– Or maybe we should have stayed in the village? Elena asked softly.
“You can come back,” the boy waved.
Zhenya just sighed. It was a bad idea to split up, it was not for nothing that all the cringe in horror films began precisely when the characters began to walk one by one. Wandering along the dark road, Eugene quickly felt tired. He was completely unsuited to long physical exertion, preferring books to walking. There was nothing left in his parents’ apartment that could entertain Zhenya, except for three telescopes and a fake Indian elephant donated by friends. It slowly turned along with the globe and smiled enigmatically as the glowing numbers on the map of Asia turned green. And now, together with a warm apartment, he was walking along a wet road, somewhere far from civilization.
The dark forest frightened each of them, but Dmitry tried not to succumb to the collective panic, not to lose the face of a lively guy who doesn’t care about anything. Here one could see terrible charred stumps, harsh overgrown shrubs, broken trees with bare roots, swaying in the wind. But above all this, the dark blue sky froze, and a bottomless bowl of the night luminary reigned overhead. In such places it is difficult to maintain peace of mind. Alena sniffled. There would be at least someone who just at that moment painfully wanted to cry. For a moment she was filled with such self-hatred that she screamed, and her hands clutched at her shoulders of their own accord, and her face contorted as if with a terrible premonition. But that only lasted a moment. And then everything returned to normal. The guys shuddered in surprise, but said nothing and continued to walk forward, choosing a more beaten path.
Dimitri was the first to notice the bright shadow ahead. Something whitish translucent strangely trembled in the light wind, vaguely resembling a child’s figure in a light dress. The figure sat on the road with its head bowed. There were brown spots on the light fabric.
Zhenya stopped right behind his classmate’s shoulder and waved his hand to Alena, asking her to be quiet. The girl stopped, cautiously peeking out of the guys’ backs.
– What is it? Yevgeny asked quietly, noticing that a forest could be seen through the figure. Ghost?
– Some kind of crap, – Dmitry noted in surprise. – Hey! Are you all right?
The girl got up from the ground, shook off the sand and blood from her dress and slowly walked along the road, looking around in surprise, approaching the company of her classmates. Her movements were unnatural, suspiciously sharp, alarming. Catching her gaze, Eugene saw a genuine feeling behind the mask, a mixture of grief and fear. Something happened in the life of this child, an event occurred due to which her former strength disappeared into a fog, that was the impression that was created. Yet there was something subtly unsettling about her. With an unexpected jerk and with unnatural speed, the girl ran towards her classmates, making a terrifying sound, like a loud whistle, crossed with a wheeze. And then, just like in the cartoons, she had her own language, complex, creepy and incomprehensible.
– Let’s run! – Dmitry was the first to turn around, rushing headlong into the village, along the way, dragging Alena. – Let’s! Move the rolls!
The frightened girl, not paying attention to her heels, tried to keep up with her comrades in misfortune. Adrenaline rushed into his blood, seething, igniting from the inside. The company fled without looking at the road, pursued by the ghost of a little girl. Having freed her hand, Alena felt her lungs burning, and almost immediately it hurt in her side, but fear drove her forward, forbidding her to think about pain.
Zhenya lagged behind a little, turning around every now and then. When he looked up again, he didn’t notice his classmates. Fear paralyzed him and in the next second he stumbled, falling to the ground, ripping off his palms to the blood. Turning to the impending threat, the guy did not have time to understand anything, as his face burned with pain, and his consciousness faded.
Next courses. He felt like a role model and this has always been confirmed. Remember your mom’s friend’s son? So this person has always been Eugene. He knew how to cook, knew a bunch of clever terms, studied well and always agreed with his mother. Studying was a pleasure, I liked to learn new things, to learn languages. The future was already planned: the first and second education, work in a large company, and then career growth. Everything was decided by the knowledge that Eugene stuffed himself to the fullest. Unlike Irka, he did not strive to get only good grades, but tried to understand the material, realizing that knowledge is power. But the future lies in the use of knowledge. Everywhere work experience is required and they say: “Forget everything you were taught before”, so Evgeny always found the use of all the information that he drew from any open sources. But classmates saw him as a botanist and a nerd, and valued him only for the opportunity to write off, because Irka never “stooped to such a thing.” Trying to get universal love, Eugene often took additional essays from classmates, so to speak, bribed them. Him additional knowledge, exciting pastime and gratitude, and classmates finished work.
Sometimes he wondered what would happen if he refused to do homework for others? Would you continue to appreciate it? Or, on the contrary, they would have been rotten, like Denis, because there is always a reason for persecution. Therefore, more and more communication with people, Zhenya preferred books and the Internet. He followed the social networks of acquaintances, lamenting that people were wasting too much time instead of studying the material and preparing for the school day. But everyone’s life seemed richer. The guy wanted to be called to a school disco or a party, but, as Dmitry put it: “Bespectacled people have nothing to do there!”. It’s a shame and unfair, but Eugene was convinced that later the world would fall at his feet. You just need to wait, gain experience and knowledge, and soon everyone will talk about him, because it is he, the very son of his mother’s friend. They will take an example from him, and the girls will bite their elbows with envy, realizing that they have lost such a groom.
– Chapter 6-
Fantastically bad story
The affair with Nikita came to life almost simultaneously. The dark tunnels of the cave evoked melancholy and cold.
– And where are we? Romka asked an obvious question.
“I have no idea,” Nikita answered no less obviously. – Some caves, maybe Syan?
– No, I watched the video and it’s not them, – a classmate shook his head negatively. – Oh, we have some belongings here! – nodding at the folded bags, which he gutted almost immediately.
– Two flasks of water, a rope and dry rations, a stalker, pancake, – Nikita squatted down in front of a few belongings. – Okay, let’s get out of here. My ass can feel that it’s dangerous here.
– Maybe a heart? corrected comrade Romka.
“Maybe,” the streamer answered evasively and, throwing his backpack in first, went into the dark tunnel. Surprisingly, it was as if there was an internal illumination that allowed them to move freely in the darkness without bumping into obstacles. Or was it just normal, and those flashes of light that flickered ahead – just their own memories of the hustle and bustle of the day? Nothing like this has ever happened to students before. And it was at least curious – at least from a technical point of view. The tunnels narrowed and widened, sometimes becoming quite narrow, allowing only crawling to overcome the distance, and sometimes you can go to full height. The guys moved forward confidently. The road in the cave gradually rose, and it became noticeable that not just stones, but multi-ton blocks of basalt were fixed behind the distant pillars on the walls. Far away in the depths, they glowed with a cold green fire. It seems that there was a natural cave in which these huge lanterns burned. Soon the travelers came to the exit – a small recess with a rusty staircase upstairs. Once on the surface, classmates staged a brief halt. It seemed that they spent six hours in a closed space, but it is impossible to say for sure – there are no hours.
Taking