Готовый перевод Хроники Аскета: Вторжение / The Ascet Chronicles: Invasion: Глава 11

Chapter 11

The next evening Olga was waiting for me in one of my classes. Student fulfilled his promise: Chizhov allocated us time for extra classes and gave us this room on the condition that it would not be damaged. I wonder - what did he imagine when he set such a condition? I sat across from the girl.

"What do you know about your aura?"

Maybe I shouldn't have started with a straightforward question, but this was my first time as a mentor-guru, and I was a little off my game. The girl was clearly not expecting the class to begin so quickly.

"Uh, it's an energy field that surrounds every living thing and most objects. It is the source of the energy we use to create signs."

"Not entirely right. Aura is a very complex natural component of our body, without which nothing living can exist. We psions differ from ordinary people by the size of one of the components of the aura, the so-called shell. This is the outer layer of the energy body, and the larger it is, the more often you can create signs. We are not interested in the shell right now: it's not your problem."

"Aura strongly depends on the physical and spiritual state of a person, and this connection is two-way. A man has a toothache, and his aura turns blue in the same place. If you cut the aura opposite the heart with a psychic impulse, you will have a heart attack. The same is with emotions: the stronger they are, the more they affect the aura and vice versa. For example, if you experience dark, negative emotions such as pain, fear, or hatred for a long time, your aura will not only turn dark: it will start to deteriorate.

"There's an analogy to be made here. Dark emotions act as a stimulant, causing a temporary surge of power, but if you take it permanently... You know."

"Something similar happened to you. You were wrapped up in your grief, unable to think about anything but it. It would be nice if you could just rest, relax, but we don't have time to rest. So we'll go the other way around. You have to caulk the cracks in your psyche, which is a long and tedious task. You have to do the exercises I'm going to show you all the time - keep that in mind - you can't concentrate on anything else."

"Are you ready?"

Olga nodded hesitantly.

"Then first..."

We began with the simplest things, with concentration. At first we just imagined a ball resting between the palms, and then this ball grew, enveloped the entire body, and turned into a kind of cocoon. Then I ordered Olga to count from one to ten while continuing to hold in her consciousness the resulting image of her energetic body without disturbing its integrity. Sooner or later the girl's consciousness had to reflect her real state to the imaginary aura. The method was crude, I had to prompt her all the time, but there was no other way. So far, there was none. Gradually we moved on to more complicated exercises.

Actually, the fact that I distracted the girl from thinking about the dead was enough to make her well again. It was necessary to make her not think about the dead family, and in time she began to communicate with her classmates, to speak not only the necessary phrases and one-liners to answer questions, she gradually re-learned how to joke and laugh.

The hatred of the aliens had not disappeared, but Olga was no longer bathed in it, reveling in suffering and pain: she accepted them as part of her life.

A week before the third assault in my psionic career, unpleasant news reached us. Sergachev had failed to fight off the headquarters "well-wishers. And as the object of the cleanup was chosen Nest near Pskov. A three-tiered one. On this occasion, the senior group gathered in the recreation room.

Student moved his palm in the air setting up the Shroud of Silence.

"You don't want us to be disturbed, or are you just trying to avoid eavesdropping?" The Shroud allowed us to turn off bugs and other electrical devices - now we were sitting in the dark. It was the only sign we knew of that didn't have a direct attacking or defensive function. We should find out from Korobok where it was copied from and what the aliens were doing with it. Masking the aura, I guess.

"More like the first. Even if someone overhears us, we're not conspirators. So if the guys listen to Wicked's foul language, so what?"

It was really worth a listen. Wicked wasn't sitting in one place - he was pacing the wall, piling up aliens, Gnezdo, officers, Sergachev, higher-ups, and smart guys from the rest of the department. Any philologist, listening to him, would have had material for at least a dissertation.

"Wicked, sit down! If you have something to say, say it, not cry as pregnant moose."

Wicked stared at the Executor:

"A pregnant moose!? I'm the pregnant moose!?"

