AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Once again, Dmitry Yenin takes the win! That’s six matches now, still undefeated!”
Boris stuffs a wad of bills in my hand, my winnings from the fight.
I don’t care about forty thousand rubles. I won ten times that amount betting on myself. I’ll collect it from Danyl later.
Still, I stuff the money in the pocket of my shorts.
I wince a little as I bend down to pick my hoodie up off the concrete.
Armen is smoking again, while bouncing lightly on his toes to warm up. He’s taken off his hoodie and sweatpants, revealing a truly stunning pair of silk shorts emblazoned with a gold tiger across the crotch.
“Not bad,” he says to me. “Glad I put a whole two thousand on you.”
“Bet Chelovek wishes he did, too.”
“I think Chelovek wishes he never crawled out of his mother’s cunt.” Armen leaks his wheezy laughter.
“Good luck,” I tell him.
“You’re not staying to watch me fight?”
“Nah. You got everything you need to win.”
“Really?” Armen says.
“Yeah. Except speed, stamina, and technique.”
Armen stares at me for a second, then bursts out laughing again.
“Get the fuck outta here,” he snorts.
“You got those shorts at least…”
Armen grins. “That I do.”
I head back down the tunnel, walking along the deserted tracks. I hear Boris’s whistle signaling the start of Armen’s match, and the shouts as his backers cheer him on. The noise fades away as I round a curve in the tunnel.
I pass the staircase that would take me back up to street level. I prefer to walk down to the old Park Kul’tury station and go up from there. This is a more direct route, cutting under the Moskva River. Plus, I like it down in the tunnels. It’s dark and quiet. At some points you can hear the vibration and rushing sounds of the trains passing by on parallel tracks that are still operational. Other spots you can hear the river itself running overhead.
I’ve got my phone out so the screen casts just enough light to see the tracks ahead of me. “Major Tom” plays quietly on my earbuds, my steps falling in time to the beat.
I shut the music off when I hear a scuffling sound up ahead. Not a rat. Something worse than that.
Fucking junkies.
There’s three of them, two men and a woman. If you can even call them that. They look scraggly and feral, and I can smell them from twenty feet away.
Who knows what the fuck they’re doing down here. They’ve got a duffle bag on the ground in the middle of their little huddle, and it looks like they’re pulling things out of it. Probably stolen from somebody on the subway, or on a crowded street up above.
If they’re smart, they’ll let me pass by.
Two of them have the right idea.
But the third stands up, twitchy and bright-eyed.
“Hey,” he says. “Where you goin’?”
I ignore him, continuing to walk past.
