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who; Kyrylo Marchuk with a special guest appearance
what; The Zone changes you, for better or worse.
where ; Exclusion Zone
when ; Late 2007
warning(s); none
Kyrylo Marchuk died in 2007.
He had been stationed at the outermost checkpoint for the Zone of Exclusion for a good part of his military career, and that was finally coming to an end in 2006. God only knew what he’d do when he didn’t spend all day standing around, checking papers and denying entry. After that group of tourists went missing in the Zone five years ago they’d had to lock it all down again. It was for the best, really… but he did kind of miss seeing the tourists a little. They always seemed so excited about going in, chatting in English and taking photographs of everything.
Someone on that last bus had taken a photo with him. He still wondered what happened, sometimes.
He was completed service before the Second Disaster, thankfully. All of the military that had been in the area had died, or so he heard. He’d been there for the earthquake in April, though, and it had certainly felt like a disaster at the time. He’d shared the last of a thermos of tea with the others on-duty when the sky lit up and the clouds disappeared like dust off a shelf after it had been blown on. The thunder crash that followed made Kyrylo lose most of his tea as he clapped his hands over his ears, forgetting he was holding the cup. It didn’t matter either way; the rest of the tea and the cup were jostled from his hand by the earthquake. He and the others only barely managed to survive it, but the checkpoint was completely toast. When the weather calmed down they had to spend several hours digging poor Yuri out from under the collapsed booth. He was laid up with broken bones long after Kyrylo left.
He heard about the Second Disaster on the news. Standing at the kitchen counter, slathering peanut butter onto a slice of bread (a boring-as-piss dinner after a boring-as-piss job, but he was no chef), he heard the late-night report on the tiny television that lived on his table. He sat and chewed on his food while the reporters talked about what happened – the sky turned blood-red, lightning struck, and suddenly the Zone grew five kilometers. Villages had to be evacuated but some people disappeared. A couple months later video from the evacuations started to trickle into news stations. They were played mostly as filler, something to pass the time until they could go on to the next big story of the day, but Kyrylo watched them intently. Electrical discharges out of nowhere, someone’s husband being attacked by a pack of hunched monsters in gas masks, a family pet getting stuck in one spot and then seemingly crushing in on itself.
He wanted to know more about this. And he knew how to get there.
He had to wait until the snow thawed off in 2007, but he used the old back ways to get into the Zone that other people had always snuck through. He guessed his time at the checkpoint had been helpful after all. And even better, it seemed as if most of the military was posted on the edges of this newly-larger Zone, too. He would be able to investigate with impunity. He’d come armed with a camera to see if he could spot any of the things he’d seen on the news, and a knife in case he ran into monsters.
He should have come armed with a gun. The first day he was chased up a tree by a pack of eyeless dogs. The knife would have been good against one or maybe two of the dogs, but against eight of them he was outclassed. The first few months were equally as difficult, trying to find food and staying away from the mutants and those spots where physics tried to kill you – there was no word for them so he just started calling them anomalies. Thankfully a few of his friends still worked at the border and he was able to trade the footage he got on the camera for food and eventually a gun (he thanked the gas-masked mutant that ran into an anomaly and got flung a hundred feet in the air for it; it was the best footage he ever got). Once he found his first artifact he gave up the camera and got himself a better weapon and more supplies. This wasn’t just a trip for extra cash or a little fame anymore; he wanted to find everything the Zone had to offer.
Kyrylo stopped in the wreckage of a house one night, setting up a small campfire after making sure there weren’t any anomalies. He’d gotten good at sensing them even without throwing anything on-hand around him. Someone else, an older man, cautiously approached Kyrylo’s campsite, raising his hands to show he wasn’t armed. He waved the man over. He could use the company for a night; he didn’t plan on getting back to that military outpost for a while and he didn’t have much human contact in the rest of the Zone. The man sat down on the other side of the fire, pulling a suspiciously familiar jar out of his backpack. “… is that peanut butter?” he asked cautiously, trying not to sound too interested. He hadn’t seen peanut butter in months.
