Turn me. Part 1
Tekst- Rozmiar: 290 str.
- Kategoria: fantastyka naukowa, fantasy rosyjskie, romanse wpsółczesne, thrilleryEdytuj
Startled, Kanny muttered plaintively:
«They… they climbed the tree. I couldn’t get them there. They got lost and… climbed up to spend the night. They fastened their belts to it, and… I p-passed them, and… th-thought that… I can’t get there, but… there’s not enough time, and they won’t come down anyway and… they won’t find the house… and… ran here.»
The sorcerer swung his hand, and Kanny shuddered and drew his head into his shoulders in fright. However, the master did not beat him, but only asked with displeasure:
«Did they see you?»
«No. I… think n-no.»
«Do you think or are you sure?» the master almost shouted.
Startled, Kanny still quite firmly answered:
«I’m sure.»
«You know that only at this time of day do I turn off the field so that you can freely enter the house. And you know that people are less sensitive to it than you are, and can come much closer. That is why at night time I demand that you destroy those who at this time may be nearby. I was sure that if there were any in the area, you would finish them off. And… Now what?!»
«Didn’t you turn on the field after you let me in?» Kanny asked with the intonation of a small perplexed child.
The sorcerer, out of annoyance, swung his hand at him again and at that moment thought: «By the way, it’s strange, I did turn it on.»
The werewolf reflexively pulled his head into his shoulders, but the master suddenly went limp and asked more calmly:
«Now what do you want me to do with them?»
Shrugging his shoulders, the werewolf, though very timidly, dared to answer:
«Only you give orders here, Master.»
After a moment of silence, considering his words, Alex shook his head and said:
«Okay, now get dressed, go to your place and wait there so that there is not a sound from you. And I will deal with these two.»
Kanny nodded and quickly walked away, and the sorcerer, having opened the inner door, began to slowly open the locks of the outer, deliberately stretching the time.
Chapter 3
The morning sun shone mercilessly directly into the eyes, and terribly interfered with sleep, but the dream was strong and stubbornly did not want to let the human consciousness out of its power, keeping it in a painful state of languor.
However, soon the strange sound of a running motor joined the bright sun, which, becoming louder, then quieter, periodically intervened in a restless sleeping state, penetrating deeper and deeper into the unsteady ripples of a morning dream.
At some point, the sound of the engine sounded so close and strong that Lera woke up abruptly and saw that the tractor Belarus was rushing towards her at speed, threateningly pointing at her the sharp forks of the harvesting mechanism.
From surprise and fright, she screamed piercingly, and her cry, despite the loud noise of the engine, nevertheless reached the hearing of the tractor driver, and he sharply pressed the brakes.
The tractor stopped, just a few centimeters short of her head with protruding fork teeth.
Apparently, the girl’s cry was so sharp and loud that it woke her brother Andrey, which neither the noise of the engine nor the morning sun could do, and he, waking up from a heavy sleep, now looked around in surprise, trying to understand what was happening and how he ended up of being here.
The driver leaned out of the tractor cab in surprise and, seeing the guys, swore in his heart, remembering all the obscene expressions that he only had in his not very rich rural verbal arsenal.
«Are you completely out of your mind?! What is the kind of place you’ve found for that matter! Come on, get off the field before I grab something heavier and go over your shameless asses.
Without forcing himself to be persuaded for a long time, Andrey nimbly jumped up, grabbed his sister by the hand, and tried to get away as quickly as possible from the angry tractor driver and the ill-fated ruined bale of hay at the edge of the field.
Having run back to a safe distance, the guys stopped and looked back at the working tractor, which, with the help of a special device, moved the collapsed hay bales to the edge of the field.
«What is he all about?» Lera asked.
«What, what? He works on the field, that’s what he’s all about.»
«Well… than… what are we doing here?»
Andrey, apparently, tried to find an answer to the same question, helplessly rummaging through his memory and, finding nothing, answered irritably.
«Probably, when we wandered through the forest yesterday, we were so tired that we fell into this hay without strength, and therefore we don’t remember anything.
«It seems to me that there was nothing like that,» the sister shook her head doubtfully.
«I don’t remember either, so what? But I remember how we got lost, and I remember how we wandered through the forest, looking for the way back.»
«There was also a tree… it seems… kind of… on which we climbed.»
«Tree? Hmm… I don’t remember the tree.»
«We still seemed to be fastened to it, remember?»
«Mm… no, I don’t remember such a thing. Apparently… We were very tired.»
The remembrance of the tree was so distant and vague that Lera herself doubted whether there was a tree or not, as if her brain stubbornly did not want to think in this direction. So, finally she said:
«Ok, it does not matter. Do you know where we are?»
