and wipe them all out, but I'm trapped in a trap about three hundred meters high, and Svetlana is going to charge for the tower? wrong. It was I who came to the headquarters to find out that no one here knows anything about the savages.And shall I try to stall for time? possible. The encirclement is tightening, I know that.It gathered along the edge of the Moscow ring road, then began to cut the city into districts, cut off the main transport lines, now rush to the uncontrolled suburbs, find shelter, try to hide yourself, it is not too late : Because the only advice the boss gave me was to persevere and stall for time, and the night watch patrols are running around looking for wildlings. You didn't drive me by accident into the area where we had our little quarrel in the winter, did you?I cannot but recall it, that is to say, in any case, I shall act under the influence of the memory. The lookout was empty, completely empty.The last group of visitors ran away, and there was not even a staff member left—only the man I subdued stood by the stairs, with a pistol in his hand, looking down with piercing eyes. "Let's change back into our clothes," I ordered, "and please accept the thanks from the light. Then you forget what we said. You go home. All you have to remember is that today is as normal as yesterday, nothing happened anything." "Nothing happened!" agreed the guard, and took off my clothes. Turning people to the light or the dark is easy, but they are happiest when they are what they are.