How pleasant it is to wake up at home! I feel like I'm back in childhood, forgetting the pain and the fire that haunts me in nightmares, and not the one I burned in... It's not for nothing that conscious comrades say: "Family is a fortress!" Oh, not for nothing!
Even though I woke up, I continued to pretend to be asleep, a part of the serene... happiness, perhaps, carried from childhood. Mom is bustling around the stove, judging by the smell, frying cutlets on her famous pan. From outside the window, the sound of rhythmic blows and the ringing of an axe can be heard. That's Seryozha chopping firewood. He likes doing it. He says it reminds him of childhood too, although he grumbles every time Mom asks.
They have a ritual – to grumble at each other, as if if they don't, the meeting was in vain. He once admitted to me that he respects my mother, but is still a little shy, so he tries to joke somehow indirectly. He feels reverence, the capitalists would say. A stupid word... That's who can't do without indirectness! He seems to praise you, but insults you. They told us about this at the political hour. And in general, etiquette is created only for this: to insult, and more cunningly, that's it!
Here I am reasoning, and at the same time I'm afraid to get out from under the blanket. Even though I had nightmares all night, making me incredibly sleepy, I have to get up, and I don't want to. I don't want to be seen like this! I don't want to see myself!
I understand that such behavior is not worthy of an officer and a communist, but my heart is ready to jump out of my chest if I catch a glimpse of a mirror! At the same time, my body seems to be paralyzed, my face contorts in pain, squeezing my neck. I remember how it crunched...
Mom and Seryozha are trying to rouse me, not leaving me alone. And me? What am I? I'm silent and try not to look at them.
"Zinaida Petrovna! I've chopped it!" Seryozha's cry came from the street.
"Quiet, you wretch!" Mom hissed at him in a whisper, going out onto the porch, which brought me relief. "You'll wake the child..."
Husband said something to Mom. Wiping her hands on a towel, she went out, muttering something under her breath, which brought me relief, and I hid my head under the blanket.
Three girls sat in the laboratory room. They were "meeting over a cup of tea," as it is not proper for a Komsomol member and a conscientious worker to drink at their workplace. The laboratory assistants chattered about their own affairs, about women's matters, gossiping about their colleagues.
"And I still don't understand why they call Filippovna 'Rzhevsky'?" Renata asked, a little confused, blinking her eyelashes in bewilderment.
"Because of..." Allochka made a bushy mustache on her face with her fingers, jauntily twisting the imaginary tips in the style of Chapaev from the famous film.
"She used to have the nickname 'Führer,' but then people from the office came... and strongly asked her to come up with something else. Otherwise, the employees' eyes would start twitching. It's nerve-wracking," Ninel replied with a hint of sarcasm.
Somewhere on the other end of the wiretapping, the eye of two employees, who had been listening to the women's chatter for an hour and a half, twitched simultaneously. The tea poured at the beginning had already cooled, and now there was cold, unpleasant liquid in the glass holder.
"I still don't understand... Why Rzhevsky, specifically?" Renata exclaimed indignantly.
"Because mustaches are a pass to panties," the two friends said in unison, almost singing.
"No way?" the girl didn't understand the jab, opening her mouth in surprise. And then her gaze slid over the robot laboratory assistant, fixing on its facial plate. "So what does this mean... Do the 'Vovchiks' have undocumented functions?"
"You didn't know?" Ninel asked innocently, trying her best not to neigh like a horse while Allochka gurgled tea, making bubbles in the cup. "There's a special configuration with the index 'HU.' There's also a separate module... elongated and external..."
"You're kidding me, right?" the girl panicked, pushing away from the robot, staring at it with wide eyes.
Then the girls' friends couldn't hold back, and now they weren't just laughing, but roaring with laughter, tears of joy streaming down their faces. Blinking their long eyelashes again, realizing they had been tricked, Renata joined their laughter. Four shifts in a row within four walls were clearly taking their toll on their psyche.
