Бесплатный фрагмент - Runners to Paradise

Agree friends, we are interested in knowing what a socialized consciousness looks like, which can become the basis of a perfect world. People — computers included in the World Wide Web, communicating with everyone, now or in the past: what is it? Knowledgeable, powerful, immortal, who ran to Paradise faster than anyone else.

There can be many branches along this path. Perhaps best of all, the theme is revealed by the British television series «Black Mirror». Computers are an incredible addition to a person, his chance for immortality, lasting joy or nightmare.

The book shows that the already existing biological basis of a person has a huge resource for improvement. Computers, smartphones, and other gadgets are just crutches for people ascending to heaven. And, someday the time will come to resolutely discard them.

…The idea is periodically raised: a chip has been implanted in the man of the future; location identifier, which is a passport, wallet, medical card, and the like.

The bond with it, however, is easily shielded by layers of metal, concrete, water or earth. Interference can be caused by thunderstorms, magnetic storms, and distance devices.

Therefore, the next step in the world order presupposes the exodus of mankind into the only House, designed for several billion people. It is forbidden to live outside of it.

The entire space here is covered by Wi-Fi, so that any person is constantly under the control of the Government. If he starts doing something wrong, he will be stopped very quickly.

But man is characterized by a striving for diversity. Otherwise, life becomes simply impossible. The house is divided into separate Sectors. Each of them has its own way of life, architecture, temperature and humidity. Sometimes, in accordance with certain principles, residents move to other places. The inhabitant of the technologically advanced, reminiscent of the office of Univer City, is transferred to Setan, stylized Central Asia, with dates and heat. A happy rentier AurumCity falls into ExoCity, a prison full of snowdrifts and stew that must be fiercely fought over. This state of affairs suits the owners of the House — after all, the game of fate is never attached.

Almost everything that was told about them and the House remained in the deleted six chapters.

Terminals are located throughout the House. To live, people must re-register regularly. Something like this is already common. This is how all social networks work. From time to time you «lose» your password. The system rejects your option, although there can be no error. You restore it by requesting a confirmation code that comes to your mobile phone.

Today, users are registering to enter the Network, and the day after tomorrow they will register all of themselves with devices that are somewhat reminiscent of modern payment terminals.

When registering, we enter a «captcha» — a set of letters and numbers. It is worth deviating somewhat from the mental norm, and this is already quite difficult.

It will be replaced by an interactive film. Letters and numbers flash across the screen, forming invisible questions. By observing the feedback, the machine determines your moods and thoughts. A similar psychotechnological device (MindReader) was created in the early nineties. The program diagnoses the state of mind in a volume unknown even to the owner of the brain. «Open your soul. Be a child. Tune in to goodness ”- after this call, the machine easily extracts from you everything that you think about, what you remember and what you have forgotten a long time ago.

In general use Terminals will appear first in corporations and government structures. Then they will occupy airports, train stations, streets, supermarkets and intersections.

It is unlikely that an ordinary computer is suitable for the role of the Terminal. The social role of the device is too great and requires some external reverence. A laptop that is regularly exposed to spilled coffee cannot earn the respect it deserves. Personality terminals will be installed in public places, where they will at least be protected from vandalism.

It is hardly possible to avoid this. Nature loves to test everything with practical experience.

Thanks to the Strong Intelligence program, matured smartphones will be able to communicate with their owners, advise and guide. The Mobile Friend manages money wisely, looks for a job, a life partner and the most acceptable way. All this will begin with the fact that mobile phones will display contextual advertising not only by reading what we write, but also by eavesdropping.

However, this is already there.

Communication means will become pets. Now they call us with flicker and vibration, in the future they can come up and bite. They will accompany you everywhere, a cross between squid and crab, wrapping around your flesh. Such they will become Assistants, capable of conducting a line of communication between the Government and the person.

…In the new, thoroughly controlled world of the House, people lack immortality. Older religions are forgotten or not taken seriously. There is no belief in a posthumous existence.

Wealthy people want to achieve eternal life on their own.

The souls of five people from the group of Guardians created in the USSR wake up in the midst of the World Order. They are calculated through the I-Di Terminals. They offer to lead the business of resurrecting customers-Trusts from any degree of decay. After all, only the citizens of the former superpower have some kind of Knowledge. They are given unlimited funding, materials and workers to choose from.

And, they agree.

Hunt is a Level 3 Mechanic.

Hart is an ambulance attendant.

Stele — Diko dancer, psychologist. Dies from the «Landfill disease». Agent «Lazaret» in the other world.

Tim is an office plankton who dreams of becoming a spy with a license to kill.

Dory is a teenager who doesn’t want to grow old.

There is also Alex Tour, a thirteen-year-old scientist, on whose behalf the story of the Infirmary is being conducted, his companions and Friends: Baby, Livi, Eri, Hett, Kyra, Agatha, Binga, Max Grudener, and others.

They haven’t got together yet. They live in different corners of the colossal House.

The house is a serfdom that grew out of a system of contracts similar to those now applied to professional athletes. Feudal relations, socialism, communism and fascism, separated by strong bulkheads, against the background of a developed technocratic society. There is something similar in the photographs of the Chinese city of Kowloon City — merged multi-storey buildings with a pair of courtyards. An immense communal apartment.

Population — a billion people, in a building so high that there is no longer enough air to breathe on the upper floors. Why was the House created? Protection against terrorism, in the conditions that a bomb similar in power to a nuclear one can be created in the kitchen, environmental protection, which has reached the point of absurdity, control over capricious humanity. But, probably, those services that always want to know your location, your phone number, and a lot of things that are more convenient to deal with people who constantly live in a space permeated with Wi-Fi know better about this.

Phone for talking to the dead

…To avoid meeting with persons of higher status, Hunt ordered a three-dimensional elevator for one.

Minus 25 units for uncommunicativeness, — replied Prilipala ((literally — «the one who stuck»).

Maybe today it is permissible?

The outskirts of the quarter appeared unusually quickly. Here you can meet your young self. Scoop up meaning from childhood. Now it is important to see the tasty past.

At the intersection of the corridors, Hunt studied the hatchway to Setan for several minutes. A completely different world is hidden just a couple of meters away. A part of the House, arranged for a patriarchal life with incubators of children for the production of work in the civilized Sectors. Medieval Asia. As soon as you open the hatch, take a few steps, and the novelty dies in your face; the smell of sand swept over concrete, figs and salty blood. Crowds of relatives unimaginable for UniverCity, meat indistinguishable from the real, dates, halva, the indisputable power of the head of the family and trade shops without price tags.

Besides Setan, Hunt only visited Exo City, at the invitation of Prilipala. Refrigeration pipes, prison cells that look like boilers, tears and fervent laughter of even more powerless prisoners than himself. An attraction for those whose secret desire to torment and escape.

Hunt walked to the partition that separates the world from the Dump of one of the courtyards of the House, large-scale, reaching almost to the Roof. Once there was a park with a fountain in the middle.

The dump was amazing. It looks like an ocean dried up in the light of a supernova. Dunes of rags that were once someone’s clothing. This tank is a whale without a tail, and if you turn the point of view, it is a crumpled bathyscaphe. Dishes, household appliances, loose furniture. Some of the things equipped with their own power sources make strange sounds, as if calling to restore them and return them to their former life.

The bones of nameless people, those that have not been recycled in recycling plants, form vast geological strata. The breath of the ventilation pipes makes the ash flutter like torn confetti. If you crawl down the network of cracks now, you can find a rarity — a bent laser disc, a TV with a vacuum tube, or even a paper book.

Birds with scruffy wings, a cross between ravens and bats, scream in the air. They fight insects for a piece of prey, losing feathers and quite correctly pronouncing the curses they hear from the boys.

— It is time! — said the Friend. — The dump is not ours. Penalty for non-standard behavior 355 units. Watch — commercial for the new White with Spices, 3 minutes.

