Leshy. The Beginning of the Path

Chapter 4. Path to the Riverbed

Borland arrived at the base gates five minutes before the appointed time.

The group was already mostly assembled. Kolesnikov stood with a map folded in quarters, next to him a second scientist — stocky, in glasses, with a pack clearly stuffed beyond reason. Two in civilian clothes stood slightly apart, calm, habitual — their military bearing evident in how they stood, how they scanned their surroundings. Not tourists.

And two stalkers.

Borland knew Krot. Short, wiry, with the perpetually thoughtful look of a man who has just read something interesting and hasn't digested it yet. Equipment solid, worn. In the zone Krot was reliable — cautious, attentive, without excess boldness. He liked going out with scientists, could talk their language, and on breaks might drop something about quantum fluctuations or spatial topology in a way that left half the group silent, unsure how to respond. That's why they called him Krot — the Mole.

The second was unfamiliar.

Borland assessed him in one glance — quickly, the way one assesses in the zone: not by the face, but by the details. Expensive equipment, nearly new. Good weapon, well-maintained, but he carried it differently from those accustomed to the zone. Slightly wrong. Gaze — calm, almost indifferent, with that cold evaluating quality found in people accustomed to viewing others as variables in an equation.

Not a stalker. A mercenary.

Borland said nothing. Noted it — and stored it in the part of his mind that held things requiring attention.

The seventh was a young woman.

Young, about twenty-five, in a neat field jacket with an expedition patch. Small pack — an assistant's, with a notebook and tablet in the side pockets. She stood by Kolesnikov and looked at Borland with the expression one uses for something one has heard a lot about but is seeing for the first time.

Borland scanned the group. Silently sighed.

Aloud — nothing. He waved his hand.

"Let's go."

* * *

The zone accepted them in silence.

The first half kilometer went through familiar sparse forest — Borland in front, pace steady, not fast. The detector ticked quietly. The group held — the soldiers walked well, Krot easily, the scientists tried to keep up. The unfamiliar stalker moved at the rear, slightly to the side. On his own, without being told. Borland didn't like that.

"What's your name?" he asked without turning.

"Vint," came from behind, briefly.

"Vint. In the zone we don't spread out. Stay in sight."

A pause.

"Understood."

The tone was flat. Neither irritation nor agreement — just a word, tossed as a formality. Borland said nothing again. Noted it.

* * *

The unpleasant feeling came about twenty minutes in.

Not danger — just the sensation of being watched. Someone was moving parallel, slightly behind and to the left, in the denser part of the forest. Borland stopped twice on the pretext of checking the detector — looked, listened. Nothing. No sound, no movement, no trace on the detector.

But the feeling wouldn't leave.

The instinct he had nurtured in his home world and sharpened over three years of forays was working at full capacity. Something was moving alongside. Something that didn't want to be seen.

He adjusted the route a few degrees — swung right, toward open ground. In an open field an unknown pursuer would lose its advantage. The group followed without questions — only Krot shot him a brief glance and raised an eyebrow slightly. Borland gave the faintest shake of his head. Later.

The feeling didn't pass. But it didn't intensify either. Whatever it was — it kept its distance.

* * *

They found the Jelly an hour or so in.

Or rather — found the place where it had been.

Borland halted the group with a gesture — abruptly, without warning. The soldiers reacted instantly, stopped. The scientists slowed with a second's delay. Krot — immediately.

Ahead, between two moss-covered boulders, was emptiness.

Not just the absence of an anomaly — real emptiness. The Jelly had stood here for years — a grey gelatinous mass, slowly pulsating, harmless if you didn't enter it. Borland had skirted it so many times he knew its shape by heart. Now in its place was a dry hollow in the earth, nearly perfectly round, like the trace of a small pond that had evaporated overnight. The earth at the bottom was dark, compacted, without grass.

And something lay at the bottom.

Borland approached the edge slowly. Crouched.

