The Twilight Watch (38 page)

But it was all non-life. It was all borrowed and stolen, and when
Kostya died, his body would instantly crumble to dust . . . because
it had already been dead for a long, long time.

We're all condemned to death from the moment we're born.

But at least we can live until we die.

'Leave me alone with Anton,' Gesar said. 'I'll try to prepare him.'

I heard Zabulon and Edgar stand up. They went out into the
corridor. There was a rustling sound – Gesar had evidently shielded
us against observation. And then he asked:

'Are you suffering?'

'No.' I shook my head without opening my eyes. 'I'm thinking.
Kostya tried not to behave like a vampire, after all . . .'

'And what conclusions have you reached?'

'He won't be able to hold on.' I opened my eyes and looked
at Gesar. 'He won't be able to hold on, he'll lose control. He's
managed to subdue the physiological need for living blood, but
as for all the rest . . . he's non-life among the living and that's a
torment to him. Sooner or later Kostya will lose control.'

Gesar waited.

'He's already lost control,' I said. 'When he killed Witiezslav and
the Inquisitors . . . one of the Inquisitors was a Light One, right?'

Gesar nodded.

'I'll do the right thing,' I promised. 'I feel sorry for Kostya, but
there's nothing to be done.'

'I have faith in you, Anton,' Gesar said. 'Now tell me what you
really wanted to ask.'

'What keeps you in the Night Watch, boss?'

Gesar smiled.

'When you get right down to it, we're all tarred with the same
brush,' I said. 'We don't fight the Dark Ones, we fight the ones
that even the Dark Ones reject – the psychopaths, the maniacs,
the lawless ones. For obvious reasons there are more of them
among the vampires and the werewolves. The Dark Ones do the
same . . . the Day Watch hunts the Light Ones who want to do
good to everyone all at once . . . in other words, the ones who
might reveal our existence to human beings. The Inquisitors supposedly
stand above the fray, but what they actually do is make sure
the Watches don't take their functions too seriously. Make sure the
Dark Ones don't attempt to gain formal control over the human
world and the Light Ones don't try to wipe out the Dark Ones
completely . . . Gesar, the Night Watch and the Day Watch are
just two halves of a single whole!'

Gesar just looked at me for a while without saying anything.

'Were things . . . deliberately arranged that way?' I asked. Then
I answered my own question. 'I guess they were. The young ones,
the newly initiated Others, might not have accepted a single Watch
for Light Ones and Dark Ones: I can't do that – go out on patrol
with a vampire! I would have been outraged by that myself . . .
And so two Watches were set up, the lower ranks hunt each other
fervently, the leaders plot and intrigue – out of sheer boredom –
just to keep up appearances. But it's a joint leadership.'

Gesar sighed and took out a cigar. He cut its tip and lit it.

'And like a fool,' I muttered, still looking at Gesar, 'I always used
to wonder how we managed to survive at all. The watches of
Samara, of Novogorod Veliky, of little Kireevsky village in the
Tomsk region. All supposedly independent. But basically, when
there's any kind of problem, they come running to us, to Moscow
. . . Okay, the arrangement's not de jure, it's all de facto – but the
Moscow Watch runs all the Watches in Russia.'

'And in three of the newly independent states . . .' Gesar
added. He blew out a stream of smoke, which gathered into a
dense cloud in mid-air, rather than dispersing throughout the
compartment.

'So what comes next?' I asked. 'How do the independent Watches
of Russia and, say, Lithuania, interact? Or Russia, Lithuania, the
USA and Uganda? In the human world what happens is clear
enough, whoever has the biggest stick and the thickest wallet calls
the tune. But the Russian Watches are stronger than the American
ones. I even think . . .'

'The strongest is the French Watch,' Gesar said, sounding bored.
'Strong, but extremely lazy. An amazing phenomenon. We can't
understand what the reason is – it can't just be a matter of
consuming massive quantities of dry wine and oysters . . .'