Andrew looked around.
«No, I do not know. I have never seen this field.»
«Maybe we should ask the tractor driver?»
«After everything he told us?»
«So what?»
«What if he doesn’t tell us?»
«Maybe we will try to ask him anyway?
«Maybe let’s just follow along the road. If the sun is on the right, then we are going right.
«Oh, but what if we are already on the opposite side of the forest and will go where we don’t have to go? I’ll run and ask.»
Without waiting for her brother’s answer, the girl threw a plastic box with mushrooms at his feet and ran across the field towards the tractor driver. Andrey wanted to object, but seeing that it was useless, he waved his hand and, picking up her box, reluctantly trudged after his sister. The whole body itched unpleasantly from many mosquito bites, responded with pain and ached as if he had been beaten with sticks all night long.
Seeing a beauty running towards him across the field, the tractor driver turned off the engine and, leaning out of the cab, shouted in displeasure:
«Well, what else do you need, shameless?»
Running a little closer, the girl reproachfully said:
«You shouldn’t be so unkind to us, man. We didn’t do anything like that.»
«Well, of course. You think, I believed you,» the tractor driver said with a grin.
«But in vain. We are siblings. We were picking mushrooms and got lost in the forest. And at night, exhausted, we fell asleep on this… haystack. We don’t know where we are.»
Looking at the girl incredulously and looking back at her companion with two plastic containers full of mushrooms, lazily walking towards them across the field, the tractor driver finally softened, and in a completely different tone, he said:
«Ah, what a deal. I see… Hmm… What do you need? What place?»
«The village of Kraevka,» Lera answered, smiling at the gray-haired worker with a childish sincere smile.
«A beautiful girl,» he thought, and said aloud:
«Well… you got very far! There will be fifteen miles to Kraevka here. It’s at least four hours on foot.»
«In which direction?» Andrey asked, who at that moment had already come close enough to hear the conversation.
«Do you see that edge of the field?» the tractor driver asked, pointing with his hand. «There is the beginning of the road. Follow it all the time straight, not turning anywhere. There will be some branches from it, but there are no forks, so you’ll figure it out. You will reach Malinovka, and there it is already close to Kraevka. Understandable, or not?»
«Oh, I see! Thank you,» Lera said with a grateful smile.
«Well, God bless you then. It is a good thing that I didn’t beat you to death today. You, boy, indeed owe your life to your sister. If she had not screamed, I would have raked you along with the hay. I could really kill you.»
«Thank you,» Andrey said gloomily and, handing a box of mushrooms to his sister, slowly walked to the beginning of the road at the end of the field. It really bothered him that he couldn’t remember how they got here.
Following the guys with his glance, the worker started the tractor and thought:
«Well, they are indeed brother and sister. You can immediately see that… They are very similar. He’s probably three or four years older than her.»
* * *
When the roofs of the houses of some villages appeared between the trees at the end of the forest road, the guys could hardly drag their feet.
«Tell me that this is Malinovka, please,» Lera said in a tired but cheerful voice.
Andrey looked ahead and after a moment answered confidently:
«Yes, it’s Malinovka.»
«How long until home?»
«A couple of kilometers.»
«So, another half an hour, right?»
«Well, yes. About that. And what?»
«Finally.»
«Y-yes…» Andrew said in a strange tone.
«What?»
«Well… I’m still trying to remember how we ended up in this hay.»
«Do you really need it? You yourself said that we were so tired that we were exhausted, and therefore we did not remember. That it must be a stress, and… because of stress, the body’s defense reaction worked, so we forgot everything.»
«Well… to say something, is one thing,» he answered, «but it is strange that this reaction worked equally for both. I understand if one would forget, and the second would remember, but when both forgot, and… it is as if the memory was simply completely turned off.»
«So what? Thank God that we were not eaten by wild animals, and ended up in a bale of hay, and not in the stomach of some bear.»
«The bear… hmm,» again, some obscure fragment flashed through his memory, as if it was cut off. «It seems like we were still on a tree, and there, it seems, there was some kind of bear, but… down somewhere. And you were talking about a tree. But I didn’t remember it, and now you said about the bear, and some obscure fragment surfaced, like a dream. So… there must still be a tree.»
Lera rummaged through her memory for a while, and then shook her head negatively.
«No, I don’t remember anything, neither a tree, nor a bear.»
«You yourself asked about tree?»
«Really? I don’t know. To be honest, I don’t remember what I asked. Maybe I dreamed it?»
«We can’t dream the same.»
«Where do you see the same?»
