Chunk 03

I shrugged: "They said something about extreme remoteness."

He leaned toward me but, before speaking, held a short pause. Just to make sure I would hear every word.

"Gil, that planet is in another galaxy."

"Come on!" I smiled skeptically.

"I'm serious. The first expedition in history to the Large Magellanic Cloud."

I pulled out my phone and entered a query in the search. And was a bit stunned.

"One hundred sixty-three thousand light years?!"

He nodded.

"And do you know how many years will pass on Earth during the jump to the Magellanic Cloud?"

"At the moment of the jump," I automatically corrected. "The jump takes zero time."

"Alright, smartass, at the moment. How much time will pass on Earth at the moment when you transfer to the Large Magellanic Cloud?"

I thought. With ordinary transverse jumps, the desynchronization can reach several days, and sometimes weeks. But now we're talking about a giant, almost unthinkable distance. And, it seems, there's a geometric progression...

"Ten months?" I guessed randomly. "Or more?"

"Twenty years."

"How much?!"

"Twenty and change Earth years! Meaning to jump there and immediately back—that's forty years! Gil, by that time everyone you know will either be very old or have passed away."

"Damn..." it escaped me. "I see why they don't mind us flying with families..."

"You just can't imagine how far it is!"

"No, well, I can imagine approximately..."

"Are you sure?" Djokhar ironically raised an eyebrow. Then he took a toothpick and made a tiny mark in the center of the wooden table. "This is the sun. Imagine it's here, on this table, and the size of a poppy seed. And you need to mark the nearest star to the sun, keeping to scale. Not another galaxy yet, just the nearest little star. Where will it be?"

"The nearest... Well, that's Proxima Centauri..." I tried to imagine it and the Sun, as if looking from the side. "If the Sun, as you say, is a poppy seed... I don't know..."

Djokhar drilled into me with an attentive gaze and was silent.

"At the next table?" I tried to see the correct answer in his eyes. "No? On the sidewalk outside the window?"

Smiling, he leaned toward me across the table and slowly said:

"If on this table lay a tiny sun, like a poppy seed... Then another seed would have to be placed not even in Kyiv, but somewhere beyond Brovary! Twenty-eight kilometers from here, Gil! Two poppy seeds and between them—twenty-eight kilometers of emptiness! That's all! Nothing more! And this is the closest star to us! And if you wanted to draw a map of our galaxy on which the Sun would be marked with at least a one-millimeter dot, this map would hang from one end off the Earth, and from the other—off the Moon! A map, Gil! Just a map where it's possible to mark the Sun! And you're going to take your family to a planet that's even farther! Much farther! After all, between Earth and planet Ix-Chel, where they're inviting you, two of our galaxies would fit completely! And your only connection there will be a quantum channel through which you can transmit text a few words long. Very suitable for an SOS signal! But help... Help, in case of anything, will come at the earliest in twenty years!"

On the last phrase he emotionally threw up his hands, and now they were slowly lowering, like sand settling after an explosion.

I thought about his words. Of course, I studied astronomy, like everyone... But I never tried to imagine space to scale like this... And two poppy seeds in black emptiness at a distance of tens of kilometers struck me... In pictures everything looks different...

We were silent.

"I don't know, Gilel," Djokhar suddenly said, "on the other hand, I understand your aspirations... You have to decide for yourself... But I'll just tell you as a friend..."

The waitress came over again, put coffee in front of Djokhar and slid the desired mug to me. Djokhar fell silent, patiently waiting for her to leave. I used this pause to immediately fall upon the cold beverage. If I had lived in some ancient times,

I might have thought that a person's stomach is located in their head. Be that as it may, the sensations were exactly like that: the brain, which until now had been flopping back and forth in the heated skull box, finally found peace and smoothly swayed in the beer. The bubbles tickled it, and from this it became good and calm...

The waitress, charmingly smiling, fluttered away. Djokhar patiently waited for me to return to the real world. I sat with my eyes closed until I felt that my soul, expelled yesterday by the combination of whiskey and Becherovka, decided to return to the body.

"Sorry, I got distracted," the voice now sounded hoarsely. "We were talking about it being god-knows-where."

"To hell with them, with these jumps, Gilelchik! In forty years Kyiv won't go anywhere. Good job, decent fees, you'll return a veteran with a wagon of benefits... After all, you won't age! But there's another reason to dissuade you."

He fell silent, choosing words, and I waited.

