The last thing I remember clearly is the stream of flame hitting me directly in the face. The fire, bursting through the window, tore me from the wall of the house along with the plaster. The blast wave picked up the debris and stuffed me with pieces of the house like a housewife stuffing a charlotte with apples, not sparing the juicy and ripe fruits. A piece of the wooden windowsill plunged into my face right under my eye socket, but I didn't feel any pain. It's hard to feel a single wound when your whole body is engulfed in a giant tongue of flame, the heat of which instantly blisters the skin and makes it burst like the skin of a juicy sausage over a campfire.
A brief feeling of flight. A blow to the ground. Lying in the tall, uncut grass, I saw my severed arms flying through the blue sky. I particularly remember the army chevron with the blood group on the rags of my uniform that remained on my severed limbs. It was so peaceful, and I didn't care about the raging flames and the burning debris falling from the sky. Everything was in slow motion. With each heartbeat, the picture slowed down, and the colors disappeared, giving way to shades of gray and white. The unreal picture was imprinted in my head before the darkness gently extinguished my consciousness, adding bloody colors for a moment and returning the sounds.
There was no pain, no thoughts. Yes, damn it, even when I first caught a "bullet" in Romania, and I didn't feel pain in the heat of battle, I had more emotions then! Death is probably like that. You just fall into fucking peace, and you don't give a shit about anything!!! Because you have no thoughts. No thoughts, so why bother?! Phew... I wasn't even worried about Katya, who was at the epicenter of the explosion. Life didn't flash before my eyes at the threshold of death. They lied, the bastards! There was only darkness and emptiness. No light, no sound. Nothing at all. Not even fear! One big scam!
Then sounds appeared. It was the sound of a surgical robot working, but then it seemed to me like a river murmuring, full and wide, like the Don during the flood. Good thing there was no "Faust" siren, otherwise it would have been exactly like the war. I remember how we crossed the river under German fire... How many guys were cut down then! The water turned pink... Sometimes hearing can play tricks without sight, and imagination shamelessly indulges it, damn it!
The darkness receded. Through the haze of unconsciousness, I saw doctors bending over me, and the sharp light of the operating room, which immediately knocked me out, unable to bear the pain inflicted by my burned eyes.
Then I felt very cold. As if I had fallen under the ice again, and my winter coat was dragging me to the bottom like a stone. Only my lungs didn't burn from lack of air. As the orderlies later said, I was injected with a cryo-solution through an IV drip, thus slowing down my body's metabolism, buying time. Even my skin pricked with an unpleasant chill. I was about to open my eyes and find myself in a village bathhouse after a picturesque swim in the snow.
But no! Fortunately, I didn't wake up in the morgue. Apparently, when they were putting me into the medical capsule, I was lacking oxygen. That's why I had such awesome associations with a body bag.
Then the hell began. It's all bullshit! There were no devils, no flames! There were only doctors led by Dmitry Sergeyevich, who were fiddling with my brains while I was alive, trying to fix them, with the unpleasant clatter of chrome medical instruments and squelching sounds of suction. I didn't feel them fiddling, but they reduced my anesthesia, or whatever it's called, so that the patient remains conscious? In short, it came, the real thing, damn it, the pain!
"They burned up like fucking pies!" one of the lab assistants shouted in surprise, even hiccuping from excitement.
"Katya!" the thought struck me, appearing with a surge of inhuman rage. The voices whispering at the edge of my consciousness had simply burned in that fire. If I hadn't been restrained, I would have strangled that scrawny guy! Good thing Sechenov didn't lose his head and shouted, "Fire!" I flinched and hit my head on some bar, otherwise it would have been very awkward. Awkward, I'd say!
It went on for a damn long time. Fucking pies! In this state, it's hard to tell – day, night, sleep! What you imagine and what's real. Dmitry Sergeyevich, of course, is a kind man, but not to the extent of spending days and nights with patients! How he fussed over Katya! As if she were his daughter... there's no other word for it. It was even enviable, mixed with jealousy, if not for the circumstances! I can only say thank you.
He was almost like a father to me before, especially after my own father and mother died. That's probably why he's a family friend? Godfather... that's not communist, but it's right. Truly a second father. And after he put us back together like a fucking puzzle, he became like family. I can never repay him in life.
