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Struggle. Retribution in the Twilight
Vladimir Anderson
The fourth part of the Struggle saga "Retribution in the Twilight", where intrigues, conspiracies and confrontations take a new unexpected turn. The Mountain makes an agreement with Cobra, their union is a powerful weapon for both of them. But the confrontation between the BSS and the Inquisition threatens to escalate into a full-scale war, which will also involve people. The newly created system of self-government of the prefect is forced to undergo new tests of strength, while the Maki movement, the last bastion of freedom, threatens to split and fade into oblivion as a non-viable organism. In Retribution at Twilight, the stakes are high and the decisions have profound consequences. Join this epic adventure where power, betrayal and the fight for survival intertwine in a story that will leave you hanging on every page.
Vladimir Anderson
Struggle. Retribution in the Twilight
Tarantula
The Hiwi didn't strike him as anything special. Good warriors who had found their place in the land and now clung to it. It was foolish to blame them for fighting on the same side as the Plagues, or for attacking the Maquis so mercilessly. Their place is their place. And it's pointless to deny it. Someone had to take it. And the fact that they have done it well is something to be learned from them rather than to be blamed for it.
That's why the prefect sent him here – to learn more about how to take his place. A place under the sun, not underground. It was safe to say that the miners had taken their place underground… And, strange as it may seem, Tikhomirov felt that there was more than enough room under the sun.
And it was not only the preserved buildings in which to occupy a place, but also, obviously, the production facilities that could be used to supply these places. Now, when Tikhomirov calmly walked the corridors of the Cobra base and saw on the one hand the abundance of weapons and various equipment, and on the other hand – the occasional idleness of those people who surrounded him, it seemed to him that in general, the life of people in the presence of plagues, probably not too much different from what was more than a century ago. It was the miners who got it, and those who work in the production of the plague empire. But for the rest of us, it's very different. It seems that it's not just the Kiwis, but the Maquis as well, who live differently…
The Maquis were always complaining. Whenever you asked them anything, they would start talking about how the plagues were always pressing them, how they always had to hide somewhere, constantly retreating and generally barely making ends meet. But in fact, no one touches them beyond Bakhmut. And even more than that, the plagues and hivis themselves are afraid of their possible attack and are looking out for them, so as not to miss an unexpected blow.
The miners didn't know anything about chiwi. And it turned out that the whole idea of people in the plague empire was a handful of survivors in the enterprises, who only do what they can to meet the production norm.
And it turned out that the world was much more multifaceted than that. And certainly not black and white, as one might have thought at the beginning.
Still. How many weapons the Kiwis have. Machine guns, which you don't often see around the tents, and grenade launchers, and even armored vehicles. And it all looks very fresh… Actually, the document they'd once gotten from Shinhra, where a certain "Coyote" reported that the Imperial Army was fighting so poorly, didn't seem to be some kind of fiction. And if it was embellished, it wasn't too much.
I'm also wondering how this whole thing is organized. A couple hours ago, Cobra went to see Raven, who is the leader of the group. But even that level of "in charge" doesn't mean that everyone obeys him. It's more like he's coordinating them. And that's evident from the way Cobra marveled at the subordination of everyone and everything to the prefect personally, and especially people who can subvert on command with themselves. They have two grenades per person, and that doesn't always work. But with us, everything works, and with one, and the first time.
All that said, the system the Prefect is implementing is going to be far more resilient to change than the one the Kiwis have now. The only flaw is that if you take away a top commander, you replace him with another. You might lose skills, but you don't lose the system. But at the Mountain, except for him no one like him can not be put, no matter how much you want to … And then Tikhomirov had an interesting idea. An idea how to make the unreal real only in the minds of other people. And even though even now it was of little use, but in the long run, if something happened to the Mountain, it would be possible to save the whole system....
