Gesar swung the wheel, swerving away from a Range Rover standing in the middle of the road. It was a strange-looking kind of vehicle—hung all over with advertising slogans and rotted right through, with its engine falling out of the chassis. This informational phantom probably hadn’t existed in the real world for a long time already, but it was still decaying here in the Twilight—that’s what happens with objects when they’ve been a focus of human attention for a long time, for whatever reason. The result of some kind of road accident, maybe?

“No, we need to go deeper,” Gesar suddenly decided.

This time he really did amaze me. He groaned—and the world around us turned completely colorless.

We were on the second level of the Twilight.

All the buildings became wooden—I must say that wooden buildings nine or ten stories high look really strange. The road turned into a winding country track covered in tussocky grass. The people almost disappeared: here on the second level they were barely even visible. Everything was gray. Instead of cars there were little clouds of steam hanging above the road—as if someone had breathed out, emptying his lungs on a cold day . . .

Well, and of course, it turned very cold.

And the car changed again.

Very noticeably and for the better.

The deer, arched over in its leap on the bonnet, was transformed into a young woman with wings.

I gazed for a while at the emblem of two intertwined Rs, then asked:

“So you prefer Russian automobiles then, Boris Ignatievich?”

Gesar dove the Rolls-Royce Phantom hard over the empty roads, hurtling nonchalantly straight through the clumps of steam and the human shadows. Most people wouldn’t notice anything. Some would sense a chill on their skin and feel a blank, hopeless yearning for something glorious and enthralling—some experience that life had never granted them. In cases like that Americans say: “Someone just walked over my grave.”

But the reality is actually even more chilling—at that instant an Other has just walked or driven straight through you.

“Everyone lies, Anton,” Gesar said suddenly. “Everyone lies.”

So apparently he did watch TV after all.

And his conservatism wasn’t equivalent to patriotism either.

“A really fine car,” he admitted. “That’s just between the two of us, of course.”

We traveled through the second level at the same speed as in the ordinary world. Except, of course, that there weren’t any traffic jams blocking our way. But that wasn’t what interested Gesar. The important thing was that time passed far more slowly here than in the real world—we would reach Semyon literally a minute after the phone call.

But then, whoever was on his way to him could also move through the Twilight. And even go a layer or two deeper.

If there was anyone on the way to him, of course.