I was going to get to the garbage can to throw away the dead, exsanguinated cargo to the delight of the stray dogs, but they wouldn't let me. I was ten meters away from the gate when large wild boar-like creatures appeared in front of me. Small wild boars, no bigger than huskies, but with huge straight fangs about fifteen centimeters upward, and long bony needles like those of porcupines, which grew from the hump on their withers.
They moved very fast, and there was no chance of getting to the gate and closing in on them. I was lucky to have my neighbor's old Niva, which I managed to jump on at the last moment. I jumped from the hood to the roof rack, where I almost got my foot caught between the bars.
The first two tried to follow my example, but on the slippery hood their hooves parted in different directions, and the critters rolled to the ground. And then my golem burst into their pack.
Each blow of his stone fist knocked the creatures to the ground, breaking their ribs and legs, slicing their fangs, crushing their elongated muzzles into a bloody mess. In a minute he'd killed five and maimed a dozen more, but there were just as many left, if not more.
I watched with apprehension as the monsters tore my creature apart little by little. Each blow with their fangs tore a few stones from the golem's body, which were then pulled back into the body, but the golem's recovery rate slowed after each blow.
Finally, the moment came when he crumbled into a mound of rubble and sand. The Quasicabans, with seven or eight more to go, rumbled their snouts at it, intent on scattering it to the sides. Whether it was the thought in the animals' brains that their adversary was still alive (and it was, I could still feel my creation) that they should scatter the stones as far away as possible, or whether the rage of the fight had turned their minds off, and they, like rabid dogs, would tear to shreds even a dead body.
At that moment I felt danger. My instincts howled and threw my body to the ground, shielding myself from my golem and the creatures with the back of the Niva. And a moment later, the golem exploded! Hundreds of small stones and grains of sand flew in all directions, like bullets from a shrapnel shell. The car was pierced through in places! The neighbors' metal fences rattled, windows rattled, boards in fences crunched, walls of houses rattled with drums. One of the car tires exploded deafeningly.
I was hurt by the golem's blast: one stone struck my chest close to my collarbone, but luckily it had broken through two layers of sheet iron of the Niva's body and lost its power; the other peeled off the skin on the calf of my left leg.
I sat in a daze at the wheel until the gate in front of me opened and a neighbor, the owner of the Niva, appeared with a rifle in his hand, which would not go anywhere without an overhaul. Wearing underpants and a stretchy white alcoholic T-shirt and flip-flops.
- Alex? - he asked.
- Great," I found the strength to raise my hand.
- What was that just now? And... what happened to the car?!
- i'm ***? - I answered angrily, and then struggled to my feet. I felt a pain in my chest and a pain in my ankle (I must have twisted my ankle when I jumped, damn it). - Go see who did it. Look at all them piggies, huh? Have you seen these, you're a hunter, aren't you?
He looked at me cautiously, rubbed his rubber slippers on his bare heels, went outside, and walked around the car.
- What the f**k was that? - came out of his mouth. - What exploded?
- I have no idea," I denied.
And at that moment several long bursts of gunfire could be heard from the center of the city, followed by gunshots.
- The war?
- How should I know? - I answered him, then kicked the bleeding nearest carcass with my foot. - But I don't think so, they didn't look like very brave NATO Marines.
The shooting ended abruptly.
- Biological weapons? - he guessed. - He lowered the volume and muttered indistinctly to himself.
I, like him, stood for a few minutes listening to the noise in the distance, which gained momentum, then several columns of black smoke rose in the center.
- Okay, I've got better things to do," I said, and quickly, as fast as my injured leg would allow, I staggered back to my house. At the gate I looked with bewilderment at my right hand, which was clutching a pistol with empty shells. That's why my neighbor looked at me so strangely and avoided me. Yeah, I do not even remember when I had time to shoot the entire block of barrels and four spare cartridges, which I put in my pocket before I left the house.
At home, after splashing peroxide on the wound, which had already stopped bleeding, I applied a piece of bandage and a Band-Aid. Having finished with the treatment of the body, I began to take care of the soul. For that every person in our country has some strong liquor, from forty degrees and above. Now I rolled the cork from the cognac, which I poured into the shot glass up to the edges. Seventy grams would be fine, it should be enough to calm me down.