Enter elevator 349, line 34.

But, now Hunt could not miss communicating with the Garbage Ocean, although he suspected that this was a desire to escape from existence. Or, more precisely, the beginning of life, where there is no repetition of what has been passed many times, which has already lost its color and taste. In general, it is interesting to meditate on such a messy, with a taste of freedom, mandala.

— Lumm. Rumm. Remy, Hunt hummed.

Remy. That was his name in that childhood life. Why — no one will tell.

«Hello Laz! (Luke). Is it still overgrown with crystalline concrete?»

Through the technological hatch, which was probably left by the builders of the House, young schoolchildren, the seekers Evin, Ri, Remi and Zhanna, made their way to the Dump. Here’s someone who could help remember everything. Just ten, or, let’s be honest, fifteen years ago, they were here together.

Hunt made his way between the shields covered in graffiti betraying the intent of the curious little bandits. He pushed aside a metal sheet familiar from childhood.

— It’s illegal! — reminded the Assistant. «You’ve already made three mistakes today. Follow the specified route. Check your loyalty to the Government at the Terminal.

An excavator with a bucket famously dug into the ground may be the same age as the House itself, as it was so legendary stood on the hillside. Just like when Remi was thirteen years old. Memory helpfully propelled Hunt into the bulky machine. The engine compartment is spacious, as if the designers took care of the comfort for dozens of mechanisms. Dark fatty oil. Rectangles of acid-smelling batteries. Everything is angular, but excruciatingly pleasant. Here, far from teachers, TV cameras and microphones, everything that was sneering, the boys sneaking into the excavator one by one took off the burden of the onset of puberty, as if fertilizing soulless mechanisms.

In a chipped pipe that once passed subway cars through itself, you can slide into a pile of sand poured out of giant fuses. From the top of this ride, little Hunt saw for the first time a special girl with white hair living in a carefully isolated half of the Orphanage. Of course, organic glass lenses distorted reality, surrounding objects with a pink aura, but undoubtedly the creature was incredibly beautiful. The creature (as Remy called the stranger), noticing Hunt with homemade binoculars, once made a friendly wave of his hand. Remi could not talk to this girl, or maybe he was afraid of it.

With the brunette Jeanne, who studied with Hunt together, the relationship was much easier. With her you could wander around the Garbage, chat, collecting mechanisms for the construction of an airplane. In search of levers, wheels, pipes, airtight fabric, they wandered as far as the Black Lake, on the surface of which, on hot days, the tentacles of what was aptly called the Squid were wriggling.

Played Time Lift travel, Eloi Morlocks, and hostile classmates fighting.

New types of unidentified living creatures constantly appeared at the Dump. In order to find their correct proper names for them, they had to seriously strain their imaginations. Chemicals and mitochondria gave rise to unpleasant but strangely appealing species. Spiders were like lizards, and lizards with articulated legs were like venomous arachnids. Dogs with outstretched jaws forgot that they were obliged to bark and only chomped, looking thoughtfully at people. Cats with colorful tufts of feathers watched the birds and tried to follow their example. The owner of a seething imagination, girlfriend Jeanne could not find a suitable name for them.

They also played with the same habits. Snap with your fingers at the same time. Wear television cameras under glasses, so that against the background of reality, you can view the translucent what the other sees. Remi introduced himself to her. Jeanne imagined herself to be him, even when Hunt was in the shower. It was really fun.

Jeanne. Not a bad friend. Too bad she went to the Junkyard with another classmate and never returned. For another three days, the cameras showed a section of the wall, a concrete slab and a piece of gray sky.

It was then, when Jeanne called at night and joyfully began to say something unintelligible, Remi began to sketch out the diagrams of the apparatus for communicating with the dead. In some ways, this device resembled an ordinary telephone. Only instead of numbers on the buttons, as it seemed in the dream, there were special signs. You have to press them many times to connect with the soul you need ...

...

..So, a person who has no better name than Hunt walks through the quarters of the House, according to the instructions of the electronic assistant or «Sticky». And, he begins to follow the cues of his new, special, awakened Friends. Hunt sees the world through their eyes, senses mood swings. Associations, thoughts and memories lead to where something important will happen.

It so happens that people, confused by a special connection, sooner or later meet at one critical point.

…The control system of the House realized that the person was thinking incorrectly. The terminal issued a command to eliminate. This kind of operation looks like a voluntary wish. In this book, informal people are brought into the arena of the Amphitheater, as if they had applied for participation in a dangerous game. Hunt heads to the site of his execution. Here he meets with unknown Friends — Dorian, the wanderer, «Fox», the doctor Hart, a certain Tim, who wants to eliminate all evil individuals and Stele, the dancer Diko. Together they slip away from the unpleasant embrace of death. The united consciousness of new people works wonders, up to the flight by the force of a common desire.

All of them are captured by the Lazaret organization, whose goal is to resurrect its founders, most of whom have long been dead. Their wills are valid. People with unusual abilities are offered to head the new department of the Lazaret And they are recruiting a new team — very young workers.

I have a low opinion of teenagers as the basis of a scientific breakthrough. Children often copy adults without hesitation. It is unlikely that you will create a team that can solve an important problem. Another thing is that their mental immunity and, generally speaking, differentiation are not yet so strongly developed. Being in a single form-forming field, they, like the cells of a growing fetus, are able to create an efficient, almost omnipotent organism.

Let’s listen to the story of the Lazaret (infirmary) recruit:

Tour Alex — Lazaret Newbie

…It cannot be said that I have always dreamed of getting into a dimensionless bunker buried in a pile of damp concrete.

Until then, the stages of my life have flowed quite smoothly in the Service Boarding School, which, in addition to the usual course in people management, is distinguished by the study of technical sciences. Parents, judging by the map I looked at in the director’s office, are the owners of the first and fourth blood groups, without stupid sores like Or-Or. Admirers of free love, and not opponents of children, gave me the opportunity to live until about ninety-five years old, matte skin, green eyes, black hair, developed muscles and different correct proportions of hormones. Where they are is unknown, but do you really need to know everything?

You need to know everything.

Ten days ago, having passed the Iron Numbers exam, I was strolling through the quarters of Ul-Karbon. Free walks in the Metropolis of Setan are provided, we note, my unknown friend, to the best students.

The Setan Sector embodies the diversity of life; the roar of camels churned in a copper pipe, fake gold, neon silver and, a piece of halva and a spoonful of molasses, free goodies at the crossroads. Endless ornaments on the walls, the giant Golden Quarter, flowing into the depths of the mines, the streets are gradually darkening. This is now only in memory!

How did the change come about?

…In the gazebo between the shop of rhinestones, the tall neon ring and the well of the Church of Euthanasia, recruiters approached me. My first thought? Let me remember. «These are the artistic bandits who love to play with people; they meet in a dark corridor, scare, talk heart to heart, shake their fingers and let them go safely. "Sartans, midnight psychologists, need fear and gratitude no less than your money, our dear Alex Tour.

Alex Tour.

Sixth course of the Boarding Service.

Plastic surgery, physical chemistry, management, stack ownership, practical hypnosis, plus a few more subjects to choose from. You can already understand who I am. And I’ll tell myself. If you are too smart, you get confused in your own thoughts. You go on an adventure. Between me, a boy and still a boy, the percentage of intelligence is given in return for common sense.

Seventy-first year of birth. Tour Alex Noah

The recruiters only smiled when asked if they were bandits. They purred like Odysseus sirens. Well, if I had not agreed to go to the Infirmary, towards adventure, what would they have done, who seemed, at first glance, trustworthy? Injected with a drug so that the boy’s memory was recaptured? Have you sent it back? It’s too late to think about all this now. What has been done cannot be returned.

A sickening journey in the dimly lit swings of long-range A-class elevators. This brought hope, because those who want to be disassembled into scarlet parts for more prudent and wealthy boys are not honored with such a long cruise.

Destination.

