everything. That's right, the government is no fool, they don't make laws out of their fingers.
I picked up a branch and poked the crow. That's it, I think it's ready. I took the bucket off the fire, poked the carcass with a stick, took it out, blew on it.
Mmm, tasty, damn! I burned myself and ripped off the thigh... this chicken is three hundred years old! As they say, a crow and water is a scrapper's meal.
After eating the crow, I swallowed the bones and leaned back on a bed of dry leaves. If I had listened to Sickelove, it would have been like going to heaven. Every day I could fill my belly like that... or at least once a week! Dreams... Hopefully, when Yellowstone blows up in America and the Russophobes don't have a clue about us, the U.S. will stop throwing knives in the wheels of our economy. That's when we'll be better off! I'll eat crows every day, we'll build fly larvae farms in all the villages, and most importantly - we'll have plenty of coupons, at least buy a bucket, at least an enamel basin, and all sorts of clothes... I'll buy sneakers, Chinese... and a sweatshirt... and I'll have dead wood to eat with my ass!
Dreams don't make it to the regional capital. I waited till the broth got cold. I drank as much as I could, poured the rest into one and a half cups.
I had walked another fifteen kilometers when the sun was inclined to the horizon. In two hills there would be Flyfuckers village - it's better not to go there in the evening, it's a dead-end place. I'd better stay here for the night. Panting and whimpering in pain, I crawled on my hands and knees, scraped up some weeds, made a tent, climbed in, packed the entrance, lay down on my belly and fell into darkness.
All night long I dreamt about something murky. I woke up in the morning from the cold, realizing that I would not sleep. I crawled out of my hole, took my bucket and stick and waddled southward, in the direction of Abitofadrag town.
The sun was a couple of feet above the horizon when I saw something shiny ahead on the road. Far away, I couldn't see, but something quite interesting. A few minutes later, when I got closer, I saw it was Boogieman with his cart. Fucking hell, that's all I needed!
Boogieman, yes, yes, that's right. Not the Boogieman the monster they scare kids with, but the real Boogieman, the one our whole ass-kicking neighborhood is afraid of. Boogieman took him, Boogieman took him, Boogieman took him away... It's not just scare stories. Boogieman only carries on his cart those cross-dressers who have been redirected to paradise. They're all dead. I mean, they're completely dead. He takes them to the fly larvae farm. A long time ago, I don't remember how many years ago, the State Duma passed a law "On Prohibiting the Destruction of Bioresources. They said - we do not have the right to throw away natural resources, which God gave to our great superpower. And they banned burying the dead. If a dead body dies, turn it over to a fly larvae farm. The fines for hiding corpses are not childish, if you can't pay - hello, Ministry of Health and Drug Control, where they will quickly cut something off to account for the fine. But if you hand over a corpse, they give you coupons for dried grenade. By the way, you can go straight to the fly larvae farm. The price is one-tenth of what you pay: If you sell a 50 kilo corpse, you get five kilos of this tasty nourishing product. Fallows - this is not a swan, yeah. Protein is pure, it quickly makes your face round and gives you strength.
They haven't built a fly nursery in our area yet, so the nearest one is in Nemnopoterpitseevsk, and you'd better try to finish off a corpse there... you'll get skinned. It's almost fifty kilometers from our settlement, and from Zhopolizov it's more than a hundred.
That's why there are carts with corpse carriers going to villages and villages. Boogieman is assigned to our district. He has a noble metal cart - the kind used to be in supermarkets. Boogieman charges a small fee, 30% of the weight. He works honestly, you can't get that away from him - he takes away the corpse, and in three days he brings back the worms just in tic-tac-toe. But it's bad luck to meet him. Well, forget it, those superstitions. The priest at church said that all these omens are from obscurantism and that I should go to church more often and light candles so as not to be afraid of the dark forces.
Apparently, the bogeyman has turned his paws up and is taking him to his last journey...
- Hey, you, stop right there! What the fuck you got in your mouth? Where you going?
I spit out a pain stick.
- It's a pain medication the doctor prescribed. I'm going to Abitofadrag town.
- It's on the way. How about this: we go together, you help me a little, I'll feed you, we'll bring some dead fish to the fly larvae farm, I'll give you some grouse. Or with coupons.
- I'm not much of a helper after surgery.
- You'll hold the cart in front, so it won't tip over on the bumps and bumps. Nothing heavy.
- All right.
- Put a bucket over the dead man's head. What you got in there, a can and a half? Throw it in the cart.
I did as Boogieman said, grabbed the body wagon with my hand, and off we went. Poor Boogieman, how did he carry it? The cart rattled and bounced, trying to get over every bump and bump.
- Don't worry, in half a kilometer there'll be an exit to a field road - it goes along the highway. It hadn't rained in a while, it was perfect.
I couldn't hold on to the corpse at the next bump in the road, and it went sideways. The body fell out of the basket, the bucket rumbled, the cans rolled to the ditch.
