Liu, Cixin / Лю, Цысинь - Собрание сочинений (4 произведения) [2014-2016, epub, ENG]

The Weight of Memories 2016, epub, ISBN: 978-0-7653-9403-3, Tor.com

The Red Union had been attacking the headquarters of the April Twenty-eighth Brigade for two days. Their red flags fluttered restlessly around the brigade building like flames yearning for firewood. The Red Union commander was anxious, though not because of the defenders he faced. The more than two hundred Red Guards of the April Twenty-eighth Brigade were mere greenhorns compared with the veteran Red Guards of the Red Union, which was formed at the start of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in early 1966. The Red Union had been tempered by the tumultuous experience of revolutionary tours around the country and seeing Chairman Mao in the great rallies in Tiananmen Square. But the commander was afraid of the dozen or so iron stoves inside the building, filled with explosives and connected to each other by electric detonators. He couldn’t see them, but he could feel their presence like iron sensing the pull of a nearby magnet. If a defender flipped the switch, revolutionaries and counter-revolutionaries alike would all die in one giant ball of fire. And the young Red Guards of the April Twenty-eighth Brigade were indeed capable of such madness. Compared with the weathered men and women of the first generation of Red Guards, the new rebels were a pack of wolves on hot coals, crazier than crazy. . . .

Mother: Baby, can you hear me? Fetus: Where am I? Mother: Oh, good! You can hear me. I’m your mother. Fetus: Mama! Am I really in your belly? I’m floating in water … Mother: That’s called the ami—ani—amniotic fluid. Hard word, I know. I just learned it today, too. Fetus: What is this sound? It’s like thunder far away. Mother: That’s my heartbeat. You’re inside me, remember? Fetus: I like this place; I want to stay here forever. Mother: Ha, you can’t do that! You’ve got to be born. Fetus: No! It’s scary out there. Mother: Oh … we’ll talk more about that later. Fetus: What’s this line connected to my tummy, Mama? Mother: That’s your umbilical cord. When you’re inside mommy, you need it to stay alive. Fetus: Hmmm. Mama, you’ve never been where I am, have you? Mother: I have! Before I was born, I was inside my mother, too. Except I don’t remember what it was like there, and that’s why you can’t remember, either. Baby, is it dark inside mommy? Can you see anything? Fetus: There’s a faint light coming from outside. It’s a reddish-orange glow, like the color of the sky when the sun is just setting behind the mountain at Xitao Village. Mother: You remember Xitao? That’s where I was born! Then you must remember what mommy looks like? . . .