The artifact was about the size of a fist. Black — not just dark, genuinely black, the kind where your gaze seems to slide off it, finding nothing to grip. Dense in appearance, almost liquid, though it held its shape. It pulsed slowly and barely perceptibly, like something alive and very calm. The local stalkers called these "Blot." Borland had heard of them but never seen one.

He reached a hand toward it.

His fingers tingled — softly, without pain. Just a tingling, like a weak current. Borland froze. The tingling didn't pass — it pulsed in time with the artifact. His body was responding. Not to a threat — to something else. Recognition, almost.

He couldn't explain it. But in the zone, explanations came after action.

He took out a container, stored the Blot.

"That's a Blot," said Krot from behind, with genuine surprise. "What do you want with it? Even the scientists can't quite..."

"Later," said Borland.

He took a small bag of metal pellets from his pocket — tiny, heavy, the kind that wouldn't blow away in wind. He marked the path from the edge of the hollow — three pellets in a triangle, indicating the spot. A habit from his first forays: what the zone shows once, it sometimes shows again. Worth knowing where to look.

"What are you doing?" came from nearby.

Borland turned. The assistant stood right behind him — close, tablet at the ready.

"Why the pellets? Is that some navigational method? And the Blot — are you really going to carry it? I've read the reports, they say there's no practical application for it..."

"Let's move," said Borland.

"But if you could explain the logic—"

"Let's move."

She fell silent. Krot gave a quiet snort from the side.

* * *

They smelled the boars before they saw them.

First — the scent. Sharp, musky, mixed with something chemical that the zone gave to those who lived in it long enough. Then — sound: heavy breathing and the crack of deadwood, too loud for cautious movement. They weren't hiding.

Borland raised his fist.

The group stopped. The soldiers drew their weapons without a command — good. Krot stepped slightly to the side, clearing a sector. Vint disappeared behind a tree — silently, Borland didn't hear him move. Professional. He noted that too.

Three boars emerged from the sparse forest to the right.

Zone ones, veteran — their bone plates on neck and sides had yellowed with age, had fused with the skin permanently. Small, reddish eyes. They spotted the group seconds before breaking into the open and didn't stop — just accelerated slightly. The decision had been made before the people even saw them.

"Hold," said Borland quietly — for his own people, not for the boars.

The first was coming straight at him.

Borland didn't retreat. He knew boars — they bluff if there's somewhere to go. If not — they charge. Here was open ground, the group was bunched together, falling back meant scattering.

He fired twice — at the joint in the plates by the front leg, where the armor didn't reach. The boar stumbled, squealed, veered off. Didn't go down — but broke off the charge.

Vint took the second — one shot, precisely behind the ear. Professionally and without waste. The boar dropped immediately.

The third slowed, saw the two down, spun in place with the grunting roar zone creatures use to express anger and confusion simultaneously, and retreated into the sparse forest. The sound of cracking wood faded quickly.

Silence returned.

"Everyone all right?" asked Borland.

Silent nods. The assistant stood pale, tablet pressed to her chest with both hands, but on her feet — holding herself together.

Krot exhaled.

"That's exactly why I always go with a guide," he said quietly, to no one in particular.

Borland was already looking at the forest — the direction the boars had come from. Something stirred again at the edge of his perception — the same sensation of being watched that had accompanied him since the start. The boars had come from that direction. The boars had been fleeing from something.

And again — no one.

"Let's go," he said. "The riverbed is close."

Chapter 5. Rest Stop

After the boars, the zone seemed to exhale.

The anomalous background dropped to normal, the detector ticked quietly with no warnings, the path ran smooth. The feeling of being watched went nowhere — it sat somewhere between his shoulder blades, quiet and constant, like a splinter — but nothing else happened. The group walked in silence, at pace. Even the assistant had gone quiet.

Borland didn't relax. In the zone, silence after noise is not calm. It's a pause.

But an hour passed quietly. Then another half.

Krot came alongside him on an open stretch and nodded at the detector.

"Clear?"

"So far."

"An hour to the riverbed, maybe a bit more." Krot paused. "If the weather doesn't have its say."