- What the fuck? - The Boogieman yelled. - Don't sell your fucking face! All right, put the cart down.
I did, and we took the dead man by the arms and legs and threw him in the cart. It was a heavy scrapper, 60 kilos, though you couldn't tell from the look of it. The dead man's skin was covered with zonal tattoos. The man had had a hard life.
- You see, that's how it is: you live and live, everybody loves you and respects you, and then, suddenly, you went to feed the maggots. The people loved him, the whole village saw him off.
- And who's that?
- The chairman from Golokhuyevka. He was a good man. I spent time with him on Shinka, I've known him for a long time. A fair man. People respected him very much - when he got sick, the men carried him to the hospital in the district center.
- And what happened to him?
- Who knows, probably appendicitis. Your district doctor only knows how to squeeze boils and cut out organs. He said right away - medicine is powerless here, take the patient to church. And the priest already made a diagnosis - it was intestine demons, he said, and he needed 50 candles and an exorcism rite. The whole village bought candles, but all the same, the poor guy died.
-At our place, no one will take Semenych to the hospital. Everyone is just waiting for him to die.
- Ha-ha, wait, wait! It's your destiny to wait and wait. If this Semenych dies, they'll bring you another one.
- Maybe they'll bring you a good one.
- So what? If you bring anyone, he'll be Semenych in half a year. What's wrong with your chairman, anyway?
- He's an outlaw, he does what he wants. He'll whip whoever he wants, for the slightest faults... with a whip...
- Don't you let him do all that? You run around snitching on each other, licking his ass. When Semenych chooses someone for a harem, have you ever stood up for him? You sit there shaking: "I wish it wasn't me..." He'll blow you all up sooner or later, because he loves it. Do you think a good chairman fell from the sky in Golokhuyevka? The men there burned the first head, appointed from above, along with the house, as soon as he bent his fingers. The FSB wouldn't leave the village for a month, and no one turned anyone in. And they gave the second head a black eye and he fled on his own. No one went to them to govern, and in the end, they were allowed to choose the chairman themselves. What about you? When Semenych suggested making a harem with faggots in the village, didn't you clap your hands: "Well done, Semenych, a wise scrapper"? And didn't you yourself appoint the first roosters? You chose two men, the weakest and harmless ones, and said: "Semenych, you are the most cocksuckers, cock them. You're all devils in the village, the only man you had was Fedka. How many times he proposed to punish Semenych, and what did you do? Did you support him? No, you ran around snitching on Fedya, saying he was stirring things up. Fedya couldn't stand your stupidity, so he left. But you tolerate it. You'll bear it and keep the Vaseline with you...
I walked with my head hanging down. Boogieman, you can't tell anything... Bad man, hard man.
- Father said that power is given by God as a reward or for sins...
- Ha-ha, for sins... God gives... For your stupidity and cowardice, power is yours!
After half a kilometer, there was indeed an exit, and there was a well-paved field road. The cadaver carriage was a breeze, it was breathtaking and my lower back ached.
- Well, Scrapie, be patient for a while, and you'll ride in my cart! - Boogieman laughed again.
Fucking hilarious. Comedian, bitch. Garik fucking Batrutdinov.
- I'm light, not like that big guy," I nodded my head at the deadbeat, "I'm like 50 kilos at the most.
- I'll put stones in your ass and you'll pull it on the scale," Boogieman laughed again. - By that time, your Semenych will have worked your asshole so that bricks will fit through.
Bitch, he's a joker.
- Boogieman," I said loudly, "aren't you afraid of God? You say all sorts of nasty things and you're not afraid?
- Why should I be afraid of him? I've never asked him for anything, and I don't believe in him at all. I hope he doesn't believe in me either.
How the fuck do you get rid of a man like that? Boogieman is Boogieman, nothing sacred.
In the afternoon we crossed a small stream. There used to be a bridge over it, but during a period of bridge falls in the early twenties, the concrete crossing collapsed. Fortunately, the river was not deep and only became a problem during floods. The cart was sticking with its small wheels in the muddy bottom, but with double strength we dragged the body-carrier to the other bank and sat down to rest.
Boogieman took a packet of cookies and a can of stew out of his bag. I stared at the treasure with my eyes wide open.
- Boogieman... You... you... Where did you get that?
- Where I got it, you're not supposed to know.
- Boogieman, how, where?!
- It's humanitarian aid from our sworn enemies that we want to bomb.
- Boogieman, why doesn't anyone know about this aid? Why don't we get it?
- You're not supposed to. You have to be patient, you're great martyrs, you have to suffer and then go to heaven. You don't have a cup, I take it? Well, I'll leave it in a jar.
My stomach rumbled and growled as Boogieman ate the stew, occasionally crunching the cookies. Finally, the torment was over, and the rural Hades handed me the can and a packet of cookies... Divine... Maybe Fedka was right about God.