The employees of the "Sh" department continued to sit with stone faces, not uttering a single giggle. The "flowerbeds" were considered the most difficult post for surveillance. Previously, disgraced operatives were placed there, but after some of them seriously suggested changing the curtains in the windows because they didn't match the wall color, the senior curator introduced staff rotation to these posts... After he stopped swearing. In his interpretation of his subordinates' mental abilities, even prepositions were profane.
"Actually, the idea came from the boys from 'Vavilov'," Ninel explained after laughing. "Our Filippovna looks too much like the actress from 'Hussar Ballad.' Her theatrical version was also staged in our theater..."
"Uh-huh, you just want to say: 'Cornet, are you a woman?'" Allochka supported her friend. "If the boys themselves tried to say that... they would have to go to dances with a club. Our collective, out of pure female solidarity, would support them, and would tear off their extra 'buds'!"
All three ladies nodded in agreement simultaneously. Komsomol members, athletes, and excellent students – they didn't find themselves in a dumpster, so they wouldn't allow their comrades to be offended.
Suddenly Renata giggled, snorting into her fist. Seeing the bewilderment on her friends' faces, she explained:
"Girls, when you kiss, do you close your eyes? And in general... when. I close mine, trying to concentrate on the process of 'studying friction.' They have such a funny face during the process! If I watch, I can't, and I just burst out laughing. People do it too funnily, and... human 'things' are funny. And laughter during that doesn't contribute to the atmosphere," the girl revealed her descended revelation.
Not only the girls but also the wiretap fell into a stupor, trying to digest what they had heard. Even the complex's main computer was shocked...
"I've never thought about it," Ninel said cautiously. Allochka nodded silently. The observers involuntarily repeated the gesture. "But enough about that! It's not comme il faut," the girl shook her curls, adopting the demeanor of a party cell secretary. "We are modern women! Proud builders of communism, not bourgeois dolls!"
"Don't remind me!" Alla grumbled grimly. "Svetochka in the dormitory is enough for me!"
The girl showed with her palm how far her Svetochka had reached.
"What again?!" both friends and the employees, who had grabbed their pencils, ready to write very quickly, took a stance. Women sometimes talk very fast.
"Not only does she smoke like a locomotive," the girl wrinkled her nose, and her friends did too. In the USSR, there was a strange attitude towards women smoking. It was as if emancipation had taken place. In movies, women were shown smoking. At the same time, it was considered indecent to smoke in public and in a group. Therefore, sometimes it was a shock for young men that a girl, yes, smokes! According to their expert opinion, only a loose woman can smoke. However, this did not apply to more mature ladies. "But she simply discouraged me with the question: 'Has my bra become too small for the spring?'"
"What kind of bra?" Renata said in surprise. "Is she completely..."
The girl tapped on the table, changing her mind at the last moment from tapping on her head. Making a contemptuous grimace, she continued:
"She's not thinking about the right thing! I understand when nature has been stingy with 'riches'... It can be awkward, especially in the bathhouse... But to worry about it is unworthy of a Komsomol member!"
"I told her that. And you know what she said?!" Alla exclaimed indignantly. "That she's a Komsomol member now, you see! And then she'll become a woman! Not someone, not achieving anything, but just a woman! Just a bourgeois toy!!!" That's what I told her!
"And what did she say?" Ninel asked grimly, feeling disgust.
"And she said that she agrees to be a toy! Only a beloved one! Ugh!" Alla finished irritably, slamming down her empty glass with a crash, causing the spoon in it to clink loudly and indignantly.
"Even our political instructor told us: 'What can you do, girls, you might not be Stakhanovites or pilots, but you must have a sense of self-worth of a Soviet citizen. No one forbids you to be happy in a simple, feminine way. We are all human. Everyone has needs. But a Soviet person is above bourgeois remnants! Therefore, there is no sex in the USSR. Comrades only make love! Respect yourselves and your comrades. By doing so, you respect the Motherland. Your fathers and grandfathers shed blood not for this, fighting against Tsarism, so that you would think about your 'sweetheart'!" Ninel concluded.
