Chapter 17


    * * *


    Just think about it, I gave people what they''ve been craving - a real cat lady. The ears, the tail, the muzzle, and the disdain in the look, all-natural to the point of impossibility! A full-fledged "morning of the furry adventurer" photoshoot with nude elements!


    What did they say? Unreal proportions! Cheap makeup! No sexy vibes!


    And what are they referring to? What is the benchmark for them? A cosplayer who has only a hoop with ears and an ass. I don''t disagree, the butt is an argument, but when it''s countered by a natural, self-grown tail... What do you know about catgirls!


    Especially the real ones.


    Walk to the left of the palm tree, touching it with your fingers.


    I wonder why all these nuances of the quest? What is primary - where to pass or touch? Or maybe it''s all necessary to create a certain mood, which then will play? And should the courier know what''s important and what''s not?


    The road this time was not easy. Three times they tried to attack, but the magic combination "invisibility + teleport" saved me. And in general, the second hour only to go there, and for this time already a couple of C-quest could deliver.


    And yet there were subscriptions to Mira, two hundred a day.


    Why would I want to do that? Certainly not to sell pornography. Now I''m reading the comments, and even though I''m mad at the idiots, I know that it was me who shot it! You have to try everything in life! Quantum physics and weightlifting I can not pull, so I''ll try to be a star producer. No, show business doesn''t appeal to me, there''s too much bodywork, but the part of it that is on the Internet, to laugh at the comments and to make money, will do.


    Walk to the left of the palm tree, touching it with your fingers.


    Did I go for a second round? Did I point my finger wrong the first time? Well, you better specify, I have a lot of fingers.


    I found the quest in the notebook. Yes, I didn''t risk going to bed first again, and while Junior went to bed, I flipped through the notes, trying to figure out the scheme of the cipher. I could not, so I decided that it was made by some kind of system device. And since I''d have to translate it sooner or later anyway, I wondered what to expect. I picked out the most worn pages, which even began to turn a little in the corners, translated them, and began to read.


    Half of it is already familiar with the boards, ad conversion, and setting dependency, but there is some interesting stuff, too. For example - types of orders, distribution by system level, and so on. One thing for another then helped to compare pending auction items and ads on the board and found a match. Some orders hang for months and years, leaving the general list in the archive. Which, again, is a paid treatment. Weird orders, it is unclear by whom and for what purpose-made. Most require special equipment or matching settings, so there is little willingness to contact. But my predecessor noticed a curious trick: some orders the System does not remove. It starts to add a reward for completion, which accumulates until one of the couriers decides that this is something to go for. I do not know what the point of Delivery is in such a scheme is. But it turns out that there is an implicit way to get relatively easy quests that pay much more than usual. And even get an extra reward!


    In this quest, the reward was a "beautiful flower," which my app didn''t recognize. And anyway, I only now realized that all I had in my database were the ingredients for several potions, so the scanner was just a waste of time. I need to get some kind of herbalist journal or a similar book.


    Stop at the big rock, wait for the hawk''s cry


    I wish I knew how a hawk screams.


    I slowed down and took out a bottle and sipped my water. It was a surreal picture of me standing by a rock somewhere in the middle of the desert, wearing a cloak and carrying a bag, and no movement for miles around. Where did the birds come from? Rocks, sand, snags, me.


    A shadow flashed to the side, then went up, shouting. A new line appeared in the appendix:


    Walk toward the sun, keeping to the right


    Okay, I''ll go. I wonder if I throw my phone away now, what would happen? Is there even one other person in this world? Speaking of people, Junior is something. He brought a mattress, an old cotton mattress, a pillow, and some food for dinner yesterday, for both of us. He said he had asked for free food in the restaurant, which I never would have thought of, and I never would have asked for it. Is that how his skill works? And if I take it, I''ll think like that too? Then let him rock, I want to be even smarter!


    So, there''s no wind, but the dried grass is moving in waves. Should I walk on it? Go around it? The app didn''t give me a clue, so I picked up a rock and threw it at the tall, chest-high grass. Nothing. I stood at the edge of the thicket, but no scent of life, no crunch of gnawed bones. Let us consider it conditionally safe. Although in such grass I could not put the exit point of the teleport far away, it covers everything, so I walk and look around.