Now Gora himself hardly gives orders anymore. It's either Tikhomirov or Rich, depending on what the order is about. The prefect spends most of his time in his office planning. He doesn't even have time to check anything anymore. His world becomes so abstract that all his subordinates
begin to treat him more like a symbol than a concrete leader. And although there are occasional moments when he gets personally involved and shows his determination and steely character, these moments are becoming fewer and fewer. And it's getting to the point where one day there won't be any at all. No one will see the prefect, but will only follow his orders. That's why you can imagine the possibility that if something happens to the Mountain, his business won't die. He will forever remain in his office to give orders that must be carried out…
And then it is his, Tikhomirov's, units that will be of particular importance. Security, Assault, and GBI. And they were clearly missing one more. Enemies are not always overt, fighting openly and with weapons in their hands. And the case of the change of power in Squad-14 is clear proof of that. Khmelnitsky missed the whole conspiracy that deposed him, and it's strange that he survived at all. No one would expect such favors at the mine. The people there are too used to blood, cruelty, and even ruthlessness. Too long have they watched the methods practiced by the plagues. It's too deep in their souls. And so to miss the plot, not only for the Mountain, but also for Tikhomirov, would mean the fatal end of all achievements.
We need our own counterintelligence. Our own SMERSH, which will identify in advance those who can stab in the back, which will do everything to keep the system running like clockwork, which will take in their hands all the threads of control over life in the mines. Especially since the speed at which this autonomy is expanding is clearly beyond anything imaginable before. Everyone used to dream of some stability, now they dream of big changes that can bring new territories and enterprises.
There was the sound of some kind of movement from the entrance: clicking, banging against the floor, stomping. Cobra and his guards had returned from a short trip. He'd been gone an hour and a half, and from the looks of it, nothing good had come of it.
When he saw Tikhomirov, Kobra nodded toward his office, and he went there himself.
There was no one inside, not even the girl who usually typed something on a typewriter.
Cobra poured tea for himself and a second mug for Tikhomirov before sitting down in his general's chair:
– Looks like you were right about resource sharing....
Tikhomirov had already taken a sip of tea and felt it warming his brain. It was strong enough, though not bitter, as it was with the tea the miners brewed for themselves, calling it chifir. And it was cooked quite differently – boiled in a pot, not infused in a kettle like this one.
– Of course… What else is there to share? But I still think this division looks a little different than just "give me this and I'll give you that". – replied Tikhomirov, sipping his tea and thinking that it would be better if it were miner's chifir, to which he seemed to be accustomed.
– You mean it's easier to change the hand holding the cards rather than flip those cards between each other?
– Yeah, sort of… You have an enviable place, so to speak. And you've set it up pretty well… I'm pretty sure you've got a lot of other things besides this base. And if that's the case, then there's a lot of people to displease with your existence… And now I would think about what once happened to Khmelnitsky in his Unit-14....
– I understand that you have already taken care of such questions at the mine. – Cobra smiled, clearly pleased to have such an interlocutor with him, intelligent and not competing with him in anything. – We'll have a look at something new… Let's go.
They left the office, went to the far end of the corridor, then down the stairs to the first floor and down to the basement. It turned out to be a large parking lot, now also divided into separate rooms. Still without numbers on the doors, which were aluminum barriers. Behind the one they entered were two men looking at the severed human heads lying on the floor. There was plenty of blood, but apparently the heads themselves had not been severed here, or else it would have been stained not only inside the room, but would have leaked out.
One of the head examiners approached Cobra:
– Only two have been identified…
– As expected…" replied Cobra. – Leave us…
When Cobra's two handmaidens came out he pointed at the lying heads with his hand and continued:
– See those heads. Thirty-two to be exact… Someone interrupted the Bravo team when they were guarding the approach to the Deez sector from the industrial pipe, and then fired mortars at us. And your patron pointed out at the time that 80-millimeter mortars were too heavy for the Maquis to carry that far… But what surprised me more was not that, but that someone had gotten so stealthily close to the Bravo group that not a single shot had been fired. And during the whole time they were interrupted, too… Their heads were left for us not far from an industrial pipe with a stick buried nearby, to which a still-living snake was nailed. It's clear that it's a message to me. You can still move, but you can't do anything… Someone knew too well when they acted. Too quiet, too stealthy, too sure and too aware of everything. And then he withdrew just as quietly… While the shelling was still going on, I ordered to change the frequency, and on the spare frequency I had already told the neighboring units to go around the attackers' position from both flanks Then I
switched to the old frequency and heard a familiar voice from there, which announced to me that they knew all our moves and it would not be possible to take them Of course, we did not take
anyone, but only found booby-trapped corpses without heads What do you think about this story?