Funny. I understood how he fussed over me there, during the war. That's why, after I recovered from that brown plague, I became a volunteer. Without hesitation! I wanted to help, but how he scolded me later... I thought, even though he's a fifth-generation intellectual, unlike me, a Ryazan face, he'd spank me! His gaze was very eloquent, like a company commander who noticed a soldier goofing off instead of serving. And privates just need to be allowed to goof off. They'll start enjoying it! Therefore, a soldier must be constantly busy, to avoid this.
I was even taken into the "Argentum" detachment at his request, as was Katya. Kuznetsov, about whom real legends circulated in the army, like about Stierlitz, told me directly later. And I understood myself, I wasn't cut out to be an elite operative. Never mind! There are no bad soldiers, only not enough drilling!
The commander sweetened the pill. He said that I was the life of the party, communicative, and had a positive influence on people's morale, but Katya inspired them even more. That's why she was given the call sign "Blesna." She attracted attention with her pioneer zeal and faith in communist ideals, preventing others from falling into despair. You wouldn't turn back when a pioneer girl is storming the barricades! The commander, Argon, used this, hooking all the men in the detachment like fish.
I initially just wanted to protect Katya... probably because of that. In quarantine, she looked like an alien among the other volunteers. A cheerful girl, with mischievous imps dancing in her eyes, couldn't help but attract attention. I didn't know then that she wasn't even eighteen. That was discovered later, when her mother came. Also a famous character. A woman who single-handedly took down a company of Germans, beating a dozen with a frying pan, couldn't be unknown!
I thought, that's it, now Katka will be beaten until bloody blisters, but no! Zinaida, seeing that her daughter couldn't be persuaded, and it was too late anyway, grumbled, calmed down, promising to kill everyone, just casually. Then somehow, Katya and I got together. Two lonely souls met... At the same time, I met my future mother-in-law in such an original way.
I had a lot of time to think. Especially when they removed the bandages along with the burned skin. It was the only way to escape the pain.
We quarreled before the operation. Of course, we would have made up later, and we didn't quarrel to shreds, but an unpleasant aftertaste remained. In the heat of the moment, we said a lot of things to each other. How would I have lived after all this... Fucking pies, the goddamn explosion! All that would have been left for me was an eternal sense of guilt, and it's hard to live with that, if possible...
From time to time, something started whispering at the edge of my consciousness, but in the end, this annoying whisper died down... It seemed that they had poured neuro-polymer into my brain, similar to what they had once tested on Katya. As soon as this gelatinous liquid touched it, crunching like the first snow and glass at the same time, the scraping and squeaking at the edge of consciousness, scratching my skull and persistent as heather, disappeared. I even thought I heard a cry-roar and the rustle of something being pulled back, damn it!
I finally came to my senses with a jolt, as if someone had snapped a clip of my memory into my head and cocked the bolt. I just woke up one day. Unlike the other awakenings, of which there were so many that they simply merged into one, I was taken out of the medical reservoir where I had been soaking. Perhaps that's why I'm thinking so clearly now, and everything that's happening doesn't seem like the ravings of a madman. Fucking pies, I'm not even sure I'm not still asleep or dying on the operating table while Dmitry Sergeyevich tries to reassemble the contents of my head again and again! Knowing him and his determination, maybe even more...
I was lying in a regular hospital room at the "Pavlov" complex, if a room furnished with the latest polymer technology, where, if you wanted to, you might not die, can be considered ordinary. I'm in shit, this time figuratively, although being in this substance would be fucking better than... I don't know! Everything pisses me off, damn it!
In a special polymer bed, instead of a mattress, there's one large piece of gelatinous polymer, in which the patient simply floats. We tested something like that. An experimental detachment, after all, not just a secret unit. Funny, you'd piss yourself laughing! Heh-heh!!! Given what I remember, it could have been worse. If they had stuffed me into "Vreteno"...
I am covered up to my neck with a special blanket, also high-tech, produced using knowledge at the intersection of botany, zoology, and microelectronics, which is not surprising for the Enterprise at all. The blanket is a useful thing, designed to protect the skin from third-degree burns and above.
This is also not surprising. Getting hit in the face by an explosion is... But, fucking pies, I don't feel my arms and legs at all and can't move them. Remembering that the last time I saw my hands against the sky, flying separately from my body... This is no longer just a bad situation, it's a disaster. And only the Enterprise can fix a disaster! I'm at it, therefore, everything will be great!
