Ольга Палагина – Stories from Lyubavino. Chronicle of an extraordinary Incident (страница 5)
Back at the office where our daring brigade worked, a great commotion had also ensued. It was no laughing matter – to leave an entire district without power. It was fortunate that a backup line existed for the local factory and hospital; the electricians were now working urgently to connect them to it.
The chief power engineer arrived with his entourage. A whole crowd of people with intelligent faces, armed with maps and schematics, was anxiously inspecting the area where Zhenya had stumbled upon the power cable just the day before.
“What the bloody hell is this cable doing here?! It can’t be here, it’s impossible! How on earth did this happen?!” the chief power engineer was indignantly exclaiming, waving his papers around.
Arguing amongst themselves, the noisy delegation spent a long time pacing back and forth across the site. After prolonged and heated disputes, a decision was reached: to dish out well-deserved reprimands to all responsible parties and to shift the trench thirty meters to the side.
Zhenya, who still hadn’t quite recovered from the previous day’s shock, timidly inquired:
“And are you sure… there’s absolutely nothing here?”
To which the chief power engineer replied with utmost conviction:
“Everything that was here, you bloody well pulverized yesterday!!!”
“Well, I guess… The boss is always right!” Zhenya muttered under his breath.
The excavator purred to life peacefully once more, and the crowd dispersed. And literally fifteen minutes later…
Dear reader, can you imagine what happened fifteen minutes later?!!!
Well, this time, against the backdrop of an unbelievably bright, blinding flash – so intense that Zhenya thought, “THAT’S IT!!! This is THE END!!!” – his entire short and somewhat wayward life began to flash before his eyes, slowly, frame by frame. And it must be said, he wasn’t too far from the truth.
The scene unfolded like something out of a top-tier Hollywood blockbuster, only in slow motion. A deafening clap, more akin to an explosion, accompanied by a tremendous detonation. A torrent of blinding light, erupting from beneath the earth and shooting straight up into the bluest of skies. Acrid smoke, lazily creeping out of the half-dug pit. And finally, the excavator’s bucket, now melted and bleached white, scraping metallically as it swayed dejectedly in the smoky haze right before Zhenya’s very eyes… For a fleeting moment, he thought he had died.
The other representatives of the “Whoo-hoo!” crew and other workers, well aware of yesterday’s events, wisely kept their distance from the working excavator this time. Just in case.… And when “all that crap” happened (as Mikhalych later so aptly dubbed the incident), they were all sent flying in an instant, like pins in a rundown bowling alley.
A minute later, the picture took on its final form: the clouds of smoke dissipated, revealing a truly epic scene. In the center of the chaos, sitting in his cockpit like a newly crowned emperor on a throne made of iron and diesel fuel, was Zhenya. However, the throne was swaying precariously, and the emperor had a slight pallor. Petrified, like an ancient statue, with eyes the size of soup plates, he looked around him with unseeing eyes, feeling his hair stand on end all over his body, including hair he never even knew he had.
The excavator’s bucket, now wobbling and missing one tooth, having ultimately failed to endure this second misfortune inflicted upon it in the last twelve hours, let out a drawn-out metallic groan of despair… And finally, the finishing touch: from the ravine, like timid groundhogs, the grimy faces of the workers were cautiously peeking out, clearly uncertain whether they should abandon such a safe haven at all.
As it was later established, those were the emergency backup cables.
Oh yes… Those very ones… For the factory, the hospital, and something else besides…
Chapter II Friday’s Apocalypse
All this debacle struck with impeccably poor timing – on a Friday. And Friday, as everyone knows, is not merely a day of the week, but a sacred boundary between the heroic labors of the workweek and lawful idleness. This was especially true given that the weekend was looming, and half of the management was already blissfully basking on their vacation shores.
Consequently, no one was in any particular hurry to repair the damages. Everyone understood that the problem would be tackled in earnest only on Monday. Unless, of course, fortune smiled, and someone was given a little ‘motivational push’ to speed things up, in which case, perhaps, a bit earlier.
The people were not spoiled; they could endure a little hardship – it was summer, warm, and for the most part, light outside… these weren’t the nineties, after all. If anything, they’d manage somehow. And so, while there was a fair bit of grumbling, the people, having no means to influence the course of events, were forced to return to their daily routines, dealing with the lack of electricity, gas, and water as problems cropped up for each household.
Some had generators, purchased for their business or for the house, you know, just in case. Others still had wood-burning stoves in their homes. Some, for a rainy day, had stocked up on portable gas camping stoves. And in the villages, almost everyone had a banya and a well in their yard. So, they improvised as best they could.
The whole affair might have passed smoothly and without incident had we been, say, somewhere over there – in the civilized Western countries, where the local folk, with an air of refined resignation, patiently await the restoration of such strategic resources as light, gas, and water. But this all happened in the vast expanses of our God-preserved Mother Russia. In its very heartland. Where dwells a people of a most restless nature, blessed with that legendary restlessness that simply won’t give their hands, feet, or backsides (and most likely all of the above) a moment’s peace!
That enigmatic, unquiet Russian soul, forever thirsting for the unknown, tirelessly striving to break free from the shackles of stability and tranquility, found in this unprecedented collapse the most fertile soil for its unique self-expression. As a result, the local populace saw their already formidable imagination grow tenfold. And with it awoke an insatiable craving for ingenious inventiveness. And all this only served to exacerbate the locals’ peculiar propensity for truly farcical adventures.
To put it bluntly, every single thing that can get aggravated in a Russian in such a situation, did. And these lovely, simple, kind-hearted folks started getting into some fantastically bizarre mischief! Each as best they knew how! A performance dictated by their wits, their strength, and the enigmatic Russian soul residing within each of them…
Chapter III Football, Beer, and The Bucket of Fate
That evening, a considerable portion of the male population of the settlement was forced to live through one of their most terrifying nightmares – a nightmare that any devoted football fan could only conjure in their most feverish dreams.
Just minutes before Zhenka stumbled upon that ill-fated cable, the television was broadcasting a football match that the settlement’s football-crazed males had been eagerly anticipating. The men, heated and intense, with a beer in one hand and dried fish in the other, were frozen before their television screens in a state of the highest possible mental tension, at times even forgetting to breathe.
Zenit was playing against Spartak, and the broadcast was at that very moment showing the match’s climactic peak. A player from one of the teams was taking a free kick from thirty-five meters out. He began his run-up from the center circle and, covering the long distance with immense, powerful strides, made an impressive wind-up with his kicking leg and, with all the passion of his footballing soul, connected solidly with the ball…
It was a curling shot… The ball spun and soared towards the goal on a trajectory known only to the two of them. The stands erupted in a frenzied roar… The supporters – both of Spartak and of Zenit – in a single, unrestrained surge, leaped from their chairs and sofas in unison with the fans from the television.
Frozen in ridiculous, contorted poses on half-bent legs, with bulging, crazed eyes and agape, twisted mouths, they were suspended in a paroxysm of rapturous ecstasy – some in anticipation of imminent victory, others in the face of inexorably looming defeat. A moment later, practically in an unconscious state, they were already completely and utterly glued to their television screens…
When suddenly, at this very (and let us not shy from the word) MEGA-DRAMATIC moment, the iron bucket of Zhenka’s excavator treacherously severed the television broadcast!