Borland looked at the sky.

The sky was already speaking.

* * *

It darkened quickly — not gradually, the way an ordinary cloud comes, but all at once, as if someone had dropped a lid over the horizon. Wind rose from nowhere — damp, gusty, smelling of ozone and wet earth. The grass lay down in waves. The trees started up.

Borland stopped the group.

"We stop."

He looked at the sky, the forest, the detector. The background wasn't jumping — this was just rain, ordinary weather, nothing anomalous. Just badly timed.

Alone he would have kept going. In rain, anomalies became more visible — they didn't like water, they reacted to it, glowed brighter, gave off more heat. An experienced stalker in a downpour could see the zone better than on a clear day. But a group was a different matter. Seven people, two of whom had never been into the zone beyond the perimeter, narrow paths, limited visibility. One person lost from view — and go find them among the Carousels.

The risks were growing. That was arithmetic, not cowardice.

"Krot," he said.

"Already thinking." Krot stood alongside, squinting at the horizon. "There's an old village around here. Abandoned, been so for a long time. I was there about two years ago with another group. There's a house on the edge — dry basement, solid. We can wait it out."

"How far?"

"About twenty minutes northwest." A pause. "Maybe twenty-five."

Borland unfolded the map. Krot leaned over and pressed a finger to it. Borland found the mark — the village was indicated in dotted lines, as all uninhabited objects were. North and west. A detour from the route.

The first drops fell on the map.

"Let's go," said Borland, folding it.

* * *

Twenty-five minutes stretched out.

The rain started before they arrived. Not a downpour — not yet, but dense, cold, driven by wind that struck the face and confused the direction of sound. The forest darkened. The grass turned slippery. Borland walked in front, checking his compass every few minutes, and felt the route stretch and stretch — longer than it should have been.

He didn't like this.

Not the rain, not the delay — he didn't like when the path grew longer than planned due to reasons that couldn't have been predicted. Every extra meter in an unfamiliar direction was a new variable. A new variable in the zone was a risk.

And all this time — eyes on his back.

He changed position twice — briefly, on the pretext of checking the rear, stepped to the side of the group, let the others go ahead. Looked into the forest. Listened.

Rain drummed. Wind bent branches. The detector was silent.

Nothing.

But — it was there. He felt it just as clearly as he felt Earth's Flame in his pocket, as clearly as he felt the Cutter on his hip. Something there. Intelligent. Patient. It didn't attack, didn't come closer, didn't leave. It simply — moved alongside. At its own distance.

Krot came alongside him when the group entered the sparse forest near the village.

"How long have you been noticing it?" he asked quietly, not looking around.

Borland looked at him. Krot walked straight, looking ahead — asking as if between other things.

"Since the start of the route."

"Me too." A pause. "Detector's clear."

"I know."

* * *

The village appeared from the rain suddenly — first the silhouette of a leaning fence, then the dark hollows of windows, then the houses themselves. Four or five buildings, all in varying states of disrepair. Roofs had caved in at two of them. A third had tilted, as if tired of standing straight and decided to rest.

Krot went confidently to the corner house — squat, with thick logs, a roof that still held. Found the door, pulled — it creaked but opened. He nodded.

"Here."

The basement was exactly as Krot had described — dry, low, smelling of old wood and earth. No windows. No surprises. Borland took it in within a few seconds — corner, entry point, ceiling beams. Everything holding. One way out. He took up position by the ladder.

The group settled in — some sat on the earthen floor, someone found an old crate. Kolesnikov opened a map, the second scientist took out a notebook. The soldiers stood by the wall without a sound — professionals, they knew how to wait without excess movement. The assistant shook water from her jacket and looked around.

"Long?"

"Until it passes," said Borland.

"What if it's three hours?"

"Then three hours."

She opened her mouth, closed it. Something in his tone made it clear that pursuing this line of conversation would lead nowhere.

