Chapter 3

“She’s not a masseuse!” Dan Mortimer squealed as soon as Andrew took the tape off his mouth. “I did not call for her!”

Helping him to rise from the floor, Barkov looked at the girl. She was sitting on the floor looking at the window absent-mindedly.

“Why did you let her in then?” Andrew asked.

Dan set his housecoat straight and smoothed his thin hair with both hands. Then, casting his eyes down, he answered, “I even let her tie me up, old fool… She told me they had an advertising campaign – one hour of erotic massage for free. Liar!”

Emily didn’t react in any way to his words.

“Don’t worry, Dan,” Andrew said, keeping a smile from showing. “Now I’m going to take her to the police department. She won’t disturb you again. As for our lesson, we’ll schedule it for next week.”

Emily shifted her gaze to the men and said in a quiet but distinct voice, “There’s no point in scheduling. In a week you won’t exist anymore. Me either.”

“You’ll be behind bars,” Barkov promised. “Let’s go to the car. And don’t try to escape. You’ll fail!”

“I know. You’ve got outstanding responsiveness.” She looked at him, her eyes suspicious. “Were you born with it?”

“No. Many years of training.”

“Ahem! I don’t think so. I’ve heard something about the people like you… Anyway, it doesn’t matter anymore. I’m sorry for trying to kill you.” She turned to Mortimer. “Forgive me for deceiving you and tying you up.”

Mortimer asked, looking at Andrew, “Why does she say that we won’t exist in a week?”

“Her father told her that the asteroid would slow down the Earth.”

The teacher smirked. “Rubbish!” Then he cocked his head to Andrew. “Isn’t it?”

“Absolutely.” Barkov looked at the girl. “Move!”

She stood up in a defeated silence and went to the exit. This time her walk was even, without swaying her hips, her head high.

Barkov made her sit on the back seat of the vehicle, lifted a transparent partition and snapped locks on her doors so the girl couldn’t jump out on the road. Starting the engine, he drove smoothly from the empty street to the avenue crossing it.

He had to brake there at once. The road was blocked by a truck that had rammed into a small vehicle. The passenger car was crippled so much that it was impossible to determine its model. A pool of blood spread from under the heap of metal. There was nobody in the cab of the truck that was damaged just a little bit. Probably the truck driver ran away.

“Oh my God!” Emily exclaimed.

He glanced at the rearview mirror. The girl was looking at the deformed car with wide-open eyes, her hands touching her cheeks. Was she sorry for the unfortunate passengers of the small car? That was strange. She had just tried to kill a human herself!

Andrew turned on a handheld transceiver. “Dispatcher!”

A female voice answered, “Listening.”

“This is lieutenant Barkov, the northeast area. There is a car crash at the corner of the Seventy Fourth Street and the Eighth Avenue. Two vehicles. Probably there are victims. Send some officers here.”

“Lieutenant, are you joking?” the dispatcher uttered quickly. “A few officers because of only two vehicles in a collision? Tomorrow evening, not before. I’ve got thousands of calls. By the way, where have you been?”

“Don’t you know? You’ve got coordinates of all the police cars!”

“No. The satellite system has gone mad. According to the map you are now in the ocean, twenty kilometers from the coast.”

“No, I’m on land, here at the accident.”

“Naturally. Captain wants you to respond to a fight on the Forty Eighth Street – ”

Andrew interrupted her. “I’ve got a dangerous criminal in custody. I’m taking her to the central department.”

“Okay. Let me know when you’re done.”

Barkov leaped out of the car and went around the crashed car trying to peep inside. In vain. The metal was pressed so hard that it was impossible to see the car’s interior.

Andrew got back to his place at the steering wheel. He drove the car around the truck on the sidewalk with care and accelerated. Thousands of calls. What’s happened in the city?

The answer to this question became obvious as soon as his car got to Dixie Highway where there had always been busy traffic. Crooked, smoking vehicles were standing here and there along the highway. People scurried about between vehicles; many of them were stained with blood. Policemen, firefighters and medical officers were assisting lightly wounded people; seriously injured people were being stretchered off to ambulances. Sobbing and shouts were heard from everywhere.

