КНИГИ КИРИЛЛА ПОТЁМКИНА

2. The Absorber

The wind died down. The forest turned into a frozen engraving.

My footsteps sounded sacrilegiously loud, shattering the crystal silence of the frosty morning. My organism demanded fuel. My stomach twisted in a spasm, my mouth was so dry that my tongue felt like sandpaper.

— «Water,» — I wheezed. — «I need water.»

== RESOURCE SCAN…

== OBJECT OF ARTIFICIAL ORIGIN DETECTED.

== AZIMUTH: 15 DEGREES NORTHEAST. DISTANCE: 300 METERS.

I veered off the animal trail. Through the brush, the gray side of some Finnish service vehicle peeked out. The car stood with its bumper buried in the trunk of a century-old pine. The doors were thrown wide open, like the wings of a downed bird. A man sat in the driver’s seat. Or what was left of him.

A border guard. A lieutenant, judging by the epaulettes on the uniform.

He hadn’t rotted. The frost had preserved him, turning him into a wax doll. His face was distorted by a mask of horror, his mouth frozen in a soundless scream, and his hands… He was pressing his hands to his eyes. Judging by the bloodied, shredded eyebrows and scratched eyelids, he had tried to claw them out.

— «Suicide?» — I asked, stepping closer. There was no smell of death, only cold.

== NEGATIVE.

== DAMAGE ANALYSIS: THERMAL BURN OF THE RETINA AND BRAIN.

== CAUSE: VISUAL CONTACT WITH «THE SHINING» (FOG PHENOMENON).

== HE SAW SOMETHING THE HUMAN BRAIN IS INCAPABLE OF PROCESSING.

Carefully, trying not to touch the border guard’s icy skin, I peered into the cabin. A half-empty bottle of «Vichy» drinking water lay on the passenger seat. I reached out. The ice inside clinked. Water. By the looks of it.

== RECOMMENDATION: SEARCH THE CORPSE.

== TARGET: IGNITION KEYS (SOURCE OF SPARK/FIRE), SERVICE WEAPON.

The pistol holster on the lieutenant’s belt turned out to be empty. Apparently, he had tried to shoot back at the hallucinations and dropped the gun somewhere in the snow. Searching for a pistol in the snowdrifts was a lost cause. I patted down the pockets of his tactical vest. A Zippo lighter. A trophy. A pack of Marlboro cigarettes. Crumpled. I shoved the findings into my pocket.

— «Sorry, lieutenant,» — I muttered, unscrewing the cap from the bottle. The icy water burned my throat, returning my strength. — «You don’t need this anymore, lieutenant…» — I looked at the dead man.

== EMOTIONAL REACTION: «GUILT».

== STATUS: IRRATIONAL.

== THE DEAD ARE A RESOURCE.

— «Shut up,» — I snapped without malice, wiping my lips with my sleeve. — «The dead are people. They just ran out of time. And we still have some for now.»

I slammed the door of the border guard jeep, cutting the dead man off from the outside world. At least it was some kind of a grave.

Ahead, the forest thinned out, giving way to something darker and more viscous. That’s where the highway began.

I had been walking for two hours. Or three. The chronometer in my head had died, and time in the «Fog Zone» had taken on the density of molasses. It didn’t flow — it dripped, sticky and viscous.

A gray, oily haze enveloped the dead forest, turning the world into the bottom of an uncleaned aquarium. The silence pressed on my ears.

Not a bird’s cry, not the rustle of the wind. The world of sounds had shrunk to the dry crackle of branches under the corrugated sole of my army boots.

«Thanks to whoever left me in the forest and didn’t forget to gear me up…»

— «Imatra,» — I muttered under my breath, tasting the word. — «I’m going to my daughter.»

== CARRIER ANALYSIS:

== ADRENALINE LEVEL: ELEVATED.

== WARNING: EMOTIONAL FIXATION ON TARGET «IMATRA».

== PERCEPTION PENALTY: -24%.

== YOU HAVE MISSED 3 (THREE) THREAT INDICATORS IN THE LAST 300 SECONDS.

The new Voice — GEN 2500 (a tongue-twister of a name). This uninvited tenant of mine, the latest «Prompter», was right on cue.

— «Shut up, Gena,» — I growled, not slowing my pace. — «I am, as you recently put it, ‘broken’, and I was stomping through these woods even before you became trendy and moved into my skull without a warrant. I’ll survive somehow.»

== STATISTICS:

== SURVIVAL OF THE «BROKEN» (SJ) DECODED AS «SMARTASS JERK» WITHOUT «PROMPTER» (GEN 2500) IN ZONE «GAMMA» — 0.00%.

== YOU ARE AN ANOMALY, CARRIER.

== DO NOT CONFUSE ANOMALY WITH INVULNERABILITY.

Was it just me, or did digital smugness just sound in that uninvited voice? Or some kind of sarcasm?

I decided to ignore this fact.

— «Fucking Observer. Sits in my head, rattling off instructions… without a care in the world.»

== CLARIFICATION:

== PHYSICAL BODY TO CREATE AERODYNAMIC FLOW IS ABSENT.