    So, about Junior. I used bots, of course. Three eternal pleasures: watching the water flowing, the fire burning, and the bot farming resources. Junior was just reminiscent of such a bot, a good one, with a replenishable database. Once said once, and he continues to do so himself. Yesterday he was quite dumb, looking and staring, but now looks into the phone, as if alive. Took away, curious - shopping podcasts, marketplaces, eBay, he studies, watching YouTube channels of various couriers. But I told him to "sleep" and he immediately laid down, snoring.


    Boring, that''s it. Yes, the quest is very scenic, interesting, educational. For example, now I know how a hawk screams! But for two hours now, not a single living soul. Except for those two naughty creatures that seemed to be zombies, and that terrestrial crocodile with the mimicry. If it hadn''t been the scanner, I wouldn''t have even noticed it. But it rendered everything, lit it up, and I jumped away without any losses.


    Half of one of the pages of the notebook was devoted to the dangers of quests. And it explicitly said that nothing extreme could be encountered on the road. Sure, sometimes it happens but in general, the System leads the trail in safe places, so look around, think a little, and rely on the description of the quest. Difficulties come in handing the order, and when returning, when you relax, so it was recommended to take an uncomplicated order in the direction in which you return. Seems like simple advice, but useful, I would not buy such a guide; but I would definitely give a like.


    By the way, a week of independent life has flashed by, with all these wonders. Life is inexorable: I already sell weeds and white powder, the onlifans account is gaining momentum, what else is left without parental supervision? No, well, I''ll try not to descend into politics, so... unrestrained student drinking? But I have a complicated relationship with alcohol. Somehow I don''t happen to drink it. It''s not that I''m a teetotaler, it''s just... no, what''s the point of it? Bread is nourishing, meat is tasty, a tomato is healthy, a cookie is awesome. And vodka? Drinking a smelly, tasteless liquid that makes you a fool at once and sick the next day - what''s the point? To adjust to a temporary general degradation? What''s the point? Let them get smarter to my level if they want to communicate.


    It''s hard these days with vices. Everywhere you look, it is allowed and even encouraged.


    Do whatever you want... and I do. I walked through another world, looking up into the yellow sky. I had to put my hands in the pockets of my cape, the grass was cutting hands. But I am still bored. I am walking and talking to myself as if I were in a video game. Right?


    Walk between the hills, the goal of the quest is the lone tree in the circle of stones.


    Just now I was walking on the plain, nothing hilly for kilometers, and look at this. All right, I''ll go through. Speaking of other worlds, the terminology itself encourages choice. If I''m offered a quest, I''ll choose the appropriate setting. Again, about randomness - already the second round of stones and again in a hot, unfriendly place. Randomness isn''t random? Does Chaos have its own rules?


    I didn''t notice the figure among the rocks right away. A girl in a loincloth and with long, below-the-waist hair was smiling like... I don''t even know who could smile like that. Maybe she was confused with someone else. I was expecting dwarves or elves or something else unusual, but after two hours on the road to meet a smiling topless girl, it''s a little unexpected.


    And the first word the customer said was unexpected: "Cloudy!"


    I even looked around, but the girl was looking right at me and smiling at me.


    "Hello, I am from the Delivery System..."


    "I know."


    And pause again.


    She wasn''t smiling quite normally. And she wasn''t looking at me quite normally, either - like in a museum, in front of a painting you really want to look at. I was literally taken in with her eyes as if a courier was such a rarity that one must be sure to memorize every fold and every thread.


    "Let me give you your order, okay?"


    She nodded, completely oblivious to my fuss.


    "Here, your order is a double burger, coke, nuggets."


    I closed the bag, both afraid to turn my back on the girl and afraid to stare at her. The more unexpected was the whisper of joy:


    "Sweet..."


    I turned around, and she was holding a cup of Coke like it was filled with... I don''t even know what. The girl sniffed it, pressed it to her cheek, tasted the moisture dripping down the surface with the tip of her tongue.