"Yes, I suppose so," Renata agreed. "I worked my fingers to the bone to get here! I'm working an extra shift now, not because I was slacking off! Social points are good. I want a non-standard color 'Thought' too, from the limited edition... But I want to be someone else, not just a woman. No matter how much I loved my grandmother, I'm not willing to clean up after a husband who gets drunk and gives you a black eye! If I just wanted to be, and nothing more, I wouldn't have pushed so hard to get here. I would have given my spot to someone else. But as it is, I'm interested in more than just boys and what's in their breeches! I want to advance science! To see other planets..."
"No wonder Filatova set Svetka up like that," Allochka chuckled. "Even her daddy couldn't help her get in here 'through connections.' She didn't even have time to squeak before they slapped her with 'incomplete'! It didn't help that she 'lay down' for her boss, that old pervert. The management council is very 'serious' these days. Filatova gets away with her antics only because of her bright mind. Smart girl, even if she's gone bad!"
"Well, she got involved with Petrov. The girls from 'design' told me he's 'missing a few screws.' He looks at robots instead of a woman!" Renata said.
"Isn't that the same guy who... you know..." Alla made a gesture that made everything clear, referring to the wardrobe mistress at the theater, "Tereshkova."
"No... That's a strange story altogether. It's definitely not him. The makeup artist told me in secret," Ninel mumbled, looking at her watch. "Alright, girls! I've been chatting too long! The spectrometer finished its work two minutes ago. And Comrade Sechenov specifically asked to run those inclusions again..."
In the evening, the employees compiled a report, but it never went anywhere. Comrade Shtokhauzen intercepted it promptly and didn't let it go any further. It wasn't just her "bright mind" that was the reason for such mild sanctions against Comrade Filatova. And this only corrupted her further.
"I see you're not out of breath, son," Zinaida said affirmatively, sitting down on a woodpile.
"Not today," Nechaev replied, lighting a cigarette. With his hands behind his head, he leaned against the wall of the reconnaissance module. "My legs and arms are listening better."
The woman gestured, asking for a cigarette too. Sergey, not being a fool, understood the hint, flicked a new cigarette from the pack, and gave it to the lady to light. A fragile silence settled. Each enjoyed their first morning cigarette, lost in their own thoughts.
"Awake?" Nechaev asked a monosyllabic question.
"Uh-huh. She's a terrible conspirator... Just like when she was a child," the elder Muravyova replied.
Silence fell again. The fair day was gaining momentum. The air filled with the scent of hundreds of herbs heated by the rays of the hot sun.
"Sechenov promised to drop by this evening," Zinaida broke the silence with a hint of irritation, extinguishing the butt on the sole of her boot.
"Worried," the man reacted monosyllabically again.
The woman sized him up with a piercing gaze. A barb was on the tip of her tongue, causing her to open her mouth, but at the last moment, she swallowed it, saying: "Since when?"
"After the adjustment. When Katya had hysterics. It was like a spell was lifted from her, then..." he replied.
"Be quiet," the woman said, uttering a single word that conveyed everything. A request, a threat, and something else that only military personnel would understand.
"It's not my secret," Nechaev said, correctly interpreting what was said and unsaid, shrugging. "Service has curbed excessive curiosity, and also cut my tongue. My superiors used to say that lead poisoning happens from that. So I don't blab about what I'm not supposed to."
"You're being sarcastic," Zinaida said, savoring the words, anticipating an argument. "That's good! Just don't expect to die from a bullet. Why should such a pile of brainless meat go to waste? If you blab without permission, I'll make cutlets out of you!"
Sergey turned his head, stopping his gaze from wandering beyond the horizon. Giving the woman an unreadable look, he said sarcastically, "They'll be burnt cutlets!"
"And I'll add buns and milk!" Muravyova retorted sarcastically, before asking seriously, "How are you yourself?"