== ORGANIC ELEMENT CLASS «CARE» (WHISKERS) IS ABSENT.

I braked, almost smashing my nose into a pine tree.

— «Are you right now…» — I stumbled. — «Did you just… develop a sense of sarcasm?»

Gena fell silent, as if taking water into his mouth (which, obviously, he didn’t have either). — «What’s up, my personal friend, decided to play the offended card? Silence in the head is sometimes useful. Cures stupidity.» — I gave a crooked smirk and moved on. Gena observed radio silence with the stubbornness of a pouting owl.

And so we churned the mud: hup-two, hup-two. Only the crunch of deadwood and the squelch of moss. Just beautiful. My mood gradually crept up, well, by a couple of notches. Insignificant, but still. You could call it progress.

A clearing dawned ahead. The trees reluctantly parted, revealing the highway — the main artery leading north to Imatra. But the road looked… wrong.

The asphalt had almost completely disappeared. It wasn’t just covered with mud or leaves. The roadbed was covered by something. A black, glossy, pulsating substance.

This crap, looking like animated tar, resembled the abomination I had witnessed in that «geometric» apartment, it felt like a thousand years ago. But that sample was fit only to be a great-grandchild to this monster. The substance had now spilled forth in all its ugly splendor.

It had occupied the highway for a good hundred meters, sprawling like a giant amoeba.

Sticky pitch that had burst from a tear in the universe. Inside this black sludge, like flies in amber, floated the half-dissolved frames of cars, mangled road signs, and… bones.

I squinted. Well yes, I wasn’t mistaken. This, whatever it was, was breathing. Slowly, once a minute, this entire black mass lazily heaved, and then slowly sank, releasing bubbles of foul-smelling gas.

— «Well, shit,» — I exhaled, stepping back behind the trunk of a birch tree. — «We’re going around.»

== EXPEDIENCY: 15%.

== DETOUR THROUGH THE FOREST (2.4 KM).

== RISK: ENCOUNTER WITH THE «INCOMPLETE» [CLASS: LUST / «RUNNERS»].

== PROBABILITY OF COMBAT: 81%.

— «I don’t give a damn about your percentages, Gena! I’m not wading into that crap.»

== ENTITY: «CREATURE» [CLASS: GLUTTONY / «ABSORBER»].

== CHARACTERISTIC: SLOW. REACTS TO SOUND AND VIBRATION.

== DANGER: DISSOLUTION OF ORGANIC MATTER.

— «Exactly! Dissolves! Do you hear me?»

== RRIER, YOU ARE NOT ANALYZING THE DATA.

== IT DISSOLVES «NORMAL» ORGANICS.

== YOUR BIOLOGY HAS UNDERGONE «PURGING». STATUS: IMMUNITY.

== ESTIMATED DAMAGE: 0-2%.

— «You want me to test your calculations with my own skin? You want me to step into acid because the calculator in my head thinks I’m ‘immune’?»

== THIS IS NOT A «THOUGHT». THIS IS A CALCULATION.

== ROUTE: OPTIMAL.

== ADDITIONALLY: WEAPONRY REQUIRED.

== TARGET MARKER: CENTER OF MASS.

I followed the vector of his attention (although he still didn’t have eyes, he was apparently using my vision). And I felt which way this invisible digital finger was pointing.

In the center of the black lake (if it could be called that), like an island of bad luck, stuck out the body of a police station wagon.

== OBJECT: PATROL CAR.

== SCAN: PROBABILITY OF PRESENCE OF A REMINGTON 870 SHOTGUN AND AMMUNITION — 92%.

== NOTE: KNIFE AGAINST «RUNNERS» IN THE FOREST — EFFICIENCY IS LOW.

He hit the nail on the head. Damn. The «Smartass Jerk» inside me, of course, craved a fight, but the «Human» wanted to live. And survival without firearms against creatures sprinting at the speed of Freddy Krueger on energy drinks trended towards zero.

— «Fine, Gena,» — I hissed, squeezing the handle of the knife so hard my knuckles turned white. — «If you’re lying, and I start melting…»

== I AM NOT AN +ANG. I DO NOT LIE.

== I STATE FACTS.

I took a deep breath (an old habit, unnecessary now) and slowly, trying to tread softly like a cat, stepped off the asphalt into the black, undulating «pitch». It, this something, judging by the feeling through my army boots, seemed warm to me. Like fresh milk. Through the thick soles of my boots, I felt this nauseating, almost cozy warmth.

And also…

It was alive. It knew I was here. My skin prickled, but I felt no pain. This black sludge wasn’t burning. Or it was saving another victim for now.

== IMMUNITY CONFIRMED.

— «Shut up.»

I took another step. My foot sank to the ankle. Viscous. As if stepping into half-cooled tar. Suddenly my boot hit something hard in the depths.

It struck my brain. Not with pain, but as if an image had come to life. A kind of GIF.

…man. A shriek. She beats her palms against the glass, the lock is jammed. Black sludge seeps through the ventilation grille, drips onto her knees. It burns… Pain…

I recoiled, almost falling. — «What the hell is this?!»