I ate, smacking and slurping. Heavenly bliss... Meat, real meat... Damn Americans, how I hate them! They're making fun of us, the bastards sent us stew, real stew. We don't need their handouts... Mmm, it's delicious... I wish they'd bomb Yellowstone, the whole world was ripped off by those bastards... And those cookies! Real wheat, I bet...
- Boogieman, why don't the yankees send so much humanitarian aid that no one gets it?
- They don't send enough? The yankees send it all right, and the chinese send it too, the whole world sends it.
- Where is it?
- Where is it? The one that goes to the region, the governor partially sells it to Mongolia. And what he can't sell, they bulldoze it at the dump.
- They bulldoze the food?
- Yeah, what do you expect? Destroying food is a spiritual staple. It's the nation's identity line, a tradition since Soviet rebranding. And destroying humanitarian aid is good for our economy. If we start feeding you, scrappers, for free now, you will go completely fucking nuts, abandon the fly larvae farms, and stop loading the soil into containers. You can't be fed.
The Boogieman laughed.
- I feel sorry for you motherfuckers. Here you are, you're a vegetable, a potato in a hole. You live in the dark and you can't see anything around you, and you're surrounded by the same kind of brother-vegetables, all alike. You believe in some kind of God or leader, you keep asking them for something, praying to them. But they don't give a shit about you. Maybe they don't even exist. Maybe it's a figment of your imagination, have you thought about that? You only believe to make it easier to tolerate. Tell me, you scrapper, how are you different from a pig?
- Well, actually, it's an offensive comparison.
- And yet?
-Well, because I'm human: I wash, I work, I can read, I think with my head...
- You're thinking with your head, you're a brace. If you were thinking with your head, you wouldn't be loading soil into a container with a wooden shovel. You're different from a pig, you're different from a pig, because the owner, before he slaughters the pig, feeds it for a long time, fattens it up. But your master only fucks you up and feeds you to those staples that died before you did. You, staple, are no longer the top of the food chain. The chain is closed, there is no top in it: you eat the maggots, and the maggots eat you. And you got to this point on your own, with your own feet, because you didn't want to think. You motherfuckers are used to having someone think for you and tell you what you want to know.
- That's a terrible thing to say, Boogieman. The devil sent you.
- The devil sent me! You're a fool. And what a shame, you'll die a fool...
We sat for a while, then Boogieman got up, got a big dirty rag from somewhere, soaked it in the river and covered the corpse. We moved on.
We walked in silence for a while, with the wheels of the carcass truck constantly rattling.
- Boogieman, - I said, - if you're so smart, why aren't you the mayor or Coksuck chieftain or at least the chairman? Why do you carry corpses?
- You know, you're a scrapper, I already owe it to eternity. My conscience does not allow me to destroy you harmless vegetables. I don't want to take any part in it at all. And I see no point in sticking up for you - you do not remember good as well as evil. You just do not understand it.
- You're a scary man, Boogieman. Listening to you as bathing in shit.
In the evening, we turned to a hole not far from the road, where among the thickets of maple trees, so that we could not see it from the road, there was a hut made of some rotten planks. The hut was two meters by two meters, with a low ceiling that was the roof of the structure. The walls on the inside were lined with boxes. An soilen floor, a small window covered with cellophane, and a fireplace in the corner.
- The Boogieman, you are, eh, the landlord? There's an iron stove over there - you're living the luxurious life, though.
- If you say anything about the cabin, I'll kill you. It's not mine. The people you call cannibals lived here.
- Lived here? What happened to them? Were they caught?
- Ha-ha, who's going to catch them? They left, closer to civilization - to Mongolia.
There was a table, a bed, and a long bench along the wall. Boogieman stoked the stove with the wood that was in the corner, then he got galettes and a can of stew. We had a hearty supper.
- If you're going to fit in here without me, leave the wood. There's a drawer under the bed, and there's salt and matches. Fall down on the bench, I'll wake you up early in the morning.
I lay down, stretching to my full height, and closed my eyes. The stove was pleasantly crackling.
- Boogieman, are you serious about the stones?
- What rocks?
- What are you gonna shove up my ass when I'm dead?
- What's it to you, you won't be here?
- What do you mean, ashamed...
- In front of whom? The maggots?
- No, what's that got to do with maggots? Just how am I going to get to heaven if you're going to shove rocks up my ass? And how am I going to stand before God, he sees everything, right?
- Don't panic, there is no God. Go back to sleep.
You made me feel better, damn it...
Fedka stood there chewing. How long can he chew, the bastard? Although I could probably eat kilbasa forever, too.
- Fedya, Boogieman said that there is no God, and you say that he is a kilbasa. Which of you is right, who should we believe?
Fedka chewed, swallowed, and answered:
- Boogieman is right: there is no God, but He is a kilbasa.
- How is that? - I was surprised.
- That's how. God - a voluntary thing. Boogieman's God is not: He exists, but He doesn't exist. But for me, God is a kilbasa, and He doesn't exist either for you or for Boogieman. But for me He is, because I strive for Him.
- Who is God to me, then?
- And you are a dumb shithead, for you God is whatever you are told to be.