Lazaret

The atmosphere is like in a labor camp when you are settled there first. Euphoria rolls over, freedom with the lightest smack of despondency. You go into the chambers, splashing paint, sleep wherever you want, if whim comes, you mark the corners in a funny doggy way. A week later, the impudent people arrive, easily capturing the territory designated by you. And there is no way you can explain to them that you have already discovered everything here, and called it by its proper names. They ignore good advice, do not show much respect for the discoverer. Wow-wow to you! Only my protests don’t bother anyone either.

Construction of the New Infirmary

Newcomers are moved into Section A, level three, sleeping on wide beds, five people at a time. I would hardly agree to the move if I knew that I would lose almost all of my lion’s mane. Such a condition. I’m embarrassed. My room is in sector B, next to the laboratories. Five and a half cubic meters, rounded corners, cozy, like a chick in a nest. Residential Egg! The bed, an armchair, a table, shelves, a toilet seem to be ordered by the dwarfs, but in practice it is quite comfortable. The atmosphere is reminiscent of a «half-star» hotel, which has become a cult everywhere. There are more hatches here. Students will hide diaries, candy, maybe synthetic drugs in them. On the left side, if you reach through the plastic, your fingers will crawl into the Hangar.

This laboratory was created by order of the domains; our strange, flying bosses. From above it looks like a blank for playing tic-tac-toe. Now there are boring empty rooms and packed furniture. There is electricity and water supply, but in general the cells are empty. On the right side of the Egg, if, in the form of a ghost, you pass two meters of wires, tubes, dried spit, you will look into the elevator shaft leading to the hall of the organization that disguises the Infirmary.

I am the only one who knows how this whole laboratory communal apartment was born. Nobody bothered to supervise. In a year, all this faceless will be covered with the initials of subjects called enemies or friends, a film of sweat, fat, dust of the epidermis. I can speak beautifully, right?

Just ten days ago, the setting of the future hostel, Anthill, was a set of parts that the silent Technis specialists were unwrapping while sipping a permitted 3% beer. The morning before last, having passed the service elevator, I did not recognize this area. No oil drip from the impressive tunneling shield. The sewerage water of the dismantled apartments has been pumped out. Several tanks with traces of crystalline concrete, worn out inscriptions, scraps of striped ribbons. The gloomy hall, the diverging footprints of workers’ shoes. That’s all, comrades!

…The concrete box was filled with swinging contours. As if you, a curious bacterium, climbed into a developing organism. Cells multiply and become more complex. The light seeks out the nodes in which something still imperfect is visible, migrates, as if he himself acquired eyes, a brain, hands, and took up work. The command of the master — crystalline concrete becomes soft like chewing gum, pulls away from the car, forms new cavities, rooms, tunnels.

I am one of those who successfully sews names to things. Bunker. Infirmary — general. The department for us, who are still babies of science, is Dzot. Well, or already, Kubotur. That could be the name of a branch of purgatory, a puzzle or a company that organizes extreme tours to the hot zones of the House.

A ribbed waterfall streamed in the middle of the hall. Escalator. Exclamations of approval by employees. New flashes of light.

The aluminum frames are covered with plastic shells. Here and there, veins of wires, nerves of optical fibers, intestines of pipes materialize. Dzot discovers energy and will, like a maturing homunculus in a warm flask of an alchemist.

In the interweaving of plastic ribs, the diaphragm of the camera appeared, a hatch with petals, leading still nowhere. The worker turned the screw with a screwdriver, and the trill of opening doors flew up over the hum of the servo, an intricate «tur-lur-l» hunt for an unknown animal.

The workers left, leaving behind piles of rubbish, garlands and cigarette filters.

It’s all for me?

I culturally turned off the lights and climbed into the Egg.

For tonight, my invention is the surest way to hide thoughts from strangers. It is only when they remain inside that you protect the person from unnecessary reading.

In two minutes, the pages of the diary will become ghosts. I will burn the page on which the day is written! I will put the ashes in the box, which was previously occupied by unnecessary, albeit expensive, compasses. So no one will read the Burning Diary, unless the successes of resuscitation will restore it from these gray feathers. But then, you see, Friend, a completely different story will begin.

Acquaintance at the Kitchen

I met Baby.

…I remembered what I wrote in the Diary last night. Not quite normal, like the composition of a child prodigy tortured by classmates. It is necessary that each phrase be businesslike, with a grain of humor and cynicism, this is how you need to communicate, even with yourself. And, perhaps, they will accept you.

I walked around, examining the safety posters in the passage from the Hangar to the buildings of the laboratories of the Old Infirmary. Towards a girl in a gray overalls.

We stopped opposite each other. More precisely, friends. And they were silent for a long time. They just breathed, considering their future colleague.

Until I hissed «hello».

Hello is the right word for the beginning of most important dating.

— I’m Baby. More precisely Aqua.

— Alex Tour Noah. The number… well, why does she actually need my ID number?

She could turn and walk into the newcomers’ manifold, to the old business acquaintances. This is the custom in a cultured society; you can’t be friends there for a long time. But, we went together, almost arm in arm, where the eyes look and starting all sorts of conversations.

It's nice to think that there is a person who just won't throw you through anything. We talked about the meaning of stupid names that directors of boarding schools like to assign to pupils, went to the Kitchen, more precisely, to the Dining Room. What is it like there now? By the way, according to the teachings of Hart (do not forget to come up with a suitable nickname for the domain), food eaten together brings people together at the genetic level. This was known before, but now it finds a rigorous scientific explanation.

Great mood, coffee, you know, such cheerfulness.

On the «bronze elevator» intended for the proletarians Laza (as the girl called our renovated Infirmary) two floors up and to the right. Shared Dining Room, like those mechanical cafes for which the offices of large corporations are famous. Much was different here yesterday. The workers were rolling out the construction waste bins, setting up the power switch, this Common Boiler, and regulating the sewage. Now the nasty sludge is hidden by plastic and nickel. In those few minutes, as the round, in the middle concave, like a bowl, hall opened, the newcomers did not have time to be disappointed in what was happening. Cheerfully fill the bellies at dining tables that have the contours of earthly continents.

People who have decided that they have sensed sympathy for themselves and are not able to spoil their neighbors’ appetite, stick to each other, chew gruel, smear jam on bread with knives, chat briskly and splash their hands. They become, as they say, related at the level of biological molecules.

A chewing mouth, I must say, is a rather dubious performance. The face distorts, grunts and squishes. It is usually not very pleasant to look at how they consume food. You can successfully empathize with extraneous pleasure only if you and your neighbor are one, so that you take the antics of alien flesh for your own.

Small shrimp soup and wheat bread, good for the jaws, hard on the outside, soft on the inside.

Algae multivitamin salad.

Corn porridge. Sauces.

Vitamins A127563, B56, E45. And note, natural tea.

Baby. Just like me, she’s still a Pro. Beginner. And also «Veasey», since she is a girl. Visy Aqua. Phonetically pleasing designation of female recruits, prefix-title to the name. Composed here, by me, in the course of eating.

She’s also a decent inventor. Invented a cute, but not too much, between us, a name suitable for her. A real Baby should have a honey skin, a cat’s face, be nimble, capricious, what a silly beauty. So that she looked sweetly from the bottom up, begging her uncle for a couple of coins for big gum. Before being called to the Infirmary, in the Boarding School of a special Technis, as the child said, the director named her in honor of a male deity. If memory serves, the female sex in the pantheon of the renewed cult of the Aztecs does not appear at all. Ha-ha, but the director called me Ganymede in the preparatory boarding school.

She didn’t like being called Aquarer … per..tel. Brutally somehow. The name then brought into existence a kind of additional angularity inherent in the reanimated culture of the ancient Mexicans. Therefore, she used to be a beech. Fortunately, here, as recruiters pointed out, you can forget your old names, change your character and habits. Because the Baby has betrayed her main word. Became Baby and, sometimes Aqua. As if she lost sight of the fact that the notions of the Mexica Indians promise very unpleasant adventures for the unfaithfulness of their name.

