Наталья Соколова – LIMBO (страница 4)

"Ohhh, the recruits are pouring in!"

"Tough as always!"

"Well, hold on, they'll show us now!.."

Ducking my head between my shoulders, I approached the information stand. The hall on the institute map was hard to find. It turns out I was now conditionally on the second floor. There was also a first floor – that one, apparently, completely in the basement. And the third – where the dean's office I needed was located.

Dragging a suitcase up the wrought-iron spiral staircases is a dubious pleasure, so first I decided to rest a bit. Especially since a soda machine was very conveniently placed near the passage upstairs. Bright drinks of all rainbow colors bubbled in transparent glass bottles: lilac-violet, sky-blue, light-blue like forget-me-nots, emerald-green, sunny-yellow, orange and… red. Like blood. No, like the red matter that I failed to taste twice today.

It seemed there were more bubbles in the soda than liquid, but my throat was so dry from the excitement that I was okay with this "oxygen cocktail".

Applying my mobile to the window, I tried to pay for a bottle, but the contactless payment didn't work. I tried several times and only then saw that there was no network here. The fancy new phone – Dad's gift for graduating school – had turned into a dead brick. Maybe something was wrong with the roaming?..

I had to take out a plastic card, but it didn't work either. As if to spite me, the thirst only got stronger. I poked the chip at the sensor, twisted the card this way and that, then inserted it in all possible variations into the receiver, but the machine, sneezing haughtily, each time spat it back into my hand.

"Let me buy it," a voice suddenly sounded from behind.

A lanky disheveled guy moved me aside. His overgrown hair – light brown, slightly shading greenish – fell on his face when he started rummaging through the pockets of his denim jacket. Finally, what he was looking for was found – a blue card with a golden logo. Exactly the same one I had seen with the woman at the entrance, only hers was white, not colored.

The machine's holder clanked, the long-awaited bottle plopped into the dispensing window and a second later was already in my hand. Unscrewing the sharp metal cap from it, which normal people pry off with openers, I drained the contents to the bottom in one go.

"Look what she's doing," someone from the old-timers noted, staring at me from afar.

"I'm starting to be afraid of them," his buddy answered with a chuckle. "We didn't drink red orgone in our first year…"

"And what, won't her head spin?!"

What are they talking about? I had to turn the bottle in my hands, examining the labels. There's no marking about alcohol content. It's not even an energy drink. Sure nothing like that can be sold in an institute!

I threw the empty vial into the trash can next to me and turned to the guy:

"Thank you," I smiled and held out my hand to him. "Let's get acquainted. My name is…"

Adjusting the large travel bag on his shoulder, he raised his yellowish, honey-colored eyes:

"I know. Your name is Niki. You've already said that. And in general, all this has already happened…" his black pupils contracted to small dots, and then stretched into two narrow slits, like a cat looking at bright light.

I froze in amazement, the handshake never happened. A chill ran down my spine.

"It's called déjà vu…" I bleated weakly.

"Jake!" suddenly came from behind our backs. "Here you are, you snake! Stop scaring people!"

"Hi, Charm. You know I don't do it on purpose."

"Oh, I wish my eyes didn't see you!" spinning the keychain with the Audi logo on her index finger, the girl blew a big pink bubble of gum with her plump lips and shook my hand that was frozen in the air. "Hey, friend! We're coursemates. And this guy, alas, is also with us."

Smiling sweetly, she adjusted the perfectly straight strands of red hair, highlighted with lilac on one side – to match the color of her contact lenses. Then she turned on her sky-high heels and, leaving a trail of sweet, candy perfume behind her, clicked up the stairs.

"That's Liz Charm," the guy with yellow eyes, now quite human-like, explained grimly. "The daughter of a local 'big shot'. We studied together in the preparatory courses. I mean, I studied, and this vixen only pretended, because in fact she had already been in her first year before."

"Another… déjà vu?" I clarified cautiously.

"Ha, no. Time loops have nothing to do with it," the guy again leaned his card against the soda machine. This time a blue drink came out. "She was simply held back for a second year."

"Is that even possible in universities?" I was sincerely surprised.

"Actually, it's not. Especially at LIMBO. But this witch," he glared maliciously after her, "is above the law. And you… you're heading to the dean's office, right? Come on, I'll help you carry the suitcase."

