Kitabı oxu: «Volume 1. The Spark. The Beginning»

Chapter 1. The Morning Before the Celebration

Miron woke up because the sun was shining right in his eyes. He stretched lazily, glanced at the clock — half past nine. Sunday, he could have slept longer, but today was a special day: his younger brother's birthday. Twenty-four years — a serious date, even though Arsen didn't like noisy celebrations.

Miron's apartment resembled both a museum and a workshop. Books on paleontology, archaeology, and anthropology crowded the shelves along the walls. In the corner stood a plaster cast of a triceratops skull, a gift from his academic advisor for successfully defending his thesis. On the desk — a laptop, with some excavation reports laid out beside it, pencils, a magnifying glass. Miron was just finishing an article for the journal "Herald of Paleontology" about new methods of dating bone remains.

He got up, walked to the window, and looked at the Moscow courtyard flooded with sunlight. In a couple of hours he needed to leave for the countryside — the company was gathering by the river, shashlik, guitar, campfire. Good. Arsen had been working a lot lately; he deserved a rest.

The phone rang. The screen displayed: "Arsen."

"Hey, brother," Miron answered sleepily.

"You're still asleep?" Arsen's voice was cheerful, as always. "I've already packed everything. The grill, the coals, the meat is marinated. Don't forget the guitar."

"I remember, I remember. How are you? Did you get enough sleep?"

"Yeah. I was thinking, maybe we could look for mushrooms too? It rained recently, there should be some."

"Well, you're something else," Miron laughed. "It's your birthday, and you're thinking about mushrooms."

"The forest is right there, it'd be a sin not to take a walk."

Arsen had always been like that: focused, practical, planning everything in advance. He worked as a design engineer at a defense institute, designing complex mechanisms. In his free time he read popular science, went hiking, and knew mushrooms and berries better than any forester. Since childhood he'd had a habit of analyzing everything and writing it down.

Miron, on the contrary, was impulsive and easily carried away, yet thorough in science. His passion was dinosaurs. At the age of five, after seeing the film "Jurassic Park," he firmly decided to become a paleontologist. At school he devoured books by Efremov and Obruchev, then entered the geology faculty and chose the paleontology department. Now he was a graduate student and often went on expeditions — searching for dinosaur remains in Siberia and southern Russia.

"Alright," Miron said. "I'll head over to your place in an hour. Wait for me."

"Come quickly, the friends are already calling, wanting to know what time we're gathering."

Miron got ready quickly: jeans, a T-shirt, a light jacket, threw a guitar into his backpack, sandwiches, a water flask, a lighter — the very one with the engraving, a gift from a friend last New Year. It was beautiful, metal, with an image of flames and the inscription "Fire is always with you." Miron grinned: it would come in handy for the campfire.

Outside it was already hot. He got into his old "Niva" and drove to his brother's place. Arsen lived in a neighboring district, in an apartment where perfect order reigned: books on engineering, physics, astronomy, a computer, a 3D printer on which he printed parts for his models. He even had a small workshop with a lathe.

When Miron walked in, Arsen was already loading bags into the trunk.

"Help me," he nodded. "I've got some firewood in the closet, grab it too."

"You prepared firewood too?" Miron was surprised.

"Last time I gathered some in the forest, but it was damp. I've got dry ones, from the hardware store."

Miron shook his head: his brother had thought of everything.

Half an hour later they drove out of the city. Music played in the car, Miron talked about the latest news from the excavations:

"Imagine, we found a fragment of a jaw from some sauropod. If it's confirmed, it's the northernmost representative of its kind. I'm actually writing an article about the dating right now."

"What method are you using?" Arsen asked, always interested in details.

"Radiocarbon for the upper layers, and for the deep ones — uranium-thorium. But there are complications with contamination. We have to recheck many times."

"Do you remember when we went to the paleontological museum as kids? You stood by the diplodocus skeleton all day."

"Of course! I firmly decided then that I would dig up bones."

"And you do dig them," Arsen smiled.

They turned onto a country road, birch groves and fields passing by. Soon the river appeared, and they turned toward a familiar clearing — the favorite spot of their company. Several cars were already parked there, and figures of friends could be seen.

Chapter 2. The Company by the Campfire

The clearing was noisy. About ten people had already set up tents, some were lighting the campfire, others were chopping salad. Seeing the "Niva," everyone waved.

"The birthday boy has arrived!" shouted a tall guy in a cap — Seryoga, a childhood friend. "Hurry up, the skewers are ready!"

Arsen got out of the car and was immediately hugged. Miron unloaded the guitar and firewood.