    "Pity it doesn''t pinch. But it''s delicious, thank you!"


    I logged into the app, checking the completion of the quest. The girl obviously didn''t confirm anything, but the order was immediately paid for.


    "Oh, I forgot! There it is!"


    Very carefully placing the cup in a kind of stone chest of several flat boulders she rushed to the tree. As it turned out, the loincloth only covered the front slightly, and it seemed impolite to stare. So I pretended to be very interested in the situation. A circle of rocks, twenty meters across, a tree in the middle. A few withered snags, stacks of grass piled in the corner. It looks like they used it for mats. I don''t know how you can sit on them, even the grass looks sharp.


    "Take it!"


    Smiling, she held out a flower to me in her palms. Only now did I realize that everything around me was a gray-sand color. The field of dry grass was somewhere far away; now the only movement in the dry, hot air was the ruffling of the ribbons on the tree. And also us.


    And here is a flower - pink, with delicate fluffy petals, half the size of a palm.


    "Come on, leave it."


    The girl shook her head: "No, no, I grow it for my friends!"


    "So give it to them, I just brought the order!"


    "Cloudy, take it! Otherwise it''s not fair!"


    My refusal seemed to upset her in earnest. I accepted the flower carefully, then fumbled with my bag - the plastic box for the ingredients. You know, the kind you keep lettuce in in the fridge.


    "And you''re just giving it away? The only bright spot in your place?"


    "I have others now!"


    She gently ran her finger along the white-red side of the paper cup.


    Something about this order makes my hair stand on end.


    "Look, how long have you been here?"


    She shrugged vaguely: "I don''t remember. I guess I''ve been here forever."


    It was said with fun and a smile that made my hair stand on end even more.


    "What, you can''t count?"


    The girl looked around puzzled, then snapped her fingers and confessed triumphantly: "I can! Here''s the bench, I made it out of that tree from before. And those two sticks are from even earlier! The corral - two trees before it, I was hoping to catch a bird at the time. Funny, I remember the word, but I''ve forgotten what it is. I mean I remember," she looked at her hands, clasping her fingers. "Seven trees!"


    The measure of time is interesting. The tree itself was about three meters tall, made up of cracked, stubby branches and a few tufts of dark green needles.


    "Do the delivery men come here often? How many of us have been here?"


    With a serious scowl, she began to count: "Cloudy - now. And Old - now, but before. And also Bone, he was with the old tree, I grew him three whole flowers. And before him, there was a tree and no friends. And before that there was Roundhead and Evil, but they killed each other." Jumping up, the girl ran up to the patch of land next to the tree. It looked like a "bedroom," because the ground inside the three-by-three-meter patch was carefully sifted. Something like a mattress, from which she carefully dug out two skulls. One was clearly not human.


    She showed it to me, and then bashfully confessed: "I ate them. It was so frustrating that my friends had died and the tree was still small. There is no food. Only when the tree grows, there is dew on the rocks."


    It didn''t even seem strange.This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    "What, you can''t get out of here?"


    "I used to be able to, but there was nowhere to go. And now..."


    She stood up and walked to the edge of the stone circle. The boulders were much rarer here than in the one where the Umruns from my world had ended up, but the line was felt. She put her fingers out carefully... and they were almost immediately chipped by the invisible wind.


    Showing me her torn fingernails and flushed skin, she shoved them thoughtfully into her mouth. I walked over to the rocks, sticking my hand out over the line, too. Nothing.


    "Can we eat together? I remember we used to eat together! I could drink lots and lots of sweet water!"


    And that joy in her voice was not a pretense. She was really happy for me. Looking around again, I took a moment to figure out if everything inside the ring of stones was only wooden, stone, or made of rope. Hairy? You have to pop out into the flesh-crushing wind to pick herbs. She quenches her hunger with dew; instead of a pillow, she has driftwood, a remnant of a previous tree. She can probably make a fire on holidays from friction from saved wood chips, but it will work... not every year. There is not even an old fireplace nearby. Of sights - a tree, stones, and a dull landscape. From the tastes - to chew a needle of a bitter even to look like a tree, or here is her own blood.