The other man started, looking at the jar and then nodding. “I got it from a trader. If you have some bread, we could share it.” Kyrylo dug in his pack until he found a loaf – dry and crusty and sitting in his pack too long, but good enough – and cut off a couple generous pieces with his knife. The man across from him produced his own knife and started spreading the peanut butter on the slices of bread. Outside of the Zone, this was the sort of bland dinner that made Kyrylo question what he was really doing with his life. Here in the Zone, though, it was a feast and a rare treat.
He took the food when offered it, nodding and smiling. He bit in, chewing and maybe savoring the way the bite clung to the roof of his mouth until he scraped it off with his tongue. “So, what is your name?”
The older man hesitated for a moment, thinking. Almost like he hadn’t been asked that question before. “I am Guide. Who are you?”
Kyrylo was about to retort that Guide was an odd name when the question was turned back on him. Now it was his turn to be a little stumped. The man was called Guide. That wasn’t someone’s real name. That was a name someone chose for themselves. He stared at his dinner for a few long moments.
Before he snuck into to the Zone he’d been a different person. He wasn’t Kyrylo anymore, not really. Kyrylo was a former checkpoint guard with a shitty security guard job, who ate shitty food in a rundown apartment and dreamed of something interesting happening to him again like that earthquake. He watched the television and wished that it could be him getting all those photographs and videos of something weird happening beyond the military posts. Kyrylo got chased up a tree by a pack of blind dogs and spent a week trying to find food while nearly bumbling into every anomaly known to man.
But who he was now… he sat in a tree, casually picking off a pack of blind dogs one hundred meters from his position. He could practically smell anomalies before he ever got close to them, and snatched artifacts from their hearts. He slept in abandoned buildings and ate food out of cans and it made him strangely happy. He was finally doing that something interesting that Kyrylo could only wish for.
Kyrylo Marchuk was dead. He’d been dead for months now.
“My name is Strelok.”
what; The Zone changes you, for better or worse.
where ; Exclusion Zone
when ; Late 2007
warning(s); none
Kyrylo Marchuk died in 2007.
He had been stationed at the outermost checkpoint for the Zone of Exclusion for a good part of his military career, and that was finally coming to an end in 2006. God only knew what he’d do when he didn’t spend all day standing around, checking papers and denying entry. After that group of tourists went missing in the Zone five years ago they’d had to lock it all down again. It was for the best, really… but he did kind of miss seeing the tourists a little. They always seemed so excited about going in, chatting in English and taking photographs of everything.
Someone on that last bus had taken a photo with him. He still wondered what happened, sometimes.
He was completed service before the Second Disaster, thankfully. All of the military that had been in the area had died, or so he heard. He’d been there for the earthquake in April, though, and it had certainly felt like a disaster at the time. He’d shared the last of a thermos of tea with the others on-duty when the sky lit up and the clouds disappeared like dust off a shelf after it had been blown on. The thunder crash that followed made Kyrylo lose most of his tea as he clapped his hands over his ears, forgetting he was holding the cup. It didn’t matter either way; the rest of the tea and the cup were jostled from his hand by the earthquake. He and the others only barely managed to survive it, but the checkpoint was completely toast. When the weather calmed down they had to spend several hours digging poor Yuri out from under the collapsed booth. He was laid up with broken bones long after Kyrylo left.
He heard about the Second Disaster on the news. Standing at the kitchen counter, slathering peanut butter onto a slice of bread (a boring-as-piss dinner after a boring-as-piss job, but he was no chef), he heard the late-night report on the tiny television that lived on his table. He sat and chewed on his food while the reporters talked about what happened – the sky turned blood-red, lightning struck, and suddenly the Zone grew five kilometers. Villages had to be evacuated but some people disappeared. A couple months later video from the evacuations started to trickle into news stations. They were played mostly as filler, something to pass the time until they could go on to the next big story of the day, but Kyrylo watched them intently. Electrical discharges out of nowhere, someone’s husband being attacked by a pack of hunched monsters in gas masks, a family pet getting stuck in one spot and then seemingly crushing in on itself.