Ah Baby! Aqua — Aquaterpel! It’s good that I can look at you and not give my thoughts out loud. But, in fact, it seems that for this we were gathered here? Move dreams, images, life itself from one person to another?

…The skin is colorless. Hair is tied up in an ash bouncy ponytail. People with such hair have neither fish nor meat character, this is a line from a physiognomy textbook. But, a slightly protruding chin, it seems, does not agree with this.

What is it like? He pretends to be ingenuous, maybe he wants to be like that, but does not remind the guys of Technis, these bigots, begging only for money and status; sometimes seriously moved. Over time, she is able to please any decent person. Not for the face, which is so-so, as I already mentioned, quite typical. For something unknown, growing in the very heart, solar plexus and lungs. After all, within an hour she did not leave the topic proposed by me, did not express obvious stupidity, did not force me to talk the same thing. Perhaps, for sure, Baby, she is Aqua (nice nickname), definitely not one of those who, without ceremony, are able to throw you over the tail. Only with sad thoughts. And then, it’s not bad at all.

The nose could be located a centimeter and a half higher than it is. Cheekbones — softly, like a cat, round out. Not a catastrophe, this is a deviation from the generally recognized norms of beauty, but, between us, boys speaking, the Baby is very far from those delicious tigress dancers who light the Performances in all decent Amphitheaters of the House.

Maybe that’s why she came here? Here there is hope for a cure for all unnecessary things. And a healthy supplement. Golden threads throughout the body, blood, liver, heart and the entire nervous system.

— Who are domains and briefings? What are we going to do here, Tour?

She asked me so trustingly! Ulyuu! What to answer to her in order to be imprinted?

— It’s simple, Aquaterpetl! Who among us has not heard the song about the boy-dancer, the fugitive, whom all the people we meet certainly want to betray, capture, drag into a special clinic and turn into a weak-willed servant? As you know, the Government provides the Second Life service with people whose brain structures are recognized as socially dangerous. A little oxygen deprivation during anesthesia, and the nerve cells are cleared of all the previous wrong connections. Now body catchers have even appeared in our conservative Setan. Skilled doctors produce household helpers who eat little, hardly rest, are cheap, and completely unselfish. Maybe here, too, everything will gradually slide towards this. Only our goods will be of much better quality and cheaper.

So we talked to her.

It’s easy with Aqua.

Angel blood

This was remembered.

Well-fed, almost satisfied, we left the Dining Room — the Globe, and moved through the Infirmary, expanding the circle of free search.

We passed empty rooms with gnarled chalk inscriptions: «Evry», looked into the laboratories of the newly-made Corps department, found there scraps of packaging, and surgical tables with grooves for blood drainage.

And I, imagine, gave out the following speech:

— Here it is, the beginning of everything! Here they will grind the bodies of the experimental creatures literally into minced meat in order to find where the roundworms of death coiled in them. Tubes sink into the floor, extend into the ceiling, drag among refrigerators and humming electrical transformers. Blood now — the receptacle of a variegated microscopic beast — flows from one laboratory to another, and on the way is radically transformed. From a liquid that is sensitive to the passage of time, baked into a brown lump in air, it sublimes into a snow-white cloud, on the surfaces of silver and gold radiators it condenses into angelic blood, a cool tender fire. And, this blood is transfused, drop by drop, we are pierced by the Thunder Salute, and we ascend to where the Golden Policy of Angels awaits!

— How does the true City of God work?

The baby looked at me sullenly, from the bottom up, as if I had already decided everything here personally. She was definitely impressed.

— Everyone sees Paradise a little differently. These pictures need to be carefully combined, like puzzles of a children’s Logo designer. You need to know everything in order to understand what it is time to do and what to expect from everything that happens.

In Setan, Baby, my former world, there are no landscapes to be elevated into a picture of the divine City. Only the sand of the immense artificial desert, graveyard cities and, for the most part, unclean megalopolises. Although, of course, palm trees and lawns are present here and there. This is not enough, of course, for boundless paradise happiness. There are fountains of sparkling water tinted with pink syrup. Generous people come across in shops, usually in the evening, when their unclaimed sweet concoctions still need to be thrown away. For pupils who do not fit into the nutritional norms, they are just angels in the flesh.

The child, it turns out, is the daughter of an employee of a filtration camp, said, in exchange for my frankness and quite appropriate, controlled exaltation, that before moving to the Infirmary she lived in ExoCity. Loves artificial snow, thawing on schedule, or the whims of the manager, walls, and the joy of prisoners being transferred to warm Zones.

We wandered into the far zone of the industrial premises, turned, it seems, towards the Angar, and, having walked along the shaft of the smashed 3D elevator to an unknown building, we practically got lost.

They tried to fix the lamps behind the dismantled escalator. One of them suddenly began to blink quickly, quickly, as if giving out all the secrets of the world in Morse code.

«I know where we are,» said the Baby, eating her notepad. «There must be something very beautiful and incredibly awful here. Dorian introduced me to some of Laz’s secrets. Do you love history and legends? This is it.

I did not know where this passage leads, but the time was a carriage.

They shook for about five minutes on a working elevator without doors, got out to the channel, which rang out into the artificial sea. A pool full of goldfish floating between parts of unknown, apparently stainless, mechanisms. Such a non-standard artistic object.

Frost-clad rooms and picturesque mummies.

— Customers of the Infirmary. Gentlemen of the Trusts, the ultimate beneficiaries of this whole project of ours, — Baby rolled her eyes.

We went up to a platform of gray veined marble. A massive sarcophagus with another skeleton.

— Probably her name is Stele. She must also come to life.

Skull. Elegant, dazzling white, like ancient Chinese porcelain with burgundy veins. Gold crown, decorated with natural, as I understand it, ruby.

— Handsomely. Really, Alex? All this together. She probably also loved everything beautiful. She kissed someone, although it is not proper to know all this, in the smallest details.

I explained to the Baby that Stela, the fifth domain, is not at all here, and is sending dispatches from the other world to friends, those who were associated with her during her lifetime. To the current leaders of our Laza. She rests, as Dory said, in the Cryogenic Hall, where we do not have access yet. She could fly. So we will succeed if we can see each other’s eyes and unite souls.

I immediately went from words to deeds. Frankly, he was very liberated.

I began to scatter around the technical area of the gallery. He demanded that Aqua think of me the way I do, see what I see, and believe that everything will work out for us.

He jumped over an abyss of five meters, marking the place of the next landing with a tin can. I tried to feel what was happening without flat thoughts.

I almost fell down. He scraped his palms on the steel bars.

The first two seconds are shocked, you don’t feel anything, then it hurts, and after ten minutes, as if there was nothing.

I peered at the Baby, trying to penetrate two centimeters of the cranium with ashy hair, trying to see myself with her watery eyes. And suddenly, again came the desire to prophesy.

I began to broadcast about the ector’s electronic mirror, what I saw in it, about loneliness and groups, our faces, maybe even something offensive. Sometimes I can speak so that everyone is silent for a moment!

And she gave out something to match.

— The Earth Sectors imprint the oil of fast food factories, the smells of elevators and trash cans into the flesh. You can see faces with earthly stamps on public transport, on the streets, at the dinner table, and on the gravestones of the Pogost. They do not deserve much sympathy, only such gallant pity.

Our phrases were not teenage ones.

— It is necessary to polish the faces with a spray of sharp diamonds and salt water, softening organic matter. Let them rebuke themselves from tears, stop being complacent and inaccessible, fashion themselves anew, perfect, childish and immortal.

So we talked to her.

All our new things will become important to the world, even Laza’s standard ration cornbread can turn into a solar wafer for people, an introduction to the secrets of the other world. Now all our traditions are in embryo — random steps that, repeated several times, will forever be imprinted in the common memory.

