"Anthony,.Piers.-.Mute (2)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Anthony Susan)

Knot expected no direct answer to that. He was wrong. She will succeed.

The seduction or the conversion to CC?

Both.

Don't I have anything to say about it? Knot demanded.

Nothing.

Nothing?

It has been determined. Mit knows.

Knot experienced a sudden firm resolve. He would see about that! He had little faith in precognition, especially as it might relate to himself. A storm might be predicted accurately enough; it had no free will. A man was different.

Finesse was making herself comfortable, arranging her limbs attractively, setting up for her effort. Knot tried to ignore her.

Other psi powers were remarkable but basically sensible. They merely accomplished by mental means what could also be done by physical means. His own talent was an example: There were drugs and treatments that could cause people to forget recent events, temporarily or permanently. They interfered with the intermediate process of memory fixation, so that the short-term memories never made the necessary transition to long-term memories. Electric currents applied to certain sections of the brain could erase established memories. The leadmuter's ability was another example. Transmutation of substances could be accomplished in the laboratory, with extraordinary effort and expense; this was not worthwhile economically, but it was possible. Clairvoyance was merely the awareness of surrounding landscapes and events, and extension of the normal perceptions. Telepathy was like a built-in intercom.

But precognitionЧthat was essentially fortune-telling. It was inherently paradoxical, since the future was mutable. Tell a man he was about to step into a hole and hurt himself, and he would avoid that hole, rendering that prediction inaccurate. Thus true precognition could not existЧat least, not if what it showed were told to the subject.

There are rats who don't believe weasels can kill them, Hermine thought.

I'm a rat, all right.

"Dollar for your thoughts," Finesse said, smiling at him. He almost felt the warmth penetrating his skin, compelling his body to react. She was so infernally pretty; it was her weapon, and she used it well.

"A genuine archaic hundred-cent note?"

"Or equivalent in service. Women have been known to do a lot for a dollar."

Don't try to fence with that predator; she'll eat yon up, Hermine warned.

"Hermine thinks I'm a rat and you're a weasel."

Finesse stretched, elbows bent, breasts flattening under
the cloth of shirt and jumper. "Some rats are attractive enough."

"And some weasels." But he had a challenge to rise to: the proof or disproof of precognition. "What's to stop me from just walking out of here, now, a rat that slips the trap?"

She gestured at the effects continuing beyond the mouth of the cave. "That."

The electrical display was at its height. Every tree radiated streams of light, illuminating the landscape so brightly it was difficult to watch. Knot was not sure what such a flow of current would do to his body and brain, and did not care to experiment. On the other hand, he knew it was not safe at this time to approach the lead-muter. To that extent the precognition was correct. He would have to remain here.

But he did not have to be seduced into anything! Finesse was lovely, and she was a normal, and his memory of his last engagement with herЧand the timely and graphic reminder of it she bad provided via the holograph Чfired his imagination and desire. But he had willpower, and he could not sell his conscience for sex.

Yes you will, Hermine thought. Her net is closing over you already. She obtained a distance precog about the storm, and timed this visit to coincide. You never had a chance.