World of Karik: A Game of Villains 33 Through Time and Space

"That's what I thought," she nodded. "When we fought the Fishmen... Remember that? Well, I came across a strange object. Very strange…"

She hesitated, clearly wondering if she had said too much. She then, apparently, reached a conclusion and rummaged through the breast pocket of her light jacket. I wondered how she managed to keep this to herself this entire time.

"Here, look," she quietly said, and held out a piece of dirty cardboard.

I took it in my hands and looked at it from different angles.

"Open it," she patiently suggested, and I noticed that I was holding someone's military ID. Very dirty and torn, but readable.

Syomin Dmitry Valerianovich... Year of birth: 18-something... The rest of the text was blurred, but I was already impressed. Nomonhan Incident, Soviet-Finnish War, World War II…

"What do you think?" Olga asked.

"I don't understand," I admitted.

"Neither do I," she said. "I can only understand that this man is barely alive right now. That he shouldn't be alive at all. But why is his ID here?"

I shook my head, not knowing what to say. To be honest, I had two theories. The first one was that people from different epochs existed in this world. Dmitry Valerianovich, the veteran of three wars, could have "arrived" here from, say, the mid-20th century. The second theory was, oddly enough, more complicated but quite logical at the same time — comrade Syomin could have come here twenty, thirty or even fifty years ago… If we could travel through different words, who was to say that we couldn't do that with time as well? He could have also gotten his tombstone and the ability to resurrect after death, just like we did.

And then it hit me.

"Olga!" I cried suddenly out and immediately lowered my voice, mentally scolding myself. "Olga! We don't know if there's a natural death in this world!"

She stared at me.

"Come on, think about it," I tried to explain. "We can't die here while our tombstones are intact, right? What if everyone in this world is virtually immortal? Do you get it now?"

"I think I know what you mean," she said. "If we can't be killed without destroying the tombstone, then, theoretically, there might not be a natural death."

"Exactly!" "What does that mean for us?" she asked sourly. "Should we become like this Syomin? Stay here for seventy years, unsuccessfully trying to get out?"

"Why are you being so pessimistic?" I angrily asked.

A philosophizing businesswoman, my God. Immortality means nothing to her. But if my guess is correct, then this world isn't that bad, after all... Why would anyone want to get out? Was leaving really necessary? Something's not right here. I lack too much information about this place!

"If we are all immortal, so is Petrovich," Olga said it in such a voice that one would think that she was speaking about some kind of punishment.

"By the way, why are you always in your cave?" I decided to take the bull by the horns. The conversation was becoming rather meaningless, to be honest. I had no idea what she was trying to achieve with it. She didn't even ask me anything. It was as if everything that Olga had said was a cover up for something else.

"I asked you not to ask me about that," she turned away. Okay, let's not push the subject. Moreover, our "hike to pick some berries" was not over yet, I felt that something was about to happen.

"Then let's go look for Dasha," I suggested.

This, however, turned out to be unnecessary. Dasha showed up on her own, making her way through the bushes so loudly that I thought that someone was chasing her. I jumped up from the stump, turning in her direction and summoned my scythe.

"Guys!" she whispered excitedly. "Olga, Cat! Follow me! Hurry up!"

Having said that, she dived into the thick and prickly bushes once again. Olga grimaced and silently showed me the way around. Dasha must've seen something really interesting if she had decided to take a shortcut through the thorns twice. Given the noise that she was making, there must've been no obvious danger, so I doubted that there was a trap waiting for us.

Olga and I went around the bushes and saw Dasha waving hands so impatiently that she was even bouncing. She was stamping her foot, expressing her displeasure with us. Olga even burst out laughing, and even I could not help but smile.

"What did you find?" Olga asked, giggling as she walked. "Blackberry bushes? Or a mushroom glade? Don't know about Cat, but I'm personally not a fan of this. I just wanted some company."

"Come on, come on!" Dasha hissed.

"So impatient," I muttered.

We walked about a mile through the forest before Dasha stopped and showed us what she had found.

"Curiouser and curiouser," Olga said.

I was a little behind, so I was the last to see it. The business lady was right — this damn world kept surprising us.

"Oh, my!" I gasped out, standing between the girls.

Right in the middle of the forest was a piece of an asphalt highway ten yards wide and twice as long. We were standing on the edge of it, right where the cracked dark asphalt was covered with moss and grass. Patches of grass were scattered along the undestroyed part of the road, and there was a thin tree growing a little further away. The markings on the road were almost gone, but I was sure that this was not from our world. Which country had a triple continuous line drawn in light blue paint?

Chapter end