Сергей Жарковский – Creature of unknown kind (страница 4)

Vadim nodded.

– The “Jackets” in the smoking room were arguing. They call this an incredible place. A gitik. “Science knows many gitiks.”131 There is such an expression.

– Now that's what we call the Red Army. – Petrovich said didactically. – All the personnel of the test site, who are alive and not in the nuthouse, sit and read damned science fiction instead of the Charter! Led by comrade General, the chief of the quarantine. And you are still running to the scientists. You are strange, Sverzhin. But you have flair. And the balance is good… And you shoot, they say… Leather stocking…

– Actually I don't read at all, – said Vadim, but nobody heard him.

– Yeah, he is… a Fenimore. Damn! – Bashkalo cut in.

– Here is your Fenimore… It's a strange thing about your conscription contract, – said Petrovich. – I heard that enlistment offices recruit eighty-six to eighty-nine of the demobilized from here by their polls, and immediately offer one thousand and a half per month. Am I right, Sverzgin? Just asking.

– They also take a non-disclosure agreement, – said Vadim. – A fifteen-year sentence.

– Look where they brought the country… – said Bashkalo unexpectedly, but right in the vein, straight down the line.

– Well, if it's a fifteen-year sentence so then stop the chattering, – said Petrovich. – Have you finished a cigarette, Vasya? And you, have you finished your lunch? Get up now. Sverzhin, take the thermos and fill it with soil. Compress it with your fingers, it should be packed! And put a cork above. And carefully throw it away, but better roll it. And you, comrade Ensign Vasya, my dear man, – you are still responsible for the poles. All three and a half. Ok, you convinced me, I'll carry the broken one. But don't you drop the rest, I dare you in the name of the proletariat. Grab and cradle them. Gently. There will be something that needs a fence.

“A cylindrical hollow of metal or glass, open from one or more sides, tools and everyday items of any length and more than five centimeters in diameter acquire dangerous properties with a 100% probability”, parodying the secret instructor in a fencing mask, Mumbler howled. Vadim even rubbed his nose bridge, “like the following: empty cans and bottles, mugs, shell and anti-aircraft cartridges, and other similar technological objects …”

Vadim was shoving clay into the thermos, and the voice of Petrovich was barely making its way through the mumbling of the little man in his brain. Vadim could not calm Mumbler, before the thermos became “full to the eyeballs”. Fortunately, Petrovich decided to repeat everything, after he waited for the place of a halt to be brought into a safe state.

– Attention, group! Listen to the combat mission. Here we see, – Petrovich indicated the “three hundred and twenty-fourth“, – there is an offshoot from the track. Unknown to authorities. We go this direction. – A wave of the cane-staff. – About four hundred meters according to the land map, and in fact a kilometer and a half. Under the embankment again. The place is weird. – He scratched under the strap on his chin. – “A gitik”, you said, Sverzhin? Let it be “a gitik”. I'll show you the real gitik. Big and complicated. If we come back – do not talk about what you saw. Bashkalo, first of all I'm talking to you. You'll get exactly fifteen years.

– Listen, Nikolaich, you… not so fast, you slow down… – began Bashkalo nervously.

– Shut your mouth, Vasya, damn your leaky hands, I'm talking to you in the presence of the cub. We change the order of movement. Sverzhin, you go close, completely on the “risks”141. I'll be “risking”, and you handing them over to me. Now we go further. This track will be a place where you cannot talk, make noise, stomp out, or pray. No sound! You can only look at me and repeat all my actions. Bashkalo, you are ten meters behind all the time. Is the task clear?

Vadim nodded. Mumbler was attentively silent.

– That's right, it is clear to me, – said Bashkalo, hard at work. – But you should explain at least, Nikolaich…

– We'll get there – you'll see everything yourself. If you don't understand – I will explain to you at home. No questions in the Zone. Or you forgot? It seems that you're not a first timer, Vasya, – said Petrovich, expressing amazement in the last phrase.

– So is there something extremely dangerous? I didn't get. We've been ordered to survive…

Petrovich lost his patience.