The memory helpfully supplied the image of how I almost choked the lab assistant. At that moment, I had hands. Therefore, with a high degree of probability, I still have them. Although, knowing the Wizard, I could be a pile of brains in a flask, inserted into a goddamn robot. Well, what, Seryoga?! Get into the goddamn robot! You'll be drinking oil instead of beer with crayfish on the Sochi beach now!!!
Inhale. Why was I so calm if they hadn't drugged me with sedatives! Exhale. Fucking pies, I suddenly wanted to smoke without hands! Inhale. Do I still have the strength to complain?! Why am I gaping?! Think, Sery, if you got hit so hard, how is your wife? Exhale. I can say one thing: she's alive! Inhale. Knowing what a specific understanding of good the professor has, and that he's a master at digging into brains, literally, I wouldn't have remembered Katya if she wasn't there. The Wizard is like that, for the common good, he'll transplant an eye to your ass and move your left testicle to the right. Exhale. He's not evil, he just perceives others a little differently sometimes, but he's fighting it. Probably.
From behind the screen that separated my cot, a hoarse voice sounded. Apparently, I was puffing loudly, doing breathing exercises, trying to extinguish the irritation that had come out of nowhere.
"Seryozha?" a hoarse voice sounded, which I didn't immediately recognize as my pioneer girl. It was too weak.
Fucking pies, I swear, at that moment I almost shit myself with joy! I'm not sure if I can still do it, our doctors, even if they are the best in the world, might have messed up my ass, but that doesn't negate the fact of immense relief! As they say, there are no atheists in foxholes, but there are no people who haven't shit themselves for the first time. Not figuratively. Sometimes not figuratively either. No one laughs at them. They are envied. If you can shit yourself, it means you're definitely alive!
And now I felt like I had after an "Faust-5" shelling, which, with their howling and explosions, put immense pressure on my ass. The cannonade subsides, and your dugout is intact, even if it's warm and squishy in your pants. You're alive, damn it!
Only this feeling of relief was not for my carcass! Katya is alive! The rest doesn't matter! We'll get out. The Wizard doesn't abandon his own! Just like the commander. And that means we'll definitely get out on our own!!! Argon is stubborn. If necessary, he'll eat dirt, but he'll pull his own out! During drinking bouts, he remembers not those he saved, but those he couldn't. After the plague, he only became more stubborn in this regard. The vaccine was developed based on his blood. Another person in his place would be happy, but he's sad.
Too much shit in my thoughts! Attention, soldier! Pull yourself together, son of an intellectual and a village teacher! If you spread the shit in your head, you'll only make things worse for your wife!!! That's who's having a bad time, and you just took an explosion to the face, you pathetic whiner!
"Ka-a-a-tya..." I squeezed out and almost coughed up my lungs. Only now did I feel how dry my throat was. It felt like I had drunk "brake fluid" on frozen scrap metal.
No one else gave us a chance to talk. Immediately, the automation kicked in, and a commotion began.
Orderlies, both living and mechanical, burst into the ward. This merry dance rushed at us, tapping, listening, taking live punctures, and doing other torturous crap! They didn't even look into our teeth!!!
Perhaps it looked funny from the outside. Before, we only tested this equipment, and now it's saving our lives.
The familiar feeling settled upon us at that moment. As if there had been no explosion, and it was just another test. Only the rage surged again, causeless and burning...
Kuznetsov was again pacing in the lobby of "Pavlov," stomping towards the reception. A week had passed since the incident, as the diplomats called it. The colonel, handing over the wounded to medicine, realized: his fighters might not survive. Although objectively he did everything he could, death is death. It doesn't matter if it's during the explosion or under the scalpel of his own butchers. The outcome for a fighter is the same. Therefore, a shadow fell on the officer's face. He knew he was responsible for the life of every soldier.
Argon understood: losses were inevitable. He had already lost many. War is impossible without losses. Only the officer couldn't get used to it, and when he starts to get used to it, he'll take off his own epaulets. It's generals who can move pieces on maps and not bother with human lives. He, a field officer, by ceasing to value the lives of his comrades, would become a threat to them. It's one thing to leave someone in a roadblock so the squad can survive. It's completely different to clear a minefield with your fighters under machine-gun fire. The line between necessity and criminal stupidity was barely visible, but vital.
The reception nurse nodded, recognizing the officer. It would have been surprising if she hadn't. Before this, the fighters of "Argentum" had ended up in hospital beds or undergone heavy medical experiments. There was no other way. Some things simply couldn't be tested on mice. They just couldn't talk.