    Well, yeah, that''s about how I imagined hell. But what did she have to do to get here? If the Umruns are going to be like this, spend a hell of a lot of years in a circle of stones... I''ve got to get them out.


    Or finish them off.


    "How do you create an order?"


    "What?"


    I had to be more specific: "How do you ask Delivery to tell me the way to you?"


    "Аh! The wind! I ask him, he''s not evil, he has to watch over me. I go out and ask him. Only I have to close my eyes. By the time my eyes grow back, it is very boring and the dew is hard to find. Then a friend comes, I give him something. Do you like the flower?"


    She said this obviously to hear my voice. Of course, I agreed.


    Then we had lunch. I watched the girl take a crumbfull bite of a cold hamburger, enjoying every second of it. She even wanted to offer me one! But I declined, saying I had lunch before I went out. Damn, I should have taken it to demons or aliens. That was the creepiest thing I''d ever felt in my life. Not from coming here, but from leaving.


    She carefully poured half a cup of Coke into a stone pitcher, then carefully, trying not to tear it, licked the wrappers and spread them out on the rocks, pressing them on top. I put the nugget wrappers in the mini-cellar. Probably couldn''t even survive bacteria in here, so they''d stay there until the gala dinner. A year, ten? A hundred?


    I stood up, threw off my cloak, and unbuttoned my shirt. The girl bit her lip, but more with curiosity than fright.


    "Here, take this. Since we''re friends, this is a present for you," I held out the plain red checked shirt, and she rejoiced the way no one rejoices in the most expensive fur coat. I was thanked a hundred times, and she put it on top of her, then sniffed it, then put it on again, then very, very carefully folded it and put it away in a secret hole next to the tree. I turned out my pockets. Money? Bullshit, it''s just pretty pieces of paper to spread out and examine. Too bad there were only four bills. But seven nickels of change - she could weave them into a hairline.


    The girl immediately objected that it would be better to make a frame, she had three pieces of wood that would fit very well! I agreed. Handkerchief. Damn, it''s dirty. But she looked at it so much that I gave it to her, too. Half-drunk water poured in the dorm from the kettle into the bottle. The uneaten sandwiches Junior had made that morning. I wanted to get her something else, but I needed boots and pants, or I''d be legless in that grass, a phone was my way back, and a cape and a bag, I knew. And it''s a shame to give her a sweaty T-shirt, though she would have gladly accepted it, too.


    "Cloudy!"


    The girl suddenly threw herself on my neck and started sobbing. Why am I a "Cloudy"? Probably because of the size of my belly and cheeks. Well, on the bright side, two people like her could get into my shirt.


    "If you don''t come, I''ll remember you for a long, long time! Three, maybe even five trees! As long as I can!"


    I was shivering again. Smiling and trying not to be too crooked, I started to get ready. Already at the edge of the stone circle, I stopped: "Look, I''ll try to visit you again sometime. But forgive me if I can''t."


    "Of course! Thank you, Cloudy, you... you are... you''re a true friend!"


    I took another look at the girl - the normal height, dark hair down to her butt, skinny and burned out. Maybe I should have looked through the scanner... but there are times when you realize it''s better not to. In much knowledge there are many sorrows.


    Waving goodbye, I opened the description of the quest and took the first step.


    Accidents are not accidental.


    Why did the System show it to me? To hint at the importance of my mission? It''s all bullshit with titles, I''m not an angel. Why would an angel go to hell? I''ve already found the second one. In one of them, people lick red-hot rocks in the heat, and in the other, a millennium girl grows dead trees. Why would the System chase me through such places? What would Delivery get from unreal people? Should I spit on everything and get drunk at home? That seems to be the tradition in cases like this. Uh-huh, and who''s going to do the business? Go to work, you wuss!


    Well, yeah, maybe that''s why they showed it. "Your work is important to us! It brings us income..." No, I understand that in the world someone can live much worse, and for someone, the fate of the girl will seem almost a paradise, but it doesn''t make it any easier. And all I get to experience is this heavy bewilderment - how can this be? Why is that, huh?


