"W. T. Quick - Dreams of Gods and Men" - читать интересную книгу автора (Quick W T)

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Dreams of Gods and Men
by W.T. Quick
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Copyright (c)1989 by William T. Quick


_This book is dedicated to:_
Sarah Mitchell, Aunt Sally and Ernest E. Quick, Uncle Ernie
You are missed...
And
Tracy Cogswell Teacher and Friend
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SPREAD OUT IN the narrow valley below, the cabin was a smoking ruin. The sharp miasma of spent high explosive filtered up to
the niche where Toshiro Nakasone clamped his hands to the sides of his head. His fingers knotted against the insidious trap he'd
unwittingly triggered in what should have been a straightforward assassination. But who could have predicted this awful, pervasive
mental attack? Particularly from a victim whose body was now bloody shreds? Finally, by sheer, teeth-grinding will, he forced his throat
to work.
"Ahhh!"
"Hang on, Tosh," Levin said. "I'm working on it."
Toshi stared at a tiny figure picking its dainty way through the rubble of the God's retreat, moving slowly toward the fifty-meter wall
of rock which sheltered Toshi's hideaway. He knew that form. Blades of God, they called themselves. He squinted at the little yellow
killer, trying to estimate how much time he had left. Not much, probably. Those fragile-looking samurai were unbelievably effective at
search and destroy.
"Levin?" Toshi mumbled. It was hard to subvocalize. His mouth was filled with peanut butter, his tongue a swollen sausage of
rigid flesh.
"Try to relax," Levin said. "When you fight, you make things harder for me."
"I killed that God. I know it. Nothing could have survived inside the lodge, and that's where it was when the bombs went off."
"Well, you got its body, I think," Levin replied slowly. "But _something_ is still with us. There's got to be a source for that control
process. I'm trying to analyze now -- it's either autonomic or psychomatic, but I can't tell yet. That God was one of the newer entities. I
haven't been able to find out as much as I'd like about the Church's latest engineering techniques."
"That's nice, Levin. Very encouraging." Toshi took a deep breath. Levin was partially controlling his respiratory system, exerting a
psychonomic calming effect. The air smelled clean and cool. There was a taste of pine to it, and damp earth and still water: a fine
mishmash of odors, heavily spiced with the charring tang of Hyundai number four industrial-grade explosive.
"I think I understand," Levin said suddenly. "Arius didn't retreat to the metamatrix when his avatar was destroyed." His clear tenor
voice turned puzzled. "But that's impossible, too. At least we thought it was."
The Blade moved alertly across the base of the cliff, head swiveling like a good hunting dog on a scent. Short lemon man with
death in his chromosomes.
"Listen, old friend," Toshi said. "It may be impossible, but it's happening. And we don't have a hell of a lot of time. That Blade
down there is gonna find me pretty quick -- and if I'm still in my present condition, he's gonna rip me into small bloody chunks with his
delicate little fingers. You do understand that, right?"
The soft breeze shifted slightly, carrying with it the sudden stench of burned God and scorched rock. Toshi decided he'd done a
good job on the building. It was just bad breaks that his intended victim seemed unexpectedly immortal and that one Blade had
remained outside on guard duty when the shatterbombs went off.
"We've never tried a full feedback loop, Toshi. But the theory's okay, and you're wired for it."
"No!" The harsh suddenness of his reply startled him. It betrayed levels of fear he had never investigated, some dangerous lapse
in the web of controls by which he governed the disciplines of his life. He was replying to logic with emotion, and that might be the
worst thing of all.
Down below, the Blade froze, his face toward the cliff. Then he smiled and slid forward into the underbrush like a sword drawn