The last bout of summer heat suffocated Ryme City like a wet rag. The air above the asphalt trembled, blurred with haze, and even the mighty Neva, reflecting the gilding of the spires, seemed lazy and sleepy. But here, at the Sennoy Market, there was no time for beauty. Its own, separate life was in full swing here - resonant, spicy, unceremonious.
The air was a thick cocktail of the smell of ripe melons, smoked fish, cheap perfume, and sweat. The shouts of merchants arguing about prices with lively grandmothers merged into a single, incessant hubbub. For Inspector Serpentier, it was a nightmare of sensory overload. Pale, he wiped his neck with his handkerchief and tried to breathe through his mouth, as if afraid to breathe in too much of this motley, noisy reality.
For Police Major Takeshi Ryujin, it was music. Loud, unmelodic, but alive. The music of the city that he thought he knew by heart. He stood with his legs slightly apart, his hands in trousers, and his broad shoulders under a simple gray T-shirt looked like a rock cliff in this sea of people. His gaze, calm and attentive, slid over the faces, snatching out details: here is a student bargaining for a pack of cigarettes, here is a tourist with a map trying to understand where this damned Kazan Cathedral is, and here are three guys at the stall with Chinese phones behaving too... Be quiet.
"Takeshi, maybe that's enough?" Niko pleaded, waving off the annoying fly. "I'm already all wet. There is no trace of robbery here. I just saw the Wall again. He loves to drive us in public so that the reporting is beautiful.
Ryujin did not answer. His eyes caught on the three. They did not look at the goods. Their eyes, quick and nervous, darted around the crowd, looking not for a purchase, but for an opportunity. They saw everyone, but they didn't see him, a big, motionless cop in civilian clothes who blended in with the crowd like a bulldog in a pack of lapdogs.
"Nico," the major's voice was low, without emotion. "Those over there in the blue caps. You see?
Serpentier turned his head lazily.
"Well, they see some rubbish. So what?"
"Hands. Look at your hands."
One of the guys, the skinniest, had his fingers drumming nervously on his thigh. The other kept adjusting the strap of his shoulder bag, which was too tight, too stuffed with something hard. The third, the largest, stood half-turned, covering his comrades, and his gaze was directed not at the tray, but at a girl passing by with an open bag.
It was the silence before the storm. Ryujin could feel it on his skin. The music of the market stopped for him, only the pure rhythm of the impending chase remained.
"Get ready," he said to his partner.
" What should we prepare for? Takeshi, let's go without—" But Niko didn't finish.
The girl with the bag turned away to look at the hanging bundles of bagels. And at that moment, the "skinny" made a rapid movement. A hand darted like a snake's tongue and snatched a purse from her bag. The girl did not feel anything.
But Ryujin felt it.
Time stretched out for him, became viscous as honey. He saw how the purse passed from hand to hand to the "big" one, how he instantly thrust it into his bag, and all three, without agreeing, broke the formation and moved in different directions with quick, but not running steps, dissolving in the crowd. Clean work.
They did not know that they would not be allowed to dissolve.
Ryujin sprang away. His body, which seemed clumsy, was transformed. It was not running, but rather a powerful, swift movement of the stream, sweeping away everything in its path. He didn't run through the crowd, he made the crowd part before him.
"Police!" Get out of my way! His voice, a thunderclap, cut through the hubbub of the market, and people instinctively shied away.
The "big one", hearing the shout, looked back. His face, stupid and impudent, was distorted by surprise and then by fear. He took off, breaking the counter with knitted socks. The old saleswoman shrieked.
"Serpentine!" Block the exit to Sadovaya! Ryujin shouted, without even turning around, and rushed after him.
Adrenaline hit my head, sweet and familiar. There was a strange, perverse order in it. Overtake. Stop. Hold up. Simple, clear rules in a chaotic world. His legs pushed powerfully off the tile, his body worked like a perfect mechanism. He saw only the back of the robber flashing between the people.
The robber, desperate, turned sharply into a narrow passage between the tents, littered with empty boxes. Cul-de-sac. Ryujin picked up his pace with a grin. Fool.
But the "large" one turned out to be not so simple. He sprang up the pile of boxes and they fell apart beneath him, but he kept his balance and jumped onto the awning of the next stall with his caps. The tarpaulin buckled, creaked, but withstood. The seller was yelling something obscene.
"Good," flashed through Ryujin's mind. He was bored with straightforward pursuits.
He did not climb on the boxes. He just went through them. With a run, he crashed into a pile of cardboard, like a battering ram, and flew out from the other side, covered in dust and scraps of tape. The robber, who had already jumped down from the shed, turned to the roar and his eyes rounded with horror. This cop was not a person, but an element.
The chase spilled out of the market onto Sadovaya Street. Siren. Serpentier, out of breath but pleased, drove up in a patrol car, blocking the way. The robber froze in indecision, looking around like a hunted animal.
And then Takeshi made a mistake. He saw in the boy's eyes not just fear, but animal, panicked horror. And slowed down for a moment.
That moment was enough. Desperate, the robber grabbed a vase of gladioli from the stall of an old heavy metal flower girl and threw it into the window of a small jewelry store.