Gravitation. That’s the reason why the transport went out of control.

Andrew slowed down as he maneuvered carefully between people and cars. A stadium appeared to the right at a distance of about two hundred meters from the highway. It was wrapped in a cloud of dust. People were running out all the three entrances and dispersing on the square before the stadium. Andrew had to stop again at the turn to the stadium to let a few ambulances pass by. At that moment two teenagers with faces covered with white and blue painted stripes – fans of a football team – came to the crossroads.

Looking out of the car window, Barkov shouted, “Hey, boys! What’s happened there?”

One of the guys, a short fellow with tousled hair, stopped on “zebra’ in front of Andrew’s car and laughed hysterically, his eyes wide, looking right through Andrew. “A piece of the roof crashed down. Half of the players died. The referee was killed, too! It serves him right, because he denied a goal!”

The other teenager returned to his fellow fan, seized his hand and pulled the trembling and wild-eyed friend along.

The guy is in a state of shock. He doesn’t understand what he’s saying.

There was dense smoke on the road ahead – probably the smoke that could be seen from Mortimer’s bedroom. At first, it seemed to Andrew that a metro station located high above the earth on concrete supports was burning. Having come closer, he discerned that the source of the smoke was closer to the highway. A number of shops – or rather what remained of them – was on fire. The first three buildings were unroofed, the next five or six were destroyed almost to the foundation, and on the place of the last two, a fuselage of an airplane without wings was burning. On the cockpit, there was inscription “Boeing H-17”. Some fire-fighting crews stood along the highway, flooding the fire with foam.

Barkov had seen a report on this newest passenger liner just a few days ago. The apparatus was designed for three hundred passengers and was actuated by four hydrogen engines. He even remembered an enthusiastic phrase of the reporter: “Before your eyes, there is a non-polluting and absolutely safe wonder of engineering. Probability of an accident is equal to zero!”

They had no chance. The plane fell from its own weight when the gravity increased.

A ringing signal sounded.

“Listening,” Barkov said.

A laser screen flashed up over the dashboard. In it, there was a face of a woman of about sixty with short curly chestnut hair and big, kind gray eyes.

“Hi, little boy!” she said in a quiet voice. “How are you? Did you get hurt in the catastrophe?”

Andrew felt guilty. He should have called her first, right after the asteroid flew by. “No, Mom. How are you?”

“Everything is okay, don’t worry. Tell me, please, do they have you very busy?”

“Yes, they have. I’m at work now. Why?”

Nellie Barkov hesitated. Andrew noticed that she was in the cellar of her garage – there was a shelf with tools in the background.

“Could you come around… when you have some free time?”

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, sonny. I am alive and kicking.”

“Mother, speak up! Why are you down there? And why are you whispering?”

“Well, I’ve just gone down. There are strangers up in the house. It seems, robbers. Don’t worry, I’ve locked myself up. They don’t even know that I’m here.”

“I’ll be there right away.”

It was just like his tactful mother to not want to give him trouble. Barkov instantly imagined big, strong rogues rushing into the cellar and beating her to find out where cash is hidden, even though she had none. She had some savings, but they were small and in a bank account. Would the bandits believe it? She had a good house in a prestigious area. Caches of diamonds are usually hidden in such places and somewhere behind a wardrobe there is a safe full of money – or so the robbers would assume.

I must hurry up.

Barkov made a U-turn and drove the car back. The tires squealed as he drove around obstacles making zigzags.

Emily knocked on the partition fiercely.

“It’s one-way traffic here! We’ll get smashed up!”

Andrew switched on the flashing lights and the audio alarm. The whole surface of the hood, roof and trunk began to sparkle like a New Year’s garland. Howling sounds floated from the loudspeakers.

The car careened about one and a half kilometers through the oncoming traffic lane. At the nearest intersection, Barkov turned to the road leading to the Pinecrest area where his mother lived.

