"Chalker, Jack L - G.O.D. Inc 3 - The Maze in the Mirror" - читать интересную книгу автора (Chalker Jack L)

that army.
They had already been here, somewhere, in place, waiting. And that was the most
significant fact of all.
If Doctor Macklinberg hadn't sworn that Bond's frostbitten toes were real, it
smelled like even the alleged fugitive was part of the set up. Or had he just
misjudged the snow and temperature and the distance involved?
It was an interesting question. There were eleven James Bonds associated in some
way with the Company, and six were the sort where you just couldn't lay your
hands on them at any given moment. He was almost certainly one of those- the
reason why there hadn't been any alarms was because his implanted identifier was
of the highest security codes. There were times when such agents didn't want the
managers to know they were there.
It was a pretty puzzle, but, oddly, since the phone call and thinking things
through he felt much better, even able to doze now. Things were finally moving;
the load was lighter. Dash was still alive, and now there was one-on-one contact
with those holding him.
Sam slept.
Bill Markham was one of those people who aged so gracefully they looked better
in middle age than when young. Of course, Bill availed himself of the same super
technology that other high level Company employees did, including Brandy and
Sam, and physically he was in the kind of shape a twenty-year-old athlete
dreamed of being, but he also had a family and a public existence and presence
and so he had to look his forty-four-year-old age. He was tall and lean and
muscular, with a ruddy face and a thick crop of professionally styled graying
hair, and he looked like the kind of guy you'd cast as a detective on TV.
"It's my baby, Sam," he said, sinking into a chair. "I'm now Security boss for
this world and all the stations along the node, so it's in my lap as well as
yours."
Sam shrugged and lit a cigar. "I know you have the big picture, Bill; but this
is personal with me. So long as Dash is at risk, it has to be a lone wolf
operation in a couple of key areas and you know it."
Markham shrugged. "I'm not going to work against you, Sam. You know that. In
fact, I'm partly here to brief you on some of our current operations and maybe
give you a better picture of who and what you're dealing with."
Sam was suddenly very interested. "You know what's going on?"
"Not exactly. As you've probably already guessed, though, this is more or less
an extension of the same old case. When we busted the takeover plot we exiled
the ones we apprehended, as you know, Mukasa included, and put them through the
wringer in every possible way. We knew Mukasa recruited an organization using
worlds where we hadn't set up shop, but we didn't know how extensive it was or
how many people were really involved on that lower level. The fact was, neither
did Mukasa. They worked through a minimum of middlemen, mostly that sweet little
secretary-mistress of his."
"Yeah. Addison or whatever her real name turned out to be."
"So that there could be no slips, they used a stock Company security technique
with all of them to prevent them from giving out information under duress,
hypno, even accidentally. They all had auto-erase routines implanted in their
minds. You spill anything, you suddenly forget, and for good, whatever cross
references there are and all other details, and it's beyond recovery. I, for
example, know an awful lot nobody else is supposed to know. What if I were