'The Watches are run by the Inquisition,' I said. 'It doesn't settle
disputes, it doesn't punish renegades, it runs things. It gives permission
for one social experiment or another, it appoints and removes
the leaders . . . it transfers them from Uzbekistan to Moscow . . .
There's one Inquisition, with two operational agencies. The Night
Watch and the Day Watch. The Inquisition's only goal is to maintain
the existing status quo, because victory for the Dark Ones or
the Light Ones means defeat for the Others in general.'

'And what else, Anton?' Gesar asked.

I shrugged.

'What else? Nothing else. People get on with their little human
lives and enjoy their little human joys. They feed us with their
bodies . . . and provide new Others. The Others who are less
ambitious live almost ordinary lives. Only their lives are more
prosperous, healthier and longer than ordinary people's. Those
who just can't live without excitement, who long for battles
and adventures, and struggle for ideals – they join the Watches.
The ones who are disillusioned with the Watches join the
Inquisition.'

'And? . . .' Gesar asked, encouraging me to continue.

'What are you doing in the Night Watch, boss?' I asked. 'Aren't
you sick of it yet . . . after thousands of years?'

'Let's just say that after all this time I still enjoy battles and
adventures,' Gesar said.

I shook my head.

'Boris Ignatievich, I don't believe you. I've seen you when you're
. . . different. Too weary. Too disillusioned.'

'Then let's assume that I'd really like to finish off Zabulon,'
Gesar said calmly.

I thought for a second.

'That's not it either. In hundreds of years one of you would
have finished off the other already. Zabulon said that fighting with
magic is like swordplay. Well, you're not fighting with swords,
you're fencing with blunt rapiers. You claim a hit, but you don't
really wound your opponent.'

Gesar nodded and paused before speaking. Another dense stream
of tobacco smoke joined the blue-grey cloud.

'What do you think, Anton, is it possible to live for thousands
of years and still feel the same pity for people?'

'Pity?'

Gesar nodded.

'Precisely pity. Not love – it's beyond our power to love the
entire world. And not admiration – we know only too well what
human beings are like'

'It probably is possible to pity them,' I said. 'But what good is
your pity, boss? It's pointless, barren. Others don't make the human
world any better.'

'We do, Anton. No matter how bad things still are. Trust an old
man who's seen a lot.'

'But even so . . .'

'I'm waiting for a miracle, Anton.'

I looked at Gesar quizzically.

'I don't know exactly what kind of miracle. For all people to
acquire the abilities of Others. For all Others to become human
again. For a day when the dividing line won't run between Other
and human being, but between good and evil.' Gesar smiled gently.
'I have absolutely no idea how anything of the sort could ever
happen, or if it ever will. But if it ever does . . . I prefer to be on
the side of the Night Watch. And not the Inquisition – the mighty,
ingenious, righteous, all-powerful Inquisition.'

'Maybe Zabulon's waiting for the same thing?'

Gesar nodded.

'Perhaps. I don't know. But better an old enemy you know than
a young, unpredictable freak. You can call me a conservative, but
I prefer rapiers with Zabulon to baseball bats with a progressive
Dark Magician.'

'And what would you advise me to do?'

Gesar shrugged and spread his hands.

'What advice would I give you? Make up your own mind. You
can get out and have an ordinary life. You can join the Inquisition
. . . I wouldn't object if you did. Or you can stay in the Night
Watch.'

'And wait?'

'And wait. Preserve the part of you that's still human. Avoid
falling into ecstatic raptures and trying to impose the Light on
people when they don't want it. Avoid relapsing into contemptuous
cynicism, imagining that you are pure and perfect. That's
the hardest thing of all – never to become cynical, never to lose
faith, never to become indifferent.'

'Not a huge choice . . .' I said.

'Ha!' Gesar said, smiling. 'Just be glad that there's any choice at all.'

The suburbs of Saratov sped by outside the windows. The train
was slowing down.

I was sitting in an empty compartment, watching the pointer.

Kostya was still following us.

What was he expecting?

Arbenin's voice sang in my earphones:

From deception to deception
Only manna pours down from the sky.
From siesta to siesta
They feed us only manifestos.
Some have gone, some have left.
I have only made a choice.
And I sense it with my back:
We are different, we are other.