«Well, a tree… a bear…»
«Oh yeah! So many things are the same! We do not clearly remember either one or the other, and there is not a single fragment that actually matches.»
«Uhu! The same lapses in memory match. Which is strange. And plus, I have some feeling that something happened to us, which for some reason we don’t remember, but at the same time, we ended up in this hay for a reason.»
«I think that now the main thing is to get home and rest. Personally, I was very tired and hungry. And when we rest, you’ll see, everything will fall into its place.
«It is like I had a dream that I forgot.»
«Andrey!» Lera pleaded. «Please, let’s talk about something else.»
At that moment, her brother, who mechanically put his hands into his trousers, took out from the right pocket of his jeans some small object in the shape of a cylinder, slightly smaller than a grain of wheat. He stopped and began to examine it carefully.
Lera came up, and looking into his palm, asked:
«What’s this?»
«I don’t know.»
«It looks like some kind of electronic device.»
«Yes, it seems so.»
«So little! Where did you get it from?»
Without answering, Andrey put his hand back in his pocket and, quickening his pace, resolutely walked along the road.
* * *
Kanny was sitting in a large Mercedes bus. Reclining his seat and completely relaxing, he lazily watched the scenery passing through the window. The bus was going fast, a pleasant breeze was blowing from the top hatch, and Kanny felt happy. He completed, as the master said, a very serious task, and deserved a corresponding reward. This time these were not just a few people, but almost three dozen directors! The job was done cleanly. No clues or suspicions. And now, finally, the long-awaited vacation. With the money that he received, he will be able to have a great rest somewhere in Spain or even better. Now a beautiful hotel room, delicious food, excellent booze, women and entertainment are waiting for him. And at the same time, he will still have money left, and not a little money.
Kanny smiled in anticipation of his leisure time as his cell phone vibrated demandingly in his pocket.
The werewolf grimaced in annoyance.
«What else?»
He took out his cell phone from his pocket and read the text message:
«606».
«Oh! Emergency!» he thought, and punched on the phone the numbers he needed.
A moment later, the next message came, which looked like a meaningless jumble of letters and numbers, but Kanny, of course, knew the cipher and, after reading the message, cursed quietly.
Looking at the road, with a sigh of regret, he typed in the right combination of letters and numbers, which meant: «I’m ready.»
As expected, after a couple of minutes, as soon as the bus reached a level safe area, its engine suddenly died out, and the driver, pressing the brakes, turned on the emergency signal and rolled onto the side of the road.
Grabbing his travel bag, Kanny went to the front door, which, to the driver’s surprise, opened of its own accord as he unsuccessfully tried to start the Mercedes.
«What’s happening? I didn’t seem to press the OPEN button,» thought the driver, but before he could press CLOSE, Kanny walked up as if nothing had happened, said: «Thank you» to him, and got off the bus.
The driver followed him with a surprised look, shrugged his shoulders in bewilderment and turned the ignition key again. This time the bus started right up.
«Strange,» the driver thought, and looked in the mirrors to see the passenger who had just exited. At that moment, Kanny was already crossing the road.
Leaning out of the window, the driver shouted:
«Hey, man! Are you going to come? We’re moving on!»
Kanny shook his head.
«No, thanks. I’m in the opposite direction.»
«What? Are you sure? You have paid your ticket to the very end.»
«Yes, I know. Thank you. It’s just an emergency. I need to get back.»
Shrugging again, the driver moved the Mercedes back to the highway, thinking:
«In any case, everything is recorded on my DVR.»
What he didn’t notice was that the dash cam silently turned off at the moment Kanny received the message on his cell phone, and didn’t turn on until the Mercedes turned back to the highway.
When the bus drove off for a considerable distance so that it could hardly be seen from the place where it had just stopped, a passing black Grand Cherokee jeep suddenly braked sharply and turned-on emergency lights literally a meter from Kanny, who was standing a little to the side of the road.
The werewolf slowly moved to the jeep.
Cursing, the driver unsuccessfully tried to start the Cherokee by turning the ignition key. The car did not react at all.
Kanny confidently approached the front passenger door and knocked.
«Will you take a companion? I need to go to the airport.
«No, I won’t,» the driver replied irritably.
«I’ll pay well.»
«Close the door. I said I won’t.»
«Five hundred dollars will suit you?»
In disbelief, the driver of the jeep looked up at Kanny, who was more than simply dressed, with a nondescript duffel bag slung over his shoulder.
«How much did you say?»
«Five hundred dollars.»
«Are you kidding!? It’s only about thirty kilometers.»
«No, I’m not kidding,» Kanny replied, pulling five hundred-dollar bills from his wallet.
Smiling, the driver answered in a completely different tone.
