Бесплатный фрагмент - I’m With You

Part I. Just in Case

On a mid-August morning, Pavlovsky Posad awoke to the scent of its weaving mills and the warm waters of the lake. The city woke slowly, like an old loom — creaking, straining, but inexorable. Vadim stood at the window of his room on the seventh floor of a panel apartment block and looked at the construction site of the future park around the lake. The cranes moved — slowly, heavily, but they moved. Excavators dug pits, dump trucks hauled away soil, concrete mixers turned their red drums. The city was being built, despite

the resistance. Or in spite of it.

He was thirty-five — an age when boyhood was already behind him, yet manhood still felt somehow unfinished. He was stocky, with the broad shoulders of a weaver — a profession he had inherited from his father, just as his father had inherited it from his grandfather. Three generations, three shifts, the same weaving shop — No. 14. Vadim’s hands knew thread better than his mind knew people’s faces. Vadim had worked at the weaving factory since he was eighteen. Loom No. 7 knew those hands well — rough, permanently callused from years of working with thread and metal. In Pavlovsky Posad, where everything seemed to breathe shawls and wool, there was nothing unusual about that. By thirty-five, most people already had children, had added rooms to their private houses, or had left for other towns in the Moscow Region — or for Moscow itself — in search of better work. But Vadim stayed. His palms were callused, his fingers permanently stained with denim dye — the factory had switched to special orders for protective uniforms six months earlier.

In the dressing-table mirror he had inherited from his grandmother, he saw a face women often described as “interesting.” Not handsome — interesting. A nose broken in his youth, fine lines around his eyes that should not have been there at thirty-five, and brown stubble he shaved every three days because shaving more often irritated his skin. Grey eyes, with yellowish whites — years of work in the dye shop had taken their toll, despite all the respirators.

On the nightstand beside the bed lay a photograph in a cheap plastic frame. Alina. A girl with long chestnut hair and a mole above her left eyebrow, like a tiny map of an unknown island. They had been dating for two years.

Vadim often replayed in his memory the evening when they first saw each other. It was at a disco in the empty shop of a former weaving factory, which the locals had nicknamed “Fabrika Party.” People chipped in a thousand rubles each, rented the old warehouse for the night, hung a mirror ball, and invited a DJ from a neighboring town. Vadim had come with friends, already quite drunk, and was standing by the speaker when she came out onto the dance floor. Alina danced with fire — not the way everyone else danced, but as if music

flowed through her veins instead of blood. She moved her hips and legs with flair, hitting the beat with an almost frightening precision. At one point she bent slightly and tossed her loose hair forward — one! And immediately tossed it back — two! Like in modern American youth films, where the heroine dances at a party, throwing her hair back in time with the music. At that very moment their eyes met. Alina looked straight at him, eye to eye, and a spark ran between them — not a metaphor, but

a physical sensation, as if someone had flicked a lighter inside his chest. Vadim didn’t approach her then — he was too shy, froze like a fool. But a week later they accidentally ran into each other in the line for coffee, and he finally squeezed out: “Hi, I remember you from the disco.” She smiled and said: “I remember you too. You never invited me to dance.” Since then they had not been apart.

Alina worked as an administrator at a dental clinic in the city center. Ten-hour shifts, eternally dissatisfied patients, paperwork. Her money was enough only for herself — she lived with her parents, saved for the wedding penny by penny, and occasionally allowed herself a cheap manicure. She didn’t complain — she was used to it. But when Vadim spoke about the contract, fear appeared in her eyes for the first time — not for herself.

Vadim had planned to propose on New Year’s Eve, but circumstances decided otherwise.

“Vad, are you going to have breakfast?” his mother called from the kitchen, her voice softened by the distance, while the smell of fried onions drifted down the hallway.

“Coming.”

He tore himself away from the window and walked down the corridor, past walls hung with carpets and photographs. The apartment smelled of old things and new anxiety. A two-bedroom apartment where every centimeter was soaked in thirty years of life. His father’s armchair with a sagging seat, covered by a plaid his grandmother had knitted back in the nineties. His mother’s violets on the windowsill — the pots crowded so tightly they barely fit. Every morning his mother came to admire them, watered them so they would be fresh and pleasing to the eye.

