The door opened. A Chinese man wearing a blue uniform and carrying a white stick entered. Moving aside, he made a sign with his head: Go.
Olga frowned sullenly at him and at the light green hallway behind the door.
“I’m thirsty,” she said.
The Chinese man repeated the gesture. And he slapped his stick in his hand. Olga put on the slippers and went out of the cell. And immediately in front of her there was a second Chinese man, a copy of the first.
“Are they brothers or what?” Olga thought gloomily.
The door behind Olga was closed and locked with a key. The second man gestured for her to follow him. Olga went, making her rubbery, poorly coordinated legs take step after difficult step. The slippers shuffled across the floor. The hall wasn’t long. It ran into a door with a code lock. The Chinese man punched in a code. The door opened. Olga didn’t have time to take it all in before the twin guards pushed her into the spacious room. The door slammed shut.
For the first moment Olga thought that she was in a meat- processing plant: dozens of people in gray coveralls and aprons were working with some sort of small carcasses resembling sheep, taking them off the hooks of a moving conveyor, skinning them, cutting and splitting them. Some were working in gas masks. The space was light, although there were no windows, as in the room. Light music played softly. And despite powerful ventilation, it smelled of dead flesh.
Olga stepped forward.
A few people glanced at her. They were all Europeans. All fair-haired. She approached the slowly moving conveyor belt. Dead dogs hung on the steel hooks. Dogs that she’d at first taken for sheep.
A short, hunched blond man with glasses, a grizzled beard, and ears that stuck straight out, came over to her. His lackluster blue eyes gazed at her calmly through thick round lenses.
“Are you new?” he asked.
“Where am I?” asked Olga, noticing a small white number on the shoulder of his gray coveralls: 77.
Her eyes squinted at her own left shoulder. There was a number there, too. She hadn’t noticed this in the room.
“One hundred eighty-nine,” read the old man in the glasses, and his gnarled finger pointed toward the far end of the room. “You with that tall fellow over there? Are you American?”
Olga saw Bjorn removing a dead dog from a hook. He waved to her, his huge hand in a rubber glove, put aside his instrument, and made his way along the line toward her. The short, heavy canvas apron was obviously too small for him. Bjorn looked ridiculous in it. And it was specifically the short apron, tossed about as Bjorn’s enormous knees moved, that woke Olga up for real. Her eyes filled with tears, and she threw herself at Bjorn’s chest, sobbing. Bjorn embraced her awkwardly, trying not to touch her with the rubber gloves, which were covered in dog blood.
“All right, all right, we’ll talk later.” The man in glasses gently patted Olga’s quivering back and glanced at the large clock on the wall. “It will be lunch soon. Let her stay with you for the time being.”
Bjorn nodded. The old man in glasses pointed in a calming gesture to the observation camera, and moved away. Olga sobbed, her face pressed into Bjorn’s solar plexus. His work clothes smelled of sweat and carrion. The workers glanced sympathetically as the two embraced.
Calming down a bit, Olga rubbed her eyes with the sleeve of her uniform.
“You slept two whole days,” said Bjorn, looking down at her.
He had a small bruise on his cheekbone.
“Did they beat you?” Olga said, touching the bruise.
“No. That was the table. When I fell. Are you all right?”
“Just fine!” Olga looked angrily around her. “What is this?”
“Come on, I’ll tell you everything.”
“What are they all doing?” she said, seeing the blood on his gloves. “How disgustin
g...
What is this — a dog-meat plant?”
“Just about. I’ve been here since yesterday evening.”
“Why?”
“I woke up earlier. Insomnia, you kno
w..
.” He tried to joke and squinted at the observation camera. “Let’s go over to where I work. There are extremely painful penalties for idling.”
He led Olga to his work station. The corpse of a dog lay on his metal table — a reddish-black mutt, with sharpened, old, yellowed canines, sagging tits, and glassy, half-closed eyes. Judging by the frost coming out on her matted fur and claws, she had been slightly frozen. She emitted a weak smell of dog and dead flesh. The dog’s skin had been slit on her paws and stomach. This was done by a stocky, towheaded fellow. He cut open every corpse this way. Bjorn took up a special electric knife and began to carefully and not very skillfully peel the hide away. The stench of carrion grew stronger.