Twenty-five minutes drive seemed to be like eternity. Terrible images flickered in his head. His mom pummeled mercilessly… covered with blood… dying trying to crawl out of the house…

At the turn to Montgomery Street, he switched off the alarm system. Robbers should be caught unawares instead of being warned about police arrival. Making two more turns, he saw the three coconut palm trees growing before his mother’s house. To the right and to the left of them, a narrow asphalted road formed a semicircle. As Andrew’s car approached one side, an old dark blue Cadillac turned out from the other side. It overturned a garbage can near the road, some black bags of garbage and a couple empty bottles of Coke fell out, and the car sped down the street.

Barkov made a mental snapshot of its number plate – “USW 116 F” – and turned to the house.

Nellie Barkov had a one-storied beautiful house with big windows, decorative columns on the facade and a tile roof. The garage adjoined the house at the left. Its door was closed, and before it, as always, there was a potted cactus. It meant that robbers had not opened the garage. However, the house’s front door was wide open. Having stopped the car at the door, Andrew rushed inside. “Mom!”

The house was in complete disorder: wardrobes and cabinets were open, the floor was covered with clothes, books, papers and broken vases. The unusual and unpleasant stink of beer and cigarettes filled the air. And dead silence.

Peeping in all the rooms, he ran through the living room and flung open the door leading to the garage. There were no changes in it. Mother’s white double mini-electromobile was in the center. Its rear bumper hung over a wooden hatch of the cellar. The hatch was shut tight.

Knocking on it with his knuckles, Andrew said loudly in Russian, “Mom! Are you there?”

The answer in the same language came from below, “Yes, sonny!”

The lock clicked. The cover started to open slowly.

Andrew helped Nellie up and embraced her.

“Thank God.” He shifted back to English. “How are you, Mom?”

“I’m OK. I heard such awful noises and clatter. They must have turned the house upside down, haven’t they?”

“Yes, they have. Don’t worry, I’ll find them. Did you see the faces?”

“Yes, I did. Fearful ones. At first they broke into the neighbor’s house; I saw them out my window. I tried to call the police, but couldn’t get through. Then they headed here. I hid and called you. I hope they didn’t break the vase your father had presented me for my birthday!”

Andrew had only a vague memory of his father. George Barkov was killed in a battle against separatists in the north of Russia when Andrew was five years old. But he knew very well what vase mother was worried about. It was an elegant Chinese porcelain with a high narrow neck that had always stood on a shelf in her bedroom.

She hurried to the bedroom and stared at fragments of the vase scattered on the floor. “They broke it!”

Andrew tried to soothe her. “Mom, we’ll glue it together.”

Nellie objected, “No. To glue porcelain is a bad sign.” She looked round. “And where’s my wooden box?”

Andrew walked around and examined the room. “They must have taken it. Was there anything valuable in it?”

“Nothing but your father’s signet ring.”

Andrew remembered this ring. It was a stylish thing made of platinum and decorated with the Capricorn image – his father’s zodiacal sign.

“Mom, don’t be upset, I’ll do my best to find those swines and get the ring back. I know how important it is to you. All the memories it brings…”

“The memories of him are here,” she touched her forehead with her finger. “Losing the vase and the ring is not the worst thing. Before the robbers came, I was watching the e-vision. There was terrible news from all over the world. Did you see?” As she talked, they walked toward the living room; the e-vision was still on, just as she’d left it. An ancient holographic video emitter with big old-fashioned loudspeakers hung on a wall, safe and sound. Apparently it had not gained the burglars interest – it cost no more than five credits at a flea market. The sound was down but semitransparent images of destruction floated in front of the emitter.

“No. But I saw what has happened in our city. Car crashes on roads. The stadium roof broke down. And an airplane fell on a residential neighborhood.”

Nellie lowered her voice. “All airplanes fell that had been in the air. Ships sank… Whole fleets did… And even satellites fell from the near-earth orbit, two of them with astronauts on board! Nothing like that has happened before. In a few minutes, they are guessing that more people were killed than in the Unification War… Thank God distant satellites remained, otherwise I wouldn’t be able to contact you!”

Her eyes filled with tears. Andrew touched her shoulder. “But we are alive. And we will live!”