== SIDE EFFECT.

== THE «ABSORBER» ABSORBS NOT ONLY FLESH, BUT ALSO THE NEURAL IMPRINTS OF ITS VICTIMS.

== YOU TOUCHED A RESIDUAL ECHO.

== RECOMMENDATION: IGNORE.

== MOVE TOWARDS THE VEHICLE.

I swallowed sour bile. My reflexes remained with me. And I waded through this black cemetery, through the mass grave of dozens of people, catching flashbacks of their final seconds. As if I was tied to a chair, eyelids pried open with speculums from «A Clockwork Orange,» being forced to watch a snuff movie.

I couldn’t squeeze my eyes shut. Couldn’t plug my ears. The pictures were broadcast directly into my cerebral cortex. Right inside my eyes.

Squelching. Screams. Pleas. Pain… Unending… Unimaginable…

Staggering, I reached the police car. The sludge had sealed the door shut, but the hilt of the bayonet knife shattered the glass with a crunch. Shards rained down into the cabin.

Gena wasn’t wrong. There was a shotgun. A matte black barrel gleamed dully in the mount between the seats. I yanked it towards me. The lock yielded with a pitiful squeak. Nearby, on the passenger seat — a scattering of red shells and a torn box of buckshot. Someone had been in a great hurry to make their last stand. Unsuccessfully, by the looks of it.

With trembling fingers, I shoved the shells into the pockets of my tactical rig.

And at that moment, the Creature awoke. Realized.

The «Absorber» didn’t possess the speed of a cheetah, but it clearly wasn’t stupid. The sludge around my legs instantly thickened, turning from jelly to concrete. And it crawled upward, grabbing my calves.

== THREAT!

== CARRIER «SJ»: TIME LIMIT EXCEEDED.

== CAUSE: EMOTIONAL FACTOR (GREED FOR RESOURCE).

== CREATURE PROTOCOL ALTERED: CAPTURE.

— «Help!» — I yelled, jerking. It was as if my legs had been poured into a house foundation.

== DIRECTIVE 77-ALPHA.

== DIRECT INTERVENTION.

== NEURAL ENHANCEMENT ACTIVATED.

Impact.

As if a red-hot knitting needle had been driven into the back of my head. The world flared and inverted. My «Pupils of Saturn» — or whatever crap Zaitsev had sewn into my eye sockets — ignited with indigo fire. Time froze. The texture of reality emerged in sharp lines.

And I saw.

I saw this Creature, not as a black incomprehensible sludge, but as a network of tense, muscular fibers. I could examine its vulnerability. I saw my reflection in the black mirror underfoot — two burning points instead of eyes.

My hands acted on their own. I raised the pump-action. And aimed. Not at the Creature — it was everywhere. At the car. In the area of the gas tank filler neck.

Shot.

The roar struck my eardrums. Gasoline sprayed in thin streams from the pierced metal. The sludge hissed, recoiling from the chemicals. The grip on my legs loosened slightly. I racked the slide.

Clack-clack.

I managed to take a step back.

And again — a shot.

A spark.

== WARNING! THERMAL REACTION…

The explosion didn’t sound — it pushed. Like a giant fist into my chest. A hot wave picked me up, tore me from the black captivity, and tossed me away like a kitten.

I flew, tumbling, for probably ten meters. Then the impact with the ground knocked the wind out of me.

Burned, concussed, but free. And with the coveted shotgun in my hands.

== COMBAT ANALYSIS:

== EFFICIENCY: LOW.

== NOISE LEVEL: CRITICAL.

== RESULT: CARRIER FUNCTIONAL. TARGET (WEAPON) ACQUIRED.

== EXPEDIENCY: 49%.

== DIRECTIVE 77 DEACTIVATED.

I lay on my back, staring into the gray sky. Nearby, the burning car crackled. The «Absorber» writhed, retreating from the fire, hissed with a hundred of its maws, bubbled from pain.

In any case, I really hoped it was feeling this pain, not just eating it.

I struggled to my feet. The world swayed. My body ached, promising to bloom with a map of hematomas tomorrow, but I moved, and my bones seemed intact.

— «Alright, Gena,» — I wheezed, spitting out soot. — «Alright. I guess I do need you after all. Asshole. Sometimes.»

== I AM NOT AN ASSHOLE — I AM A CONSTANT, CARRIER. AND YOU ARE A VARIABLE.

== CONTINUING MOVEMENT.

— «Since I’m a variable…» — I checked the shotgun’s action and allowed myself a crooked grin. — «Then, let’s do this, I officially christen you… Gena. Two and a Half. Liters. Or like this. Or — Asshole. Choose.»

My conversational partner switched to «ignore» mode. Became a pouting owl again.

I turned and limped into the forest, leaving the black puddle howling from burns behind me.

Having already reached the edge of the trees, stepping over the ditch of the shoulder, my uninvited comrade suddenly woke up — a click in my head:

== ACKNOWLEDGED.

== IDENTIFIER «GENA 2.5 L» LOGGED IN THE SOFTWARE REGISTRY.