"I didn't tell you why I left the conquistadors?" he asked and continued before I answered. "So listen..."

5

I sat, shocked by the frankness of his terrible story, and tried to comprehend it all. Djokhar was also silent, staring into space, and his fingers barely noticeably twitched, beating out an inaudible rhythm on the table.

"Alright, Djokhar," I stood up, extending my hand to him. "I'll think about it. Actually, I seriously had doubts because of all these years that will pass on Earth..."

"But I didn't convince you, did I? You've always been stubborn, Gilel... Even on Proxima."

I said nothing. Djokhar stood up, shook my hand firmly and unexpectedly warmly.

"Forty years, my dear, forty years!" he said. "If you haven't realized it yet, for me you're flying away forever. So... You'd better change your mind. But if you still decide to..."

And Djokhar hugged me tightly.

When father jumped, we weren't home.

The police immediately called mother. And I was at school and knew nothing. When, exiting the elevator, I saw the open apartment door, I got scared. Inside there were lots of unfamiliar people. And mom immediately rushed to me.

"He's gone," she said and cried.

I didn't ask who. I didn't even ask how. Instead, something completely different flashed through my head. Finally—that's what I thought about the person I loved more than anyone on this earth. I immediately tried to soften this thought, adding to myself: "Finally he's released from suffering"—but it sounded false and as if not in my voice. Not at all as easily and sincerely as the cynical and vile "finally." It seems to me I would never have thought of such a thing if this thought hadn't come to my head on its own. As if not mine. It just appeared, flooding me first with a strange, inappropriate feeling of relief, and then—with a wave of burning shame. "Finally this hell has ended."

And it all started almost innocently. Imperceptibly. Father stopped reading. Previously, books were his obligatory companions in bed before sleep, in a chair on weekends, and even very often at meals. And suddenly he abandoned reading. Completely. Then nobody saw anything bad in this. And I—even the opposite: father suddenly shared my passion for computer games, and it was fantastically great! True, he didn't like discussing the game—just didn't support the conversation, as if it wasn't him who was shouting "go-go" five minutes ago, overtaking me in the motorcycle racing championship simulator...

No, then I saw nothing strange in this. Now I know the reason: he couldn't talk about what didn't exist at that moment. His abstract thinking was like a plastic cup into which some wise guy poured boiling water. And every day this cup became smaller and smaller, turning into a useless lump of polystyrene...

We were always very close. Only he never tired of saying how much he loved me. Mom more often played the role of one who is ready to accept love—with the caveat that my childish affection would be appropriate and not too rough, that mom wouldn't be too tired after work or very

busy... But father—father gave love in its simplest and most precious manifestations, regardless of how he felt and under any circumstances. Before sleep he would come to kiss me and, kneeling before the bed, would voice his favorite question: "Do you know, Gilka, why I love you so much?" And I was the happiest in the world. And then we rubbed noses, like New Zealand aborigines...

When I was ten, father was already visiting doctors because of strange involuntary movements—the first "steps" of the still unfamiliar to us "dance of the fool." It was then that such an incident happened.

We were walking through the market. A large pavilion of fruits and vegetables was filled with the aromas of melons and peaches. Father, catching my gaze, suddenly took a large golden pear from the counter and gave it to me, smiling with his kindest smile in the world. I waited for him to pay, but he walked on, showing no intention of doing so. Actually, he didn't even think about this necessity, just as a five-year-old child might not think. And the seller—a tall tanned guy with a gloomy face—called out to father, coming out from behind the counter. I don't remember exactly how he said it. I remember the confused smile on dad's lips. He didn't understand what they wanted from him. I don't know how he perceived all this... He thought he'd already paid, or maybe thought that for such a trifle you don't need to pay...

Probably the only thing that can be said for certain is that the abnormal protein in his chromosomes was already mutating and desperately destroying nerve cells. It was getting harder and harder for father to grasp abstract concepts. Various "ifs" and "thens," "to predict" and "to imagine"... Cause-and-effect relationships and logical chains were becoming an impossible science... He was still an ordinary person who had fallen out of love with reading... But in the wormholes that corroded his brain, there was gradually no room left for anything except the simplest actions.

"Are you stupid?" the seller asked father, enraged by his smile, and snatched the pear from my hands.