Beerbrewer quickly set up an Air Wall between them. The two men were finally pacified, and once again Student spoke:

"As far as I understand, we can't change the situation: the order has already been issued. So all we can do is figure out how to clean up the Nest without any casualties. Give us some suggestions, if you have any."

"I think the first two tiers should work in the old way, with three groups," said Whip. "On the third tier, we'll go with one or two, just to be sure. Once we storm the cell, we'll see how things go. It would be good to see the kids - maybe there's someone ready?"

The "kids" had been practicing for two months. Given their previous experience, they could really be taken with them to the Nest. A trial run, so to speak.

"No need," said Student. "There's no reason to interrupt the learning process, Sergachev won't let them go, and rightly so. Who will come with us, ordinary Special Forces?"

"Yeah," Whip hissed, "I hear they're training a whole unit using our methodology, only those guys have small shells. But they haven't finished their training yet."

"What do you mean by our methodology? All of our training is based on signs."

"So they took what they could from us and use it."

"I agree with Whip. " The conversation began to drift away from the main topic again, which Executor didn't like. "Although the previous scheme had proven itself, it would have to be changed on the third tier. Two groups, no more."

In the end, we couldn't think of anything more productive, and Beerbrewer's timid suggestion to give up escorting the Special Forces was quickly suppressed. Maybe someday it will, but right now we're still too weak, we could use the extra help. The escort will exist until it becomes a burden, which will not happen in the foreseeable future.

We went to bed unusually late that day, in the second hour after midnight.

* * *
And here we are near Pskov. The area is densely populated by Russian standards, there are a lot of roads, and journalists and local gawkers are constantly trying to get into the cordoned-off area. Idiots.

"Why is there a three-tiered Nest here?"

"The locals missed it," Hawk cracked an apple. "Lots of swamps, so they blamed the loss of people on them. They start moving when the creature got hit by a truck."

After the lifting of the veil of secrecy, people were flooded with information about aliens. And naturally, numerous sects, prophets, societies for study, contact, and other charlatan organizations began to multiply around the world like mushrooms. They greatly hindered the work on the detection of the Nests because the hysteria in the mass media fueled by all kinds of alarmists led to the fact that the aliens were seen even near the Kremlin. It was physically impossible to verify all the signals coming from frightened citizens - responsible bodies were overwhelmed by the flood of calls. As a result, things got messy often.

But still, three tiers is too much. The Nest should take at least a year to develop to that level. The locals really missed it.

Compared to last time, there were considerably more people on the site in front of the entrance to the Nest. Korobok explained that the lower the level, the better the chance of finding something interesting. By "interesting" he might have meant the most monstrous nastiness. That's why, unlike us, the scientists loved the multilevel Nests.

This time the plan of the assault was developed entirely by Chizhov, which suited us fine. The escort - old acquaintances from the previous cleanup - also knew and trusted our abilities, thereby calming our nerves. After all, it's better to work with people you've known for a long time.

"Who's that?" Brewer pointed a finger at a group of priests in silver and gold embroidered robes, standing near the tunnel to the den of aliens.

"The Church has sent them to bless me." Whip jerked his liquid mustache. "What the hell do we need them for, if there is father Athanasius?"

Since the first Nest in Russia, Father Athanasius had comforted and instructed the fighters who fought the creatures, went with them on sweeps, and gave the dead a post-battle funeral. The presence of the new priests was somewhat out of place. Of course, we understood that the Church could not help but keep track of events related to outsiders, but we would have preferred to dispense with the unfamiliar faces. I didn't care much about the Orthodox religion as any other, and some of the guys took it seriously. The Executor, however, was a Muslim.

The first tier was easy to clean - the experience was a factor. Problems began on the second tier. Almost immediately the Executor's group came upon a third-level creature that had managed to hide its aura. It tore into one of the fighters and spat an acid cloud at Whip, corroding the thick fabric of his jumpsuit. As a result, Whip went to the hospital, where he lay for four days, and I was transferred to the Executor.

