AFTERWORD

I don’t know why all this happened. We were living, more or less, fine. All around were ROSes. In our language, that's the abbreviation for Cut, Kickback and Bribe. The market economy was a perfect feeding ground. And if you didn’t play the ROZ game, you’d be locked up for fraud or some other white-collar crime. If you weren’t much of an economic player, they’d get you on drug charges. The political ones were busted for foul language or jaywalking. Everyone was served an article.

And then suddenly—reforms. Release the popular articles, re-investigate the economy. How is that even possible? A month of stalling, and then bam—all investigative agencies shut down. They found strikebreakers, made precinct officers into investigators, and off it went. And this was back when he was still President.

I won’t even talk about digging in around the outskirts of settlements in the taiga. At least that had some use. Maybe I’ll buy myself a dacha there now, since it won’t burn down.

Now we have Emperors. Two of them. Who’s really in charge? Looks like it’s her. She wants heroism from the tough guys, and from the weak ones—their kids volunteered for the ranks. Look at that! She staged a safari in Kazakhstan just to do some shooting. And now these exercises in Belarus. Every day brings news from the fronts.

And I’ll tell you this: someone should check Moscow. The highlanders from the President Hotel are doing things that make you want to stage a safari on them. I’m just afraid to tell her that. Why are you grinning? Try it yourself. My gut tells me, in the next book sixth, such a mess will kick off…

Respectfully,

Chief of Police