She and her friends were sitting, as usual, at the reception, the three of us at a wide table that stood on the stairs on the landing between the floors. Along a wide corridor, emerging from a painted green door, walking along a gray carpeted path, people sometimes approached them. They walked for 10 meters along a windowless passage, lit by a soft, matte gray light from long lamps in the ceiling and walls, in silence. Most were focused and businesslike, some were solemn or even pretentious. Most hid their anxiety, or maybe didn't feel it, and looked rather casual, as if nothing extraordinary was happening, as if what was happening was just a small everyday necessity. It's like going to the bath or something...

Approaching the table, trying not to look the girls in the eyes, the guests showed their tickets. The girls smiled sweetly and said where to go next - to the upper or lower floor. Most walked down the stairs and there they disappeared into the brown doors. At those doors stood stylized guards, who were called Morans. Young black guys, embossed, slender, fit, dressed like ancient African warriors - in colorful loincloths, in feathers in lush hairstyles, with faces decorated with bright makeup. In their hands they held sharp, real spears, real combat knives hung on their belts. When visitors passed into the lower hall, they checked the ticket again, and having let the guest in to the door, they ritually crossed their spears behind him, clanging loudly and carving a bright spark that illuminated the passage for a moment after the departing person.

This guy in a black jacket immediately seemed strange to her. He was dressed somehow in a street style, as if he were going to work or shopping. He entered with a quick step, as if he was running away from someone, looking around incredulously. He didn't pretend that anything was going on, but he wasn't scared or depressed either. He just didn't trust... When he came up to the table and showed his ticket, he did what no one else did - he looked into her eyes.

She saw there. No, she will not say what was there - now she did not believe. But she became funny and interesting. When she looked at the ticket, it became even more incomprehensible. It was a ticket to the upper hall. It's just a very expensive ticket, with such big bosses or businessmen come. Most often, they are warned about and prepared for them. In general, a guest upstairs is a rarity, it does not happen every day. But the ticket was real.

The girls, smiling, nodded to the guy, enticingly stroked their hair, winked and nodded upward. He, also with a quick step, and also looking around in disbelief, went up the stairs to the white doors. He opened them, illuminating everything around with the light of bright white lamps from the upper hall, and disappeared behind them, gently closing the wooden doors with gray lacquered handles behind him.

The girls looked at each other and smiled. "I wonder who it is?" Red asked. “Maybe you won a lottery?” Light suggested. She was silent, remembering his look. Hundreds of customers pass by every day. Girls, of course, are obliged to remember them, just in case, at least until the end of the shift. But you can’t remember everyone, and why? But this one would be remembered, she already knew. She felt sad that she did not know more about him, and now she never will. The girls giggled as they sensed her thoughts and read her silence.

However, very soon the white doors at the top opened, and this one in black returned from them. It certainly didn't happen. The client always went in one direction, the exit was at the other end of the hall, and no one returned through the reception. Yes, and time - he definitely did not leave there in the white hall for the paid period ...

The guy came down to them, his face was even more incredulous than at the beginning. He handed them the ticket again. She looked carefully at him and at the ticket, showed her friends, and they seriously nodded - everything is right there. But, in the end, even if this obviously poor citizen had got a VIP ticket by mistake, he would have stayed there, since he was lucky ...

But the guy didn't look like he was lucky. He looked into her eyes again - it was an honest look. She did not meet more honestly, but did not understand what he needed and what she could do. Do not send home from the institution. Then, if you drive out, there may be some kind of check, the girls will be asked why they kicked out a person with a VIP ticket. But he definitely did not want to go to the white room.

Winking at each other, the girls showed the guy to the stairs down. They tinkled a copper bell with a pink bow, attracting the attention of the Morans. Showed them to the guy, saying a few words in their language. And once again pointed out to the guy on the stairs down.

He went there obediently, approached the Africans and showed them the ticket. The Morans let him in through the brown doors, and he, passing by their spears, disappeared into the yellow half-dark hall.

She sensed something was wrong. Some mistake. And, perhaps, the girls will still get it for the fact that he left without a ticket. The fact is that tickets were not sold for money, but were appropriated by various organizations and departments in accordance with status, merit, and so on. Their establishment gave credit to everyone who walked through their doors... The tickets matched the listings that came in from the organizations. Now upstairs, without counting their client, they can raise a fuss. Yes, and below, it can be accidentally calculated in the crowd somehow. After all, he does not look like an ordinary representative of the unassuming public there. Usually family men go there, rustic, sometimes rustic, and aunts go there too - most often pot-bellied mothers, exemplary wives, who finally deserve a decent rest.

The girls, thinking about this guy, were already waiting for the brown doors to open now, and he would come out of them, again poking his ticket and looking into her eyes. But the doors did not open, the Morans stood motionless, black against the black background, speckled with bright red armbands and feathers.

- I guess I liked it, - the blonde girlfriend giggled softly.

- The desire of the client is the law, - the redhead muttered.

She was surprised to feel disappointed that the story ended there. The work of gatekeepers is a rare boredom. There in the halls, with clients - real life. And here you sit and look at the tickets, check with the lists. For all the endless shifts, there was not a single mismatch. The administration in the institution works clearly and there are no overlays. The whole job of doorkeepers is to be nice and smile. And here, for the first time, we encountered some kind of misunderstanding. And still they didn't know what to do. Behind the girls was something like an inner hall. There, in the shade, they had a refrigerator, there was a microwave and a kettle. The blonde plugged the kettle into the outlet and stood in thought, opening the refrigerator. White, humming softly, it was mostly filled with morans—preserves, yoghurts, and sliced ​​red fish. The blonde took out her strawberry jam

Chewing white bread with red jam, drinking tea with lemon, they again discussed that guy. “Lost some,” said the blonde. “Maybe you just found a ticket?” The redhead suggested. “Some kind of unstoppable. Hungry, and his eyes are like ... I don’t understand what kind of look he has a strange one, ”the blonde thought.