    "Uh-uh-uh."


    The dead man, whom I had avoided before, was much more active this time and moved much faster. It made me shake up because it''s hard to suffer the injustice of the world and run away at the same time, trying to get the teleport exit right. The two-second "ring of invisibility" on the zombie was clearly not enough; it barely slowed down. So by the time I got away, by the time I got to the place where I had to "shuffle my foot, throwing back the stones," I had already somehow cheered up.


    The shift isn''t over, I have to work. I''ll worry about it later.


    Rainin wrote "opening hours from 10:30 to 17:00". Will I make it before closing time? What''s waiting there? No, if I''m told that they will help me, then they will help me. Even gave a hint as to what type of quests need to have in their inventory. I got the flower, it''s good as a gift, I guess. Seven thousand points dropped for the quest, which is nice. If the obscure place I have to go to has office hours, it must be some kind of institution. Maybe I should wrap up in my dorm, change my shirt.


    About halfway through, the Internet turned on, and I went to check my e-mail... An hour later I realized that I had let go. The warranty was on, I was lucky, and there was some understanding of what needed to be done. I mean, do something, but I don''t know what exactly. But I''ll find out.


    If I can''t get them out, at least I''ll do something. You can''t do that. That''s it.


    I uploaded some more of Mira''s photos for subscribers and sent some to a friend. He would spread them all over the place, but I asked him not to overwrite the watermark. I''d get a hundred or two more subscribers by tomorrow.


    I could almost guess my surroundings, and the world looked almost normal. The package of reports from Junior came down at once, and I glanced through them without interest. He took the order - he delivered the order, no amateurism. Then a classmate wanted to chat, bored at work. I was told that I had my job and that they could eat me up at this kind of work. He sent me a picture of a fuck and then disconnected.


    "Hey, where the hell is you going again?!"


    I was standing on the fresh asphalt again. How is it that an unknown mystical road leads here? Or is this shrieking accent a condition of anchoring me to the real world?


    "Thank you, you are doing very well!"


    The road worker didn''t believe me and started cursing. I had to use concealment and jump to the other end of the street.


    So much excitement and we don''t have three hours yet. So we''re going to beg for something from someone we don''t know, and at the same time for a price, we don''t know. But he promised, didn''t he? And we, Kuziakins, keep our word!


    Almost always.


    The building I was looking for turned out to be an ordinary administrative three-story building. On the wall at the entrance to the only entrance hung a dozen different signs of government offices, including the incomprehensible, but clearly my "Migration Committee".


    Does Rainin understand exactly what I want? Or is this committee is the correct committee?


    At the reception desk, I had to explain what I needed, and the most ordinary guard in the most ordinary camouflage entered my data in the log. He asked for my passport, I offered my phone, the guard was not surprised and held it with the familiar reader, after which he lost interest in me.


    Only now do I realize that it was a shame to give the flower away. She grew it, she tried, who''s going to appreciate it here? Maybe they''ll take the points? I ran out into the street and rushed to the grocery store, picking out the freshest cake I could find. The guard at the sight of me pretended to be unfamiliar with me, and again signed in the magazine, and only then flicked the turntable switch, allowing me to pass.


    What struck me immediately was the emptiness. The day in the middle of the day, the place is clearly present, and even more so, there should be crowds of concerned people, so where are they? Could it be that we are simply being sent out to neighboring worlds, and at the same moment there are dozens of people in the corridor? If you think about it, it might be the same principle in the dorm: you always feel like there''s someone around, but they''re always either behind a door that just closed or about to turn down another hallway. It''s like a perfect horror movie.


    I stopped at one door, and something familiarly clicked. Then it jangled, and I realized: a typewriter! Do they still use them?


    The office I needed on the fourth floor was almost at the end of the corridor. I stopped at the door, which was padded with this soft thing with rivets for some reason, and knocked gently. Yep, I could see why it was upholstered. Turning around, I tapped with my foot, so that it could be heard. I couldn''t hear the answer from inside, so I sighed and somehow smiled and pulled the handle. I don''t like all kinds of offices, especially if it''s written on the door... Shit, I forgot to look.