An hour after the incident, Wicked and the Beerbrewers noticed the transition to the third level. Luckily, they managed to retreat in time. Their group returned to the temporary camp, where Executor and I were resting at the time. And with a reinforced formation, we managed to take down the guards - two creatures of the fourth level. The first looked like a wild hybrid of a shark and a scorpion - at any rate, the fluid escaping from its tail was definitely poisonous. The second looked more like a pillow with wings, which is used to defend itself against our signs. All the spells it created were somehow deflected to the side, causing the creature no tangible harm. Against firearms, the alien used the Wall of Air.

We had to chop the enemy to pieces with our swords - thankfully, his speed was not much higher than a human.

The rest of the creatures encountered on the second tier did not cause much trouble, so after mining the passage to the third tier and making another round of the cleared area, we went to bed with a clear conscience.

Before we cleared the third tier, we got a day to rest, to pull our strength. Daniel was stuck in the lab. My friends were scattered. I didn't feel like practicing, so I just sat under a tree and relaxed. To avoid the attention of onlookers, I hid my aura. It's an old trick, the first one Phantom showed us: a completely relaxed and calm person is hard to spot. The eye glides over the figure without noticing it, making the seated person completely invisible. He is seen, but not noticed.

Nevertheless, someone came up and stopped in front of me. It was an interesting aura - as if braided by a subtle shadow, and intentionally braided. I could have sworn that the person standing in front of me was unfamiliar to me - it was hard to forget such a distinctive feature. And when I looked at him, I had the strange feeling that someone else was standing behind him - someone invisible. I opened my eyes.

A young lad - at first glance, about twenty years old. A black riveted jacket, tattered jeans, and terrible-looking boots on his feet. Thin, nervous hands with long fingers, a thin face with shiny eyes of indeterminate color, and long, straight black hair. He was easy to meet at a hard rock concert, sipping beer and yelling something from the stage, but not in a cordoned-off area. The first cop will ask him to come in and find out, and he'll do the right thing. Let's see what this colorful guy wants.

"Hey!" The guy smiled. "Are you going to be the Ascet?"

Without letting him out of my sight, I nodded.

"And I'm the Dead Man. Phantom told me that you, like, can help me."

"Perhaps." The reference to Phantom interested me.

"Look, I'm sorry I'm bothering you. I know you want to rest, but the next time they let me out of my cage, nobody knows." He lowered his voice and looked around nervously. "They let me go here just to check if there are spirits here or not."

A normal person can be diagnosed with such words but in the case of a psion, any nonsense can be true. Like right now, for example. The funny kid saw spirits. Not the mental projections that any psion with basic training could sense, but something else. Dead Man was piously certain that spirits were living, possibly sentient beings, and claimed to be able to communicate with them. To prove this, he "incarnated" one of them, though not on a material level, but a mental one. The creature felt like something cold and weightless: as if a stream of cool air blew around my neck and ruffled my hair.

I must say, the boy did not come alone. About twenty paces away, two men in camouflage were resting, seemingly busy talking but occasionally glancing in our direction. Their attention extended both to us and to anyone who came too close.

"My watchers." Dead man followed the direction of my gaze. "They don't leave me alone anywhere "it's getting annoying. Such is the lot of the unicum."

"Are you saying no one sees the spirits except you?"

"Well, almost. There's another Englishman, but they won't let me see him."

"Why are they so careful to watch you? What is so important about these spirits?"

"It's not just because of the spirits that they're after me. It's ever since I brought the canary to life that they want to know what I'm doing and how I'm doing it. Although I have no idea why it happens!"

It turned out that the guy had managed to put one of his otherworldly friends in a dead canary's carcass, "just for fun," as he put it. The prank was a success, but ever since then the security guards have surrounded Dead One - that's when he got his nickname - with such close supervision that he literally can't go to the bathroom in peace.

"Just think, I'm sitting on the toilet, relaxing, and all of a sudden there's a knock on the door: Andrei Alexandrovich, is everything all right?"

