The Hackers. ДАРЬЯ Дмитриевна РОСНИНА

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      Early in the morning, when the night freshness had not yet given way to the daytime heat, a tall young man was walking quickly along a path that linked two opposite houses. He was dressed in jeans and white loose cotton shirt with rolled-up sleeves. His had dark hair and skin testified to his Hindu origin. While his neatly cut hair, glasses in metal frame and the way he handled himself showed that he preferred reading and observation to physical activity.

      The young man was hurrying towards the nearest house with a concerned air, mumbling something under his breath and accompanying his thoughts with arms movements.

      "Thereby, Absolem, we’ll reach the upper limit while preserving all the initial parameters. Tell this to the neurobiologists in the lab, and ask them to start after breakfast. That’s it, end of the line.” He ended up his reflections and stopped in front of a wide-open glass entrance door.

      He came in and found himself in a spacious hall almost free of any furniture.

      In the middle of the room, a motor bike was proudly standing, with a fresh dirty trace leading to the wide entrance door.

      The bike was making a specific crackling sound, which indicated that it had been recently used. The engine was still hot.

      “Asha! I’m gathering everyone for breakfast! Come out! I’m waiting for you!”

      As there was no reply he made a few steps inside, looked around and then called again.

      “Atarva, I’m already going down,” said someone’s voice on the top floor, and then a tall girl with blond hair combed into a ponytail lightly ran down the stairs.

      She was dressed in skinny jeans and a T-shirt with a picture of Goddess Lakshmi.

      “Hi Atarva! Nestor is already coming; he arrived from Delhi yesterday night. Did you sleep well?”

      “I slept perfectly well! After all, I’m the master of my mind,” replied the young man. “And I consider yesterday’s news to be the customer’s reasonable wish, rather than his quirk as you put it!”

      “Good morning everyone, I’ve got some news and an idea to offer. Let’s talk it over during breakfast.” A guy with long shoulder-length hair was approaching them, on his way combing his hair with his fingers and trying to fasten it with a band.

      “Hi Nestor,” Asha and Atarva said almost simultaneously and both burst out laughing at that coincidence.

      “What are the Curators saying? Have we delivered the job?” Nestor managed at last to cope with his hair and looked closely at Atarva.

      "Yesterday, the Fourth Curator gathered all the groups’ leaders to inform them on the customer’s desire to block a part of the processor’s potential with a tough limiting program,” Atarva said and gave them a meaningful look. “The requirements to these programs are so specific that I even think they are…”

      “Idiotic?” Asha suggested with a barely hidden annoyance.

      “Asha, our development is so important that it has more Curators than developers. By the way, since yesterday our clearance level has been again increased.”

      “I’ve noticed that! Yesterday evening when I set off on a ride, the security didn’t even let me out of the gates! I had to ride the bike within the perimeter on the test site. And the story repeated itself in the morning!”

      “I guess they don’t let us out because of our clearance allowances! Luckily, I left earlier, otherwise I wouldn’t be able to see my father in hospital,” Nestor said.

      “How is he? Atarva inquired politely.

      “In my opinion, they can already release him from hospital, but the doctors, on the contrary, think that he will be forever their patient.”

      “What is the diagnosis?” Atarva stared at Nestor over his glasses.

      “As said before, schizophrenia! I talked to my father. He is in the right mind, while meds only render him weak. At parting, he gave me a pile of sheets with notes. He said that those were reports on his experiment that he had written from memory in his hospital room. I looked them through on a plane and I think you’ve got to look at them, too. In fact, he did not obtain a zero result – they were wrong. The contact did take place!”

      “And where are the reports?” Atarva persisted.

      “All the reports and documents were taken away. There is no longer any lab, the room is empty. The father’s apartment was raked through. So now not a single note is left.”

      “That’s quite interesting! Let’s go and have breakfast now, tell us everything in the lab.”

      Upon hearing the news, their good mood left them at once, and the group headed silently towards the canteen building.