The light in the apartment was on, but Zhenya was not in the rooms. I carefully laid Lisa on the sofa in my room, after which I immediately closed the window with thick curtains. The windows of this room overlooked the avenue, along which the flying hunter periodically cruised, so it was necessary to play it safe. Closing the window from a possible observer, I looked around. Girls crowded in the corridor, for some reason not daring to go into the room. Fortunately, Lisa explained the reason for such a strange behavior of her friends:

“Victor, you should take those posters off the wall. My classmates are very religious and posters like this hurt their feelings. I at least understand what the rock band "Aria" is, but the rest can be shocked by pictures with demons, pentagrams and inverted crosses. Yes, and pictures of naked women on the wall can also be embarrassing.

I looked at the large colored posters for the Blood for Blood and Calm albums. Demons, gargoyles, hellfire, signs of the Antichrist... I tried to imagine how these posters are seen by the pupils of the church school, and immediately rushed to shoot. At the same time, involuntarily blushing, he tore off pictures of naked girls in overly seductive poses. I crumpled all these papers and threw them in the trash can.

Only after that the girls came in, still timid and uncertain. Although the most nimble quickly grew bolder and immediately occupied the sofa. The less efficient ones sat down on chairs, on the desk, and even on the windowsill. The small room immediately became crowded. And although I brought a couple more chairs from the kitchen, still half of the girls had to stand or sit on backpacks. At that moment, the jingle of keys was heard in the corridor, Zhenya Oparev returned. He stopped at the door with his mouth open.

Don't worry, this is my neighbor. I'll arrange everything now! I said quickly, went out to my friend and closed the door to the room behind me.

Zhenya brought with him a whole box of expensive vodka. Two more boxes full of alcohol were already found in my friend's room.

“I bought Kolka from our neighbor on the floor, who works as a loader in the store,” the friend explained, pushing the boxes into the corner of the room. “Today he stole several cases of vodka from the warehouse and sold three cases to me for a quarter of the price, fool. He does not understand that money will soon be worth nothing, and vodka will become the main currency. By the way, Kolyan invites all the neighbors to celebrate his unexpected wealth. He also has a snack there, also stolen from the store. I'm going there now, I need to heal my nerves. If you only knew what I had to go through today! Will you come with me?

My friend smelled strongly of alcohol. It seems that he and Kolka have already managed to wash a successful deal. I refused to go anywhere. Zhenya went to the window and lit a cigarette, then asked in a whisper:

- What kind of harem did you bring to us?

I briefly told the story of my meeting with schoolgirls, as well as that I promised to help them get to Sergiev Posad or build them in a safe place. Zhenya unexpectedly laughed and even dropped ashes on his shirt. Looking with displeasure at the burnt hole, my friend asked:

“And what did you demand for such a service?” A new girl every night?

- Stop sending! – I could not stand it, because I considered such humor now inappropriate. I didn't demand anything from them. It's just that they are boarding schools, completely helpless and do not orient themselves in our world at all. They have nowhere to go, and for one day I brought them here to our apartment. And I have a request for you. If you still go to drink until the morning, can you place some of the girls in your room? Not for long, just for one night.

- Okay, I'll help you out of old friendship. But only an agreement - so that by tomorrow evening there will be no trace of these girls in our apartment! And see that they do not dig into my things and do not touch my vodka. And then I know these boarding schools, they drag everything they see!

Zhenya left. I closed the front door behind him and breathed a sigh of relief. I did not expect that the character of my old friend would deteriorate so dramatically in just one day. I returned to the girls and in a deliberately cheerful voice said that everything was settled, and the apartment for the whole day was at their complete disposal. Delighted squeals and joyful cries became my reward for my labors. Several girls immediately raced to occupy the second bedroom, another group of schoolgirls took a turn in the bathroom.

But I went into the kitchen and looked longingly at the contents of the refrigerator: half a loaf of already slightly stale bread, three pitiful sausages in an open package, four eggs and an unfinished bottle of beer ... Sparse, frankly. Especially when divided into twenty-five hungry mouths. But what can you do, I'm not used to stocking up.

Back in my room, I put my phone on charge and turned on the TV. There were news of the capital. Hundreds of black triangular ships circling over Moscow. Flaming cars on the Moscow Ring Road. Burning planes in Domodedovo. Metro train that fell into the Moscow River from the bridge. And everywhere there are corpses, corpses, corpses... I clicked through the channel and got to a speech for the press by the American Vice President, which said that the death of the US President in a plane crash was officially confirmed, and that the United States had declared war on the aggressors, whoever they were. ..

Flicked the channel again. Two leaders of the factions of the State Duma of the Russian Federation argued how power should be transferred in conditions when there has been no news for a day about the fate of the country's president, who has left on an official visit to China, and the already confirmed death of the prime minister and defense minister.

The next channel had news again, this time live from Washington. The quality of the picture was terrible, but it was still possible to understand. A tired and some kind of rumpled correspondent was reporting live from a meeting of the UN Security Council, where for the tenth hour the diplomats of the leading countries were trying to find at least some kind of consensus on the issue of joint actions. The proposal of China to create a unified international command and transfer all the troops of the Earth to this single center was vetoed by representatives of Great Britain and the United States. The alternative proposal of the Americans to transfer aviation and air defense systems of NATO countries, and then all other countries, to direct subordination to the Pentagon also did not find understanding among the members of the UN Security Council.