    "Good day?"


    It''s not the best room of sorts, cramped. I could fit a few of them in my attic. Three tables, two against each other, and one by the window. An old one, still with a wooden frame, judging by the peeling paint - am I sure I''m in the right place?


    "What are you with, young man?"


    "With a cake."


    Two of the three elderly women present hummed, and the one sitting by the window broke away from her knitting:


    "And only with it? What need is that for?"


    "For resolution."


    "For what?"


    "Well, I don''t know how to say it."


    The knitting lady gnashed her knitting needles and advised: "Just say it like it is."


    The question is, if I got in the wrong place and started talking about umruns, the desert, demons, and other worlds, how would a normal person react? The ladies are perfectly normal, except that they are dressed too tightly for the summer weather. But what is the dress code here? What if I''m in the wrong room? Or the floor? I''ll start ranting and they''ll call the psychiatrists.


    I walked into the room in one piece, and carefully placed the box with cake on the table, asking permission beforehand.


    "As it is... Well, I work in Delivery."


    The knitter took her eyes off her work for a moment and looked in a way that made it clear she didn''t have much respect for couriers.


    "And then I got to some creepy place, and there..."


    I told them about my meeting with the Umruns, about their request for help, about how I had to do something for people, and I felt more and more like a fool with each word. I had broken into the usual accounting office and was giving the women metaphysical bullshit. Now they''re going to send me away.


    "Go, young man."


    I twitched, but the one sitting on my right added: "There is a cooler next to the stairwell, get some water. Please."


    Oh, yeah, that''s right. I saw something like that.


    I got up, took the kettle from the left one, and went out into the hallway. The door slammed gently and inevitably behind me. There was no sign on it.


    Something was unusual here.


    I still couldn''t figure out what it was. So, I go into the building, there''s a guard, everything''s fine. People came in before me, but they weren''t in the hallway - bullshit, they could have gone into the room. Then I go up the stairs like I was told. Knocking... no, before.


    The kettle was full, and I just caught a few drops with my finger and licked it off for some reason. Something on the stairs? Damn, they''ll eat my cake now, and then they''ll laugh. Or...


    I went out to the stairs and watched the old, narrow steps go up. Wiped out, a lot of people had passed through here.


    Yes, that''s right. A three-story house and the office I was told was on the fourth floor. Uff, such relieved, the good old unreal is here after all. So, not in vain came! My thoughts immediately switched to the cake - by the way, I chose a good one, so can the three of them eat it? And what about me?


    For the sake of curiosity I went down to the third floor - it was empty, a bit dark, the lamps were burning every other one. The same cooler, chairs along the wall for visitors, the indistinct sounds of work, coming either from behind the doors or right through the walls. The doors are also monotonous, and the one behind the one on the fourth floor, where the women I need sit, is exactly the same - dermantin or whatever it is, studded with rivets.


    Just to be sure, opened the door. Better to do and apologize than to think about what might be behind such a door.


    The right, distracted from the monitor, looked up: "Did you bring it?"


    "One moment."


    I closed the door and went to the stairs. Sure, I''d heard stories about official people being forced to be monotonous and horror stories about corporate rules duping everyone, but would they be so identical that everyone had my cake on the table?


    I went down to the first floor, then up, counting the floors. On the fifth, I turned down the corridor again, a corridor that looked suspiciously familiar, but still different.


    This time behind the door, the left one was taking the lid off the box and the right one was holding out the knife for her.


    Silently closing the door, I returned to the stairs and continued climbing. The sixth floor, the seventh, the eighth - all the corridors were different, but each time there was something new to see out of the window. The backyard and garage gave way to an official-looking square, then a gray tilled area with a couple of trees, then a high wall with a school stadium behind it. At about the ninth, I turned off again and went to the familiar door.


    "Young man, haven''t you had enough?"