Chapter 3: Twin Flame

I was turning the red card in my hands, examining it from both sides. The front was engraved with the words: LIMBO. 1st year. Group "P". On the back, a golden circle shimmered with a dragon and a bird inside. The two beasts, mirrored, faced each other like yin and yang. The dragon – or rather, a long serpent with legs – mercilessly bit its own tail. The peacock – like a mythical firebird – aggressively spread its lush wings, engulfed in flames. Between them, a compass and a square intersected in the shape of a diamond, and in the center sparkled the sign of infinity – a figure eight turned sideways.

"Hey, Niki, let's go for a walk!" a bold voice pulled me out of my meditation on the hypnotic symbol glowing in the sunset light.

Startled, I tucked my new pass into my pocket and looked out the window. Third floor – not too high, but the whole street was visible.

Our dormitory – a beautiful old building with columns and carved windows, painted white, green, and gold – was located quite close to the institute. You only needed to walk through St. Isaac's Square and turn left at the monument to Nicholas I, into the courtyards.

"There's an interesting spot nearby on a roof," Lizzy waved to me. She was standing near a peculiar forked lamppost that resembled either a mast or the scales of Themis. "You can see the whole city from there! You'll love it!"

The words trembled on the evening Petersburg wind like a magical spell. Indeed, how could I not love a place from which the entire city was visible?..

I looked at my half-unpacked, lopsided suitcase. Well, I could sort out my things later. Besides, no one else had been assigned to the room yet, so my mess wouldn't scare off any roommates.

"Coming!" I shouted, throwing on a windbreaker. In the hallway, I instinctively glanced in the mirror hanging by the entrance, and it seemed to me that my already too pale blue eyes had grown even paler, while my dark hair, on the contrary, had blackened, becoming like the wing from my dreams. I shuddered, but chalked it up to fatigue or the tricks of the dim dorm lighting.

It had gotten colder outside. The first streetlights were coming on. We walked along the Neva embankment, sipping cocktails from tin cans – this time not from the institute's vending machine, but from the nearest store that only serves those who had already turned eighteen. Liz, having stayed back a year, had recently celebrated her coming of age and took advantage of it.

"On the last day of vacation, you absolutely have to get drunk," she confidently objected when I tried to refuse. "There's no freshman initiation for students at our institute. Alcohol is strictly forbidden. So consider this the only evening you can spend like a normal person. You didn't go to the prep courses, did you?"

"No, I… My parents only told me last week that I'd be studying here."

Liz suddenly slowed down. She put her can on the wide parapet of the bridge and leaned over, looking at the restless waves below.

"I see, they dragged it out until the last minute. And they never spilled the beans? Didn't tell you what you'd be?"

"No," I repeated, "they didn't say anything. I don't even know the full name of the institute."

"Well, you're not alone in that," the redhead chuckled. "Sometimes I think no one knows it, including my dad who stuck me in here."

"So the sign's been broken for a long time?"

"Ha, the sign!.." a steamboat rumbled below in a deep bass, passing under the Palace Bridge, and Lizzy paused, then suddenly smiled and pulled car keys from her pocket. "Listen, let's not talk about that. I wanted to take you to the roof, remember? Let's go!"

It seemed this wasn't her first time driving while tipsy. Thankfully, we didn't have to drive far, I didn't have time to get scared, and the only traffic cop we encountered at an intersection didn't smell trouble from afar.

We spent the whole evening and even part of the night sitting on the roof of a tall building, from which a panoramic view of St. Petersburg opened up. My savvy friend's bag held a few more cans of cocktails, which we used to keep warm while admiring first the city lights, then the drawbridges, and later the stars.

We chatted about all sorts of nonsense. About school, about parents, about pets, about where we go on summer vacations. That's how I learned that Lizzy's father is a deputy in the local council who sent her to the best boarding school near Peterhof10 since she was four, hoping to raise a prodigy. That her mother was – surprisingly – an astrologer, and had prophesied a special destiny for her only daughter since childhood. That they have three generations of cats living with them – all black, without a single white hair. And in summer, the whole family travels to places of power. They'd already been to the Solovki islands, the Krasnodar dolmens, Lake Baikal, Altai, and even the Valley of Geysers in Kamchatka.