"Stephen Goldin - But As A Soldier, For His Country" - читать интересную книгу автора (Goldin Stephen)

He sat in the rubble with his back against the crumbling wall, and for the first time since Gary’s death on the
Moon, he cried.

Asia.
Africa.
Antarctica.
Luna.
Venus.
Pacifica.
Alpha Centauri 4.
The planet with the forests.
The world with oceans of ammonia.
Planets whose names he’s never even bothered to learn.
The ghosts of billions of war dead assault his conscience. And Harker cries with them, for them, about them, over
them, to them.

There was a movement. A man in a red armtag. A strangely familiar figure. He hadn’t seen Harker yet. Without
thinking, Harker’s hand raised the gun to fire.
 His motion attracted the other’s attention. The soldier, with reflexes as fast as his own, whirled to face him. It
was himself.
“They copied some of our tapes,” he had been told. Exactly. Then they could make themselves a Harker, just as
this side could. He wanted to laugh, but the pain in his leg prevented it. It would have been his first laugh in
uncounted incarnations. This was the ultimate irony – fighting himself.
The two Harkers’ eyes joined and locked. For one joyless instant, each read the other’s soul. Then each fired at
the other.