Careless Ruin.

Chapter 1 :Moscow Crisis:

,Aleksei. A grueling name given to me. The way she said it was not only music to my ears but torture. I was making my way to a place no one wanted to go down. Could I have stopped it? Maybe. But I couldn't change my path, even if my life depended on it...

                I awoke from my sleep and looked around for a brief moment realizing something. Something wasn't right, I checked my countertop for my wallet, and I discovered it was missing. I searched all the pant pockets that littered my floor, jacket pockets, and even under my bed, I stood up to scratch my head and noticed my brother's pocket knife. I grabbed it and folded it in, I gripped it tight, and at a brisk pace, I walked through the door facing left down the hall. I jiggled the doorknob to force my way, in but it was futile, I begin to bang on the door for him to let me in until I hear him. "I'm tired, go away." I pounded harder because I had what's left in my savings in my wallet. I took a step back and kicked the door bouncing me back and began with another kick, this time next to the doorknob. My foot slammed through, and the door frame was almost beyond repair. My brother shot up and looked at me; I begin to take a look around, throwing his clothes out of his drawers and tossing things off of his nightstand until I stopped and looked at him. "Do you know how much I have, Nik?" He got up from his bed bare, but in his boxers, he begins to stretch and speak, "About enough for a damn loaf of bread." I clutched his pocket knife and I threw it at him, it hits his exposed belly. He expelled a huge grunt holding his stomach. He groans too, me, "You left it on the downstairs table. Ugh.." Seeing him sitting on his bed in pain, I explain. "Stop acting like that. We all know I didn't throw that hard. Trying to get me in trouble?" He stands up as if nothing ever happened. "Just go downstairs" I proceed to turn the corner and walk down the stairs to find my wallet just as he instructed where it was. I was astonished that he didn't lie to me, but to make sure I checked the balance in my wallet to make sure nothing is missing. I softly count to myself. "Fifty, a hundred, a hundred and fifty." It appears that nothing was missing, surprisingly. I folded my wallet into my back pocket and grabbed the door handle. I tried to turn, it but it had strange resistance. I let it go. The door opened itself. It was my father.

                 He entered the room with a wide smile and asked: "Are you heading out this evening?" "Yes, papa," I replied. "I need to make it downtown before they run out of stock" I rushed back to grab a bag and resumed to charge down the sidewalk I make it past the first block before a childhood friend stopped me. Just out of the corner of my eye, he grabs my shoulder and pulls me aside into an alleyway and proceeds to warn me in a panicky .way. "I don't know what's going, on but I heard some news of a cataclysm. Things are becoming more expensive; soldiers have been going around the block. You seem like you're in a rush, do you know what the hell is going on?" I responded, confused. "No." I jerk my shoulder, "You're acting weird. You need to go home." I walked at a brisk pace down the road. I thought a little more about what he said. And the more I thought about, it I began to understand slightly. But that's just my mind adapting to his fear-mongering. "He needs help or something. Nothing is going on. I mean. The Union recently collapsed, of course, something negative is bound to happen" As I walked along the path to the stores, I see shops closing down. The ones closed the longest seems to be selling food at the cheapest. I thought nothing of it. Everyone needs to make a living, but they were just the weakest link in this "New free-market" Democracy is something. No one here is used to it. There are bound to be mistakes from people who are exploring the possibilities. I turned to where I was most used to shopping for food. Little by little as I roamed the isles food was slowly disappearing or prices getting higher. So I grabbed the most for the least and made it to the counter and began to check out. I dropped what I had in my arms and begin to pull out my wallet before being stopped, and the woman at the counter tapped my hand, I looked at her, and she pointed at the sign above me. I looked at the sign she made apparent to, me, and I stopped counting to read it. It read "Инфляция изменит цены, действующие сегодня." (Tran: Inflation will change the prices, effective today.)