"David Brin - Senses Three and Six" - читать интересную книгу автора (Brin David)

These eyes in the sky keep coming back. And the picture of a burning mountain.
I try to shrug them aside, but another image comes, uninvited, unwelcome...
A closeup of the moon...


Hey, I'm not illiterate. Though my life depends on seeming as if I am. Like Bogart
said to Bacall, I been to college and I can read a book. It's just that I adapt real
good. And right now I've got to adapt to being Chuck Magun.
Chuck. Yeah. Cut this memory crap and think about Chuck. Reinforce Chuck.
Chuck looks a lot like I used to look, naturally. I couldn't change that. He's a big
guy with shoulders and everything heaped up six three or so. He looks mean. He lifts
weights every day and runs a few miles along the riverfront.
He's got an old Harley torn apart in his living room,
and either a country western station or the TV is on all the time.
Chuck drinks in local bars, curses at all the right bad plays when football is on,
and enjoys tearing up a patch of back road with his dirt bike, time to time. When he
races he uses a lot of profanity, but he never loses his temper.
He reads motorcycle racing magazines and maintenance manuals with a guilty,
hungry nervousness. He can't scan more than six or eight sentences without
suddenly looking up with a shy grin on his face, as if he expected to be kidded, or
maybe killed.
Mostly he doesn't read. He's a fully qualified member of the Great Unwashed. At
least I hope so.
Chuckie may also be getting married soon...


(... A closeup of the moon... the stars bitterly bright... purple cat-slitted eyes...)
 What was that? An earthquake? Did the bar shake? Why is my hand trembling?
Maybe I should stay away from provocative topics for a little while. As long as
I'm standing here mumbling to a pretend listener in my own mind, I might as well do
some background. It'll take up the time.
Ever been a bouncer?
You say no, my imagined friend? Well, let me explain. It's not a trivial trade.
Bouncers meet all the chicks. There seems to be a sort of fascination women feel
towards that husky bearded type of guy who stands alone with watchful eyes at the
edge of the bar with a big flashlight in his pocket and a beer that hardly gets touched
during the night. Maybe it's that here's a big stud whose whole purpose in life is to
make sure little girls don't get bothered in or around the Yankee Dollar if they don't
want to be.
Anyway, the girls here are always flirting with Chuck. He doesn't mind, but I hate
it. Their attentions make me nervous. I don't like strangers looking too close. Sure,
none of Them, the monsters who pursue me, could disguise himself as a young
woman. Especially the way they dress these days. Still, I have Chuck's girlfriend join
him here each night to shake the chicks loose.
Hell, it's not the girls' fault. Neither is it Chuck's. So much for bouncer lesson
number one.
Lesson number two is pick a place where kids hang out. You get a hell of a lot
more aggravation, minute by minute, but it's a damn sight better than working bored
sick in some topless place when some drunk jumps onto the runway to dance with