We also thought about which department of the Infirmary we would get. I was thinking of establishing a foothold in a Domain run by Domain Hunt, a retired mechanic. The kid spoke very favorably of Hart’s ER Corps.

So, chewing the grains from the chubby package that turned out to be in the purse of the Baby, we gradually got back to the Dining Room, drank tea, refilled dry rations and went to bed. The Baby purposely sprinkled popcorn on the sides, smiled at the mirrored walls of the dining room. This, too, stuck in my memory as something important.

Test day.

New friend

Another one of ours was found.

Black and yellow skin. Combining the flesh of the Ramp and Black Setan Sectors. If you think carefully, despite the dark skin, a clear sign of a dominant gene, the blood of the Asian, essentially, Ramp will someday overcome African organics. Facial features, looks, even habits will change. And even thoughts imperceptibly, image by image, will become different.

As Aqua and I wandered around the Dining Room looking for a free breakfast table (we chose secluded Greenland), he chewed on a bagel on the periphery of the world, next to a collection of wonderful copper teapots. Sometimes he thoughtfully screwed it into a Petri dish, combining it with the jam there. I analyzed a picture of a long-gone battle, attached to the wall, somewhat discordant with the general pacifying atmosphere.

The heavy look of a street, not unsuccessful fighter. Why is he here, in the company of domestic guys, huge clever guys?

Also, the motorcycle boy was looking into the dining room hall, moving his lips, as if wrapped in a thin vacuum package. Oily pupils (I have excellent eyesight) are slightly dilated. There was a general impression that chaffr sees things without embellishment, which they really are. Can this mestizo be called chafrom in the eye?

There was a certain natural freshness in it, which, as many physiologists believe, is characteristic of the fruits of different races. And, also, like a tiny hatch somewhere in the temporal region. Still, sometimes the chaffer suffered a deafening catastrophe, and then for a long time delved into thinking about all its circumstances. Hook on this wound, open the fontanelle of the skull — a person can be easily corrected, introduced into joint ventures, and all that.

The baby also carefully examined the representative chaffra.

Chaffre wiped his fingers and dropped the napkin into the North Pole funnel. He got up, walked over, bent down, whispered a few words about the beautiful morning and coolly kissed Aqua on the cheek. She didn’t resist. Such is the usual greeting of the chocolate-tangerine brothers.

Chaffra are relaxed, for the most part, quite friendly guys. In principle, Aqua is not my doll, and in general, so far it’s a draw, but Tur Alex needs to get used to operating just as quickly, dexterously, without receiving any offensive rejections from the girls. Yes, you need to learn how to download such useful customs!

Sector Ramp. Livi. The typical name for the brainchild of the yellow and black races, as they say in White Setan, is chaffra.

Joint dinner. Conversations about everything in the world.

He talked about how he was a member of a successful gang. They were the smartest, moderately aggressive, constructive «members» there, they perfectly understood each other. But then they committed an obvious crime. Destroyed competitors, sleeping, for real, at night, without declaring war. And — fell into the sphere of action of another, dark world. We met with a gang that is much, much cooler and stronger than them. It was inconceivable to even imagine. Any action of the brothers was easily anticipated, as if the enemies were communicating with each other by the internal Internet, were everywhere and everywhere. Everything was guessed in approximately the same way as a cunning, in its own way, thought of a cat or a dog — by a man.

And, in the end, there was only one thing left — to agree with the Third World — the infirmary recruiters who had appeared from nowhere. It looks like here you can become stronger than the most powerful gang in the House. «And now, I am with you, dear brothers.»

The fifth day of the flight.

And he’s normal.

Competition between boys

When children of puberty gather in a confined space, they must begin to compete in something.

New acquaintances (not friends yet), Romm and Hett got hold of a springboard somewhere. Such things are usually found in the back rooms of school gyms. I had to jump and fly through the window in the wall, head first. Quite dangerous! Someone ran away, joked and, grimacing, walked away. When it was my turn, two came up behind. They offered not to risk their head, but, look — it’s dirty — to remove the dishes, wipe the gravy from the tables. They said so with the spiteful man. I don’t like it when I’m not taken seriously.

Those who manage to rally, connect in such sweet inseparable couples, have an advantage over a loner, like. And then they are right, completely regardless of the current situation. Check it out for yourself, my unfamiliar friend.

At first, I mentally imagined how I was entering a fight with these guys (an internal demonstration of intentions, this is important), brought a mental gray ball in front of the sternum, you know, the front sight, turned towards potential rivals, like a heavy tank preparing for a shot.

Do you understand?!

Then he pushed them aside, tilting his head slightly so sideways, pulled himself together, ran away, and deftly jumped.

Everyone cleaned up for himself, and for others, those who for some reason forgot to do it. Without tension and anyone’s specific orders.

Since then, you know, I noticed that it became easier for everyone to find a common language. In everything.

I’ll tell you what. In the multidimensional 3D elevator of the Path, you make the right choice — and everything is constantly being improved. You follow up. Good fellow travelers sit down. They start to recognize you.

In the other direction, they will make a servant out of you, like those that every decent boarding headman has.

Such a philosophy is revealed.

At first, everything works out for me.

A story about a horse and more

…They listened to my story. Lively gestures were observed with the participation of two sharp-toothed forks. At about ten, I felt like I was in a strange, big, like a kitchen kettle, plate.

Seeding Paradise… What is it? For example, the horse that I spotted at the central hippodrome of Ul-Karbona. Pegasus Mare! A creation of nature, in every possible way improved by the technologies of pharmaceutical companies, which it actually advertised. Perfection is, write it down, the unity of the multitude. Electrified mane, sleek neck, legs, smart wild eyes. I don’t know how to convey it to you in human words. Muscles organically flow into bones and blood, and seem to be their continuation. Nerve impulses unite the body down to the horny layers of the hooves. A small lump of sugar thrown by a certain benevolent child hit the croup, and the horse half a ton in weight, at once, shuddered entirely. I got a healthy teenage wet emission, so it was all good.

I remember, I thought, I would like the presence here of another individual of the same species, but of the opposite sex. On one level, I wanted to watch how they together, without any fuss, gallop across the lunar landscape, and on the other, they climb to hug. That is, erotic and spiritual principles are organically combined in me.

Fiction.

I spoke like this in the morning Dining Room, along with Hett, Livi and Sey, to the hiss and puffs of the Cauldron. After the porridge, they ate sprouted grains and blueberry jam. Hand-Feeding Each Other: An Exercise for Removing Constraint Recommended by Domains.

For some reason, having bowed slightly, Dory sat down next to us. He offered to express the topic without hesitation.

I continued.

— Thieves from Zastenki stole this specimen from the exhibition, dismembered or, as they say, swallowed alive. Such a tradition is to introduce perfect organisms into oneself. The inhabitants of the secret rooms of the House, the Hongs, expect that the vital essence of all sorts of different beauties passes into their bodies, broken by botulinum toxins. Why not treat yourself? — that’s their motto.

«The idea is promising,» said Dorian. — I, too, you know, ate only multicolored butterflies. So that they flow into me and tickle my guts.

What is your seed of the Garden of Eden? Aqua joined the conversation. — Am I late? Are we talking about something good?

— Grain of Paradise? It’s… like I am a singer of the best songs in the world, and I am faced with a horde of fragrant fans. It’s all so excited, electrified flesh. Girls with moon faces are the most effective means of cleaning the visual channels. Shiny pupils, as if glazed lips. The angels are thinking of tearing my body into talismans of eternal, spicy love. Sea of Love. This is not new. But cute.

— Were you girls idols? — asked the Baby, adding more jam. — Clicked like nuts?

— What? — Dory drooped. — Not really. I like it when they look attentively like snakes. Wherever I went, the girls turned to see the Free Fox. It’s good to be forever young, beautiful and nobody’s. Enchant, excite, rub into your head — and run away.

