"Why call it Chernobyl NPP when it's like ten miles away from the city?" Konrad asked, fighting for survival with an old roadmap on his lap.
Turns out, nobody taught Dmitry to slow down before sharp corners.
"Gotta love old Soviet naming conventions," he laughed, foot heavy on the throttle.
Yeah. It made zero sense. Not that Konrad was one to talk.
Growing up at the foot of the mountains, in the last village before—
Well, the Halaima Pass. With Halaima fifteen miles away, while Haiten was right next door.
But it made sense when it was the name for the entire duchy.
Here? The exact opposite.
This was the Pripyat Marshes, named after the Pripyat River.
"And the closest town's called Pripyat. Everything checks out," Konrad scowled. "Except the power plant. Like, make it make sense, man."
"No, you got it backwards," Dmitry claimed without easing on the gas.
They drove back the way they came, from the Polish border all the way to Kyiv.
Then they hugged the Belarusian border while the roads became scarce and deserted.
With terrible, terrible pavement on them.
"They built Pripyat after the fact," the Captain educated him. "And the basic idea was to confuse those pesky Western spies. Have 'em search for their target in the wrong area, haha."
Spies? Here? Why?
"That's ridiculous."
But the Captain kept laughing.
"It is. Welcome to the Soviet Union and the Church of Paranoia. The only state religion here. They wouldn't even put this place on the map until—well, if you know, you know."
Konrad did, and shivered.
Reading about the tragedy was one thing. Heading straight there?
"We're going to meet up with a local fixer in Selo Illintsi," Dmitry's voice shook him up.
"Wait, weren't we going to Pripyat?"
"Hah, in due time, kid," the Captain smirked. And had to pull that kid thing when he was only in his mid-twenties. "It's not as easy to enter the Zone as driving there."
Which was anything but smooth sailing, by the way.
Their Niva devoured the miles, but it was nowhere near as comfortable as Gabby's carriages.
Like, come on, those things had to deal with Kasserlane's dirt roads.
This one?
It looked like an off-roader, but whenever it found the smallest defect in the pavement—
"What's a fixer?" Konrad winced, dropping the map for the second time in five minutes. The car jumped around like crazy. "Slow down, for fuck's sake, or we'll never make it in one piece."
"Hmm, how to put it?" Dmitry pondered.
And ignored his second sentence completely.
"When the military settles in, they need locals with connections. Know-how and whatnot. Our man, Sidorovich, is an old trafficker who used to tour the Zone."
"Tour it?" he asked, "Isn't that, like, super dangerous?"
The captain shrugged.
"Not if you're not a complete idiot." And he said that while speeding on a road that would have been rough even on foot. "Tourists loved the place. It was always booked full before the war."
"You've been there?" Konrad blinked, but his insane chauffeur shook his head.
"Not me. But know a guy from the National Guard. He introduced me to Sidorovich."
Bless the spirits for his connections.
He would have had no idea what to do here, and, well—
Still had no clue what Strelok might have been doing there, either.
"Anyway, the National Guard is in control of this place on paper, but yeah, it's huge. We can slip through, then get lost immediately. That's why you need Sidorovich to sort you out."
Right. Because once they reached the Zone, Dmitry would return to duty.
Konrad would be on his own again.
And he would have never made it this far like that.
The Niva slowed down, pulling to the side after climbing a shallow hill.
Captain Bandera killed the engine, stretching his arms as he got out of the car.
"That should be it. Those houses in the forest valley," he said with a sigh, pointing ahead. "Selo Illintsi. One of the many ghost towns of the zone—though that looks more like a village."
Was he speeding all this time to take a breather now?
They weren't even close yet.
"It's all restricted beyond this hill, so I'll only do a quick in-and-out," Dmitry explained. "Not sure if we'll have the time for a proper goodbye, but I wanted to say thank you again."
Ah, so that was it?
"I was only trying to save my own skin," Konrad waved him off. "And you helped me out a lot."
If anything, he felt like he owed the Captain, not the other way around.
Dmitry didn't look at him, though.
"Sidorovich knows pretty much everyone, in and out of the Exclusion Zone," he said. "Ask him if he heard anything about your Strelok guy, or whatever odd things might have happened."
Yeah. That was exactly his plan. Did he play his dad now?
"If you get caught by the National Guard, you're better off reverting to your journalist alias. Impersonating an international police officer would get you treated like a Russian spy."
Okay, that was actually solid advice, though.
"Need your pistol back?" Konrad asked, tapping his pocket with the Makarov still in it.
The Captain shook his head.
"Keep it," he said. "You'll never know when you'll need it. I heard the wildlife here was nuts. Not to mention the bandits. And we're still at war, even if these parts are nice and quiet."
The quiet, he could understand. But calling it nice?!
Actually—
The longer Konrad studied the landscape, the more peaceful it seemed.
Nature took over.
The roads and some dilapidated houses might have remained, but no people in sight.
It was all peaceful and quiet—except for that monotone buzzing.
Wasn't it too late in the autumn for this many flies?
"Crap," Dmitry said when he noticed. "That must be a Guards' drone. Cover your face."
Konrad complied, even before finding the source itself.
But indeed, a tiny quadcopter hovered about thirty feet above their heads.
And it wasn't alone.
"Cover our faces? But you're military," he groaned, scrambling to get back in the car.
"Told you", the Captain shouted over the revving engine. "We're off the books here."
Of course. And he didn't want to get his new friend into trouble right before—
A fucking explosion.
What the hell?!
If they had started that Niva two seconds later, they would have been the ones to blow up.
Instead, now the peaceful little hill had a jagged crater on its summit.
Konrad ducked below the dashboard as all four wheels spun out.
If he thought Dmitry was a monster on the road before, he had to think again.
"Suicide drones," the Captain barked. "The fuck is wrong with these guys?"
And that plural wasn't a mistake.
Looking back, he could count three more diving after them already.
"When you said this was a restricted area, I didn't think it was THIS restricted, damn it."
"It shouldn't be," Dmitry seethed, too, swerving to shake down the pursuers. "Something's up, but I don't know—don't feel like stopping to ask them. We'll lose 'em in those woods below."
Konrad wanted to argue or offer to erect a barrier around the car, but missed his chance.
The Niva was already in the air.
And upside down.