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

were cross-programmed from another classroom,
a classified, advanced, damn-it-but-it-all-made-
so-much-sense classroom, and Jason rolled over
and dug his hand into his mattress, partly because
it felt good, and partly because his mother had
told him, "When you muck up the mattress it has
to be replaced early, and if it has to be replaced
early, the government gets angry."

Advanced astrodynamics. Well, it just felt like
more math, how was I to know I was playing little
games with stars and planets? And I understood
it, once I got the answer. Jas rumpled the bed
again. Once he got the answer: that was the prob-
lem. He couldn't show them any figuring. He
couldn't show them how he arrived at the correct
answer. "I figure in my head," he said, and they
showed him the paper where he had done some
other figuring, and Jas had smiled and said,
"Sometimes, anyway."

If only Tork had been a moron and had remem-
bered astro-dynamics wrong.

If only God were still alive and not just a face on
the ceiling.

"I'm a Swipe," Jas said under his breath, trying
out the words.

Suddenly a hand was fiercely clamped over his
mouth. Startled, he opened his eyes to see his
mother glaring down at him.

"Fool!" his mother hissed. "An intelligence
that can't be measured and you talk as if the walls
weren't listening!"

"I was joking," Jas stammered, "I didn't
think—"

"In this world, boy, don't ever not think. Why
do you suppose your father died?" She wheeled
and left the room.

Jas looked after her. "Father didn't have a
chance!" he shouted.

"Shut up and eat your dinner," his mother
snapped, surly again. Again? Still.