A/N: Yay, chapter 2 is up! XD
Chapter 2: Huntress to Stalker
Pyrrha is crouching behind Sergei looking through his binoculars. They're observing a military checkpoint through a large crack in the roof, watching the soldier's movements as they guard the path that's headed deeper into the Zone.
"Anything?" Pyrrha asks as she shifts uncomfortably.
Sergei shakes his head as he continues to watch the soldiers, "Well, no…but we have four options." He answers stoically as he continues to scan his surroundings before eventually going back down and moving to place his back against the wall.
"So, what are those four?" Pyrrha asks as she looks through the crack, seeing men in green holding their rifles in the distance under a bridge surrounded by containers and wrecked vehicles before looking back towards Sergei.
"Well, we can try the tunnel filled with electric anomalies not far from here, or we try and sneak through the open across this building since that side isn't fenced off." Sergei shrugs as he scratches his underarms.
"Or we can try negotiating with the soldiers?" Pyrrha suggests as she sits down with Sergei.
Sergei shakes his head "Nyet, unless you have the money…and before you ask, I barely have any." He chuckles "Well we could've had Sidorovich decided not to put the tab on me."
"The tab?" Pyrrha asks before taking a minute to realize what the stalker meant "Oh…sorry about that…" she sighs and gives Sergei an apologetic smile.
Sergei shrugs "Well, you can pay me later – the bastard's a greedy shit anyway. For now, let's figure out how to get past the soldiers. Besides, we don't know how will they react to you … or to anyone else in the Zone, really – I think they're just ordered to shoot stalkers on sight." He chuckles as he stands up and leaves.
Pyrrha ponders at the stalker's words before following him down the old rundown mill to wherever he's headed to.
They decide to go through the tunnels. Well, more like Sergei did as he thought that this would be useful in teaching his new companion about the Zone.
Upon arriving, Sergei spots a dead stalker and in typical fashion, approaches it and searches the body for anything valuable.
Seeing this, Pyrrha then slaps Sergei's hand from the body, "What are you doing!?" She asks, shooting a glare at Sergei "Why are you- "
"Looting? Ah…" Sergei takes a moment to silence think before continuing, "You see - resources are scarce, and buying necessities are expensive. Looting bodies is a lot cheaper, don't you think? Besides, he'll not use it anymore and he'll understand - such life is in the Zone after all." He shrugs before continuing to search the body, finding the stalker's PDA and pocketing it.
Pyrrha stares at him with shock and disbelief as he rummages through the dead stalker's body "This just doesn't feel right…you know." she says in almost a whisper.
"The answer is simple Pyrrha, survival." Sergei replies, "Yes, it is kind of fucked up, but if you want to live then you have to push some morals to the side." He sighs as he finishes rummaging through the body and stands up before muttering in Russian, "The Zone takes another life." Before motioning to Pyrrha to follow.
Pyrrha stops for a moment to look at the dead man on the ground and dips her head "I'm sorry…" She whispers before jogging up to Sergei.
…
They stand at the entrance of the tunnel where they can see pulses of electricity, about 10 meters in diameter each, pulsing on the ground as the smell of ozone filled their noses through their gas masks.
"Alright, see those pulses of electricity? Those are called Electro anomalies - they're the quite shockers." Sergei chuckles at his joke and hands Pyrrha a bolt "Treat them like the springboards, except electric with the possibility of frying you to a crisp."
"I see…" Pyrrha nods as she throws the bolt to the nearest one setting off a bright flash of light and tendrils of electricity which she feels as the hairs on her skin stands up.
Sergei nods in approval "Alright, let's get moving - it will take some time for them to recharge." He says before jogging up to an empty spot along with Pyrrha following behind him.
They spend some time in the tunnels, throwing bolts and moving up to safer spots as they progress deeper into the tunnel. And at one point Sergei had to carry Pyrrha as the 'safe' spaces between each anomaly became smaller; which left both with hearts racing with fear and excitement as they leave the anomaly filled tunnel.
"Phew! A lot of close calls!" Sergei laughs as he sets Pyrrha on the ground who has a troubled expression on her face. Sergei notices this and he sighs "Still bothered about it huh?"
Pyrrha nods solemnly, "It's just that…you know, it feels wrong to loot from the dead." She sighs.
Sergei nods in understanding "Understandable, but…if you don't want to, then don't. Are we clear?"
"I guess so…I still have a lot to learn, don't I?" Pyrrha sighs as she gives Sergei a small smile.