Vadim knew that after his departure the flowers would demand her care as never before. They always sensed her hands, her mood — faster than people did.

At the table his father was already sitting. Viktor Ivanovich, fifty-eight, with a face carved by wrinkles deeper than his son’s, and hands that trembled — not from illness, but from nerves. Three years earlier at the factory two fingers had been cut off his left hand — a circular saw, night shift, human error. Now he worked as a storekeeper and took phenazepam prescribed by a neurologist. Today he wasn’t drinking — he planned to drink later, when his son returned from Noginsk.

“Sit,” his father said without raising his eyes. His voice was dull, as if he were speaking from underwater.

His mother — Nina Pavlovna, fifty-five, a woman with faded blue eyes and an eternally worried face — put a plate of fried eggs and bacon on the table. She always fed him as if it were the last meal of her life. Vadim suspected that was exactly what it was — not the last meal ever, but the last one in this configuration. Son at home, father at the table, the confrontation somewhere far away.

“Are you sure?” his mother asked, sitting down opposite. It was the question she had asked every day for the last two weeks.

“I’m sure, Mom.”

“When are you signing the contract?” his mother asked, driving the word “when” into the beginning of the phrase like a nail.

“Today in Noginsk. At the training center.”

His father crunched bread. Loudly, deliberately. Vadim knew that gesture — the old man didn’t want to hear details. Details made reality too tangible.

In the west of the country, a complex confrontation had already been going on for the eighth month. With a country obsessed with an alien ideology — that was what they said on television. Vadim didn’t particularly delve into politics. He didn’t care about ideology. He needed money. The wedding cost four hundred thousand. A studio apartment in a new building near the lake — another two and a half million in mortgage. Alina worked as an administrator at a dental clinic; her salary was enough only for herself. Vadim pulled in thirty-five thousand at the factory, plus taxi side jobs in

the evenings. The confrontation gave three hundred thousand a month. Three hundred thousand for life.

The simplest arithmetic, which he ran through his head every night.

After breakfast he went to take a shower. The water ran rusty for the first three seconds — the eternal problem of the apartment block. He stood under the hot stream and looked at his fingers. Legs. Chest. All of it could turn into mince at any moment. But he forbade himself to think about it. The thought of death led to paralysis of the will. He had to move forward, like a tightrope walker over an abyss — without looking down.

His father was waiting for him in the hallway when Vadim came out of the shower, hastily dried with a towel.

“Take this,” the old man held out a black pectoral cross on a leather cord. “Mine. I’ve worn it since I was twenty. Don’t take it off.”

Vadim took it. The cross was warm from his father’s body. He put it on over his T-shirt, then tucked it under the fabric.

“I won’t, Dad.”

“Good.”

They didn’t hug. In their family, embraces were something foreign, like vegetarianism or yoga. Love was measured by silence and tea served on time.

At ten in the morning Vadim left the house alone. His parents stayed — his mother washed the dishes, his father turned on the TV to the news. Vadim went down the stairs (the elevator had broken the month before), walked past the children’s playground where the grandmothers were already seated on benches, and came out at the minibus stop.

He decided to take public transport — it was cheaper. First a minibus to the bus station, then a regular bus to Noginsk. The trip took about an hour if there were no traffic jams. Vadim sat by the window and put his backpack on his knees. In the backpack were his passport, document, a spare T-shirt, and sandwiches his mother had packed for the road, wrapped in parchment.

The bus started moving. The city floated past the window: first five-story buildings, then neighborhoods of detached houses, then fields and forest belts. Vadim looked at the trees and counted. Three hundred thousand a month. In six months — almost two million. The wedding, the down payment on the apartment. His mother could retire earlier. His father could buy new prosthetics for his fingers — there were modern technologies, after all. He did not think about death. He had forbidden himself.