And then I cried. Not because I needed that damn pear. I just didn't understand what was happening and why father was called stupid, and he was standing and smiling. I cried and shouted: "Dad!" —helplessly looking at him. I thought he would just pay. But he threw himself at the seller and started beating him, putting some unprecedented fury into each blow...

When they pulled him away, father suddenly broke free, easily scattering those who held him back, picked up the cursed pear and, wiping it on his sleeve, held it out to me.

"Don't cry, Gilka," he said, smiling. "Don't cry."

He was acquitted. The results of medical tests arrived exactly a week before the trial. Father returned home the same kind and smiling video game enthusiast. But the former dad never returned.

A year later his condition was frankly pitiful. He had become a huge child, incapable of predicting the elementary consequences of his actions. Multiply this by poor coordination... And even bringing a spoon to his mouth was a problem for him... Plus spontaneous involuntary arm waves or head twitches. Most simple household tasks became impossible for father, and even dangerous. Moreover, dangerous not only for him.

We took turns feeding him with a spoon. Mom shaved him every morning. Then she stopped—when he once unexpectedly jerked his head so hard that mom cut him with the safety razor.

We tried not to let father go anywhere alone, because he fell, and the abrasions on his face became as familiar to us as his beard... And then he started running away. Running away at the slightest opportunity, as if he were a spaniel anxious at the start of spring. And if running away didn't work out for a long time, father would go openly, despite mother's attempts to hold him by force...

Of course, we were advised to put him in an appropriate institution. And mom even agreed to this, despite my protests and her own doubts... But in three weeks we came to visit him and immediately took him away, seeing this beaten and miserable creature that "qualified help" was turning our dear dad into...

I don't know why I remembered him now... Who am I fooling... I know, of course I know. I have to go through all this nightmare again, only now my daughter will be in my former role, and the dance of the fool awaits me... I entered the elevator that was supposed to take me to the seventy-first floor of the skyscraper where my apartment was located. But instead of the floor number, I typed the word "garden" on the touch screen.

I want to be alone.

No. You want to finish the conversation with yourself, because you still haven't decided. And it's not at all about father's fate awaiting you. It's that you're afraid to act like great-grandfather.

As soon as this thought visited me, I decisively protested and even said aloud:

"What nonsense are you spouting!"

And immediately loudly answered myself:

"This isn't nonsense at all!!!"

At that very second the elevator doors opened. Before me appeared a young couple. They looked around the elevator in surprise, in which there was no one else. The girl involuntarily glanced at me and squeezed out a polite smile. Her look was embarrassed. I hastened to exit.

This floor was open and completely planted with trees. Once this garden became the decisive argument for Vira and me in choosing this not-the-cheapest apartment. The wind pleasantly blew on my face, bringing the smell of the river. It was dark. The lighting allowed you to see the paths but didn't disturb the atmosphere of night. Between the fancifully combined cedars and apple trees here, a neat alley led to the high parapet. As if for a running start before a jump...

I mentally cut myself off. Normal people admire the city from here. And only in a sick head can an association with jumping arise. In one like yours and your father's. If, of course, he jumped and didn't fall.

Somewhere far below, a quiet night street tinkled with bicycle bells. The city played with lights, as if it were a cluster of cliffs with stars scattered across them. Leaning over the parapet, I looked down. A light chill ran down my back. Reaching all the way to my knees, it curled up there in a ball, barely pricking. I thought about dad. Imagined his helpless gaze and how he tries to grab the window frame with his hands, but only waves them in the air... No, he couldn't have jumped himself. I don't want to believe it. I don't want to believe that his life was so unbearable... No. Not him, and even less so grandfather.

But great-grandfather could?

Oh yes. Great-grandfather could. The story of his death has been retold for two generations now. And, obviously, will be retold further if I preserve my sanity long enough to manage to initiate my daughter into this. After all, you can't act like that. Never, under no circumstances.

And what are you, Gil, planning to do? Isn't your departure on a mission (to another galaxy) together with your family the same thing? Great-grandfather just chose a thermobaric grenade, and you—a contract with the Conquistador Corps. But there's something in common, right?

There's nothing in common here! Great-grandfather acted like an idiot! Selfish, cruel! I've hated him since I first heard that story!!! What do I and a job offer have to do with it!

With the fact that great-grandfather also didn't care about everyone, including the closest ones. He was only concerned with his illness. Somewhere, like you...

"I do care!!!"

My cry echoed briefly from the buildings opposite and dissolved, mixing with the shouts of sellers announcing today's final discounts at the fish market.