Nechaev's gaze slid upward, stopping at the ridge of his mother-in-law's dwelling, as he pondered, listening to himself. After a brief silence, nodding at something, he replied affirmatively, "Tolerable. The carcass is nothing. It's what I saw then that weighs more on my psyche, but I'm more worried about Katya. I've seen this many times..."
"And it always ended badly!" his mother-in-law finished for Sergey, interrupting him. "I've seen it many times too. Will you tell me? We're under the same oath and classification..."
Silence fell again. The husband and mother heard Katya slip into the bathroom, only to fly out and dive back under the covers. Each understood that the special bandages would need to be changed to allow her still tender, not yet hardened, new skin to grow, but each was afraid to do it. Even a simple touch scared her...
"In a word, it's fucked up!" Nechaev expressed his thoughts.
"Concise, son. But could you be a little more specific?"
"A mess of images. Like several films were put through a meat grinder, glued together, and projected. Nothing is clear, but it's very interesting. And at the end, it's terrifying to the point of shitting yourself..."
The man shuddered.
"Even when I was drowning and suffocating in cold water, I wasn't this scared. This horror is what almost broke Katya, not the injuries. Even death is not as frightening in the flesh as this. It's cold, slimy, and it feels like roots have wrapped around you! Only this isn't ordinary bullshit, it's reality. I know. She knows. It's sitting somewhere out there! In space. Waiting..."
"Then Sechenov..."
"No," Sergey interrupted his mother-in-law decisively. "He's doing the right thing... It's hard to say. I just know that it doesn't like this."
"Good, if that's the case. Alright! Let's go change the bandages. Everything as usual... I'll sing lullabies, and you'll do the dressing. We'll get through it. Let her get used to it for now. In a week, call your comrades. Just get us together! I'll give them instructions... Oh, her! No way! Your Wizard promised, so I won't let him off the hook now!"
"I know, but it's hard. He won't do it instantly..." Nechaev finished the conversation, resolutely rising up the porch on an exhale...
Nechaev in the original source is far from stupid. All his swearing, antisocial behavior, and misunderstanding of social norms are a consequence of trauma. The entire left side of his brain was damaged. He only survived thanks to a polymer expander. It controlled not only memory but also heart rate and breathing. His cerebellum was also perforated. I'm proceeding from the assumption that if a device can control the entire body, then controlling breathing and pulse is easy for it.
His aggressiveness was fueled by blocked memories, but they weren't the root cause, in my opinion. That didn't happen here. The restraining factor in the form of a living "Blesna" cannot be underestimated. It's amazing how the fate of one character could have changed history. I would have played something like that if the partner's usefulness was on the level of BioShock, which inspired the developers. It would have been perfect if they had decided on the possibility of stealth gameplay or through polymers, and all this with a partner, maybe even another player.)
The synthesizer completed its work, applying a silver coating several nanometers thick to the neuroactive polymer storage. The part, held in a gravitational grip, slowly rotated around its axis, gleaming under the daylight lamps. Sechenov, having carefully examined it from all sides, nodded with satisfaction. The tendrils of his neuroconnector twitched, making a wave-like motion, and transmitted a new command to the machine.
The computer, receiving the command, instantly began to work. Streams of data rushed from the server machine to the academic's personal laboratory calculator. Numerous manipulators came to life, breaking the silence of the secluded "forge of the future."
The illumination of the medical box with transparent walls lit up. A soft transition membrane opened hospitably, contracting like part of a living organism. The automation sprayed a disinfectant, leaving small droplets on the membrane's surface. Sechenov, without delay, bared his left arm, unfastening his shirt sleeve, and pushed it into the damp interior of the box.
The tendrils of the neuroconnector twitched again, transmitting another command. For a moment, it seemed as if antennas of an insect were sticking out of the academic's temple, sensitively probing the space. The machine obediently began to work.
Soft grippers secured the arm. The manipulator's revolver head clicked, selecting the correct attachment. A flexible black tentacle treated the skin with a disinfectant and anesthetic.
