"Rajnar Vajra - A Million Years and Counting" - читать интересную книгу автора (Vajra Rajnar)

A MILLION YEARS AND COUNTING by RAJNAR VAJRA

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[Insert Pic AFF0906Story09.jpg Here]
Illustrated by John Allemand
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The tendency to forget why you came into a room may increase with age, but few
have experienced it quite like this!

I was walking across Lincoln Center’s Josie Robertson Plaza the first time my
head fell off.

Something inside my neck clicked, my body froze in place, the world and sky
circled each other, and my cranium clanged against hard tiles. Twice. The second
due to a minor bounce.

Strange.

If my head were as spherical as it had been when I’d been found, and no one
was thoughtful enough to put out a blocking foot, it might’ve rolled all the way to 9th
Avenue—surely a world record of some kind. Instead, my extruded nose, chin, ears,
and imitation cheekbones insured a wobbling course, which made it tricky to
calculate where my head would come to rest.

The resulting estimate was worrisome. My need had summoned protocols for
handling such a crisis—which was strange in itself since the event seemed so
improbable—but no assurance these protocols would work with my cranium
between nine and ten meters from my body. Further calculations started me
extending my nose and expanding my ears.

The Metropolitan Opera House, some gushing waters, Avery Fisher Hall, and
the New York State Theater revolved around me at creative angles and I fancied the
scene would be dramatic as viewed from above: an oversized humanoid noggin in
tasteful sheens of gold and silver careening over the tiled spider-web surrounding
Revson Fountain.

I hoped someone was enjoying my situation; it added no luster to my day.
And certainly, I had no shortage of audience. At ten to eight on a cloudless morning
in early March, Lincoln Center wasn’t crowded, but it was hardly uninhabited.
Dozens of voices gasped, yelled, muttered, or swore. After the initial surprise, the
most popular phrase was “Moon Robot,” including one youngster’s screech: “Hey,
Dad! That’s the Moon Robot! How come its head popped off?” I knew the Plaza
was crackling, even more than usual, with patterned microwaves doubtless
image-messaging my predicament.

If anyone, I thought, would manually re-place my crown, the gesture would be
deeply appreciated. I blinked a similar message ten times in Morse code but with
humble expectations. How many people in this decade of megapatches and