Vint stood apart from everyone. Looking at the ceiling. Borland watched him from the side — not demonstratively, just noting. The mercenary wasn't restless, wasn't talking, wasn't asking questions. That was professional. And it was uncomfortable — a man you can't read is a man you can't automatically trust to cover your back.

From above — a rumble — the rain had intensified, drumming on the roof steadily and densely.

Borland climbed three rungs up the ladder, stopped in the darkness, and examined the room through the doorway. Rain lashed through the windows that had long since lost their glass. The village was quiet.

The eyes were still there.

He stood up there, listening to the rain, and thought that whatever was watching them was out there now. In the village. Or at its edge. Patiently waiting for them to come out.

"Leshy," Krot called from below. "Tea — I'll pour some from the thermos if you want."

"Pour it," said Borland, without turning.

The rain drummed. The zone waited.

And something waited alongside it.

Chapter 6. The Trap

The decision to stay the night was made without much argument — the weather left no choice.

The rain kept going. Not intensifying, not weakening — just falling, monotonously and with no intention of stopping. Borland had looked at the sky for the fourth time in an hour, put away his compass, and said what everyone already understood:

"We sleep here."

Kolesnikov nodded. The soldiers — no reaction, they were already figuring out where to lie down. The assistant wrote something in her notebook — why, Borland didn't understand, but he didn't stop her. People deal with anxiety differently.

They ate what was available — canned goods, bread, the thermos of tea Krot had been saving since the base. Krot, it turned out, had been going out with scientists long enough to know they always had something decent in their packs. The second scientist produced a flask and offered it around. The soldiers declined. Borland declined. Krot did not.

* * *

Before lying down, Borland went outside.

The night was damp and dark — no moon, clouds holding the sky completely shut. The rain had eased slightly, turned to drizzle. Borland stood on the porch, listening to the village.

The village was silent. Not with the living silence of a forest — but empty, the way an abandoned place falls silent when everything has left, including the echo.

He set traps methodically — around the perimeter, at the approaches to the house, on the path between buildings. Nothing complex, nothing military — simple signal ones: thin wire, a tin can with a few pebbles inside. If someone passed — you'd hear it. Enough to wake up.

Finishing, he stopped at the corner of the far house and looked for a long time into the darkness.

Something was there. He felt it — just as clearly as he had felt it since morning. It stood somewhere beyond the edge of visibility, in the place where the drizzle gave way to darkness. Not moving. Not coming closer. Just — was there.

Borland looked. Nothing appeared.

He went back down.

* * *

The basement had a certain coziness — insofar as an old earthen basement under an abandoned house in the zone could be cozy.

Krot sat between two scientists and was explaining something about spatial pockets and the theory of nested bubbles. Kolesnikov listened attentively, the second scientist argued — quietly, but with the eagerness of a man who'd finally found something to engage him. The flask passed between them in strict rotation.

The soldiers lay by the wall. Both of them. Eyes closed, breathing even. Borland wasn't sure if they were actually asleep, but he didn't disturb them. Good habit — use rest time while you have it.

Vint sat slightly apart from the general circle.

Borland noticed it as soon as he came down. The mercenary had chosen a spot against the wall — back to stone, face to the basement. From there you could see the entrance, the ladder, and everyone else at once. A convenient position if you need to react quickly to anyone present. Not to an external threat — to someone among your own.

Either Vint had a serious past, or there was someone in this group he was watching. Or — which was the most uncomfortable thought — Vint himself was the one worth watching.

He pushed that thought to later. Tomorrow.

The assistant sat against the opposite wall and was looking at him.

Borland didn't notice at first — she looked quietly, without display, but when he turned, their gazes met for a second longer than accidental. Her eyes held interest — alive, not professional. And a faint flush that neither the drizzle nor exhaustion could explain.

"How old are you, Leshy?" read that gaze. "You're so young."

Borland looked away. What are you dreaming about, sweetheart. Not the right time.

Krot said something clever, the second scientist disagreed, voices rose slightly then fell again. The flask made another round. Borland lay down by the ladder, closed his eyes.

The night passed quickly.

* * *