"I care!" I closed my eyes, pouring out all the pain and fear of recent weeks into the face of the night emptiness. "I want my daughter to be happy! Not like mother and I, but happy! And I want to be happy next to her! To live happy next to her!"

The only question is whether you want to live to see it, Gil...

I felt a tear slide down my cheek, as if it lives its own separate life, and immediately the cool wind started to tousle with invisible fingers the wet trail left on my cheek. It's true, what can I say. Deep down I wanted to leave this world beautifully, loudly, and young. I remember when I dreamed of buying a gravicycle and almost memorized various reviews, on one site I came across this phrase: "The Statistical Forecasting Service called this extremely high-speed Japanese device the most dangerous modern gravicycle due to the large number of accidents involving it." It was about, of course, the famous "Tsunami." And it was this phrase that became the last grain that tipped the scales of choice. I bought the "Tsunami" in a week. "Because I'm a balanced person and will be able to tame it"—that's what I told myself. "Because this is my insurance against the dance of the fool"—that's how the truth sounded.

And a few years later Elsa was born, becoming an uninvited thread that tied me to this world. Eventually I even sold the bike... And though I didn't agree with Vira about the bike, the truth is that Elsa was worth all the gravicycles in the world. Probably, this was the only real purpose in my life—to give her happiness.

And what are you doing now? Aren't you going to put your tiny Elsa's life on the same scales as yours? How can you even think about such a thing! Especially considering what you know about the Corps now.

Djokhar left the conquistadors as a sign of protest. "As a sign of protest against cynicism"—that's what he said. Nobody noticed this protest, except himself. But he couldn't stay.

The private military company "Conquistador Corps" began developing some new planet quite far from the Sun. The planet was not just Earth-type, which is already rare, but also had decent deposits of osmium. So they landed a reconnaissance group there. Everything went according to plan. But after four months, contact with it was cut off. After some more time, various commissions were sent there—to study what happened. They figured it out, drew some conclusions, and decided to land the main contingent. And then Djokhar flew there.

The planet was called Hun-Ahau. In honor of a deity from Mayan Indian mythology. In general, all the attributes in the Corps somehow bear the imprint of the conquest of America. It's part of the ideology.

So on the planet everything was not bad, so much so that it was even boring. The fauna wasn't hostile, the climate—a bit hotter than Earth's. The atmosphere, however, was unsuitable for breathing, but this problem was easily solved by oxygen masks. The only nuance—some microscopic parasites. Medics prescribed obligatory rubbing of the skin with special protective cream once a day, but there were no other warnings.

The conquistadors made camp, set about clearing territory for the future osmium mining station, etc. About the reasons for the death of the first reconnaissance group, nobody knew and by that moment nobody was even asking. Until one of the shuttles crashed.

The ship was descending to the planet with a small group of civilian specialists, and one of its engines failed. The emergency landing was managed quite far from camp, in a rocky gorge. The pilot died, the second pilot was seriously injured, osmium-rich rock completely blocked the signal of all communication devices. The civilian specialists with the wounded in their arms decided to move to the plain, where rescuers could detect them. And everything should have ended well: three or four days to the plain, the water supply should have been enough, there was no shortage of medicine,

the second pilot's condition was stable. The only "but"—nobody told the civilians about the prescription to apply the cream. After all, this briefing was planned after arrival at camp...

On the seventh day after the crash, a rescue group commanded by Djokhar penetrated into those same rocky spurs where the shuttle fell. They came across traces of the missing almost immediately. An hour later they discovered the cave where they had spent the night. Djokhar entered first. It was his flashlight that snatched from the darkness the corpses curled up on the cave floor. All the bodies without exception had no skin. None at all. The cursed microscopic parasites attacked skin not protected by cream, settled in it and multiplied. For a person this process was accompanied by obsessive itching, but no more. But after three days the parasites moved to a new stage of development. Like a caterpillar becoming a butterfly. And they devoured all the host's epidermis in a matter of hours.

The most horrific thing is that by the moment when there was no skin left on the body at all, the people were alive.

"And now ask me how Hun-Ahau translates," Djokhar said, reaching this point in his story.

He leaned across the table, his eyes burned with some fierce fire, and his fingers gripped the tabletop so hard that his nails turned white.

"You said it's the name of a deity..."

"Yes! Ask, Gil, how this name translates!"

"And how?"