“Ug
h..
.” Olga turned away.
“There’s a mask.” Bjorn pointed.
Olga took the gas mask off a hook and put it on.
“How about you?”
“So far I don’t need it.” Bjorn shook his head. “It’s easier to talk without it.”
“Where are we?” Olga mumbled through the new Chinese gas mask.
“I don’t know. They say under the iceberg.”
“Under the ICE?”
“Yes.”
“Who says so?”
“The others who are here.”
“And who are they?”
“They’re the same like us.”
“They were hammered too?”
“Yes. And at some point they also found the site of that Michael guy. And then — just what happened to us. They came here to fight against evil. In short, you and I weren’t the only idiot
s..
.”
“But wh
y..
.” Olga looked at the dog skin, which peeled off the corpse’s leg with a crack. “Yo
u...
that i
s...
the
y...
why, why, why all this?”
“What do you mean? Why are we here? I am not the one to ask this question.”
“Why all this? Why all this nasty stuff?”
“Why are we skinning these dogs? Because at that end of the workshop the women cut the skin into strips. Which are then used somewhere to tie the ice to the handle. Then they have an ice hammer.”
“How do you know this?”
“Well, I spent a whole night among our comrades in misfortune.”
“Bu
t...
but why did I sleep so long?” Olga took off the gas mask, which got in the way of talking.
Bjorn spoke seriously, “Here you go, put on these gloves and help me.”
“I’m not going to do this shit!”
“They give electric shocks. And don’t let you eat. Or drink.”
“That’s right,” she remembered, “I’m really thirsty.”
“There’s a drinking station over there in the corner.”
Olga looked at the observation camera.
“And what now?” she asked indignantly. “Bastards! The day after tomorrow I have to be in Philadelphia with a contract! They’ll fire me!”
Bjorn laughed bitterly. “I think we’ve already been fired. From the living.”
Olga looked at him attentively.
“What should we do?” she asked.
“Skin dogs,” he answered seriously. “And not make any sudden movements.”
“What?” She squinted furiously. “Sudden movements? I’ll obliterate them, the scum!”
She shook her fist at the moving observation camera and cried out loud, “Fuck you!”
The camera focused on Olga immediately. The workers froze. Up above, on a small balcony jutting out from the wall, a door opened silently. A Chinese man in a uniform emerged from it. Two side doors also opened and guards appeared in them as well.
Olga’s lips trembled from anger. But Bjorn, his hands in gloves covered with dog blood, grabbed her wrists.
“Olga!”
The dead, cold blood turned her to stone.
“Olga.”
She turned to look at Bjorn. But her lips were still distorted with hatred.
“They’ll kill us at the drop of a hat,” Bjorn said. “You’ve got to understand.”
Her gaze drilled straight through Bjorn.
“And you’ve got to understand: this is completely serious.”
She looked at the Chinese. They stared at her, immobile. Bjorn gently wiped her wrists with a paper towel. And began putting new gloves on her hands.
“Go get a drink. And come back over here to me.”
A stocky fellow, who sliced the corpses open, winked at Olga and Bjorn sympathetically. He took another corpse off the hook and dropped it with a thud on the table in front of Olga. It was a bitch with matted gray-brown fur. Olga looked at the dog’s frosty tits. She turned her gaze to the conveyor. Only bitches hung from the hooks.
“But wh
y...
are they all females?” she asked distractedly.
“No one knows,” said the stocky guy, taking off his gas mask and wiping the sweat from his freckled forehead, looking at Olga with a half smile. “Not even the old-timers.”
It was clear that he liked Olga. Softening, she looked at the frozen dog tits, while Bjorn pulled the gloves on her helpless hands.
“You know what we call each other?” The stocky guy grinned.
“No,” Olga mumbled.
“Friends of Dead Bitches.”
The great
night has arrived.