They knew how to distinguish people by their look. There is a look of a serf, there is a look of a master, a look of a hunted victim, a thief, a cop, a merchant, a teacher… And this one? In general, he looks like a cop in some way, like an opera - very attentive and penetrating, but for a cop he somehow behaved too lost. Cops often come to them - confident, firm gait, with a smile - strong, domineering.

Maybe, really, the operas, or the inspector? Inspector? That's what we'll rake then, - the girls thought, for some reason not being afraid of this, warming themselves with tea, enjoying how the jam touches the tongue.

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The battalion was marching in a long column of trucks along the central wide avenue of Kaulnin - Baldur avenue. Five lanes towards the center were cleared of everyone except the military, and the trucks were moving fast. In the body under the awning, the soldiers were shaking on the benches. The bright October sun shone in a clear blue sky. Yesterday, black clouds stretched from the broken industrial zone, today they were brown and rusty, with them sometimes a sour stench of iron and chemistry flew in.

Ratmir saw how the soldiers looked at him - pale, thin faces that did not get enough sleep, almost childish eyes searched and found hope in him - in their company commander. “Every military man believes in the best, maybe one of us will survive…”, Ratmir hummed a cheerful song from a children's cartoon about a crocodile under his breath. He liked himself now. He is tall, about ninety meters, broad-shouldered and thin, athletic, athletic, tenacious. He is kind, he is strong. He is blond, which is rare for the Horde. His mother is from Kaulnin, she has Western blood. As a child, he lived in not far from the capital, and went to Kaulnin to visit his grandmother for the summer. After military school, he commanded a platoon in the jungles of Florina for three years, and then he managed to transfer to the 22nd division, in his beloved city.

His father's mighty build of the Eastern Horde and high growth, in addition to the light hair and gray eyes of the Kaulnin, often made him highly appreciate his appearance. There was always a share of doubt, as now, - maybe that morning conductor liked Ratmir? Maybe she's thinking about him now?

The column turned around on the overpass, rolling out onto Saara Avenue, leading to the southern districts of the city. Buses slowly crawled under the overpass, completely flooding the street - the evacuation of the population continued.

After driving for about ten minutes along the avenue, they turned into lanes, with stops, began to wind through courtyards, spreading in groups along the 17th microdistrict, which went to the southern outskirts. Ratmir's company in five cars rolled out onto the square in front of the Batyr sports center. They dismounted, rattling their boots on the asphalt from the height of the truck.

The battalion commander sent a message in the regiment's closed chat, "Batyr" is the stronghold of Ratmir's company. The sports center is a three-storey powerful concrete structure with basements and branched underground utilities. Behind its rear end, two residential nine-story buildings go to wastelands like a wedge. Nearby is a large shopping center with restaurants, but this is a useless piece of glass, interesting only for basements and exits to underground sewers. Behind the nine-story buildings there is a good view to the south. And the forest is almost two kilometers of wasteland. Ratmir was lucky - in other places the city smoothly flows into the suburbs and industrial zones, which makes it difficult to defend. And this area around "Batyr" is like a fortress...

Ratmir sent one platoon to residential buildings, the third platoon, signalmen, a first-aid post and a kitchen began to be placed in a sports center. Three tanks were given reinforcements to the company - they puffed heavily, spraying stinking jets of burnt stench to the sides. An irreplaceable thing. Two PAK infantry artillery systems rolled up. Lightly armored field artillery - a thunderstorm of tanks, is equipped with launch systems that reliably kill tanks or concrete fortifications with guided projectiles at a distance of up to 3 km. But here, in the city, it is of little use. You will have to fight in close combat, where these PAKs will be packed at the moment. Later than everyone else, softly rustling and buzzing like a transformer box, an anti-aircraft gun came up. It will help, if anything, from helicopters.

Ratmir stood at the window of the nine-story building on the fifth floor and looked into the forest, in which, probably, the Argunians were already. The signalman approached from behind and showed the control device - red bars crawled and trembled on the screen. This means that someone was now inspecting these houses with the help of thermal imagers, remote metal detectors and gas analyzers. The Argunians sniffed at these stone buildings, and, of course, they already smelled Ratmir, his soldiers, and his tanks.

The captain shuddered at this hostile attention, and, with displeasure, felt nervous discharges in the lower back, heaviness in the bones, aching throbbing in the knees. A strong dank wind blew through the window, pierced, Ratmir felt defenseless and doomed.

From fear there are two reliable ways. When you suddenly catch yourself on this feeling, similar to the trembling of a person entering ice-cold water, you should not enter smoothly, but dive immediately with your head. The feeling of the line between air and water, the shaky line between reality and the fear of uncertainty, disappears if you do not linger on this line. Therefore, in a fight, Ratmir immediately attacked first if he felt that the mahach was inevitable. And fear didn't get in the way. In the combat charter, in other words, but the same thing was said - to attack the enemy is better than to wait for his attack. But now Ratmir will not attack this dark impenetrable forest, but will remain on the defensive, in a convenient position, “will show restraint”, and will overcome fear in the second reliable way.