Ирина Пименова – No Names, No Signs. Technology I Virus I Life (страница 5)

So, they flew away.

At first, of course, they were suspicious of the lanky man who was preparing them for the flight. It is hard to say goodbye to the Earth. The Earth is a home. Everything is native here. Especially, at their age. And there? What will be there? Uncertainty. New life. Is it that good?

Already here, at the station, Olga often remembered this young man with an open face and a very inviting smile. He was among the volunteers and immediately stood out from the general mass of search engines. He sincerely grieved when Andrey was never found. It was he who told them about the station.

Olga thought about all this for a long time – about the loss of her son, the decision to fly. Would she have taken this step if Andrey had been found, or if he had not been lost at all? She wasn’t so sure.

With her husband, in recent years, they did not talk much, and did not spend much time together. Did they live together out of inertia? Who knows? It is highly likely or it was some kind of internal mutual respect and distant understanding….

And here they are, together, and they need to talk again somehow.

Yet their seclusion was not absolute. They could watch station news like at home on TV. Sometimes, Nastya told the news, she even brought dominoes. She asked not to tell anyone – it was forbidden. This couple was sympathetic here. In general, time somehow passed.

***

– I do not like this slight deviation Olga has, – one nurse said to another, carefully studying her tests on the computer screen.

– Should we tell Sergei Sergeyevich? – Another responded, – or let’s look at the morning tests?

– Come on, let’s monitor it for a bit.

***

Since no symptoms of the disease were revealed, their exit to the general compartments of the station was scheduled for Tuesday.

Everyone was very happy, smiled like a mountain fell off their shoulders. Olga freshened up, began to get ready, she was afraid to plan, but the feeling of the end of quarantine and the curiosity to see the station, their new home, even had a therapeutic effect.

For such a solemn event, a small welcoming ceremony was usually prepared. Finally, everyone was informed about the DNA results, Andreyka was prepared and the parents. Everyone was very worried. They really wanted to meet as soon as possible, and to hug each other.

Kate was the wariest of all. She understood that potential patients were coming to her, and she would have to conduct a whole series of sessions not only to get used to the station, but also to reunite the family.

The med bay was separated from the common corridor by a large glass walkway. When the doctors went first, before Olga and Andrew, they immediately saw a very excited, but trying not to show it, little boy with goggle eyes, who was obviously outstood of the entire group of five people who were meeting newcomers.

Andrew smiled happily, Olga was a little pale, but also visibly happy. There were only ten meters to the airlock doors.

Unexpectedly, Olga stumbled, then inadvertently swayed and began to fall sharply. Her smiling face froze, replaced by a grimace of fear, she was overtaken by a strong attack of suffocation. She clutched her throat with her hand, desperately pulling the other towards her son. Her hand was sliding horribly across the glass.

Everyone was incredibly anxious. There was a commotion around Olga. She fell and barely moved. At this time, Andrew began to lose his balance. They also ran up to him. Doctors helped, but very quickly it was all over. Sergey Sergeevich, pale as chalk, not understanding anything, ordered that a stretcher be brought to pick up the bodies.

The stunned greeters froze. Everything happened before their eyes, behind the glass partitions of the airlock corridor.

Kate rushed to Andreyka, trying to hug him, so that he would not see any of this. Yara fell into a stupor, slowly realizing everything that had happened. From the other side, everyone returned to the med bay, and no one else came out. Since the illness of the spouses showed itself so unexpectedly, it meant that it was impossible to leave the infected gateway. The head of the Yara’s shift understanding that Sergey Sergeevich would disappear right now, quickly and abruptly came to the communicator, told something to Sergei Sergeyevich on the communicator, and they left.

It was so quiet that it was possible to hear the working ventilation. Yara finally came out of her stupor and also rushed to Andreyka. He’d rooted to the floor. He was all white, only eyes, huge, blue, drilled the empty corridor.