"Oh definitely, now come! Let's go meet Miller!" Sergei chuckles as he ruffles her crimson hair while receiving a playful punch to the arm from Pyrrha as she jogs after him.
…
They enter the abandoned pig pens, as they meet the stalker named Miller. Like any other stalker, he wears his gas mask while also wearing forest camouflage fatigues and body armor.
Upon seeing the two approach, Miller readies his weapon, "what do you want?" He asks with a wary tone on his voice.
"Sidorovich sent us, he said you know the whereabouts of this 'file'." Sergei shrugs as he looks at the AKS-74 in Miller's hand.
"Ah…you're looking for the wrong man." Miller chuckles before raising his rifle "Both of you out of the way now!" He barks out and the two jump to the side quickly before Miller could hit them with the stream of hot 5.45 rounds, which kills an unfortunate mutant that was charging towards them.
Miller lowers his rifle with a chuckle "Looks like I will be having dinner later. But as I was saying earlier - you got the wrong man, but from what I heard a friend of mine, a stalker named Fox has some information about this 'file'…everyone has been talking about it, don't you two know?"
Sergei shook his head "Nyet, tell me about it." He sighs.
While the two stalkers converse, Pyrrha examines the mutant's corpse: It's a grotesque abomination compared to the mutated dogs; it has a dirt brown hide with greyish patches of what seems to be bone on its body, with black colored veins seen under the mutant's skin. It has disproportionately sized eyes as one was large and the other was slightly smaller, it's legs are akin of that of a crab, and more covered in the same bone-like substance as it went on towards its feet.
'Even grimm weren't this hideous…' Pyrrha thought to herself as she stands up and find that the two stalkers are done talking "What is this thing?" She asks at the two while nudging the mutant's corpse with her foot.
"Ah, that? Mutated pigs, we call them Flesh…and are still pretty safe to eat." Sergei replies "And I know, they're ugly as hell, though they are fortunately pretty easy to deal with." Before giving a bottle of vodka to Miller for the trouble.
"I see. So, are you two done?" Pyrrha asks, putting her hand on her hips.
Sergei nods, "Da, we're going to the garbage." He yawns as he watches Miller sit on a nearby crate and pops off the vodka bottle cap.
"Okay? Anything else?" Pyrrha asks.
"Well…bad news - there's bandits up on the road, and they're blocking the way to the Garbage." Sergei replies with a sigh as he breaks his shotgun open and removes two shells before replacing them with blue-colored ones "And question Pyrrha: can you shoot? And if you can, how good are you?"
The two then leave the abandoned pigpen, going past a large pack of dogs by sneaking past them while the mutated canines are busy tearing apart some flesh mutant corpses. The scene makes Pyrrha wince and look away immediately, while Sergei simply ignores it.
After a few minutes of walking, the two then sees a dilapidated checkpoint house on top of a small hill in the distance. And at the entrance are two men in black colored jackets and jeans with black colored balaclavas covering their faces, Sergei pulls Pyrrha behind a rock and says: "put on your gas mask." Which the huntress then did as instructed.
"Nearly forgot to tell you one of the most basic rules here: always wear your gas mask, only remove it if the Geiger counter isn't going crazy," Sergei said as he peeks behind the rock they were hiding behind.
"Well, I did see the other Stalkers not wearing theirs…" Pyrrha replies, making what she could just assume is Sergei rolling his eyes.
"Remember, radiation? Trust me you don't want to be breathing that stuff…especially in hot spots. Dammit, Sidorovich also did not give you your Geiger counter." He sighs "well let's just find one if these bastards have one after we kill them."
"Wait kill them?" Pyrrha asks as the thoughts of killing another human being seemed too farfetched for her and it disgusted her.
"What else? Besides, they're assholes and they'll cause trouble to everyone later if we don't." Sergei replies as he checks on his gun's ammunition.
Pyrrha freezes in horror as she watched Sergei peek out of cover, take aim, before then pulling the trigger - the gunshot echoes throughout the Zone as he blasted one of the bandit's head to pieces with one of his slug shells in reserve.
The other bandit yells something in Russian before he ducks out to the side, dodging Sergei's second shot and makes Sergei curse out quietly in Russian as he quickly goes behind cover as rounds hit the dirt near him.
"Look if you don't like killing someone, just think that these bastards will not hesitate to kill you, hell even do whatever they wish to you, alive or not!" Sergei yells at Pyrrha as he scrambles to reload his weapon "And think about the other people here, these men will literally attack anyone, hell even the Ecologists hate them!" he then grabs her by the shoulder and shakes her "Hey, do you want to live?! Do you want to see your home, or family again?! If yes, then help me kill these sons of bitches!" before peeking out of cover again and fires at the bandits.