The Earth has fallen asleep. The meat machines are immobile until dawn. They sleep and dream their meat dreams. But the Brotherhood of the Light isn’t sleeping. The Brotherhood has waited a long time for this night. It has traveled a long path to this hour — an entire Earth century. The Brothers and Sisters of the Light moved toward this. They brought the Great Hour nearer. They struggled and were tormented. They perished and were reborn. They suffered and prevailed. They labored and overcame. They tore brothers and sisters away from the world of the meat. They protected the Newly Acquired.
Iron birds take off into the night air. They serve the Brotherhood. They lift Khram and Gorn into the night air. In the main iron machine Khram and Gorn are lifted into the air. This machine will help them. It was created for this night. It was created for this night alone. For the first and last flight. In order to help Khram and Gorn. The flying machine rises higher and higher. The Earth is farther and farther away. From the flying machine one can see farther and farther. The other flying machines fly close by, guarding them.
Khram and Gorn sit, embracing, in a glass sphere. Their bodies are naked. Their eyes are closed. Their chests are together. Their hands are intertwined. Their hearts are
prepared
.
The glass sphere flies above the sleeping Earth.
Khram and Gorn are strong. They are
capable
.
The Brotherhood is also prepared. All across the Earth, Circles of the Light have formed. Great and Lesser Circles. In different countries. Thousands of brothers and sisters are frozen and still. Their eyes are closed. Their hearts are
prepared
. They are
waiting
.
Khram and Gorn soar over the Earth.
The night helps them. For it is only at night that the meat machines are immobile. They are all in
their own
places. They are all
visible
.
The Earth lies in the palms of Khram’s and Gorn’s hands. They
hold
it like an apple. They are
prepared
.
The flying machine rises to the heights. This is its limit. The moment of Beginning has arrived.
Khram’s and Gorn’s hearts shine cautiously.
All the Circles of the Light on the Earth below instantly shine in
response
. They give
strength
to Khram and Gorn. They offer them
support
. They guard and
hold them
.
The hearts of Khram and of Gorn shine ever
stronger
. They gather the
power
of the Light. They prepare themselves. The iron machine soars over the world of meat machines. Its mechanisms are prepared to be of use to the Brotherhood one last time. They are on alert. They depend on Khram and Gorn. The iron head of the flying machine awaits its
commands
. To remember those whom Khram and Gorn
will see
. In order to help find them. The Brotherhood controls the complex mechanisms of the flying machine. The brothers grow stock-still.
The Brotherhood of the Primordial Light
grows still
.
Everything is now in the
hearts
of Khram and of Gorn.
Everything depends on them.
Everything
rests
on them.
One second passes.
Anothe
r...
A thir
d...
THEIR HEARTS HAVE FLARED!
It has come to pass!
Khram and Gorn
have seen
.
Their hearts
see
EVERYONE.
All 23,000. Including Khram and Gorn, 23,000 brothers and sisters on the planet Earth.
All
the brothers and sisters, Khram and Gorn see
all
of them, down to the very last one. Gorn
sees
: 22,437 are on Earth; 563 are now in the air.
Khram’s and Gorn’s hearts
shine
. Their bodies tremble in the glass sphere. It is hard for bodies to
withstand
the power of the Light. It will tear the meat bodies into 23,000 pieces, they will fall apart on account of the Primordial Power. They won’t be able withstand the Force of Unearthly Light. But the Circles of Light on the Earth shine in reply. The brothers and sisters
stand
.
They hold them
like a shield. They
help
with support.
They contain them
.
The complex mechanisms of the flying machine have come to life. Its iron head begins to work. It receives commands from Khram and Gorn. They issue from the embracing bodies of Khram and Gorn. They flow into the head of the flying machine. The machine sees along with Khram and Gorn. But not with heart
vision
, with its own iron vision. It sees everyone that Khram and Gorn
see
. It determines the place, commits it to memory, finds through the machines of the Earth the names of the sleeping brothers and sisters. New names flow into the iron machine. They join with glittering flares. They are collected in order. They are conveyed to hundreds of other irons machines that serve the Brotherhood. The machines remember the new names, they find out their new addresses, they find earthly ways of acquiring these brothers and sisters.