– Obviously whoever interrupted Bravo's group knew them personally. Just why didn't they report seeing someone, even if it was their own.....
– Yes. That's the question I was most concerned about. And now we know the answer to it…
See these heads," Cobra pointed to the severed and mutilated heads of people.
– Yes, you are.
– Only two of the Bravo group are actually lying here. The others are so disfigured that they are unrecognizable. But we have our own methods of doing this. And not everyone knows about
them. We measure the skulls of all the fighters so we can distinguish them if they die. It is most
likely that at least in some form the skull will be preserved, so it is more likely to be recognized… Whoever did this didn't know about this trick of ours. And hoped to remain anonymous Well,
almost. Because the answer to why Bravo Team didn't report someone arriving is that no one did.
It was Bravo's group that fired on me, having previously killed the two who didn't want to be involved, and having prepped the bodies of the apparently dead Maquis beforehand. That's where all the awareness and confidence in their actions came from. And that's why the voice was so familiar, though he tried to change it. It was Bravo's group commander…
– Looks like we need to pay more attention to our own safety. – Tikhomirov smiled a little this time. He was pleased that he had thought of SMERSH himself before he heard the story.
Masha
It's a very strange feeling when you get used to something no longer being the same in your life. When someone is gone, someone you never imagined life without. When that someone used to fill all the space in your life, and now they're not there at all. And this feeling of continuous emptiness in a place previously filled all the time, on the one hand, makes you stop feeling anything, and on the other hand, makes you sometimes look at everything too detached. It's as if there was never any of this before. It was always empty.
That's how Masha started thinking about six months ago. And now that the baby was born.
Her baby and Raphael's baby, she had a new life. And that life filled a void. This boy filled that void. And strangely enough, he slept most of the time.
He was almost a month old now, and he was still sleeping quietly, only waking up occasionally to drink his mother's milk. And then to sleep again. And it was very surprising,
because she herself had seen how newborn babies scream at night when they were teething, how they did not let everyone sleep, and only absolute fatigue does its job, cutting off to sleep the working somas.
She remembered Raphael hugging her and the baby screaming somewhere nearby. It was probably not only because he was teething, but also because there was nothing to eat. Everyone was still sleepy, and those who were exhausted did not even hear the crying, while those who were not so tired continued to listen to the baby's cry, sometimes grumbling a little about it.
Raphael thought then of what might still be lacking in someone who had just begun to see the world with his eyes and hear its sounds with his own ears. Such a small creature would certainly lack the connection between the movement seen by the eyes and the sound that would correlate with it all. He had read about an ancient toy for children, called the most important among others-the rattle. The next day he made one: a small wooden ball on a stick and with bits of charcoal inside.
Each time he swung it, the charcoal hit the walls and made a sound.
The child liked the toy very much. Now he rattled it half the night and then slept quietly. Not to say that the crying was louder than the constant beating of the coal against the wood, but it was easier for everyone. Everyone knew that it was easier for a child to grow up that way, so he could at least feel that there was something under his control – a little rattle made by a slave.
Masha dreamed that one day she and Raphael would have a child of their own, who would also rattle a toy like this, growing up and becoming independent. A person should be independent, that's when he or she could feel alive.
If she had thought then what those words meant to her husband. That he wouldn't be able to accept that their life was one big ordeal with no choice in the matter. That he would want to change that. Including at the cost of his own life. And that the only thing that would come out of it would be to lose him to her. And now his son was starting his life without even seeing his father.
