Roadside Picnic

No, friends, it's hard to describe them to someone who hasn't seen them. They're too simple, especially when you look close and finally believe your eyes. It's like trying to describe a glass to someone: you end up wriggling your fingers and cursing in frustration. OK, let's say you've got it, and those of you who haven't get hold of a copy of the institute's Reports—every issue has an article on the empties with photos.

Kirill had been beating his brains out over the empties for almost a year. I'd been with him from the start, but I still wasn't quite sure what it was he wanted to learn from them, and, to tell the truth, I wasn't trying very hard to find out. Let him figure it out for himself first, and then maybe I'd have a listen. For now, I understood only one thing: he had to figure out, at any cost, what made one of those empties tick—eat through one with acid, squash it under a press, or melt it in an oven. And then he would understand everything and be hailed and honored, and world science would shiver with ecstasy. For now, as I saw it, he had a long way to go. He hadn't gotten anywhere yet, and he was worn out. He was sort of gray and silent, and his eyes looked like a sick dog's—they even watered. If it had been anyone else, I would have gotten him roaring drunk and taken him over to some hard-working girl to unwind. And in the morning I'd have boozed him up again and taken him to another broad, and in a week he would have been as good as new—bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Only that wasn't the medicine for Kirill. There was no point in even suggesting it—he wasn't the type.

So there we were in the repository. I was watching him and seeing what had happened to him, how his eyes were sunken, and I felt sorrier for him than I ever had for anyone. And that's when I decided. I didn't exactly decide, it was like somebody opened my mouth and made me talk.

"Listen,” I said. “Kirill."

And he stood there with his last empty on the scales, looking like he was ready to climb into it.

"Listen,” I said, “Kirill! What if you had a full empty, huh?"

"A full empty?” He looked puzzled.

"Yeah. Your hydromagnetic trap, whatchamacallit … Object 77b. It's got some sort of blue stuff inside."

I could see that it was beginning to penetrate. He looked up at me, squinted, and a glimmer of reason, as he loved to call it, appeared behind the dog tears.

"Hold on,” he said. “Full? Just like this, but full?"

"Yes, that's what I'm saying."

"Where?"

My Kirill was cured. Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. “Let's go have a smoke."

He stuffed the empty into the safe, slammed the door, and locked it with three and a half turns, and we went back into the lab. Ernest pays 400 in cash for an empty empty, and I could have bled him dry, the son of a bitch, for a full one, but believe it or not, I didn't even think about it, because Kirill came back to life before my eyes and bounded down the steps four at a time, not even letting me finish my smoke. In short, I told him everything: what it was like, and where it was, and the best way to get at it. He pulled out a map, found the garage, put his finger on it, and stared at me. Of course, he immediately figured it out about me—what was there not to understand? “You dog, you,” he said and smiled. “Well, let's go for it. First thing in the morning. I'll order the passes and the boot for nine and we'll set off at ten and hope for the best. All right?"

"All right,” I said. “Who'll be the third?"

"What do we need a third for?"

"Oh no,” I said. “This is no picnic with ladies. What if something happens to you? It's in the Zone,” I said. “We have to follow regulations."

He gave a short laugh and shrugged. “As you wish. You know better."

You bet I did! Of course, he was just trying to humor me. The third would be in the way as far as he was concerned. We would run down, just the two of us, and everything would be hunky-dory, no one would suspect anything about me. Except for the fact that I knew that people from the institute didn't enter the Zone in two's. The rule is: two do the work and the third watches, and when they ask him about it later, he tells.

"Personally, I would take Austin,” Kirill said. “But you probably don't want him. Or is it all right?"

"Nope,” I said. “Anybody but Austin. You can take Austin another time."

Austin isn't a bad guy, he's got the right mix of courage and cowardice, but I feel he's doomed. You can't explain it to Kirill, but I can see it. The man thinks he knows and understands the Zone completely. That means he's going to kick off soon. He can go right ahead, but without me, thanks.

"All right, then,” Kirill said. “How about Tender?"

Tender was his second lab assistant. An all-right kind of guy, on the quiet side.

"He's a little old,” I said. “And he has kids."

"That's all right. He's been in the Zone before."

"Fine,” I said. “Let's take Tender."

He stayed to pore over the map and I made a beeline for the Borscht, because I was starving and my throat was parched.