The sound of breaking glass sounded like a gunshot. People on the sidewalk roared, freezing and running away at the same time. The robber, growling, climbed into the resulting opening.
Ryujin's thoughts raced like a bullet. Damage. Reporting. Stein. You can't miss it.
He rushed forward, ignoring the shrapnel. His hand in an iron grip gripped the robber's jacket as he was halfway inside.
"Come out!" The major barked, resting his feet on the asphalt.
"Leave it alone!" He wheezed back, twitching.
A nasty sound of tearing fabric was heard. The jacket parted along the seam. Another moment and it will slip out.
And then Ryujin changed tactics. He did not pull it towards himself. He jerked it *towards himself*, but immediately, using inertia, turned around and threw it with all his power on the hood of the patrol car.
The blow was deafening. The metal buckled with a terrible screech. The robber went limp and groaned. A wallet fell out of his bag and... a pack of cigarettes.
Everything fell silent. For a second. Then there was an uproar—indignant shouts, exclamations of admiration, the howl of a siren. Serpentier ran up, pale as a sheet.
"Did you kill him?" He whispered, looking at the dent on the hood.
"Alive," Ryujin snapped, breathing heavily. He picked up his purse and glanced at the shattered window. Inside, the seller huddled frightened. The cost of the damage was probably many times higher than the cost of the stolen. Commissioner Stein will be furious.
A second car drove up. The routine began: protocols, explanations, witness testimony. The girl who had received her wallet back was crying and trying to hug Ryujin. He pulled away awkwardly.
Half an hour later, he arrived at the place himself. Commissioner Emil Stein walked out of his official Volkswagen with a face on which everything was written: anger, disappointment, and above all, fear of paperwork.
"Ryujin," his voice was hissing and quiet, which was much more terrifying than a scream. "Major Ryujig." Explain to me. Explain how a brilliant operation to apprehend a pickpocket turns into... in this? He gestured broadly to the shattered window, the crumpled patrol car, and the crowd of onlookers filming everything on their phones.
"He resisted, Comrade Commissar," Ryujin replied in a muffled voice, looking past the chief.
"Resistance?" He resisted, and did you turn on the tank? Stein stepped closer, lowering his voice to a venomous whisper. "For a minute, we don't have Chicago in the nineties!" We have a city-museum! Tourists! Reputation! Do you have any idea how many reports I have to write now? How many explanatory statements will the prosecutor's office ask from you and Serpentier? Did you even think with your head?
Ryujin was silent. He thought. He thought about the fact that the guy could run away. And rob someone else tomorrow. And the day after tomorrow. And so - he was detained. He is in handcuffs. Justice has triumphed. What difference does it make, in what way?
"Your methods are outdated, Ryujin," Stein gasped, looking at the dent in the machine. — The XXI century is in the yard. There are cameras, there is surveillance, there are protocols. No more breaking people's ribs and smashing stores to catch some punks. I got it?
"Yes, sir," the major replied automatically.
"Not 'exactly'! The commissar broke down into shouting again. "Take the recordings from the cameras!" Find a store owner! Calm him down, promise that the city will compensate for the damage! And so that I don't see you again in such situations! Draw up everything according to the charter! Clearly! I see?!
"I see, Comrade Commissar."
Stein shook his head once more in contrition and drove away, leaving behind a trail of expensive perfume and general gloom.
Niko approached Ryujin when it was dark and the crowd had dispersed. The two of them were left at the dented car.
"Well, Takeshi? How do you feel? Has justice been served?" Serpentier's voice sounded tired irony.
Ryujin stared silently at the shards of glass gleaming under the lanterns. Somewhere inside, a familiar, cold ember of anger burned. Not at the commissar. Not at the robber. For all this senseless fuss.
"He said," Grom said quietly, more to himself, "that this is all a fool's tale."
"Who? Stein?"
" No, I don't. That guy. On the hood. When I drove him. He said: "All of you, garbage, are here like in a fairy tale. The rich are getting richer, the poor are getting poorer, and you invent villains to make you feel like heroes. He said that we were guarding a system that had rotted away a long time ago."
Nico snorted.
"So what? Every second detainee talks such nonsense. Justified. Is this the first time you've heard of it?"
Ryujin turned to him. His face was serious and tired in the light of the lantern.
" No, I don't. Not for the first time. But today... Today I looked at this window. And I thought about it. The cost of the damage is the annual salary of that old flower girl. Or that salesperson from the store. And I became interested... And who is the real villain here? He? Or me, who climbed to catch him, demolishing everything in my path?"
Serpentier looked at him with genuine amazement.
"Takeshi, are you out of your mind? Are you seriously listening to some scum? He's a criminal!"
"Yes," Ryujin agreed quietly. "But that doesn't mean he's wrong.
He sighed, raked his face with his powerful hands.
"All right. Forget it. It is raining. It's time to wrap up."
He looked up at the dark, gloomy sky over the illuminated palaces and smoky roofs. The city was beautiful, like an illustration from a book. And just as far from the truth that swarmed in its alleyways.
"A fairy tale for fools," he thought again.
He did not yet know that very soon there would be someone who would decide to end this fairy tale. And a real thunderstorm will begin.