"Brennert, Alan - The Refuge" - читать интересную книгу автора (Brennert Alan)

All at once, that enemy threw him backward, and he fell, burning and freezing,
into a snowbank.

He fought to retain consciousness; to get to his feet. But his spasming body
wouldn't obey him. He looked up at the house, his vision blurry as rain off a
windshield, barely able to make out the partiers-- oblivious to his plight,
their smiles and laughter unknowingly mocking him.

He tried to call out to them, but could hardly make a sound. His head dropped
back onto a cold pillow of snow, and he finally surrendered, to old enemies and
new.

The first thing he felt, as he drifted back to consciousness, was warmth. He
couldn't recall having done anything to warrant going to Hell, but there was so
much he didn't remember, he couldn't rule out the possibility either. Still, it
was a moist warmth, gentle and comforting-- if anything, heavenly -- and,
slowly, he opened his eyes.

He was lying, naked, in a metal tub filled with warm water. There were whorls
and eddies of motion up one limb and down another --nanomachines, he guessed,
circulating the water, massaging those parts of him that needed it most. He
shifted slightly, then felt a gentle touch on his shoulder.

"Take it easy," a woman's voice said. "Don't try to sit up."

He looked up to find a woman in a nurse's uniform sitting beside him: brunette,
with glistening shoulder-length hair, and a sweet, sensitive face in which he
read concern, compassion, relief.

He tried to say something, but his voice was a hoarse rasp. She reached over to
a table, handed him some water; it tasted sweet, like glucose, and he drank it
thirstily. He looked at her again, managing a small smile. "What," he said, his
voice barely better than a croak, "no bubble bath?"

She returned the smile. "Believe it or not," and her voice was as sweet as her
face, "bubble bath is considered optional in cases of hypothermia."

He tried to laugh; it needed work. She gave him some more of the hydrating
solution, and as he drank it he took in his surroundings for the first time. He
was in what seemed to be a small infirmary-- three beds, an exam table, medical
telemetry along one wall. At the far end of the room were two doors, one marked
RADIOLOGY, the other SURGERY. And at the near end, an older man in a white
doctor's coat stood in a doorway which led into some sort of anteroom.

"Gina?" He was in his late fifties, Ray judged, his face deeply lined --a
nervous wisp of a man. "May I speak with you?"

The woman -- Gina? -- glanced at him with a trace of disdain, quickly covered
up. She kept her tone crisp; professional. "Of course, Doctor. Just let me get
him out of the immersion bath."