Chapter Forty-Four - Sense-less

"This map makes no sense," Alice complained.

She had the maps taken from Raivis laid out on the ground before her. They were just steps away from the factory, tucked in an alley next to one of its all-brick walls where the wind wouldn't sweep the pages away.

"It doesn't?" Crystal asked. She was holding up a small length of crystal that glowed with a faint, pure-white light that did wonders to illuminate the maps.

Vasilisa, standing closer to the alley's exit while keeping an eye out, leaned back a little and looked over the maps herself. Not that she had any hope of understanding them at a glance.

"Look, this is the factory on this larger map," Alice said as she pointed to a rectangle on the map. "And this is the zone-ward direction." she traced a line towards one corner of the unfolded page. "This area here, between us and the unmapped middle of the zone, is called the City Streets Area."

The maps were colour-coded for convenience, which was genuinely useful. She had a lot to say about Raivis and his Greenies, not much of it polite at the moment, but they were rather organised.

"I think I'm following so far," Crystal said. "What's the issue?"

"Right, so look at this. There's a road from the factory to this highway here. If we follow the highway, it's a straight path all the way into the city we're aiming for. That seems like the shortest path, and it's well-documented."

There were red marks for known anomalies and gridded areas that showed more dangerous spots.

"So we can just go that way?" Crystal asked.

"No, look, the path has the range marked out here. How far it is from this intersection to this one here, next to the city." Alice tapped the distance marker. "It says that the road is two kilometres long, then four, then twelve."

"Huh," Crystal said. "That... kinda doesn't make sense. At all. Is it an error?"

Alice shook her head. "No, there's a notation here. These little letters. I think it's referencing something, because the same symbols appear on other measurements. Look, here, and here, and here. Always with distance measurements that have changed."

"What are they referring to?" Vasilisa asked.

Alice shook her head, then pawed through the pages. "Nothing? Or something that isn't here. Did you grab a pen and paper while you were taking things?"

Vasilisa nodded, then fished out a small notepad. She didn't have a pen, but Alice could make due with a bit of magic. She started to write down each notation on a separate page, then wrote down the distances associated with them. She wasn't even a third done by the time she noted a pattern.

"The higher the letter, the shorter the distance," Alice said. "I don't know what it means, though."

Crystal leaned over. "Could be time?"

"Time?" Alice asked.

"Well, time and distance go together, right? And we're sure it's not alternate routes or something?"

"Nothing indicates that," Alice said. "If we presume that it's time, then... the distance grows shorter the larger the letter. Are the letters counting down?"

"How are they ordered?" Crystal asked.

"Randomly," Alice said. These map had notes written directly onto it. She frowned, then checked through all of the maps again. "Some of these maps have the same notation on the top. Wait, look. This building here, on the side of the route. It has the notation, less than C. And there's a closer map of that same building here... ah."

She got it, all of a sudden, though it took a twist of intuition and she wasn't entirely certain if her guess was correct.

"Space here doesn't follow conventional rules. The greater the letter, the more time has passed, I think."

"One letter a day?" Crystal asked.

"Could be. I'm not certain about that, but I'm pretty sure higher letters means more time. And more time means that the routes between places are shorter."

Crystal tilted her head. "Not longer?"

"No... look, some maps show areas that have notation that show less than and then a letter mark. I think these are areas that disappear after a set time. They're... folded into the Zone, or locked away, or just inaccessible after a period of time."

"But there's a reset, right?" Crystal asked.

"The Storms," Vasilisa said.

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

Alice glanced at the girl, then nodded. "The storms make sense. We know that they reset some anomalies. We also know that the Zone is supposed to be bigger than it should be." She nodded. "So, assuming that each letter corresponds to a day... it's been three days since the last storm, right?"

"I think so?" Crystal said. She counted on her fingers. "We arrived after a storm, got to Pripyat, walked out, slept in the Zone. Then the next day passed in the Zone too. Then the day after we met Vasilisa in the Camp and slept again. So that's three sleeps. Tonight would be the forth. Soon, I guess."

It was getting to be late. They had a few hours of sunlight still, but it was definitely approaching evening.

"So, we're day... C, I suppose," Alice said. "Which is about middling in terms of distance then. I imagine that the storms don't all happen at even intervals."

"I don't think so," Vasilisa said. "I... think there have been times where it's more than a week between storms? Wouldn't you know better?"

Alice hummed. "We haven't been around to notice," she said. "So, if that's the case, then that highway route might not be the fastest way into the centre of the Zone. See, there's a passage here on the main map that refers back to..."

She slid some maps aside, then brought one over.

"This one. The highway turns off into this sub-urb, then that leads into the city. If you check the distances, this is a solid fifty kilometres shorter, only this sub-urb route here is marked as one of those that disappear after... E days. So four or five days post-Storm."

"So we'd better travel across it quickly?" Crystal asked. "What happens if you're on one of these roads that disappear when it disappears?"

"I have no idea," Alice said. "In an ideal world, the road would reappear after the next storm and you'd be none the wiser for the gap in time."

"Oh, but that's spooky," Crystal said. "Losing several days like that. Oh! Wait, didn't we go back a day, to that other factory?"

"I... believe so, yes," Alice said. "Does that put us back to B days?"

"Isn't that good either way? More time to cross," Crystal said.

Alice nodded, took note of the route they'd have to take, then started to compile the maps back together into a neat stack that she slipped into the file folder they'd come in. "That decides it," she said. "We'll look at the maps again tonight, but for now we have a good idea of our heading and route and some of the anomalies along the way."

The map really was invaluable at the moment. She didn't intend to get caught in any traps if she could avoid them. But just having the map wouldn't get them anywhere if they didn't get their steps in.

Alice took the lead, with Vasilisa right behind her and Crystal in the rear. She had a good memory when it came to maps. Something about seeing two dimensions as three came easily to her, even if she could immediately tell that the maps weren't entirely accurate.

The Greenies had likely hired a few architects or the like to help them, but she couldn't imagine them laying out all of their equipment in a place as dangerous as the Zone just to have perfectly accurate measurements.

The further into the Zone the maps went, the less accurate they seemed. The maps closest to the centre looked like photocopies taken from someone's journal, with thin lines still visible on the page and the details laid into the map by a scratchy, uneven hand. She suspected that that one had been taken by a brave scientist far out of their depth.

She wasn't looking forward to being that deep into the Zone.

The group stepped out from the alleyway, making their way through the deserted streets. The air was still, and the only sounds were their footsteps and the distant hum of the Zone. Alice kept her senses sharp, constantly scanning for any signs of danger. She expected that the scientists they'd just angered would be on their trail soon enough.

They followed the path outlined on the map, moving towards the highway that would lead them into the city. The roads were cracked and overgrown, remnants of a world long abandoned. Strange plants twisted out of the ground, their colours a stark contrast to the grey landscape.

"We're on the right track," Alice said, glancing at the map again. "The highway should be just up ahead. After that, we might want to start looking for a place to camp out for the night."

***