I shook my head. It should be 'We are Others'. But even if we
were to disappear, everyone would still be divided into ordinary
people and Others. No matter how those Others were different.

People can't get by without Others. Put two people on an uninhabited
island, and you'll have a human being and an Other. And
the difference is that an Other is always tormented by his Otherness.
It's easier for ordinary people. They know they're human, and that's
what they ought to be. They have no choice but to be that way.
All of them, forever.

We stand in the centre,
We blaze like a fire on an ice floe
And try to warm ourselves,
Disguising the means with the goal.
Burning through to our souls
In meditative solitude.

The door opened and Gesar came into the compartment. I
pulled the earphones out of my ears.

'Look.' Gesar put his palm-held computer on the table. There
was a dot crawling across the map on the screen – our train. Gesar
glanced at the compass, nodded and confidently marked a thick
line on the screen with his stylus.

'What's that?' I asked, looking at the point that Kostya's trajectory
was heading for. I guessed the answer myself: 'An airport?'

'Exactly. He's not hoping for negotiations.' Gesar laughed. 'He's
making a dash straight for the airport.'

'Is it military?'

'No, civilian. But what's the difference? He has the piloting
templates.'

I nodded. For 'backup' all operational agents carried a collection
of useful skills – the ability to drive a car, fly a plane or a
helicopter, emergency medical knowledge, martial arts . . .Of course
the template didn't provide perfect skills, an experienced driver
would overtake an Other with a driving template, a good doctor
would operate far more skilfully. But Kostya could get any kind
of aircraft into the air.

'Surely that's a good thing,' I said. 'We'll send up the jet fighters
and . . .'

'What if there are passengers?' Gesar asked sharply.

'It's still better than the train,' I said quietly. 'Fewer casualties.'

That very moment I felt an odd twinge of pain somewhere
deep inside. It was the first time I'd ever weighed human casualties
on the invisible scales of expediency and decided one side
was lighter than the other.

'That's no good . . .' said Gesar, and then added: 'Fortunately.
What does he care if the plane's destroyed? He'll just transform
into a bat and fly down.'

The station platform appeared outside the window. The train
blew its whistle as it slowed to a halt.

'Ground-to-air nuclear missiles,' I said stubbornly.

Gesar looked at me in amazement.

'Where from? The nuclear warheads were all removed years ago.
Except for the air defence units around Moscow . . . but he won't
go to Moscow.'

'Where will he go?' I asked expectantly.

'How should I know? It's your job to make sure he doesn't get
anywhere,' Gesar snapped. 'That's it! He's stopped!'

I looked at the compass. The distance between us and Kostya
had started to increase. He'd been flying as a bat, or running along
as the Grey Wolf from the fairy tale, but now he'd stopped.

The interesting thing was that Gesar hadn't even looked at the
compass.

'The airport,' Gesar said, sounding pleased. 'Okay, no more talk.
Go. Requisition someone with a good car and get to that airport
fast.'

'But . . .' I began.

'No artefacts, he'll sense them,' Gesar retorted calmly. 'And no
one else goes with you. He can sense all of us now, you understand?
All of us. So get a move on!'

The brakes hissed and the train came to a halt. I paused for a
moment in the doorway and heard him say:

'Yes, stick to the "grey prayer". Don't make things complicated.
We'll pump you so full of Power he'll be splattered across the airport.'

That was it. Apparently the boss was so fired up I didn't even
have to say anything to him – he could hear my thoughts before
they were formulated in words.

In the corridor I walked past Zabulon, and couldn't help shuddering
when he gave me an encouraging slap on the shoulder.

Zabulon didn't take offence. He just said:

'Good luck, Anton! We're counting on you!'

The passengers were sitting quietly in their compartments. The
chief conductor was the only one who watched me go, with a
glassy stare, as he made an announcement into a microphone.

I opened the door into the lobby at the end of the carriage,
lowered the step and jumped down onto the platform. Everything
was moving fast somehow. Too fast . . .

There was the usual bustle in the station. A noisy group tumbled
out of the next carriage, and one of them bellowed: 'Now, where
are all those grannies with our favourite stuff?'