    This time it was the one with the knitting that asked me. With a dumb nod, I put the kettle on the table and sat down on the only visitor''s chair. By the door. A little farther away.


    The cake was cut into six pieces, the kettle was placed on the nightstand, just under the sign "the use of electric heating devices is strictly prohibited!"


    "Lach, where is a tea leaf?"


    "Atro, you ask every time. Nothing has changed."


    Either something pushed me, or I just sat uncomfortably, but my foot moved the bag.


    "I''ve got a present for you."


    They looked at me curiously, and as soon as I opened the box, Atro snatched it out of my hands:


    "Girls, look, such a wonder!"


    Now even the knitter was up, they looked at me approvingly, and a translucent glass teapot was retrieved from the cabinet. It was boring to watch them fiddling with the brew, so I pulled out my phone and checked briefly to see what Junior was up to. At least this one was okay. I made three more deliveries, closed the slot, and immediately picked up a new one. Well done, bot, work hard for my sake!


    "It''s ready, give me the cup."


    They weren''t talking to me, although the smell was nice. It wasn''t proper to look at strangers without their knowledge, but I took out my phone anyway.


    Not a single name, not a single digit of levels. The ladies were not recognized by the system scanner. But the teapot was identified:


    ???????? ???? ??????


    Saturation 72/1


    I''m freezing for a moment. Twenty to one is conventionally blue, thirty is epic... There''s something higher than "legendary" in this teapot. A lot higher. Where did I come to? What did I bring?!


    "Would you drink?"


    Lach... Or whatever her name was?


    "I won''t be bursting?"


    All three of them pondered: "Well, you shouldn''t... probably."


    That''s a very meaningful clarification. Okay, maybe they''ll be too lazy to clean up the corpse.


    Recalling the horror stories about all the potions the pharmacist had told me, I sipped. It''s just good tea. My mom makes better tea, but here it''s just water from the cooler. They didn''t offer me any cake. It''s understandable, it''s not mystical crap, it''s just honest goodness. They''re too greedy to share. However, the tea party did not interfere with the business, the ladies were exchanging phrases:


    "What about the quotas?"


    "The quarter is not closed, can we put them there?"


    "How many are there?"


    I tried to answer but didn''t have time. Atro clarified:


    "One hundred and seventeen. Fit the system''s standards. Young man, what''s your setting? Oh, I see... Well, are we within the quotas? That should work." And already turned to me admonishingly clarified. "But in fact, you need to make an application in advance. It is not such a simple thing, by the way!"


    Then, with a spoon, she carefully removed the creamy rose from her slice and drank... with this unknown decoction, for some reason called a tea.


    Finally, it was over. The printer threw out the papers, the stapler clicked, and the stamps came down three times... I took the stairs down four floors, went out through the gatehouse, and looked around. Just passed by a man with a folder under his arm, the security guard checked his documents and opened his turntable. Was it my imagination, or did the turntable swivel in the wrong direction for this visitor?


    By the way, I never heard the name of the third accountant, the one with the knitting. What would she be called - Cloty?


    Brrrh. I wish I could tear a page out of my memory, burn it, and trample the ashes.


    Why do they sit in our usual state company? Why am I talking about it, I saw for myself that they seem to be everywhere. Only not everyone can visit them. One can be proud... Or on the contrary, try to forget it as a bad dream?


    Without looking at the papers, I slipped them into the inside pocket of my bag, and then I resolutely went home. That''s it, no more miracles for today, I do not have extra nerve cells. To hell with your bonus, I''m not made of stone, I need rest, you can''t earn all the points. And anyway, what makes me think this is Them? Once upon a time, there were ordinary accountants, who jokingly called themselves the masters of destiny, got under the emission of unreal and incarnated, and now they work, sorting out the dead people.


    And no mystique at all!


    I''ve decided to spend the rest of the day in blissful laziness. I''m going to look at the pornography contestants, figure out what poses to shoot Mira in. Again, I have a lot of shows I haven''t watched, I haven''t read the novel, so it''s a mess.


    That''s enough for today.


    I''ll think about miracles tomorrow.


    * * *