By the way, here’s another thing. If the muscular guys thought I was a being of the opposite sex, the first five minutes the relationship develops perfectly. Instead of the usual aggression, only an indispensable desire to please. Why shouldn’t everyone treat each other that way, even for no reason?

— What `s next? — Aqua thoughtfully looked at the Petri dish with jam. — How did your relationship with the guys develop, Mr. Domain?

— After playing for a few minutes, I found a reason to quickly leave. It’s nice to live like that, like a woman — to charm, charm, and float away.

— You have parents?

— Maybe yes. But I ran away from it all. It would be sad to think about relatives when they are clearly approaching the threshold of life. As they grow old, parents pull their children along with them, awakening thoughts of death in them. It is more interesting for me to wander around the House, alone, illuminating the world, guessing passwords to other Sectors. Let’s say I’m in ExoCity, a looking and snowy prison. Freeze to the bone. Dark. And now, when you are already leaving the other world, the word flashes in your head… for example, «Shaundorfin»! You caught the programmer’s wave. You go to the hatch, you type this word with stiff fingers. The doors open for seven seconds, you even have time to think whether you need to go through. You fall into the heat of Setan, or onto Univer City Avenue, shake off the snow and despair, and go. It’s great to live like that! It’s like eating the sun, it’s in your tummy. You get younger from the newness that has opened up. The skin on the wrists becomes correct; honey and pink.

— So interesting! Aqua chirped. — And what else is interesting in the Sectors of the House? I didn’t get out of ExoCity.

— And you probably don’t know the real Exo. Periphery, residential area E? everything is sweet there. The real Exo is hell. I was there three times, taking prisoners with me. Everything that inhuman people have invented is there. Spiral roads, tar pots, flaming rivers. And — an opportunity for escape. Yes! Always! You can find friends and, say, some rolls of cloth, secretly build a balloon. Fill it with air from the boiler and climb five hundred meters. There you will understand that the crimson moons are searchlights, and people are walking on the terraced balconies. Yes, these are the very ones who dropped the flasks, with water or empty, a little leftover or a weighty stone. You will be applauded, and you will go to where everything is always good. There are many different ways of escape, very strange at times, but few succeed.

«Take a look at my former Paradise,» Livy suddenly suggested. — This is the plundering of a pretentious supermarket, the battle at the Crossroads of Sluices, and then — communication between brothers in an atmosphere of complete, you know, mutual understanding. The main thing is the widespread abatement of contradictions that arises after joint deeds, not always good, but requiring the most active interaction of all members.

Sometimes, after fights in the neighborhoods, portions of White with Spices, and smoking Lemurs, I spoke to God. Do you know what he is? In a gray cape. The face does not say that it is attractive. I ask you to advise how to live on the right way, but He gets up and leaves. Like a voiceover: «You made me this way.»

Chaffr ran his finger across the table like a child.

— Want my hell? In the former Boarding School, I started classes for a year. After the Sector Wars, I decided to go back to school to make sure that I am still the master here.

Everyone around is strangers and funny, handing over notebooks, I look at them and fall out. I only have a date and a name. And in other subjects, no lecture notes, no textbooks, not even notes in the margins. Shout, don’t shout «Yo» — you’re a loser. How I rose to my former heights is a topic for comprehensive psychological research. Studying is like climbing an ice mountain, without claws and an oxygen mask.

— Maybe in search of Eternity one should go exactly from the beginning of the Abyss? Step by step, bending over like a diver in lead shoes, crawl out of the hole? Farther and higher into the shimmering light? — Inspired, but, it seemed to me, not quite serious, said the Baby.

— I always wanted to master the profession of a deep-sea diver. Descend into the elevator shafts, in search of air bubbles, where, after the flooding of the Second tier, as they say, there are still residential quarters, — noticed the domain, seemingly looking at his reflection in a cup of tea.

— Abyss? Yes! I know that. I went down a couple of times behind the block of the old columbarium, the hole into which is hidden under the steps of my previous boarding school canteen, — I indulged in chaotic childhood memories. — I saw a lot, ugly and attractive; it was an interesting time. Now, this is the Abyss. And the skulls were there; crunchy gray piles. Abandoned House Builders Warehouses. How it becomes clear when you freeze from a dull shout; if you go right, straight, or left, twenty more steps, you will surely find the center of dying yearning, the Violet Heart.

And it will find you.

Dory asked to go with him.

I looked up from food. I stuffed donuts wrapped in foil into my pockets. Moved after his swaying maiden mane.

The domain showed several damp rooms. Concrete, wires and plastic pipes. Unpacked boxes. Low light.

He offered me to work in his Evry Department.

— Develop symbols of Eternity. No special documentation. To lead. Enlighten. Design Craftsman and Newbie badges, sew pretty jumpsuits, and all that.

I saw you through recruiters. Hardworking hands, head, deep eyes, tanks and roses in mind. I’m too lazy to work long hours. We Foxes are running away from old age. If you do not get involved in the pyramid of social relations, you will not be overwhelmed by time. You stay beautiful, you can seduce, stay young, running away before the interaction between you and someone else becomes unnecessarily dense.

I want to work here, but I find it difficult to dispose of you all. In a large team, its own poison always appears, there is nothing you can do about it, and I have no antidote. Will you be my assistant, Tour? Isn’t that what your name is?

I think I get it.

Mannered, slightly feminine, so what? Drink the bitter poison of industrial relations instead of Dorian? Let be!

…Our first invention. Sey and I, featuring Hitt. Gray trash bags with a disheveled broomstick surrounded by comets. Maybe they will become a symbol of the work to cleanse the world from death?

For the next two days, there was no one in Evry’s department except Sey, Dean and me. They unpacked boxes, assembled cabinets, tables, shelves. Screw in the screws, see the instructions, work with a screwdriver — this way you will achieve enlightenment! As Minister Ash, I wore the keys to the premises around my neck.

The baby and Livi were somewhat isolated, seized and equipped all the new premises for their departments, looked exhausted, and were no longer assistants to me.

Evry. Eternity. Fresh breath. Doesn’t sound bad at all.

I look for myself in the Mirror

— Listen, oh, my first student!

The domain of my branch, Hart, spoke like a joke. He’s an adult, but interesting.

It’s hard to be a good speaker. Sitting opposite, I licked jam from a Petri dish, although I prefer tea with red honey made in the boarding laboratory. It was interesting. It was like sneaking into Trubny Quarter.

…A year ago I was standing on the outskirts of an abandoned tunnel. It looks like the world of the Middle Ages. Cemeteries and gardens. Old houses under the steps of new dwellings. Near serviceable lamps, on lumps of soil, plants are trying to turn green. Pipes of communications, all at random. New quarters on the foundation of ancient apartments. The crunchy earth seems to be all formed by particles of heads and ancient manuscripts. Dilapidated elevator wells. Dark casemates of workshops. One can imagine that alchemists were secretly working in them. Those people who could give good advice, who are not ashamed to work as an apprentice.

A teacher could be found there. Smart yourself.

Well, or how to put it easier?!

Finding a mentor is not easy. Who in a sober mind gives advice to representatives of puberty and expects that they will certainly be accepted with gratitude? Only a prophetic skull that does not belong to any age category can count on this. Bile, kind and, in general, no rival to anyone. He whispers life stories in which there are no distressing signs of naivety. A teacher who does not point tips in the ear with a pointer, who does not limit the search for a volunteer teenager.

Only in the evening, when I could think comfortably, sitting in bed, I realized that Hart’s reasoning was not an explanation of ancient knowledge, but an invitation to create our Theory of Everything. And that means I won’t be the last one here.

Some disappointment was replaced by excitement. I will become a reanimator from the series. One of the first. An angel, an angel of wild delight. Scientists dissecting the world!

I look at myself in an electronic mirror. Sleep early! The screen shows the body in all its charm. Young. Vigorous. Playful foal.