After the procedure was completed, another manipulator, more resembling a creation of human hands, bent at its mechanical joints, scanning the secured limb. Marking it with an instantaneous defocused beam of light, the machine activated a medical laser, making the first incision.
A cloud of cryopolymer rose in the chamber, causing the box's walls to frost slightly. The laser quickly finished its work, giving way to the tentacles.
Flexible mechanical appendages took hold of the wound edges. Three suction-cup fingers at their ends reliably held the tissues. The machine spread the flesh, removing the skin and exposing nerves, veins, and muscles. The surreal picture was enhanced by the absence of blood and Sechenov's complete indifference.
The apparatus switched to a new stage of work. Filling the box with general-purpose polymer to create a nutrient medium (to prevent hypothetical tissue necrosis), they began installing a polymer battery, mounting it directly into the man's forearm.
Bone saws activated silently. Only a swirl of bubbles around the blades indicated their work. Slowly deepening into the bone, the instruments reached the bone marrow. The machine removed the saws. With sensitive manipulators, it installed superconducting rods, connected them to the bone marrow, and then to the nervous system, creating connectors and ports at the junction point so that additional equipment could be disconnected without harm to the body.
The robotic surgeon sewed up the flesh, leaving no trace. Only the power cable connector protruded, a reminder of the operation performed.
With a squelching sound, the polymer was pumped out. The gravitational grip lifted Sechenov's hand, splaying his fingers.
The tentacles stretched a special membrane, and only then did they put on the glove of the polymer manipulator. With a click, the neuro-polymer container was in place. Sechenov handed a vial with a gray, bubbling content to the mechanical assistant, and it unhesitatingly poured the polymer into the silver-plated container.
With a rustle, the grippers opened and the membrane parted. The academic slowly pulled out his hand, wincing slightly from phantom pains in the muscles that had been cut and then reassembled.
"Finally, I can say everything I think about you, Dima!" Khariton, no longer just Khariton but CHAR-les – finally and irrevocably – said irritably.
The tendrils, as if reluctantly, crawled out of the glove. Their movements were symmetrical, mechanically precise, but they carried echoes of emotions. However, it resembled a theatrical performance – as if the one who controlled them was merely imitating feelings.
Sechenov, marveling at the analogy, replied, "I'm also glad to hear you, Khariton."
"But I don't feel any joy in your voice," CHAR-les retorted sharply. "And address me as indicated in the documentation. Who knows who might hear."
"Enemies all around?" the academic inquired, his face hardening.
"That too. We have too few allies and too many enemies. If they knew about your plans, you would have been destroyed long ago. How many times have I spoken about their thirst for power! I'm not going to give them even a hint of immortality! I want to do science peacefully, so that no one hinders progress."
The scientist did not like the answer. Too much "I." Perhaps he had hurried. Death had not changed his friend for the better.
"It's even good that I'm officially dead," CHAR-les interrupted his thoughts. "Let it stay that way. Then they'll understand who they outplayed."
"Do you really not want to connect to the main array? Your capabilities would greatly help us..."
"You have no idea what you're asking, Dima! After what I've been through, I won't become part of the array!" The voice of the polymer intelligence sounded angry and terrified, but Sechenov detected falseness.
He caught himself thinking that a couple of months ago, he wouldn't have even hesitated – his friend would have simply become a tool to achieve his goal. Now, the academic asked himself a question impossible for his past self: wouldn't this approach turn utopia into hell? How easy it is to impose one's will by force, without asking a person... An ideal society cannot be built on such a foundation!
"I'll have to keep an eye on Khariton. His help is invaluable, but... it's better to take measures now. I'll get a couple of psychology books from the library. I'll refresh my knowledge. At the same time, I'll reread 'City of the Sun' and Thomas More's work. And... who were they discussing recently? Ray Bradbury and George Orwell, if I remember correctly? It will definitely be useful to read about the opposite of what we want to build..." the scientist decided.
The scales of probability shifted. The dreamer took a new step. Where it would lead – no one would know until the path was walked.