… The queen drone slipped out of the hangar into the high orbit, breathed slightly with side maneuvering and entered the upper layers. Then the nose brakes worked, then a cluster of parachutes was released, then Arsen Mykytovych said:
– Yes, I’m shooting them off one by one. Kryvobok, you’re first. Then Nalyvaichenko. Then Rakhmetova. Then Sidorov. Then Raskin. Then…
* * *
Arsen Mykytovych shot off the entire combat group one by one, saying the surnames aloud: he considered it a ritual, everyone already knew whose drone stood in the magazine in which position. This sequence hadn’t changed in three months: there was some advice from psychologists not to change the launch sequence more often than once every six months. Something about getting used to it, readiness, attention, and what else is written in smart psychological files.
* * *
Vasya was thirteenth. They didn’t know where they were being launched from, only seeing as they approached the kill zone, that the surface was mountainous and covered in forest. Arsen Mykytovych guided each to the approximate BR area, then went to strike deep and concrete targets: the queen drone wasn’t returning to the hangar, it had something concrete-penetrating and cumulative, the task was heavy and serious. Not to mention the twenty-eight small drones, which, of course, had a “one way ticket.”
* * *
– “One way ticket, one way ticket,
One way ticket, one way ticket,
One way ticket, one way ticket to the blu-u-ues…” – Vasya hummed and tapped his foot to the rhythm of the music in the sensory capsule. Another hour and a half, then another queen drone with Arsen Mykytovych’s voice in his ears, and that would be it for today.
* * *
After an hour of flight – lakes, cliffs, tall trees… Vasya flew around the designated kill zone in the BR. Strange, armored vehicles moving in a column. Pushing through piles of soft snow, rushing through the blizzard… Almost night, what is this, who is driving… A sharp buzzer: important target. Biometric data from the target flowed in: height, weight, pulse rate, typical frequency and depth of breathing, hundredths of body temperature in different areas, movement habits and voice timbre embedded in the AI… it couldn’t be. It couldn’t be. It couldn’t…
* * *
“One way ticket, one way ticket,
One way ticket, one way ticket,
One way ticket, one way ticket to the blu-u-ues…”
* * *
Thirty-eight microdrones: ten cumulative, twenty explosive into the burnt holes, three DNA collector-analyzers, three video operators, two will rise ten kilometers and with the last charge of the batteries transmit a compressed signal-impulse. Vasya’s sergeant drone will fall and self-destruct after completing the BR.
* * *
A white screen of lost video series. Buzzer in the earphone: Arsen Mykytovych.
– Stay put, stay put, don’t crawl out… We have one more operation today – and that’s it…
– Was it him?!
– Who? Ah… No. Another double. They’re learning. No, it was a person, but not him. We’re learning, and so are they. I destroyed the bunker he was fleeing from. There’s one more BR, stay in the capsule, don’t drain the liquid. In half an hour, we start again.
* * *
After two hours, Vasya crawled out of the sensory capsule, drained the cushioning liquid, took a shower, and put on a robe. Mom had already returned from work and was preparing lunch:
– So, how was the school day?
– Today was practice… We worked on “Special Operations with Small Tactical Drones.”
– How did it go?
– Fine. Arsen Mykytovych gave me twelve.
* * *
Vasya was sure that in the next, seventh grade, he would catch that bunker devil. Can’t not catch, can’t. Vasya knew this for sure, because he managed to upload tracking programs into every drone he flew: he knew he’d get in trouble with Arsen Mykytovych, but couldn’t resist.
So today, the sixth B grade was working over Valday.
On the screensaver: Drone School Free Sky Ukraine. Photo: Sergey Tkachuk/Facebook