– Ensign Bashkalo, stop chattering! The task is set, is clear. Perform the task. It's extremely dangerous everywhere here. And for the Soviet people, you, Vasya, must work your fifteen hundred per month through two hundred for each mission. We seem to have an ideological cub here, I live by the rules, and you have come to talk too much about money lately. Enough, no questions. Right dress, attention. Forward, contract boy. The order of movement is statutory before my command. On the march!

Vadim took one step and tumbled down into a river.

It was good in the river. And the world through which it was flowing was good. Warm, safe, and forever homely. Newcomers have been warned about hallucinations repeatedly. They were advised to recall what happened in them and, if possible, to count a seconds of objective time. One, Mississippi, two, Mississippi, three, Mississippi… And then, without fail, describe the memories in the report. A slow, narrow river in the jungle. The heavy river, the powerful river, flows from afar, for a long time. The Amazon? What the jungle is this? “How do I know”, said Mumbler, “am I a jungle specialist to you, or what?” The river flows majestically, like semolina porridge. There is a feeling of peace and security, peace in the whole world. And crocodiles and piranhas? There are none here. The water is very clean and tasty. Upstream, a half of kilometer away from Vadim, the river made a turn (he perceived it as “the river flowed out of the bend”), and out of this bend some boards with life buoys on the walls, fishing rods and open doors suddenly appeared, all sparkling in the sun, white, like in Chekhov's poem, suburban, theatrical.

“That's right”, said Mumbler, “a houseboat. A square like a box, a house on a raft, with a veranda, wicker chairs, curtains in the doorway… Who is sitting on the veranda? Two people? Or one is sitting down, while the second at the railing, spits into the water?”

It was unclear from the scene.

Two hundred eighty-five Mississippi, two hundred eighty-six Mississippi… Vadim was counting diligently.

– Sverzhin, stop!

Vadim was thrown back. He stopped and slammed himself hard over the eyes, trying to wipe them.

– “Stop” was a command! – repeated Petrovich after all this. – Pay more attention on the track. – Vadim heard his footsteps, and here Petrovich approached and stood next to him on the right. And only then the vision seemed to be cleared from the river of semolina porridge, and Vadim realised that he had almost stuck into the famous fog of the Zone. The atmospheric condensation.

“And I saw it a long time ago, about fifteen seconds”, said Mumbler, “But you force me to count there, to watch here, friends don't act this way with a friend!”

“Oh, shut up!” – Vadim almost said it aloud.

– Hey you, bumper, how you called…, Sverzhin, you need to be more attentive, – Petrovich said quietly and unexpectedly mildly. – Do you see the old “risk”, it is lying right there? I'm throwing a new one next to it.

A small nut, flying for a dozen meters, with a gauze strip, not very long, tied to it, crossed through the air and entered the fog. The fog blinked, at once, totally disappearing for a moment.

– Did you get it, Fenimore?

Vadim completely returned from the river. The taste of water disappeared from the tongue, sharp TV flashes melted in his eyes. An automatic desire to jump on one foot, shaking the water out of the ear, lingered for one more second (By the way, yes, he got water in his ear). His short-term memory kicked in, and Vadim said, focusing on reality:

– Yes. I see. D-damn! What a mess. There is no fog in reality, is there?

– Yes. That’s the thing. Exactly this one does not actually exist. Something happens with the eyes here. These kinds of places lie in wait. Gitiks, damn them. Doctors say it's like a mental leap. We see in some other way, or sometimes do not see at all. But the Trouble forces a special human gut feeling to show itself, if you're lucky. If there is one – even you, young one, immediately distinguish the real fog from… well, from this, from what's in the mind. But it can also happen like now – no fog at all, neither in the brain, nor in reality, but the visibility is still only a few steps. And no hunch will help. Here, take a step backward.

Vadim carefully obeyed. The fog vanished.

– There is no fog, but there are “risks”, right?

– Yes.

– Don't even step back, just lean back with your body.

The “risks” disappeared.

– Understood? Neither exists. Hocus-pocus. But they are there, I see them from here. This is called “to blink the fog away“. Here is what a creation of unknown kind it is, our Mother-Trouble… Hunch is a hunch, but attention and caution are the main thing. Like in a minefield. Listen, Sverzhin, – Petrovich said suddenly, – so you are married; why did you come here, you fool? Have you got kids? Come here.