He wanted to know more about this. And he knew how to get there.
He had to wait until the snow thawed off in 2007, but he used the old back ways to get into the Zone that other people had always snuck through. He guessed his time at the checkpoint had been helpful after all. And even better, it seemed as if most of the military was posted on the edges of this newly-larger Zone, too. He would be able to investigate with impunity. He’d come armed with a camera to see if he could spot any of the things he’d seen on the news, and a knife in case he ran into monsters.
He should have come armed with a gun. The first day he was chased up a tree by a pack of eyeless dogs. The knife would have been good against one or maybe two of the dogs, but against eight of them he was outclassed. The first few months were equally as difficult, trying to find food and staying away from the mutants and those spots where physics tried to kill you – there was no word for them so he just started calling them anomalies. Thankfully a few of his friends still worked at the border and he was able to trade the footage he got on the camera for food and eventually a gun (he thanked the gas-masked mutant that ran into an anomaly and got flung a hundred feet in the air for it; it was the best footage he ever got). Once he found his first artifact he gave up the camera and got himself a better weapon and more supplies. This wasn’t just a trip for extra cash or a little fame anymore; he wanted to find everything the Zone had to offer.
Kyrylo stopped in the wreckage of a house one night, setting up a small campfire after making sure there weren’t any anomalies. He’d gotten good at sensing them even without throwing anything on-hand around him. Someone else, an older man, cautiously approached Kyrylo’s campsite, raising his hands to show he wasn’t armed. He waved the man over. He could use the company for a night; he didn’t plan on getting back to that military outpost for a while and he didn’t have much human contact in the rest of the Zone. The man sat down on the other side of the fire, pulling a suspiciously familiar jar out of his backpack. “… is that peanut butter?” he asked cautiously, trying not to sound too interested. He hadn’t seen peanut butter in months.
The other man started, looking at the jar and then nodding. “I got it from a trader. If you have some bread, we could share it.” Kyrylo dug in his pack until he found a loaf – dry and crusty and sitting in his pack too long, but good enough – and cut off a couple generous pieces with his knife. The man across from him produced his own knife and started spreading the peanut butter on the slices of bread. Outside of the Zone, this was the sort of bland dinner that made Kyrylo question what he was really doing with his life. Here in the Zone, though, it was a feast and a rare treat.
He took the food when offered it, nodding and smiling. He bit in, chewing and maybe savoring the way the bite clung to the roof of his mouth until he scraped it off with his tongue. “So, what is your name?”
The older man hesitated for a moment, thinking. Almost like he hadn’t been asked that question before. “I am Guide. Who are you?”
Kyrylo was about to retort that Guide was an odd name when the question was turned back on him. Now it was his turn to be a little stumped. The man was called Guide. That wasn’t someone’s real name. That was a name someone chose for themselves. He stared at his dinner for a few long moments.
Before he snuck into to the Zone he’d been a different person. He wasn’t Kyrylo anymore, not really. Kyrylo was a former checkpoint guard with a shitty security guard job, who ate shitty food in a rundown apartment and dreamed of something interesting happening to him again like that earthquake. He watched the television and wished that it could be him getting all those photographs and videos of something weird happening beyond the military posts. Kyrylo got chased up a tree by a pack of blind dogs and spent a week trying to find food while nearly bumbling into every anomaly known to man.
But who he was now… he sat in a tree, casually picking off a pack of blind dogs one hundred meters from his position. He could practically smell anomalies before he ever got close to them, and snatched artifacts from their hearts. He slept in abandoned buildings and ate food out of cans and it made him strangely happy. He was finally doing that something interesting that Kyrylo could only wish for.
Kyrylo Marchuk was dead. He’d been dead for months now.
“My name is Strelok.”