Electronic mirror. In other words, the ector. Truth and falsehood in one vessel. It can show the body from the back, from the side, freeze the image, enlarge all or part of it. It will present you not inverted, like glass with amalgam, but truthfully.

Maybe like this.

I stuck a black mane with red feathers on my head. In the Infirmary, the ector is EMG455, the latest model. Having moved the ball over the body, I achieved an increase in muscle volume. A neck, devoid of an Adam’s apple, appeared. I do not like the angular, up-and-down Adam’s apple. Conan the Barbarian’s belly. Kuvalda, the headman of my former Boarding School, has a similar relief. He plays rugby, which means that the career of a scientist is closed to him. A person who has experienced the influence of physical strength on status and wealth is unlikely to want to tinker with microscopes, even if he has brains. Such a career can be dreamed of, for example, by the outsider of all fights, Go Lesh. He will achieve a lot. Will withdraw from the Contract. Organizes his own company. It will acquire a lot of servos that can be sterilized, even change sex. He will start making bets, arrange a personal school of gladiators-bodyguards who are ready to tear up the abuser of the boss without hesitation, and all that.

Muzzle? stretched out his jaw, straightened his lips, raised his eyebrows. Thick eyelashes are somewhat feminine, but so what? It’s a pity that this wealth does not attach to the natural body, in the same way that something rolled with a joystick sticks to a double on the screen. Well, so why not try it? Well, you pervert!

Every normal boy thought about it. It’s nice to be a stallion with weighty genitals. Okay, I have it all!

Solved one more option of the modernized ector. The user can see how the appearance of a person who has chosen a certain type of activity will change. Well, if only he had been doing this for many years.

I entered the data of the medical record into the ector, dropped the previous image. Has clicked twenty years of work. What will I be like if I opt for pharmaceuticals? Related professions are hardware assembler and software compiler.

It works!

The lips thinned. The chin moved back. The abdomen is enlarged. The legs are thinner.

The ector depicted the most deplorable state for a chemical scientist who combines hundreds of details with vanishingly small tolerances. Stir some milliliters of something in accordance with some parameter. Flip through volume number… eleven. Add the solution. Sniff, lick, cough.

Eyes squint, sprinkling laughter lines down his temples. The brain drinks the blood of the face. True, the experts in that boarding school of mine argued that the nerve cells are good for the exercise. Clever people leave this world five years later than the movers.

It's creepy to look at yourself as an adult. You probably feel the same when sliding the lid and proceeding to the exhumation of a well-known person. Hair again, sparse. The testicles are such that, grabbing them in a handful, you can hardly feel the usual contentment of the male.

The body is transformed according to the work being done. All unnecessary is thrown away. Food chain vectors sculpt flesh.

Even plants do not develop according to the pattern set in the pollen. In sunlight and shade, they become different. Once in the mountains, thoroughbred horses, within only two generations, sometimes even at once, become shaggy and short in order to save heat. At the same time, sperm, eggs, blood, something else, keep the suit intact. All this is being restored in the valley. How do cells think apart from the brain? How do they understand what they should be? Can I control my beloved body myself? Are there any signs of a tall breed in me, so that if I go to Paradise, I will immediately become flying? Oh, Tour Alex! Your pitiful knowledge is not enough to reveal the secret.

Perhaps this is fate.

Stay here for many, many years. Walk through the corridors, raking with your feet. Scratching your bald head, squinting and coughing. Float in the spaces of pentodes, reverberators, diffusers, programmers and collectors. Lean look. Flabby belly. Life is like an endless repetition of one film. Hey! Where is that occupation that will save the suit of the angelic lion cub?

Service Official? We look.

The look is oily and sly. You need a fairly high KIT to break out into at least middle managers, I must admit. The assessment of my abilities is not very high, only one hundred and thirteen, on the exam I began to fill out the IQ test from the end. Sharp nose. Strong-willed folds. Well developed chin.

How to define the essence of the seeker of eternal freshness? What service will mold the statue of Conan the Barbarian, filled to the top with wonderful thoughts? To become famous, to steal two hundred tons of gold, eat a lot of meat, make love to beauties, kill many healthy strong men, see the closed Sectors? Take part in the course of history. Maybe the kind of life of an imperial police officer?

Police officer.

Missions to all Sectors of the House, examination of human souls, stern gazes in the eyes of suspects, a set of exercises that mimic the movements of animals. Traveling on assorted vehicles, landing in the twilight quarters, battles with the creatures of the Dumps, AurumCity resorts, autographs on girls' breasts, their own lipstick, expensive wine, soft drugs, cigars, honor. Critical phrases in web blogs, meeting new interesting people, killing these interesting people.

Cheekbones clench an imperative shout. Not that.

I dropped the images and they, scattered into squares, disappeared into the depths of the screen. Time to sleep! The day has passed.

Tomorrow is a new day.

Real work

It is necessary to write down who, where and how will work. It is difficult to remember a half dozen names in my memory, even for me, after all, an excellent student of Service.

Blond Hett Ri will remain, but it is uncertain. TerraNova sector. Candidate for admission to BioUniversity. It was very difficult to part with his shepherd dog Honnie, who can pronounce a dozen words. In the past, the Boarding School founded a laboratory offering animal treatment services, it was popular. Two excursions to the Dump, for medicinal mushrooms. Aggression, giving way to self-examination on the verge of schizophrenia. The dream is to live in ancient Babylon; Swearing or fantasies — you need to check.

Bingа. UniverCity Sector. Fourteen years old, promising. She grew up in a complete family, a year after being sold to the state, studied at the Higher Service. Specialization — biology, mathematics, physics, that is, the gentleman’s set of the Infirmary. She appeared at the University City Olympics, with a model of a chemical molecule replicating itself in microscopic cavities. She wants to get into the Corps, but she is not lost to Evry either. Motivation is to do something particularly meaningful.

Max Grudener. Tottenhaos. Formerly a youth gang accountant. He survived between a rock and a hard place, knows how to get along with the bad guys, and the unusually bad ones. Disassembled slot machines, wrote his own theory of probability on Iron Numbers, and threw this information into the Web.

Agatha. There is not enough information on this visa. A couple of sketches from the disco. She dances like the enlightener of souls, the vestal Diko, and this is very cool. He keeps himself apart, always smiles mysteriously. Graffiti master. It seems that for this alone she was taken to Laz — the girl uses signs that introduce a person into a hypnotic trance. After standing in front of a painted wall, a person begins to perform actions that the artist encoded in his puzzles.

Denshn. UniverCity. A naturalist biologist with the makings of a techie. Office character. A couple of interesting publications; ordering of biological molecules, interaction of mutual similarities. It is very important that the installation is assembled in hardware. He wears fake glasses.. He looks like a future uncomplicated clerk, coffee lover and secretaries.

Early in the morning, as soon as the «moonlight» lamps went out, I walked along the corridor, knocked on the doors, and brought the working group to Block Ash. I gave an introductory lecture. Do at least something sensible, break down and achieve a positive result. All disputes, contacts, sooner or later, will become a legend.

They sewed the robes. It worked out well. The case is red, the Domain is black, and we, Evry, are blue. It just so happens. Here is a blank for my department’s emblem. I give it to the court!

…What if a person left the laboratory and moved to wander around the buildings? I went to the gym, worked out on the simulators. I found him sleeping in my Egg. The newcomer looked quite pleased with himself! And, most importantly, he objected to something with a mockery and a sense of dignity!

The first time I complained to Dorian.

Dory is quite serious. In general, he seems to have stopped posing as the Wandering Fox. Has aged three or four years, that’s for sure. I drank the poison of educational and industrial relations.

«They must be stopped, Tur. So that they stopped rebelling and asking questions that are not relevant to the case, smiled and began to work unconditionally. From independent bacteria, they became a living, intelligent, multicellular organism!

