"Rudy Rucker & Bruce Sterling - Hormiga Canyon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rucker Rudy)

Emily was smart and decent, just his type. But—the thing was—he couldn’t
possibly think about Emily without also thinking about work. Those years of
servitude were something he wanted to forget. In any case, right this minute
he was for sure too busy to call Emily, what with all these friggin’ ants.

Stefan glared at his unshaven clown-haired visage in the mirror. He
knew in his heart that he was being stupid. How many more women were
likely to ask for face-time with him? He’d never get another such offer from
kind-hearted Emily Yu. There were a million pretty women in L.A., but never
a lot of Emilys. Call her now, Stefan, call her. Do it. You have ten thousand
phones in here. Call.

All right, in a minute, but first he’d call his landlord about the ants.

Back in his living room, long tendrils of ants were spreading out from
the TV. Amazingly tiny ants: they looked no bigger than pixels, and their
jagged ant-trails were as thin as hairline cracks. They were heading for the
laundry baskets.
 “Not my cell phones, you little bastards,” cried Stefan, hauling his
baskets outside to the dilapidated porch.

He found a phone that seemed to hold a charge.

“Call Mr. Noor,” Stefan instructed. He’d cloned a single phone
account across all ten thousand of his phones.

He heard ringing, and then his landlord’s dry, emotionless voice.

“This is Stefan Oertel, Mr. Noor. From the cottage in the back of your
estate? I’m being invaded by ants. I need an exterminator right now.”

“Hyperio,” said Mr. Noor. “You tell Hyperio, he fixes that.” This was Mr.
Noor’s usual response. Unfortunately Mr. Noor’s handyman Hyperio was
some kind of illegal, who appeared maybe once a month. Stefan had seen
Hyperio just the other day, trimming the bushes and hand-rolling cigarettes.
This meant that the ants would rampage unchallenged for weeks.

“Does Hyperio have a telephone?” asked Stefan. “Does he even
have a last name?”

“Use poison spray,” said Mr. Noor shortly. “I’m very busy now.” Mr.
Noor was always on the phone to rich friends in the distant Middle East.
End of call.

Stefan snorted and squared his shoulders. The ant-war was up to
him.

He found his cyber-tool kit and extracted the coil of a flexible
flashlight. He poked his instrument through the slots in the back of his TV.
The ants had settled right in there, ambitious and adaptable, like childless