"Oh, a guitar!" Katya, a girl from their company, a conservatory student, rejoiced. "Will you sing?"

"If you ask," Miron smiled.

He loved these outings: forest, river, friends, campfire. The perfect rest from laboratories and libraries.

While the men started the fire, the women set the table. Arsen walked over to the river and looked at the water. The river was narrow but fast, with rapids. On the far bank the forest loomed dark, rising toward a high cliff.

"It's beautiful here," said Miron, coming up. "Do you think there are fish?"

"There should be. Pike, perch. But fishing isn't on the agenda now."

By evening the campfire was blazing. They roasted meat, drank tea from thermoses, someone brought homemade wine. Miron picked up the guitar and started playing. Songs followed one after another: Vysotsky, Okudzhava, his own compositions.

Arsen sat slightly apart, thoughtfully gazing at the fire. Seryoga sat down next to him:

"What are you thinking about, engineer?"

"Just thinking. I look at the flame and think that fire is the greatest invention of humanity. And someone was the first to figure out how to preserve it."

"You always dig deep," Seryoga laughed. "Just relax."

But Arsen couldn't just relax. His brain was constantly working. Even now he noticed how ants were carrying twigs to the anthill and thought it would rain by night. There was a smell of dampness, though the sky was still clear.

Miron finished the song and sat down next to his brother:

"So, weatherman, will it rain?"

"Closer to morning," Arsen replied. "But we'll have left by then."

"Let's take a walk to the cliff? They say there are lots of fireflies there now. I want to see, maybe it's some special species. I read once that fireflies' bioluminescence is a complex chemical process."

"You even rest like a scientist," Arsen smirked.

But he got up and brushed off his jeans. He took a flashlight and a folding knife — just in case.

"We'll be back soon!" Miron called to the friends. "We want to look at the fireflies."

"Go, just don't get lost!" they answered from the company.

The brothers walked away from the campfire and went deeper into the forest. The path led along the river, then rose toward the cliff. It was getting dark, but there was still enough light to see. Mosquitoes swirled in the air, and there was a smell of rotting leaves and resin.

"Listen," Arsen said when they had gone about a hundred meters. "Do you remember how we got lost in the forest as kids? The whole village was looking for us."

"I remember. You didn't even cry, you acted like an adult, though you were about six."

"I was just memorizing the way by landmarks. That tree with the hollow, that anthill. And we made it out."

"You were always like that," Miron smiled.

They approached the cliff. Below, the river roared, and the opposite bank was drowning in darkness. No fireflies were visible yet.

"Let's wait," Miron said, sitting on the grass. "They usually appear when it's completely dark."

Arsen sat down beside him and put the flashlight on his knees. The silence was unusual — no birds, no animals. Only the river roaring somewhere below.

Suddenly Arsen tensed:

"Do you hear that?"

Miron listened. At first nothing, then — a muffled rumble, as if a train were passing somewhere far away.

"What is that?"

"I don't know," Arsen stood up. "The ground is shaking."

At that very moment something thudded beneath them. The edge of the cliff where they were sitting swayed and began to slide down along with bushes and stones. The brothers didn't even have time to cry out before they were carried into the darkness.

Miron felt a strong blow against a stone, then another. He clung to his brother with all his might, heard Arsen shouting, "Hold on!" But the world around them turned into chaos of thunder, dust, and pain.

The last thing he remembered was his hand slipping out of his brother's grip, and he fell into black emptiness.

Chapter 3. Awakening

Consciousness returned slowly, in waves. First hearing: somewhere water was murmuring, birds were singing — unfamiliar ones, with some kind of clicking trills. Then smell: damp earth, rotting leaves, pine needles. And finally pain: his whole body ached, especially his back and the back of his head.

Miron opened his eyes. Above him was the sky — bright blue, with sparse wispy clouds. Not at all like the night sky. The sun stood high. He tried to sit up and hissed from a pain in his side.

"Ars!" he called hoarsely.

"Here," came from the right.

Miron turned his head and saw his brother. Arsen was sitting, leaning against a large moss-covered boulder, feeling his left shoulder. His face was covered in scrapes, a bruise had dried on his forehead, but his eyes looked clear and focused.

"How are you?" Miron asked, crawling closer.

"Alive. My shoulder seems to be dislocated," Arsen carefully moved his arm and winced. "And you?"

"My head is buzzing, and my ribs hurt. But I seem to be intact."

They looked around. Around them was a forest — but not at all the one they had walked through in the evening. The trees here stood taller and thicker than in the Moscow region: huge pines with massive trunks, some unfamiliar species with broad leaves. Lianas wound between them, and large dragonflies — the size of a palm — circled in the air.