«You’re crazy! But, even if I agreed, my car stalled, and I have no idea what’s wrong with it.»
«Try again. Maybe I’m lucky and it will start now?»
Shrugging his shoulders, the driver said:
«Well, if it starts now, then I’ll take you.»
He turned the ignition key again, and to his surprise, the car started immediately.
«Hmm… some kind of magic!» He looked at Kanny in surprise. «Come on.»
* * *
On the opposite side of the forest house, which from this angle surprised even more with its size and massive rough log walls, several people were talking quietly at a table on the veranda.
Their conversation was interrupted by Alex coming out from behind the house, who stopped respectfully in the distance and coughed warningly.
One of the speakers, a slender, well-built, neatly trimmed gray-eyed brunette in a dark-green businessman’s suit with a shimmer, drew attention to him and asked:
«Yes, what do you want, Alex?»
«Inquire about 213th, Mr. Tennius.»
«What! Could you not yourself clear out this question from the duty officer? I already told you that I gave it to the operator,» the brunette replied, and looking at the screen of his gadget, he added: «Here… as I thought, the answer was received. The 213th is returning. He’s almost at the airport, so you can be free. The operator will bring him to the very end.»
The sorcerer bowed and hurriedly left, and the brunette, looking up from the touch screen of his gadget, turned back to the conversation. One of them, a tall, fair-haired, short-haired man, dressed in a short-sleeved gray shirt, black shorts and good-quality crocodile-skin sandals, asked him, his blue eyes piercing:
«How could it happen, Mr. Tennius, that the Ch-15 ended up in the possession of these… uh… children?»
«How could these teenagers even survive, and even more so, enter here!?» asked another, stocky, strong, red-haired interlocutor. He was wearing tight-fitting black T-shirt and loose light-colored trousers.
Tennius folded his arms over his chest and arrogantly looked at one and the other, while the third interlocutor, small and thin, but at the same time inspiring a sense of authority, clapped meaningfully and said:
«Hush, hush, dear. Mr. Tennius must have some serious reasons of his own, so I suggest not to hurry, but to give him the opportunity to speak:»
Once again measuring everyone who were gathered with his eyes, the brunette answered with dignity:
«Mr. Saurris is right. You shouldn’t have asked me questions like that. However, listen. My ward turned off the screen to allow 213th to enter. The scanner showed that he is two kilometers from the place and moving quickly. Apparently, the teenagers did not have any gadgets, because if they were close at that moment, then at least the scanner did not detect them.»
Coughing, Tennius stopped and, after taking a few sips of coffee from the cup in front of him, continued:
«The moment Alex finished the transition process with 213th, the two of them knocked on the door. It was clear that if they were not let in, they would try to get into the house, thinking that there was no one inside, and they needed an overnight stay in their critical situation. Just as he was about to annul these two, the buzzer went off with a P El signal. Therefore, he checked them and saw that their older brother was a special affairs officer, the head of the 5th department of a very serious level. If my ward had killed them, this FSB officer wouldn’t certainly have calmed down with the version that his brother and sister had been killed by a beast, but would have started his own investigation and scanned every centimeter of the forest, and something would have to be done with him, which is against the rules, because he is directly subordinate to the initiated person.»
After a spectacular pause, the brunette continued:
«Pondering all the data he received, Alex decided to put them to sleep and erase their memory by sending them to the nearest settlement. Of course, I don’t support his decision 100%, but I don’t think that you need to worry so much about it.»
«You let him use your flownter sometimes, don’t you?» Saurris asked him.
Tennius cleared his throat and replied in a restrained tone:
«Mr. Saurris, you know that my degree of trust in Alex and his status allow me to do this, and even more so when it is necessary.»
«And when was the loss of Ch-15 discovered?» asked the tall and black-haired man. «And I still don’t understand why Alex didn’t turn on the field right after 213th had entered?»
«I have already checked this point. He did turn on the field, and this was clearly recorded on the camera. But apparently there was a technical error. The switch would not be pressed to the end, which, of course, is strange, according to its construction, but the guardian himself is not guilty of this. And the chip was discovered one second before I called you, dearest Mr. Nonnie,» there was a confident answer.
«Hmm… understandable. But I would not like to hear the adjective „dearest“ in my address.» Nonnie responded with obvious sarcasm.
«Ok, I’ll keep that in mind for the future,» Tennius nodded without emotion.
«And what do you intend to do now, Master Tennius?» the redhead asked.
«Personally, dear Alyette, I think that Alex spared these children in vain, but his fears about his older brother from the FSB are fully justified and are not a violation of job descriptions and a direct oversight on his part, so I clarified the information about this subject and simply ordered to return the 213th to him and still eliminate these teenagers, because in this case it is his job. Everything will look like an attack by a rabid beast.»
