"02 - Hot Sleep" - читать интересную книгу автора (Card Orson Scott)

were so sure."

"I guess they can't cope with somebody out-
smarting their stupid tests." Jas lay back on the
bed and breathed deeply, "I need to rest, mom,"
he said. His mother nodded and got up and went
to the kitchen-dining-bathroom to ring up dinner.

Jas lay on the bed, his heart still pounding. He

had been stupid, not to realize that they'd know.
But it had been so easy—the test in front of him,
and then just by looking at Tork the answers so
clear, sitting right behind Tork's eyes. It was as if
for a moment Jas had forgotten that telepathy was
a capital crime. In fact, of course, he hadn't really
realized, not for sure, that what was happening
was telepathy. It had grown so gradually, his
gift—beginning when he turned twelve—fleeting
glimpses at random of what people thought, what
they felt. And then in the room last week, just as a
child might discover a new muscle that let him
wiggle his ears or twitch his scalp, Jas had
realized he could control it. Not just random
glimpses, but a deep, hard, long look into their
minds.

The Swipe? Swipes were monsters, Swipes
were planet-wreckers, Swipes weren't kids in"
schoolrooms taking calculus tests.

He stared at the picture of his father on the
ceiling. The tiling had been there since their last
authorized remodeling, when Jas was seven, and
he had instantly seen the picture. That squiggle
was the nose; the dark space his eye; the lips the
gentle curves just below. It was a benign face,
kind if monstrous, trustworthy if incredible. How
had he decided that it was his father? Jas knew.
After all, he had seen no other picture.

He wanted the face to smile, but it always just
smirked, as if just about to laugh, or as if it had just
tired of laughter. Or as if it knew that a meal was
coming. Jas shuddered.

And as he did his mind gave his body a reason

for the fear. How was I to know, he asked himself.
How was I to know that the last three questions