Masha thought about it, and she didn't have an exact answer for what she would do if she knew ahead of time what she knew now. That he was gone. Would she have been able to keep him from that? Or would all her words have been nothing to him? She didn't know the answer to that question. All she knew was that he was no longer alive. And that his son would someday grow up and start thinking like him. She didn't even doubt that… But what would the world be like when he grew up?
The dreams she'd been having lately were jarring in their harshness, their omnipresence. She felt that she was dreaming on the threshold of the changes that awaited everyone. And it concerned above all the fact that the plagues would lose their power, granted to them by the Black Stone…
How exactly, she did not understand. And it didn't even occur to her what the plagues could lose, what they were using now. What could their great relic even give them now? It opened a portal to Earth for them. It jammed all human electronics. But now that they've conquered humanity, what do they need from all that the Black Stone has given them? Open another portal for someone else to invade and conquer the Chumans? To turn on electronics that no longer exist, and no longer even have people capable of using them to their full potential?
Masha didn't see any answers to these questions. But the very feeling of coming change seemed as real as the sun rising every morning. It just had to happen…
But the dream made it unmistakably clear. It was the same dream now. A clear field without any armies as before. No thunderstorms or rainstorms. Just light clouds blocking out the sun so it wouldn't bake. And Raphael so calm, standing beside her. Very close. And watching her with his faithful, peaceful eyes:
– My love, you will know the secret for sure. But first you must wait for her. Natasha.
Without her, this secret is too dangerous for you. And it's better for you not to know it at all than to know it alone… Wait for her. Wait for Natasha.
Masha woke up every time she heard that word, because she realized that her arms and legs were twitching – she was trying to reach out and hug him in her sleep. To hug her beloved husband, because she missed him so much. To hug him and tell him that their son had been born healthy.
And ask him what name he would like to give him.
She wanted to do all this, and at that moment she realized that she was asleep… That's how she woke up every night, feeling next to the peacefully sleeping infant, who now seemed to fill some void in her, still leaving room for Raphael.
– I miss you so much. – every time Masha whispered aloud. – How much I miss you every
day.....
Metropolitan
The church's railroad train arriving in the Deese sector was not just luxurious – it reveled in that word. Even the carriages of the rank-and-file novices-and those destined for the punitive drill of the "unspoken resource"-were decorated with silk, varnished oak wood, and in places gilding.
Guzokh could imagine that such a thing might be in the Metropolitan's own wagon, but to see it in the rooms reserved for the fighter monks was already astonishing.
Well, at least it became clearer why the chief of the punitive borax Ruminhr so easily believed Guzokh's story that he was given in charge of this borax on the personal orders of the patriarch, and to doubt the words of the Metropolitan – is not allowed even in thought… All this was supported in fact also by the desire of the chums from the borax of the "tacit resource" to live rather than die in a stupid shootout with the SSchekists.
Obedience is in their blood. So they obeyed. The Metropolitan. Albeit a different one. But it doesn't matter. They have no responsibility when the plague with such a high dignity has it.
The train was now moving back to the Korsa sector. Guzokh wanted to keep his unit away from the captured Samoh as a last resort. He could really massacre if given the chance. Especially now that his slippery mind games had failed so miserably.
Before departure, of course, the railings were removed from the roof of the metropolitan carriage, so that it would not differ from all the others. And by his personal order Guzokh allowed to pass through the chambers of the central carriage in both directions. And himself calmer, and to get their favor to himself – let them see that he was not a stranger to their presence, and once again ready only to bless for a holy cause, especially if it concerned his personal security. Exactly so.
Now this drill is his personal security, not some punitive operations, for which both the Imperial Army and the SCK have enough forces. And let them deal with it by his own decree.