«To be honest, I don’t understand why we need to deal with such small things,» said one of the audience, a fat and bald man named Ounn, who had previously kept silent. «Like we don’t have bigger things to do.»
«Is there a signal from Ch-15, Mr. Tennius?» asked the lean Saurris.
«Yes, although sometimes it disappears, most likely due to geolocation, as, for example, right now.»
Nonnie and Alyette looked at each other, and Nonnie said:
«Well, I apologize for the misunderstanding of the situation, Mr. Tennius, and the unduly rude tone. Since 213th has brilliantly fulfilled his task, I think we can close this issue and get on with more important things. By the way, how much did he eliminate?
«Twenty-nine people, Mr. Nonnie. Including the general director of the aircraft factory.»
The others nodded in approval, and Saurris took out a document from his briefcase and unfolded it in front of the assembled.
* * *
Peter, Andrey’s and Lera’s older brother, was carefully examining a small transparent cylinder with some kind of complex electronic device inside, rolling it in his palm. He was very similar to his younger brother, though the Andrey was slightly taller. However, behind the gray suit, one could not see Peter’s steely muscles, and looking at his good-natured face, it was hard to imagine that he had lightning-fast reaction and huge punching power, both arms and legs. Andrey was also athletic, and also loved martial arts, but he knew perfectly well that in sparring he could not hold out against his older brother for even a few seconds. And physically, his brother was much stronger than him.
«Where did you say you got it?» asked Peter, looking at his younger brother with his light gray penetrating eyes.
Andrew shrugged.
«I already told you. This morning, after we had walked about thirteen kilometers from that same field, and were already near Malinovka, I accidentally reached into my pocket and found it there.»
«And how did you end up in the hay?»
«Oh! Haven’t I already told you?»
The brother looked at Andrey with his special look, which made it clear that if he asks about something, you need to answer without asking unnecessary questions, even if you have to tell the same thing dozens of times. Knowing that it could not be otherwise, Andrey sighed and continued:
«I don’t quite remember how we got there, or to be more precise, I don’t remember at all. And when I try to remember, all I see are vague images of us wandering through the woods in an unsuccessful attempt to find our way home.»
«And what is the data of the most recent memory?» Peter asked, looking straight into the eyes of his younger brother with the same fixed gaze.
«Well, I don’t know exactly what time it was… how can I know?
«Try to remember, was it evening, or still a day, or has it already been night?»
Lera intervened in the conversation:
«The last thing I remember is about eight or nine in the evening, because it was getting dark, and we were afraid that we would have time to find a suitable tree for the night before dark.»
«Oh! This is a new thing! Have you thought about finding a tree to sleep on?» Peter asked, turning his searching gaze to his younger sister, but this time there was much more tenderness in his eyes.
«Yes, there seemed to be some kind of tree, but for some reason I remember it very vaguely, as if it was in a dream,» Andrey answered.
Peter took in his hand his mobile phone, the model unknown to Andrey. As far as he remembered, he saw such a phone only with his older brother.
By pressing just one button, Peter brought the phone to his ear:
«Maksimych, urgent matter, code 012. As soon as possible.»
«Something happened?» Lera asked, scared.
«A helicopter is flying to take us. We have about 15 minutes.»
«Brother, what’s going on? Maybe you can explain to me, who has no understanding?»
«The phrase „no understanding“ doesn’t seem to fit you well. It’s strange that you were allowed to live. But your memory has definitely been erased,» Peter answered, and it was clear from his tone that he was not joking.
«What! Were we kidnapped? Is it a UFO? It’s their sensor, right? I thought so,» Andrey exclaimed with annoyance in his voice.
Slightly hesitant, Peter answered:
«Most likely, everything is a little not so banal, brother. You seem to be very lucky and, if you didn’t have this thing, you would probably be forgotten, but now… everything can go very differently. By the way, I think it might have eavesdropped on us, so just in case…»
He walked over to the sideboard and took out the food foil from the drawer.
«What are you going to do?» Lera asked.
Smiling, Peter winked conspiratorially, tore off a fairly large piece of foil and, having made a multi-layer bag out of it, carefully wrapped a cylinder in it and answered:
«Screen, sis. Simple but effective.»
«Screen?» The younger sister was surprised.
«It is not so easy for a radio signal to penetrate several layers of foil,» Andrey answered with the tone of an expert.
«Ah,» the girl nodded in understanding.
«Let’s go,» said Peter, rising from a comfortable makeshift chair. «We’ll just make it to the wasteland.»