"Major Degtyarev?" Dmitry repeated the name. "Never heard of him."
"Well, of course, you didn't," Sokolov scoffed. "Because he's a spy. Some big shot sent him into the Zone to recover the downed aircrews and whatnot. These are from Pripyat?"
"Y-yes, Sir," the senior officer stuttered, eyeing Yuri's shotgun. "A guy named Strelok had—"
"We," the Captain interrupted. "Konrad, Strelok, and I helped them escape. And not kill them, as your spy friend claimed. Same with the Wolves. We didn't kill a single one of our friends."
No shots fired so far, but the atmosphere was definitely tense.
"Friends?" the leader of the Wolves scoffed, for one. "I have no recollection of ever meeting you or this Konrad guy. But I have seen my comrades murdered by that farmhouse, and—"
"Okay, hold on," the Corporal demanded, raising a hand. "What do you mean, no recollection?"
And yeah. The fact that Konrad's parallel brain erased Yuri's memories didn't help, either.
He would have loved to explain, but Dmitry didn't understand it at all.
"You have met before," Sokolov was trying to convince the tiny but fierce leader. "By the time you ran into each other at the mobile lab, you had already called Konrad the Hero of Garbage."
How much of his memories did that thing delete, anyway?
The goal was to make him forget about that massacre and return to the Bar somehow, but—
"What are you even talking about?!" Yuri protested. "Why would I call him that?"
"Because of all the Artifacts he found there," the Corporal grunted. "I told you that Major was messing with your head. See, they didn't kill the soldiers, either, but rescued them. Your men—"
He couldn't continue, but his stare landed on the severed head, still in Dmitry's hands.
"Where is this Major Degtyarev, anyway?" he broke the heavy silence. "These are the airmen he wanted. I'm sure they could clear things up as soon as he asked them."
But Sokolov let out a long sigh.
"Well, that's the thing," he said. "He disappeared. I told him we're too close to the Anomaly Field, but he knew better. And right when we saw you leave the town—poof, he was gone."
Ugh. Wasn't that great?!
"Why didn't you guys try to find him, instead of, uhh—"
He realized halfway through what that soft ping the soldiers asked about was.
And given how the PDAs worked—
"We were looking, but we stumbled into you first," the Corporal said, and yep, that's exactly what he had expected, too. "Look, I do believe you. More than I'd believe the Major, but—"
Another unfinished sentence, but now he had a good reason to shut up.
Someone fired a shot in the darkness, and he could even hear a bullet zip past his ears.
It wasn't Yuri's shotgun. It would have ripped his head off, even if he missed.
Not the soldiers, either, but—
"Get down," Sokolov yelled, dropping his expensive Gepard in the process.
More shots. Different direction. Full auto.
But the aiming—
"Zombies?" Dmitry grunted, crawling on the ground.
He still had his Krinkov, and he could return fire, but—
"I saw a white camo," the Corporal whispered, pointing left. "But there is a new dot on my PDA on the right, too. Could be zombies, but we thwarted their efforts to restart the Brain Scorcher."
"Thwarted?!" the Captain whisper-shouted.
This was the first time he heard about anyone trying to restart that thing.
And they only dealt with it yesterday.
No. Hold on. That wasn't important now.
"It could be a fucking Controller again," he gritted out. "Remember that farmhouse? Lots of blood, not enough corpses. It was already like that before, you know—that massacre."
His first thought back then was that something ate the dead.
But since he said both the Monolith and some Stalkers were shooting at them right now—
"It must be puppeting those bastards against us."
That definitely proved his earlier point, but he'd rather they didn't believe him.
"So what?" Yuri gritted out. "We only have to kill the zombies, and—"
"The Controller would take over us as well," Dmitry grunted. "I take it none of you have a Psy Dampener. And those fuckers are tough. I took one out with the Gepard before, but—"
"Yeah, sorry, no ammo for it," Sokolov admitted, his head swiveling as he scanned the darkness.
Great. He could have survived that mutant thanks to his shield, but—
'No. Actually, it's in my way,' a familiar voice claimed. 'Unless you consent. Then I can bypass it.'
"Consent to what?" the Captain repeated, earning a few curious glances.
Right. If this was Konrad's parallel brain, he was the only one hearing it right now.
But that meant he was still within his range? He had already forgotten about it.
'Consent to take over that Controller and release the zombies, of course,' the voice boomed.
He could do that from so far?!
'Through your mind, yes,' the brain claimed, urging him. 'So? Come on, do you consent or not? I have a Teleportation Field to hijack as well, you know. Don't have all day.'
Ugh. Yeah. He promised updates, but—
"Yes. Do it," he gritted out. "I consent."
And damned be those weird glances he got.
Dmitry felt like a strange power was welling up inside him. Not one he could control—or even rein in his own body for a few uncomfortable moments. But he didn't have to.
He stood up in the middle of the darkness and crossfire, yet no bullet came anywhere close.
'Seems like I found it,' the voice claimed, and—
Ripped his consciousness away from his body.
He was speeding through the darkness without his legs moving an inch, and a moment later—
Yeah. He could see it, too.
Another big-headed bastard, staring at its own extended arm while zombies shuffled around.
Then, as if it had noticed him, too, it scowled, fingers trembling, but—
'Don't worry, I won't let him touch you,' the parallel brain hollered. 'How about I make his own zombies turn him into Swiss cheese instead?!'
And when the Controller felt the change in its environment, its milky eyes went wide.
Nothing he could do at that point.
As Dmitry had no control over where his consciousness had gone—
The mutant could no longer control its men, either. The Captain watched in horror as half a dozen gun barrels had turned towards him. They all fired without hesitation, and—
He was back in his own body, shaken but unharmed, blinking in confusion.
'I'll leave the rest to you,' the voice boomed, already fading. 'Things got a little hectic on my end.'
And it was gone.
Dmitry's ears were ringing, his sight a bit blurry, and his head wanted to explode, but—
He was alive, standing where he stood a moment ago, and the others were still staring at him.
"What the fuck, man? Do you want to get shot?!" Sokolov finally yelled, grabbing his arm and yanking him back down to the ground. "Even if they can't aim for shit, one stray bullet, and—"
"They're gone," the Captain interrupted, pointing out the obvious. "The Controller is dead, too."
"Wha—how?!"
Hah. As if he could explain. Not even if he wanted to, but—
Yeah, no. He'd keep this to himself until the day he died.