Russian Roulette Read Online Free PDF Page B

be at the house . . .”
    “Thank God you’re here!” my father said. He was still holding on to me. He was breathing with difficulty.
    My mother opened the box. I didn’t know what would be inside or why it was so important, but when I looked down, I saw that it contained the last thing I had expected. There was some black velvet padding and, in the middle of that, a hypodermic syringe.
    “For every weapon there has to be a defense,” my mother went on. “We made a poison, but we were also working on an antidote. This is it, Yasha. There was only a tiny amount of it, but we stole it and we brought it to you. It will protect you.”
    “No. I don’t want it! You have it!”
    “There isn’t enough for us. This is all we have.” My father’s hand had tightened on my arm, pinning me down. He was using the very last of his strength. “Do it, Eva,” he insisted.
    My mother was holding the syringe up to the light, tapping it with her finger, examining the glass vial. She pressed the plunger with her thumb so that a bead of liquid appeared at the end of the needle. I began to struggle. I couldn’t believe that she was about to inject me.
    My father wouldn’t let me move. As weak as he was, he kept me still while my mother closed in on me. It must be every child’s nightmare to be attacked by his own parents, and at that moment I forgot that everything they were doing was for my own good. They were saving me, not killing me, but that wasn’t how it seemed to me. I can still see my mother’s face, the cold determination as she brought the needle plunging down. She didn’t even bother to roll up my shirtsleeve. The point went through the material and into my arm. It hurt. I think I actually felt the liquid, the antidote, coursing into my bloodstream. She pulled out the needle and dropped the empty hypodermic onto the ground. I looked down and saw more blood, my own, forming a circle on my sleeve.
    My father let go of me. My mother closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them again, she was smiling. “Yasha, my dearest,” she said. “We don’t mind what happens to us. Can you understand that? Right now, you’re all we care about. You’re all that matters.”
    The three of us stood there for a moment. We were like actors in a play who had run out of lines. We were breathless, shocked by the violence of what had taken place. It was like being in some sort of waking dream. We were surrounded by silence. Smoke was still rising slowly above the hills. And the village was still completely empty. There was nobody in sight.
    It was my father who began again. “You have to go into the house,” he said. “You need to take some clothes with you and any food you can find. Look in the kitchen cupboard and put it all in your backpack. Get a flashlight and a compass. But most important of all, there is a metal box in the kitchen. You know where it is . . . beside the fire. Bring it out to me.” I hesitated, so he went on, putting all his authority into his voice. “If you are not out of the village in five minutes, Yasha, you will die with us. Even with the antidote. The government will not allow anyone to tell what has happened here. They will hunt you down and they will kill you. If you want to live, you must do as we say.”
    Did I want to live? Right then, I wasn’t even so sure. But I knew that I couldn’t let my parents down, not after everything they had done to reach me. Not daring to speak, my mother silently implored me. I could feel my throat burning—I reeled away and staggered into the house. My father was still sitting on the ground with his legs stretched out in front of him. Looking back, I saw my mother go over and kneel beside him.
    Almost tripping over myself, I ran across the garden and through the front door. I went straight up to my bedroom and, in a daze, pulled out the uniform I had worn on camping trips with the Young Pioneers—which was a sort of scouting organization that existed