Let them live and cooperate, remaining equal. Together forever. No jailers or special prizes. No competition at all. Maybe we should use a secret force? Sow fear everywhere, give it at random, like a bitter medicine, to everyone? So that people huddle together, ask their neighbors for advice, do not leave, as now, without asking the team for leave, at their own whim. Is this the structure of eternal life that embodies the principles of flying light?

I scolded Hett (it was him), told him to go about his own business, outlined by me. He looked at me seriously for a long time, and then gave out something in that spirit, they say, this is the territory where you have to try to understand a person, embrace his spiritual world, try to become, first of all, a friend. Well, and then just rub your brains with all sorts of rules, regulations, orders and Wishlist.

In the evening and in the morning, according to Dory’s behest, we beat the drums. Together we dance around the pole, on a wide concrete slab. At first it’s funny, then, suddenly, it turns out that it’s cool. We check desires and confess. Then we come to the Kitchen and drink Common Tea. Did I say «Shared Tea»? I will write it down again to always remember. The point is that each of us should give a little spit in there. Funny again? There is a value! First, a common, shameful secret is formed, which liberates us in everything else. Secondly, the circle of initiates exchanges jumping viruses, independent pieces of DNA, on the introduction of which the phenotype, character and even individual thoughts depend.

We prolong thoughts with conspiracies, such as; «Be my will as strong as this stove.»

True, before the participants began to work together in concert, they had to break down again. Three days without food, under the control of each other — not a bad exercise for Combining Consciousness. Running for thirty kilometers along the corridors around the Angar, slow or fast, this is how you can, just not to stand still. After that — a handful of germinated grains from each other’s hands, and a tearful confession.

That’s when people become meek like doves, we can explain what we need to do.

And — to develop a detailed plan.

Dorian was with us, unless he slept in the domains abode — the Planetarium. Instead of a ceiling, an artificial sky with convex planets, this is its essence. At dances around the pole, and in Tearful Confessions, he is trying to pump into us something from his life before last. Tells stories about the order in all Sectors of the House and calls for a reciprocal frankness.

Whoo-oo! I blink and sometimes pictures of another world are shown. It’s like throwing up after being poisoned — just as inevitable, disgusting, but it also brings wonderful relief. Crazy, scattered, compelling ideas across all areas. Screens in sight, I don’t know how to record this all. Like a computer — more and more Windows that can be easily flipped.

Dorian is popular. Throwing his ideas all over the place (now I see) like diamond bracelets. I try to catch the mantle of his aura, volatility and physical beauty. The world of your mind and body can be controlled if you dare to put on a strange decoration, you will look and not come off, even if what you see seems scary. Quite fun to walk along the same road as the Silver Fox.

Yes, for me.

First experience of downloading soul files

Yesterday I definitely got in touch with Dory’s information field. As if I tuned in an ancient TV, persistently clicking a toggle switch. I saw who he was before Fox was born. Minus eighteen lives of different sizes.

All objects were covered with wraps of trembling auras, in which objects similar to them could be seen. The world is almost like ours. One cannot be separated from the other, there is energy in this combination.

As if there are two Infirmaries. One is ours, where we are now, and the other is its ancient reflection in it. Such are the multidimensional viscous, but cheerful feelings. How to introduce them to you? The very hint.

Let’s say you watch films made two hundred and fifty years ago. Cheerful and vital. And for a long time you will not understand your sadness. And, the point is this. After all, none of the artists, whom you already perceive as best friends, could not live up to my living days; neither the girl who looked out of the car, nor the respectable owner of patent leather boots, nor the mistress of the flower shop who had seen her sight.

Memories are like fragments of a single world. And, in the auras, one can already clearly discern, adhering to current things, somewhat similar to them, or completely different objects.

Magnified by a hungry gaze, like a magnifying glass, crumbs of gray bread. Cast iron radiators. Eerie droning white light lamps. Barbed wire, a four-engined plane in the sky, dull snow and a flock of chickens on it. Tunnel with gold inscription on the coal wall. Painful, nice people. Others, but painfully similar to us.

Where are you from in me? Are you good or evil?

Another I, looking back at the distant, stretching out to space, already fading fiery flower.

In the world of the Infirmary’s past, you can move independently, but with great difficulty. One more step at will, and the world of such a past melts away. You cannot think on your own in the past tense, otherwise the otherworldly video goes out.

At the end of the vision, I determine who are those birds, wandering aimlessly across the plain. Not chickens at all. Blind seagulls.

That was how Dory betrayed himself.

The life before last exists. At least fantasize it, but it turns out to be true.

…The third month of work in the Infirmary. I am quite good at navigating the corridors of the Infirmary. Something is fundamentally and radically changing. Baby Algor, the bearer of Progeria, became a regular at the Parishes (Blocks, Parishes, simply, departments) Laza, and stopped aging. The nervous witch Elizabeth, the protege of the professors, left, leaving memories of a crystal ball, burgundy lipstick and blue candles, but Agatha blossomed, which is pleasant to look at.

In the Kitchen, my department, Ash, is at full strength today. Cooking food together can effectively assign roles, make connections, laugh and dance, nurture, and nurture a variety of foods.

The infirmary has turned into a kind of passenger plane. Bulkheads, compartments, portholes, consoles, monitors, comfortable chairs. The constant hum of secret engines is everywhere.

Agreements on all issues are very fast. I would never have believed you could be so hardworking. Or are they doping us?

I’m writing this now at dinner in the Kitchen. I’m here, it’s me, in a good mood, Alex Tour Noah.

There are serene goldfish in the aquarium in the middle of the room. Baby says something. Chaffre rolls the roll with chopsticks.

Need to remember.

The next chapter is a continuation of the work of fictional, one hundred percent positive characters. I cannot depict them with flaws, as it should be in a normal book, for the development and turn of the plot. There will be no battles with bullets and swords, magic talismans. Let them just work.

There are experiments, lectures, an ode to the colony of active angels. Everything that will help to open the Eternal Movers, which are at the same time the Time Machines, as well as the Altars — the converters of everything according to a given pattern.

It is important to represent the spirit of search. The author is not interested in putting phrases together just for the reader to enjoy fussy movements. Let the words become flesh, draw him to creation.

I hope God likes what is presented here?

Vacuum information

If you are going to open a chest with a secret, grind, enlarge, bring closer and divide. Make the world communicate. Check all his answers.

What happened during these six months? Recruiting on the outskirts of Ul-Karbon. A week in the deserted Infirmary, then — Aqua, Livi, Sey, Hett, Agatha, Binga. Lumen Dory. The arrival of Evry. Beginning of work. Badges, bags, gowns and stripes. The first attempts at pumping the soul. And now, a new direction of research!

…The emergency light comes on.

On the table are books, sandwiches and tea. At night, the senior of the shift can whip it in unlimited quantities, from the inexhaustible boiler, sip jam, meet with sleepless friends. Wander through the buildings. Reveal by eye the flaws of other people’s designs.

Thoughts turn into madness, laughter, or burst out into the light, like butterflies from worms.

Babe, Denschnom and Livi and I, stirring spoons in black jam, talk about immortality.

— It’s hard to imagine the way of life of an eternal person, isn’t it? Now, imagine, I am just like that; I observe the birth of stars, the flourishing of the Universe, then its catastrophic contraction and transformation into the primary Egg. Habits that were once very extravagant become obsolete in a maximum of fifty years. I find myself in the same situation. Often? Now always. You can imagine how the painful feeling of déjà vu pulsates in the souls of immortals.

Here, the universe is again shrinking into an embryo, the size, as scientists suggest, with an electron. Although, other men of science believe that the electron does not have its own size. I, by condition, an eternal, immortal individual, chill near him, waiting for the next Big Bang. How do you like these emotions?

— It feels like you are naked and wet in an electrical cabinet, near the humming wires, waiting for a short circuit. Scary, uncomfortable.

— Let’s think that he is not in the least afraid of the Big Bang.

Ideas.