"God-without-skin! Do you understand or not? The first scouts were also found without skin. And some wise guys from the Corps thought this was terribly witty! 'How good that the Maya have such a suitable deity—God-without-skin! It'll be cool to name the planet after him, where parasites live that can skin you alive!'"

"Lord..." it escaped me.

"At that second, when I saw the bodies, I decided to leave there. When I realized that for someone in the company our lives are nothing more than a play on words. That's the whole Corps. Cynicism as a way of thinking... That's why I don't trust them and wouldn't want you to go to that outfit!"

Today in the cafe I decided not to let this story into my life. To mentally fence myself off from what I heard. It's an isolated case. An isolated case in Djokhar's life. Not in mine. What do I have to do with it! But now I didn't even understand, but acutely felt—Djokhar speaks the truth.

I felt better. Somewhere over the boundless Dnipro, which stretched almost to the horizon, a seagull cried... Once it was narrow, and over there, quite nearby, towered, sparkling with residential districts, left-bank Kyiv. And now it has become a refuge for fish. Human dwellings and memories, sidewalks and squares dear to someone's heart are buried under tons of water. And for us who live today, this is now something as distant as that poppy seed in boundless emptiness...

6

"What is this, Gilel?"

Vira didn't even greet me. She came out, hearing the doors unlocking, and was obviously furious. In her hands she held the film of a liquid-processor tablet with an open email letter.

"You haven't been paying them all this time?!"

I took the tablet, already guessing what was there. I wanted to say "it can't be," but the very first lines of the letter convinced me that it could. Our bank had blocked my card and demanded immediate repayment of all loans or confirmation of solvency. All loans—that's not just the debt on the card. It's the remainder of the debt for our apartment. That is, what we were planning to pay off for another fifteen years.

"I paid, Virun... We specifically set aside... This is some nonsense," I mumbled, already understanding what the matter was.

Back in May I was supposed to update all these certificates of income and other data... But since I had been unemployed for three months by then, I decided to wait a bit. Obviously, the bank took care of everything itself...

"Can you protect us from at least this?! What now? What will I buy food with tomorrow if the card is blocked?!"

"Well, for tomorrow we'll scrape together..."

"I don't need tomorrow!" Vira exploded. "I need, Gil, to not have a headache at least about these loans!"

"Vira..."

"Tomorrow get a certificate from your new job that you were hired! Just take it to the bank right away. And do it in the morning! So the cards are unblocked by the weekend. I wanted to buy Elsa some sneakers."

Vira turned around and went to the kitchen, apparently considering there was nothing more to discuss.

"By the way, where did they hire you?" she asked indifferently, not even turning around.

Silence fell. Virka always turned on the soundproofing, so the silence was almost sterile. "Grave-like," I corrected myself mentally. They say "grave-like silence."

I took off my shoes and put the sneakers on the shelf. Our Elsa's sandals, as if on command, fell to the floor. I tried to squeeze them into place, but because of this Vira's shoes fell out.

"Gil?" Virka's voice sounded. "Where did they hire you?"

I angrily shoved the shoes on top of my sneakers. I almost succeeded. But then something cracked, the shelf sagged, as if it opened its mouth in confusion, and all the shoes spilled onto the floor.

Upset, I decided I'd pick it up later and went to the kitchen. Vira, as always, was cooking something. I plopped down on the el-puff, took the remote and turned off the soundproofing. Into the apartment burst the cries of seagulls and the echo of loud laughter somewhere far below...

"I hate it when you turn on that noise," Vira muttered. "Don't you love silence?!"

Silence is not loved by those who are afraid to be alone with their thoughts... At least that's what father said. Maybe he was right. Or maybe I'm afraid to be alone with Virka's whining...

"Gil? Did you hear my question or not?" Vira finally turned around, and her gaze focused on me. "Where did they hire you?"

In her eyes there was only ordinary domestic indignation like "you're not listening to me again" or "how tired I am of talking to a wall." She didn't suspect.

"Nowhere," I said.

"What do you mean 'nowhere'?"

"You asked where I was hired. Which part of my answer is unclear to you?"

Vira frowned, as if trying to grasp the thought with vertical wrinkles above her nose bridge.

"You mean 'nowhere'?" she repeated in surprise.

I stood up and approached the kitchen cabinet. I didn't want to eat at all. But probably I'd drink some tea...

"And where's Elsa?" I asked.

Vira was still frowning, staring into space.

End of Chunk 03