Free Labyrinth of reflections by Sergei Lukyanenko Page B

silent on the table.
    – Oh it feels good… – I whispered into the ceiling.
    I need to change the apartment, to buy the normal one-bedroom in the downtown, in a good brick house, with the view to the Neva river… not in this proletarian district, rotten and blown through by all winds.
    Then we'll move Vika into new 'apartments': I'll buy the new 'Septium' brand name, with preloaded licensed software, with a couple of hundreds Megs of RAM… with the 1000 Terabyte holographic HD, cordless modem and super-sensitive Siemens microphone… with a color printer, Dunn what for, but let it be, a decent scanner instead of the manual piece of shit, a dedicated phone line… Geez, even 50 grands isn't enough!
    On the other hand… why would I need two rooms in the apartment? Even here the kitchen is empty anyway: I moved the fridge and microwave into the room long time ago, and it's closer to get the water in the bathroom.
    Okay, this is decided: let's celebrate the move for Vika. It'll not be a shame to invite friends then.
    I rose, padded to the fridge and took out a can of beer. I don't drink before noon usually, but it's almost 1PM already. What a good time I woke up at!
    The light 'Schultheiss' seemed almost strong in the morning. It's over, good bye 'Amsterdam-Navigator' and 'Bavaria-86', the good friends of poor hackers. From now on – only 'Guinness', 'Heineken', 'Kilkenny'… and instead of Belgian boiled sausage the decent Moscow 'servelat' { raw-smoked hard sausage } and a real ham. And also… well, I'll buy the coffee maker. Down with instant coffee!
    When for the first time in two days I started to shave and cut myself quite tangibly, New Russian's fantasy suggested me to get 'Shick-Protector' also. Nothing else could come into my mind after that, just some messy ideas about the second phone line and second modem – in order for Vika to be able to download mail and do some other simple tasks while I'm traveling in the deep.
    It's a bit far too much though. Even Maniac doesn't have second phone line.
    By the way, I owe him beer, it looks very much like he saved my life yesterday.
    And it's better not to procrastinate with it: I've got the suspicion that I'll be able to treat him with nothing more than just 'Navigator' in a week… well, quite a beer too, a strong one, with original taste…
    I turned the computer on, connected to the Internet and transferred $5000 to my St. Petersburg account without any virtuality, just in 10 minutes. Then I checked my wardrobe, chose the decently fresh shirt and old but clean jeans, put my passport and Visa card in the pocket. What else? Ah yes… the beer.
    The shabby 5 liter canister was standing sadly on the balcony. I unscrewed the cap and sniffed inside: it smelled of soured 'Zhigulevskoe' { classic Russian beer ;-) }. I had to wash the canister in cold water, then in hot one, then in cold again. Then I've put it into the bag that stayed here from previous apartment owners (I never have time to get rid of garbage) and walked out.
    My, how much cleaner and neater my staircase in virtuality is! And unlike here, no eternal smell of flooded basement and stray cats!
    Having left the side streets I stopped by the road and raised my hand; I had to stand like that for quite a time. Finally one junky 'Lada' condescended to stop.
    – To the 'Kredo-Bank', – I said.
    As strange as it seems, the driver knew the way.
    In around 20 minutes, parted with the remains of my cash I was entering the palace of hidden and evident capitals under glassy stares of security guards.. In 20 minutes more, filled with various checkups, numerous phone calls to the bank's main office and requests to specify the account number, the bank clerks became kinder and finally gave me out $1000. In rouble equivalent of course.
    And in quarter of an hour more I entered the Irish pub 'Molly' on 36 Rubinstein Street. It's not too crowded in the daytime and this helped me. The Big Mugs { security guards ;-) } by the