His parents died overnight. To say that Sergei Sergeevich was discouraged would be to say nothing. He was furious, the disease manifested itself at the very last moment, the life of the entire station was practically put in jeopardy. But there were no symptoms…

The briefing on the causes of the undetected virus was held in a closed atmosphere. The doctors, although they completed all the protocols for examinations and autopsies, answered the questions «Why?», «How did it happen?», evasively, as always. Perhaps, new features of the behavior of the virus have actually been revealed.

Chapter 7

The ceremony of farewell to the deceased at the space station had a very sad character. Here in space, the coffin was a one-man shuttle. The body of the deceased was immersed there and released into the open space. There was no other way. Relatives, but often just seeing off on their last journey, needed to be in spacesuits, because after the short last speech of the captain, they had to open the gateway and release the shuttle into space. The burial chamber, in fact, the docking bay, was not even designed properly. Everything at the station was strictly functional.

Space carefully accepted such shuttles. They slowly drifted off into the distance, into the blackness. In this slow movement to infinity, the Universe unbearably clearly showed its greatness, both giving life and taking it away.

Two shuttles of light metallic color were slowly sent on an eternal flight. There were no flowers, no memorabilia. They searched for a small spacesuit for a long time for Andrew, there was no way to persuade him to watch the procession on video.

When the lock closed, the whole procession returned to the station in mournful silence.

Part II. Earth

Chapter 1

Nikolay Nikolaevich was going work. It was a fresh morning, sparkling after a short summer rain. It was sunny and already hot. Moisture still glistened on the leaves of the trees. The day promised to be wonderful. He loved his city just like that – not yet awakened, while the noise of the city bustle had not yet replaced either the rustle of trees or the singing of birds.

Moscow has changed a lot in the end of the XXI century. Incredibly tall houses, with large tiered green terraces, rose majestically into the sky. Architectural styles abounded in curved, extended lines. The buildings were a combination of gleaming white-and-metal structures and greenery that thrives in summer, descending between floors. In winter, these orangeries, located on almost every floor, were carefully removed under warm glazing, the structures of which softly covered this entire green riot, because of which the buildings looked grayish in the overcast sky, even orphaned, and a little pulled up in their forced asceticism. But in summer, the aromas and colors of flowers located along the entire height of the building gave a feeling of lightness and airiness. At night, such illuminated terraces made the city very cozy. It was adorable to walk and look at the streets from above.

Nikolay Nikolayevich left his flyer on the roof, in the covered parking slot, and headed for the elevator, which brought him down to the 23rd floor, to the laboratory.

Nowadays solar stations were installed on many neighboring rooftops. Between the buildings, even higher, where only technical floors remained, flyers scurried back and forth.

People, despite the warnings of eco-activists, and their eternal struggle for clean air, still came up with flyers powered by solar panels and electric motors, and at the same time air traffic rules. Fortunately, it occurred to them that they should not entangle the sky with huge networks of wires and dangling signs of air traffic. All information about the rules in the air came to the on-board computer of an air car or a light flyer, and the passengers did not think about anything. Sometimes, they recalled the ancient times with a smile, when drivers had to know all the rules of the road by heart, follow the road, and even at night! Yes, even to take some medical tests to drive a car! Unthinkable inconvenience! Now the on-board computer is in charge for everything necessary and people turned from drivers into passengers. Rarely, there was a need to take the control. Below, on the ground, electric cars also drove along the roads, very busy, but there were more parks and alleys.

Leaving the elevator, Nikolay Nikolaevich found himself in a brightly lit hall. The exterior facades of buildings with their cheerful, green decoration only slightly influenced the interior. There was a strict, office atmosphere. Brightly lit passages and corridors of predominantly light colors. The walls now and then came to life where the worker touched them with his hand or simply looked at her intently – suddenly a thin screen appeared, reflecting the necessary information from the Brainnet, which colleagues could, for example, argue on the way to the buffet or to a meeting. The Brainnet which widely uses AI technologies and neuronets, became the powerful and omnipresent change to the old Internet.