Pyrrha shakily then takes a hold of her pistol and peeks out of the rock and whispers to herself "I'm sorry." Before firing on one of the bandits to hit one of them on the shoulder, making the man cry out in pain as he stumbles to the ground and crawls behind a tree.
Seeing this, the bandits then quickly take cover behind an abandoned, rusting APC in front of the check point's entrance before continuing to fire back at the two behind the rock. The other bandits meanwhile run to the small tower behind the checkpoint's walls before hailing down some automatic submachinegun fire upon the two.
"Pizdec!" Sergei grumbles as he fumbles through his pouches to pull out a green oval object, a grenade, which Sergei then pulls the pin out before throwing it at the bandits behind the APC while yelling in Russian: "Eat this you fucking bitches!" before hitting the dirt as a stream of bullets whizzles over his head.
The dying screams of the bandits echoes throughout the Zone as the explosion and shrapnel ripped the bandits apart. Sergei and Pyrrha take this as an opportunity to fire back at the bandits with Sergei scoring a few kills with his slugs before he ran out – forcing him to change his shells back to buckshot while Pyrrha manages to hit a few more on the chest, most likely leaving the men to die from bleeding.
The fight drags on, with Sergei blasting his double-barreled shotgun to the bandits on the tower. Unaware, the bandit that Pyrrha shot earlier peeks out of the tree he's hiding behind before aiming at Sergei who was unaware of the danger of him being shot.
"No!" Pyrrha screams as the bandit fires his pistol to Sergei who was too late to do anything about it, closing her eyes Pyrrha activates her semblance: managing to stop the bullet just a mere inch from Sergei's eyes who was left dumbstruck for a moment before regaining his senses and immediately kills the bandit who nearly shot him.
"Hell, you never told me you had superpowers!" Sergei laughs as he scrambles to reload his shotgun "I will not be surprised if you have laser eyes." Before snapping his shotgun shut as he finishes loading fresh shells and exchanges more fire with the bandits.
…
It took an hour for the firefight to end, with Sergei and Pyrrha still alive. Sergei walks up to Pyrrha "Good shooting out there Pyrrha, and thanks for saving my ass back there." He chuckles as he gives her a pat on the back and then looking at the carnage before starting to loot the corpses.
Pyrrha, meanwhile, looks shaken knowing she killed another human being with her own hands. She tries telling herself it was for her survival, Sergei's, and the other loners out there who might get mugged by the same men she killed. She turns to watch Sergei looting the bodies they both murdered for a while before turning away, shuddering as the scene disturbed her.
Sergei then walks up to her as he finished looting the rest of the bodies "Here, an MP5, it isn't much but a lot better than just a pistol." He chuckles before noticing her downcast demeanor and sighs as he hands her the MP5 "Look - This place is a cruel one. Like I said they will not hesitate to kill, so if you hesitate, even for just a second? You're dog food." He then pauses for a moment before continuing "Shit, I'm not good at this." He sighs before saying: "Come on, let's go."
Unfortunately, an Emission caught up with them just as they step inside the checkpoint. Both sit by the fire as they wait for the psychic storm to pass. An awkward silence between the two forms as the distant thunder, lightning, Sergei's PDA beeping, and the gentle fire crackling can only be heard before Sergei coughs as he takes out a sausage and asks: "You hungry?" to which Pyrrha shakes her head in response.
The silence became worse as time went on. With Pyrrha thinking about the recent events, she only snapped out of it when Sergei said out of the blue "It bothers you, doesn't it?" To which Pyrrha nods solemnly.
"It's just that…I wonder if they had families…friends out there. It's just that…" Pyrrha sighs "It just bothers me…if a child out there grows up without his or her father…b-because of me." She stammers as she hugs her knees.
Sergei sighs "Look, every stalker here knows the risk of dying. Even if one of those men was a father, your own survival comes first." He says before taking a bite of his sausage.
"But it still is wrong, t-there must be a-another way-…" Pyrrha yells at Sergei before slumping back and hugging her knees "I-I'm sorry I- "
"It's fine…" Sergei replies, "I understand…I was in a similar position when I killed my first man." He sighs before taking another bite from his sausage "But survival is first. So, I killed him." Before chuckling, "I'm not good at this am I?" He smiles lightly at Pyrrha.
Pyrrha gives Sergei a small smile under her weary sad face "You are…but I appreciate it anyway." She then moves back on the wall "I'll be taking a nap if that's okay with you."