The training center was located in the building of a former vocational school on the outskirts of Noginsk. A three-story Soviet-era building, with peeling stucco and cracked steps. On the roof hung a flag — huge, faded by the sun. In the parking lot stood buses with tinted windows and several civilian cars. Near the entrance, about ten people were smoking — some already in uniform, some in civilian clothes like Vadim.

Inside it smelled of cheap canteen stew, bleach, and sweat. A lot of sweat. Vadim walked down the corridor with yellow walls to an office with a sign: “Reception Office — Contract Signing.” A queue of four people. All men between twenty-five and forty. Some with serious faces, some deliberately carefree. One guy, very young, with trembling hands, kept adjusting the belt on his pants even though it already sat perfectly.

Vadim joined the queue, took out his phone, and texted Alina: “Here. All good.” She answered immediately: “Love you. Come back.” He didn’t answer. Not because he didn’t want to, but because the words stuck in his throat.

Twenty minutes later he was invited into the office. Inside sat two people — a supervisor with tired eyes and a female doctor with a mole on her nose. The supervisor leafed through his documents; the doctor looked at the monitor.

“Vadim Viktorovich,” the supervisor raised his eyes. “Volunteer? Reason?”

“Financial.”

The supervisor smirked — without mirth, simply stretching his lips.

“Honest. That’s good. Better than ‘for ideals.’ For ideals, you know, people work the first year, drink the second, and collect certificates the third. But for money a man always works.”

Vadim didn’t answer. He waited.

“Medical clearance received,” the supervisor continued. “Healthy, fit. All that remains is to sign the contract.”

The female doctor moved a stack of papers toward him. Vadim began to read, though he understood it was useless — the legal language was designed so that a person couldn’t understand anything. He looked only for numbers. The sum. The terms. The liability.

“Three hundred thousand a month,” he read aloud. “Advance of one hundred fifty upon signing.”

“Correct,” the supervisor nodded. “But that’s not all. You’re from the Moscow region, from Pavlovsky Posad?”

“Yes.”

“Then listen carefully. For residents of the Moscow region there are additional regional payments. A one-time payment upon signing a contract with a government agency—1.9 million rubles from the government of the Moscow region. Plus a federal payment—400 thousand. Total 2.3 million, which you will receive immediately after being sent to the unit. In addition to the monthly allowance.”

Vadim felt a jolt inside. 2.3 million. Immediately. Plus three hundred thousand a month. Plus insurance of three million to his family in the event of… He forbade himself to think about the last point.

“And if…” he began and faltered. “And if during missions I disable something? Equipment, aircraft?”

The supervisor smirked for real this time, showing yellow, nicotine-stained teeth.

“You’re thinking far ahead. But correctly. For disabled opponent equipment they also pay separately. For a plane — three hundred thousand. For a helicopter — two hundred. For heavy equipment — one hundred thousand. Not only planes, but the sums are like that. So if you prove to be a professional out there, consider it a jackpot.”

The doctor giggled again, but Vadim wasn’t listening. He was counting. 2.3 immediately. 300 a month. If he stayed six months — another 1.8. Total more than four million in half a year. Plus possible bonuses. Alina could stop working. His mother could close the mortgage. His father could buy normal prosthetics.

“Insurance?” he asked, returning to the papers.

“Three million to the family in the event of death,” the supervisor repeated. “I hope it won’t be needed.”

Vadim nodded. The papers rustled under his fingers. He took the pen. Signed. Put the date. The second copy — for himself. The third — for the file.

The supervisor extended his hand.

“Congratulations on concluding the contract. In a week we expect you at the unit at the address indicated in the order. Bring your passport, document, contract, and personal items according to the list. On the day of departure a minibus from the training center will come for you — at seven in the morning sharp. We know the address.”

“Thank you.”

Vadim stood, put the contract in his backpack. He was about to leave when the door to the office opened without a knock.

A man entered. About forty, in an expensive dark blue suit, with a badge on his lapel. “Descendants Corporation — Cognitive Copying Department.” The man was smoothly shaven and smelled of expensive cologne — sweet-woody, with notes of tobacco. His face was unremarkable, the kind you forget a second after you turn away. Grey eyes looked calm and slightly mocking, like a car salesman who knows you’ll buy the car anyway.