The acquaintance was interesting, but unfortunately, Dead One came with a serious question. Pity: he had a lot to learn.

"You say you needed my help?"

"Yeah," the lad said. "You're the best at the mental sphere, aren't you?"

"Not really. There are plenty of specialists who know better how to influence the human mind. But if it's spiritual space you're interested in, yes, I'm the easiest person to get into."

"I talked to these specialists. A lot of hubris, but no results. They can't answer any of my questions clearly. You see, I have a problem. Our spies gave me a task: to make it so that my spirits could penetrate into the right place and eavesdrop, look for the right people - in short, everything of the sort. But I can't say, "Find me Ivanov Ivan Ivanovich, passport so-and-so". Spirits don't have names, as we understand it. Their name is both a description and a body of the essence."

"Therefore, when I say that I need such and such a person or object, I have to show the spirit the aura of the one I am looking for. This is where the problem arises. Spirits are not able to leave the mental space: to show them someone's aura, I have to take them out of it. It is a difficult and demanding task. Further, it is dangerous to work directly with a human aura in the mental space - it is too easy to destroy the object, I mean, the aura. Phantom said that, in principle, it is possible to throw a piece of the aura into the mental, and then the task will be greatly simplified. I tried that, and it turns out to be some kind of crap. Can you give me any advice?"

"Show me how you do it." I had some free time until this evening.

I stepped out into the mental space. There was no point in describing in words the picture I saw - the mental has always appeared to me like streaks of light of varying intensity, to others it looked like a giant tree whose roots were lost in an ocean of darkness, others saw it as a white plane with no beginning or end. What difference does it make, really? All that matters is that here every living soul, and not only it, has its reflection.

Dead One was still fidgeting in his usual space, in the "real" world. The auras of the people living in the camp shone, the psions stood out especially brightly, and the radiation of the anthill's collective soul seemed pale against them. There were no animals or birds: for several kilometers around the Nest, the forest was usually extinct - only humans persisted in breaking into danger. I could see the "attendants" of my new acquaintance very close by. I should tell Phantom: let him prepare the team better - they were too easy to spot. There's the spirit that accompanies the Dead One.

Unlike humans, who had no clear spiritual appearance and seemed to me to be shimmering flames of varying degrees of brightness, the spirit's body was shaped. It looked like a small bird with brightly colored blue feathers, a long beak, and shaggy paws with horse hooves. We studied each other with interest, the spirit slowly circling me in a spiral. When it attempted to approach, I, not wanting to risk it, formed the emotion of "caution - stay where you are" in my mind and sent the resulting packet toward it.

The creature froze in place, then flew back a little. I could have sworn that it understood me, and the appearance of the Dead One kept it from further experimentation. In the mental, I became aware of the origin of the thin film enveloping his aura. Thin branches, which emanated from his shell in innumerable numbers, formed a thick mass. Apparently some kind of anomaly. The little spirit flew up to the Dead One and sprawled across his aura, and instantly a multitude of thin hairs braided tightly around his body.

"Gopher says - he wanted to introduce himself to you, and you chased him away."

"Not chased him away: just asked him not to get too close. Why Gopher?"

"I had to call it somehow." In fact, the name was quite an accurate description of the spirit; all Dead One did was add a touch of humor to it. "All right, ready?"

"Show."

The two of us were able to discover what the Dead One's mistake was. Eventually, we managed to find a way to explain to the spirit what was required of him, though it took longer than I had anticipated. By the time we both came out into the real world, it was late afternoon. I guess they were already looking for me.

"Thank you for your help." Dead One was pleased and smiled broadly. "If you need anything, come to me. You can find me through Phantom, or you can ask in Research. Better through Phantom, though, because those guys," he waved his hand toward the guards, "will ask all sorts of questions."

"I'll send you a Call if I have to."

"How that?"

I had to teach him. The boy did not know some simple things that have become known to our group since the beginning of the training. I wonder if they hid the information from him deliberately, or was it an accident?

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