"They've regained consciousness. Their condition is stable-critical," the nurse said dryly, not looking up from her documents, knowing who the grim officer wanted to ask about. "You can go in. They're in the laboratory wing, but you won't be able to talk to them. They have procedures."
The laboratories in "Pavlov" were like anatomical theaters, so that high-ranking officials could more clearly see the results of the experiments. Many party leaders and generals liked to look at medical achievements, especially if they could be used for war. Malignant prisoners died like experimental rats, atoning for their sins before the Motherland through pain, under the supervision of the highest echelons of the party.
This made the complex's staff drier in communication, even more so than ordinary doctors in any other medical institution. Deaths were not uncommon here, but rather the opposite, but there was no other way. The USSR was not fighting an enemy that allowed for sentimentality!
There was nothing surprising about people becoming hardened, watching people die day after day. It didn't matter if they were volunteers or criminals. Any death before your eyes cannot leave you indifferent.
Alexander nodded gratefully and, throwing a lab coat over his uniform, went deeper into the complex, saluting the guards. Any capitalist would have long since convulsed with fear if they had entered these walls.
Bolsheviks were made of different stuff, and Kuznetsov himself was forged from alloyed steel. Therefore, the colonel was not disturbed by some sights. He simply knew: it could be much worse. He had seen it with his own eyes, back in Germany, and in some American laboratories.
Yankee laboratories had recently been much scarier than any concentration camp, especially if a Soviet citizen, improved at Enterprise 3826, ended up there. By dissecting them, the Yankees were digging into the very heart of Soviet science. The US special services were trying to find weaknesses in their ideological opponent and did not shy away from the dirtiest methods. Even in fascist concentration camps, there was not so much hatred and inhumanity...
Reaching the right laboratory, the soldier froze at the panoramic window, watching the procedures. Blesna and Plutonium looked frankly terrible. They were now more machines than people, but at least they were still among the living, despite the injuries they had sustained. Their burnt flesh intertwined with steel and polymer. And the fact that they were conscious made the sight even more terrifying. Argon felt this pain as his own.
He was not the only observer. Zinaida stood frozen near the window, watching her daughter and son-in-law being treated. The colonel noted to himself how gaunt the woman had become. She hadn't left the complex all week. Her eyes showed more pain than the victims themselves. Combined with her frozen face, it was a terrible contrast.
"I don't like it when people pry into my soul," Muravyova broke the silence, making it clear with one intonation who she was talking about.
Argon didn't know what Muravyova had talked about with Sechenov, but the black eye on the man's face after the conversation was eloquent. Therefore, he decided not to ask any unnecessary questions. Soldiers generally don't like it when people pry into their souls.
Zinaida, after standing a little longer, turned away from the armored, triple-layered glass. She clicked a cigarette out of the pack and slowly lit it before continuing her unhurried conversation:
"Thank you. And to that scientist whip, thank you too. I don't give a damn about the party, the Central Committee secretary, or communism. My daughter is the only joy in my life. I didn't want this life for her... Apparently, I didn't spank her enough," the woman grinned crookedly. "Her rascal somehow... influenced. At least they taught them, along with Sechenov, and even then they're just okay! One with persuasion, the other with scientific tricks. But you know, and I know, people like them are only carried out of service feet first. I don't know where this son-in-law got it from, his father, God rest his soul, was a decent man, but my daughter is all me! It was evident from childhood. That's why I sent her to ballet. But can you keep a she-wolf in captivity? Especially when she got the 'itch' from her father..."
Kuznetsov continued to remain silent. He didn't need to shake the air to respond. A soldier always understands a soldier. The unforgettable aroma of "Prima" hung in the air. What was there to talk about?
"No matter how I feel about this Sechenov of yours, all his gadgets saved Katya's life. And he himself, the damned bug, is tearing his ass off! He feels guilty! Oh, he feels it! You know, I scratched my fist on him, and it got easier. A good person or not completely stupid. He left silently."
"I hope his gadgets, as you aptly put it, will save us from trouble," the colonel replied, saying everything with this phrase, hinting at what wasn't discussed in the barracks, while knowing everything.
"Who would save them! Make a fool do... A-a-a-a-a," the woman waved her hand, turning around in an army fashion, on her heels, and walking away from the laboratory. "I don't even want to talk! Too much honor for this shriveled little man! If he pulls through, then we'll talk. I'm tired! I've become too kind... Goodbye, soldier! We'll see each other again in service! And I left this brothel unattended for so long."