“The main thing is that you are alive. As for me, it’s high time…”

“Don’t talk bosh, mother!”

“Never mind.” Her eyes went to the e-vision image as a news bulletin flashed a message. “Look! Now the President is going to make a statement. Shall we listen together? But,” she looked at him with worried eyes, “you must be in a hurry?”

Barkov could turn on the e-vision in his car, but he didn’t want to leave his mother alone right after the burglary. He knew every police officer was needed on duty right now, but this was his mother and she came first to him. I must make sure that she’s OK.

He looked at the window. His car was still standing near the house. Emily was sitting on the back seat. She had no chance to escape from there. The locks could only be opened by the electronics from the driver’s seat that she couldn’t reach because of the durable partition. It wasn’t possible to open the car from the outside either. The doors would not “listen’ to anybody except the owner – Andrew had setup the system so that it was convenient for him to transport arrestees.

“I’ll stay. Let’s listen to what the President has to say. Besides, I’ll help you do the rooms.”

Nellie turned up the volume by force of her brain, but there was no voice, just interim music. The text “Special Statement of the President of the World’ appeared in the air. There was a countdown timer under the text.

“Two minutes before the speech!” Nellie exclaimed as she sat down on the sofa wiping her tears. The images became a little more rich and natural – she must have increased opacity and contrast to the maximum level that the emitter could support.

Her son started to put the scattered things back into cabinets.

“Don’t do it, son, sit down, take a rest,” she urged. “I’ll do it later by myself. Half of the junk should be thrown away. Thanks to burglars – without them, I wouldn’t do it in a hundred years!”

She’s trying to joke. That’s good.

“As you wish.”

He sat down beside her.

A gray-haired person with slanting eyes and prominent cheekbones appeared in the air. It was CHENG Wenming, the second President of the United States of the World. Contrary to his usual habit, there was not a shadow of a smile on his face.

“Dear friends,” he started slowly in a dull voice. “I have bad news for you today. The asteroid that had been considered harmless, brought a disaster. Flying past the Earth, it multiplied the gravitation of our planet. It is estimated that about thirty million people were killed within just a few minutes around the world. We mourn the dead. It’s our common pain.” Lowering his head, the president froze for a few seconds and then looked at the camera again. “But the trials and tribulations have not finished yet. The asteroid caused deceleration of the planet. Its rotation on its axis has started to slow down. As a result, the earth day has already become five minutes longer. And, although the asteroid stopped exerting influence on the planet, the deceleration process continues. Most likely, the cause is the Earth’s core. According to scientists from the International Academy of Science, the metal core of the Earth is rotating slower than the mantle and the crust. It is an abnormal phenomenon. There is friction in the bowels of the Earth. It has become a cause of earthquakes and volcanic explosions in different parts of the world already. Seismic activity does not cease, but, on the contrary, increases. Scientists prognosticate that this process will last for some more days – until the rotation speed of the core, the mantle and the crust are synchronized again. I’ll tell you the truth: we’ll have to go through difficult times. It is possible that it will be more dreadful than all the world wars taken together. In such circumstances I am compelled to declare the state of world-wide emergency. All strategic objects will be under protection. All those in need will get help. Relevant instructions have been delivered to the World Government. Take courage – nobody will be left alone to fight against the elements. Together we will overcome these difficulties. I promise!”

The President pronounced the last words with confidence, raising his voice.

An image of the rotating planet appeared with the inscription: “Current earthday: 24 hours 05 minutes 28 seconds”. In a short time digit “28” was replaced by “29”, then by “30”, “31”…

Designation of the time scaled down and moved to the right top corner, and the rest of the image was occupied by a mountain scenery with a magnificent waterfall and birds flitting over it. Flute sounds were heard, the media’s obvious attempt to placate the frightened masses.

“That’s terrible,” Nellie Barkov whispered.

Andrew took her by the hand and repeated CHENG Wenming’s words, “Together we will overcome difficulties. I promise!”

Unexpectedly Emily’s voice came from behind, “In what way, I wonder?”