How foolish were those who decided that the Inquisition should be carried out by the hands of the Inquisitors. It's not their business at all. It's their business to judge, to pass judgment. But others can carry it out. And on the one hand, this will whitewash the executors from the gravity of the decision, and on the other hand – will not waste a single drop of blood and sweat of the clergy … Guzokh became directly disgusted with Nevrokh's approach to understanding the role of the holy Church in the modern world. He wanted to substitute himself for the given, to become the head of everything and subordinate everyone to his will, including the Central Committee of the Empire … What absurd stupidity. What an unprincipled departure from the essence of the holy Church, which presupposes wise counsel for rulers. Advice that cannot be refused. Advice that is given as if by the Black Stone itself. As opposed to the heavy words and orders that the current patriarch wants to enforce.
He doesn't deserve to be a patriarch. From the moment he stopped understanding the importance and advantage of soft power, capable of controlling the completely heterogeneous subjects of the Empire. He emphasizes brute force, which, while destructive in nature, will only do irreparable damage to the reputation and influence of the Holy See.
That is why they are so caught up in luxury, because they think too much about the strength and rigor of their beliefs, which must be extended to other minds. Therefore, for them, material things have become the main foundation on which they stand too shaky… And it would not be shaky if the strength of beliefs were held on the sure proof-grounded word that passes from mouth to mouth by itself. Without any pressure. When the plagues themselves want to tell each other the truth that they like, and that they will want to see everywhere.
The "unspoken resource" is a tool to shut the mouths of the irrepressible… But you can't shut the thoughts. They will remain. And will continue to spread like a plague from one to another at a rate faster than the real plague. And unlike the real plague, completely untreatable.
Just look at Samoh and what he's gotten himself into. To openly provoke in front of witnesses an official of not just the Empire, but the SCK itself. Weaving intrigues on the fly, in the
office of the head of the entire sector… And it's amazing that such things sometimes worked out… Although it's not so surprising when you find out that the deputy commander of the Korsa sector was in fact a full-fledged member of the Church, not the SCK. With such nefarious methods, one can really believe in one's own infallibility… Though what it leads to… Self-confidence… Careless self-confidence that has one tiny end.
They were now passing the section of road that the Maquis had recently blown up and the miners had hastily repaired. They had been shot at, and the Kiwis had had some kind of strange conflict. In general, of course, these Kiwis have become completely detached from reality, the reality that was even some 30 years ago, when they performed only security functions, and their numbers were so small that there was no thought of forming large units of them. Not like now, when they are doing the most dangerous and bloody work for the imperial army and the S.S.C. combat units.
Guzoch learned all this from a confession five years ago, when one of the veterans of the JFK needed help in easing his fate before he passed away. It happened at one of the defense plant security conferences. Guzoh was there, of course, on business for his favorite worker-chums. And one of the speakers had a heart problem, like a heart attack. He wanted repose for his soul and immediate confession, which Guzokh, as a clergyman of the highest rank nearby, provided.
The SSchekist told him of the complexities of his apparatus and how he had done nothing on his own to save the true foundations of the Empire, which was rotting from within and decaying like a human corpse. As he said, the Hiwi now made up the main fighting force of the JFC, and in some cases even the Imperial Army itself, rapidly approaching it in numbers. It was an experiment at first, but the effect was so striking that it was quickly adopted as a practice, and after only a few years of use, the balance had shifted dramatically. The commanders of the imperial ministries were constantly reporting to the top about successful operations to suppress the Maquis and establish links between the disparate parts of the empire with minimal casualties. Human casualties, of course, were of no interest to anyone, but no one thought that such practices would only multiply the influence and role of the Hiwi in the vital processes of the Empire. In some instances, the Hivi leaders themselves set the price for completing tasks, and given the balance of power, the price had to be paid – imperial officials were addicted to this means of solving problems like a drug. The dying SSchekist didn't give the exact numbers, but it was hundreds of thousands of fighters. All he asked was to be forgiven for the criminal inaction of this cancerous tumor against which he dared do nothing.