Sergei nods "It's alright, you had a long day. So, I'll take the first watch. I'll wake you up when there's something wrong." He replies as he unslings his shotgun from his back and as he looks back at Pyrrha she was already sleeping making Sergei smile a little behind his mask.
…
The Emission ended late at night again; Sergei let Pyrrha rest for a bit longer, while he looks out of a nearby window and into the clear night sky with its light beaming down into the room, giving the room a soft blue glow.
Sergei yawns as another hour passes, he was then about to wake up Pyrrha until the world around him suddenly turned grey as if the colors of the world were sucked out, Sergei panics as he quickly stands up with his shotgun ready to fire at anything, not noticing that the fire has stopped moving.
He makes a slow yet cautious sweep around the room, as he looks around. Sergei then catches a quick glimpse of movement outside the window, Sergei steps outside and notices a man at the checkpoint's entrance standing.
The mysterious man's clothes seem to be weaved out of shadow as the light seemed to be sucked into the man. Sergei cautiously moves up and yells: "Buzz off scum." In Russian with spite in his voice. He takes the man as a bandit, as bandits in the Zone generally wear black-colored clothes or jackets.
The man then turns to him, leaving Sergei in shock as he never thought he'd be seeing a close family friend of his in the Zone "Uncle Misha?" Sergei asks with confusion in his voice as he immediately lowers his shotgun making the man chuckle.
"Ah, it is good to see you again Sergei." Misha chuckles as the moonlight reveals the man's features. He was a ruggedly handsome, middle-aged man; his skin pale as alabaster with a neatly shaved beard, his eyes were piercingly dark as if they were two voids staring down one's soul. He then combs back his slick black hair, "I see you have the 'spartan' with you." He said as he approaches Sergei and rubs his head making him grumble something in annoyance and slip out of Misha's playful headlock.
"Sheesh uncle, I'm not a kid anymore!" Sergei complains which he only receives a chuckle from Misha "Anyways, where have you been?! After those…aliens came where and how?" he said as he sadly reminisces of those times…
"Well…that's a secret, but I must tell you one thing Sergei before I leave because I'm a busy man." Misha sighs as he takes out a cigarette and lights it with a small, red-colored crystal.
"W-what is it? Dammit, you always disappear and reappear out of nowhere uncle!" Sergei sighs before crossing his arms and lets out an annoyed huff.
Misha chuckles "I will soon tell you my boy, but for now…this is concerning your red headed 'friend'. My brother wants her back in her world." Before letting out a puff of smoke.
"Wait? How do you know about her?" Sergei replies as he narrows his eyes towards his uncle, slowly letting his index finger slips onto the trigger guard.
Misha then replies "Another secret that should be answered for another day. But I have information involving your mission…and it also holds key to returning your friend to her world." He chuckles as he eyes Sergei's finger on the trigger guard "No need to be hostile, is that how you treat family friends?"
Sergei rolls his eyes, "If they're acting suspiciously then maybe." He retorts.
Misha pauses for a moment "Huh, fair point. You two are looking for Fox in the garbage, right?"
"I am suspicious that you know everything… but where are you going with this?" Sergei grunts as he scratches his back.
"Go and raid the military base there and take some classified files related to the mission that Sidorovich gave you." Misha grins making Sergei's eyes go wide.
"Are you crazy? Do I look like I can take out an entire platoon of trained soldiers to you?!" Sergei replies with outrage.
"Yes, especially with your friend." Misha grins before taking a coin out of his pocket and tosses it to Sergei.
Sergei then catches the coin and gives him a small glare "Fine, I'll do it…if you got the money or give me guns or something."
Misha sighs "Fine, fine how about an AN-94."
"Toss in a sniper rifle and some ammo and it's a deal." Sergei grins.
Misha then shoots Sergei an irritated look "Fine kid, also make sure your friend doesn't die this time." He sighs before giving him a small smile, "I believe you can do it." Before turning back and walking back to the dimly lit road.
"Wait! What do you!" Sergei calls out but after he blinks, Misha is gone. He shakes his head and slap his face a few times to check if it was real, "Shit…now I have a spooky ass uncle." He sighs before examining the coin he was given. It was a 1-ruble coin with one side being gold and the other being rusty black. Sergei then pockets the coin and heads back inside to wake Pyrrha for her shift.
-
and that's all for Chapter 2 folks!
Thank you so much NlaEid for helping me out for the editing, and some story hiccups that I haven't spotted.
See y'all on the next chapter!
And as usual, stay safe out there stalkers and hunters!
(Note: made some corrections)