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

exoplanetary enclaves on Mars and Titan have even heard of Samuel Morse or
Alfred Vail? I worked on that problem until it proved unsolvable with my current
information.

“Can’t be Dan the Can, JJ,” a man’s voice announced. “Probably one of
those Toshiba-Disney knockoffs made to look like Disney characters. But with a
bad weld. See that face? Dan doesn’t have Pinocchio’s nose or Dumbo’s ears.
Besides, something that’s lasted a million years wouldn’t just fall apart.”

I had the perfect retort at hand, but no voice available. Or hand, for that
matter. And by the time I was reassembled, the opportunity would surely be long
passed. Such, I have noticed, is life—or in my case, existence.

An interesting question arose. Although my primary sense organs are attached
to my cranium and therefore my identity feels similarly attached, no one on Earth
knew if whatever I used for a brain was in my head or placed, say, in my left leg. If
so, was I technically out of my mind right now? Or was it the other way round?

With a little luck and a lot of nose, my head stopped spinning with one eye
adequately positioned to see the rest of me—a convenient arrangement since I could
only migrate my eyes a few inches and without visual guidance, I’d have no way to
know if someone were standing in my body’s way. The thought of trampling little JJ
was upsetting.

Perhaps Professor Norhaart is right about me having a subconscious because
the exact telemetric etiquette was already waiting for me as I reached for it. While I
pondered what kind of signal my body could receive since most forms of
electromagnetic radiation bounce off me, the bulky thing stirred, the crowd gasped,
and a headless giant lurched across the Plaza. Couldn’t feel a thing until, a moment
later, my head clicked back into place with enough authority to almost convince me
the join was permanent.

I shrank my expanded features and bowed to my audience—taking due care
to keep my skull balanced!—as if I’d completed a circus trick. Then I hurried
toward 9th Avenue with an eye out, figuratively this time, for the nearest full-size taxi.
I’d only recently learned to fold myself to fit into a cab’s back seat.

A ride appeared quickly, but the wait while New York’s Energy Authority got
the gyros up to speed while feeding off my cred-disk seemed to last as long as my
stay on the Moon. Subjectively, much longer, since I couldn’t actually remember my
Moon visit. Embarrassment made me anxious to leave, and my relatively newfound
ability—only two weeks old—to feel embarrassment made me more anxious. And
I’d already been plenty anxious before my decapitation.

Boiling it down, I had to talk to Jon Norhaart immediately. Obviously,
something within me was going horribly wrong.

On the bright side, I now grasped a concept that had eluded me for years:
irony. I’d come to Lincoln Center this morning because it’s so infused with art and
culture, which inspires me when I face particularly difficult problems. And those