And so Guzokh looked at the surrounding space and saw that people were starting to do what they wanted. Blowing things up themselves, fixing things themselves, deciding for themselves when someone would or would not pass by. After all, he had gotten to the Deese sector so quickly because the prefect had let him through from the Korsa sector via his underground route. So that's it, the Metropolitan is let through by the man who runs the entire faction. Running it, mining it, developing it. All by himself and his own resources. Only paying the proper fee to the Empire.
Apparently, those who were involved in calculating resource extraction, production management and transportation also paid attention only to numbers. Which, obviously, suited them. And what it could threaten in the future, apparently, they did not care about, since it would not happen in their time.
No one but the Church seems to care what happens to the balance of plagues and people in the Empire itself. After all, the Church is the only one who cares how many of the living believe in the Black Stone and how many don't. Humans are not capable of believing in it. Plagues do. And that's where the Church sees the difference – the rest of us don't. The rest of us only see the difference in production, speed of delivery, shipping and sabotage losses and who gets rewarded or punished for it. This is the sense that the patriarch should have noticed. The sense of the main linchpin of the plague state. And if he had done so, like all the past ones before him, he certainly would not have allowed such decay in the Imperial Army, or in the SCK, or anywhere else. And he just counted his influence figures like everyone else.....
The Empire deserves a far better patriarch than Nevroh. And than most of those who came before him. The Empire only deserves to live if it is healthy. And the only health it has is faith in the Black Stone. Which humans may well believe in as well. And the Prefect has shown that this is not only possible, but necessary to preserve the Empire.
Prefect
Gora was pleased with himself. It had been a long time since he had felt that he had calculated all the moves so correctly. And there were many. And an even greater number of variations of them. To persuade Cobra to leave a passage for Samoh and his punishing drill, which they would not fail to take advantage of. Let Guzokh pass through the underground pathways to allow him to subdue that storm. And, of course, to convince the Metropolitan of his total allegiance to the only true faith on Earth, the faith in the Black Stone.
And surprisingly, as time went on, he began to realize that he understood the language of the plagues. And of different plagues. Gora was more than sure that plagues are different like people, from different races, nations, and that he should not have understood them all at the same time. But no, that was exactly what was happening. And now it was not even a secret to him why the plagues themselves had no problem with it – they too spoke one, apparently, some unified plague language.
How far this would go was yet to be seen, but Guzoh was not opposed to extending the autonomy of the Mountain to neighboring factions if the people who would fall under his command also believed in the Black Stone.
For her part, Ananhr was not against it either, as long as the nominal subordination of the other factions' sectors was left to the JFC, and the Hivi would provide ground cover for those facilities.
This was a very successful mechanism for expanding the prefect's influence. It had been practiced first in the Diza sector, and then in the entire Donetsk-Makeevka grouping. From the point of view of the Empire's development, it should not have hindered anything, but it was obvious that such a situation would not suit either the High Priest Nevrokh or the Imperial administration represented by Bluh. But both problems were more than solvable.
Lately Gora had changed his attitude to the word "problem" in general. Now the word did not exist for him at all in its usual sense. Now he had only the words "issue" or "situation", which could be important, urgent, inconvenient, dangerous, paramount, critical, extraordinary. None of these are problems. They were tasks that needed and absolutely could be solved.
And scrolling back over some of these issues, such as Samokh's attempt to get into the mine of the Korsa sector, when the man of the Mountain blew up the elevator with him, and the stairwells became inaccessible through smoke and periodic gunfire – all of these were just deliberately calculated moves according to a certain already calculated combination. And before, he would have considered all this a suicide....
Power. That's what gives you a completely different awareness of reality. And adjusts this reality to himself, not the other way around. But Gora himself understood perfectly well that it was not worth mentioning that he was first and foremost a human being. Capable of being wrong, deluded, and self-righteous. Those three traits in general were his most dangerous enemies now, and not at all plagues, chivi, or maquis. Now that his resources and capabilities were counted in units of a completely different order than before, it was these three enemies that were now prioritized. By virtue of their stealth… They were impossible for him to calculate. Whether he wanted to or not. But the same mind that was supposed to calculate them was itself the object of their use.