“Forgive the intrusion,” his voice was soft, insinuating. “Vadim Viktorovich? My name is Andrey Viktorovich. A representative of Descendants Corporation. We cooperate with the government structure within a psychological support program. We have an offer. It will take three hours of your time.”

The supervisor nodded — as if to say he knew about it and approved.

Vadim frowned.

“What offer?”

“We want to copy your memory and consciousness onto a digital medium.”

Silence hung in the office. The doctor with the mole stopped breathing. Vadim looked at the Descendants representative and waited for the catch.

“Why?” he asked.

Andrey Viktorovich sat on the edge of the table, like an old friend about to tell him something important.

“In complex situations much can happen. Concussion, memory loss from trauma… and the worst. Your physical body may not return. But your personality — your memories, character, voice — can live on. A copy of consciousness can help restore memory if you suffer an injury. Or it can help your loved ones survive the loss. Imagine: your mother could talk to you after you are gone. Hear your voice. Get advice.”

Vadim smirked. The smirk came out crooked, nervous.

“I’m not planning to die,” he said. “I’m planning to come back alive and healthy. Get married. Have children.”

“Of course,” Andrey Viktorovich nodded. “No one plans to. But even excellent drivers fasten their seat belts.”

The doctor giggled — nervously, immediately covering her mouth with her hand.

Vadim was silent. A thought spun in his head: the idea was wonderful. A copy of consciousness. Immortality in digital form. He had read about such experiments — the Americans had done them, the Chinese, even Europeans. They said the technology was raw, but working.

“And you won’t use my copy without my consent?” Vadim asked. His voice sounded harsher than he had planned. “In schemes, creating clones, replacements? What if in five years I retire, and there’s already a me who signed some documents for me?”

Andrey Viktorovich smiled. The smile was perfect — neither warm nor cold.

“This is a tested, closed technology. We are not going to use your copy illegally. Everything strictly within the framework of the signed agreement. The copy will be stored on a secure server and activated only upon the occurrence of one of the conditions: your physical death, severe traumatic brain injury with memory loss, or upon your personal request after returning.”

“And if I return alive and healthy, what happens to the copy?”

“We delete it. At your request.”

Vadim looked at the supervisor. He nodded. There was essentially no choice — he had already agreed mentally. Not because he believed in corporate nobility. But because there were no spare three hours in his life, and yet there was curiosity. And also — a vague hope that if something happened to him, his mother would not be left completely alone.

“All right,” said Vadim. “I agree.”

“Excellent,” Andrey Viktorovich clapped his hands — dryly, businesslike. “The copying process will take three hours. You will be given a sedative if you are not ready to stay awake that long. Many prefer to sleep.”

“A sedative,” said Vadim. “Let’s do the sedative.”

“A reasonable decision.”

Vadim signed the agreement with Descendants. Thin sheets, fine print, legal constructions he did not understand. He put his signature where they showed him, and the date. Andrey Viktorovich took one copy and left the second for Vadim.

“Follow me.”

They went out into the corridor and down the stairs to the basement. A clean room painted white. In the middle — a chair like a dental chair, with a headrest and armrests. Around it — equipment: screens, wires, blocks with blinking lights. It smelled of ozone and something sweet.

“Please sit down.”

Vadim sat. The leather upholstery was cool. A technician — a young guy in a white coat — began attaching sensors to his head. Gel discs, wires, tape. There were many sensors — twenty, thirty. They covered his skull from forehead to nape.

“Doesn’t hurt?” the technician asked.

“No.”

“Now a little injection.”

Vadim felt a prick in his shoulder — the syringe entered softly, almost imperceptibly. The technician pressed the plunger. Warmth flowed into his blood, as if hot tea had been poured inside him.

“In a few minutes you’ll start feeling sleepy,” said Andrey Viktorovich. “Don’t resist.”

Vadim nodded. His head was already growing heavy. The walls swam. The white became too white, then too grey, then disappeared altogether.