"George Alec Effinger - Posterity" - читать интересную книгу автора (Effinger George Alec)

live."
Courane felt the blood drain from his face. "I don't want to know about that," he said
quietly.

Eldr├зs shook her head. "Well," she said, "it's why we have to get right to work. Your
surgery was a success, all right, but there are more tumors in there, and not long from now
one of them will rupture. You're going to die on your own bathroom floor, stark naked, in
terrible pain."
"Thanks," said Courane. "Thanks a lot." He took a couple of deep breaths, but it didn't
help the sudden feeling of dreamlike disorientation that had seized him. He felt a monstrous
anxiety attack looming.

"I'm terribly sorry," said Eldr├зs, "but you can't let it depress you. I mean, everybody dies,
you know. Everybody has to face it."

"Yeah," said Courane angrily, "but everybody doesn't have to hear all the awful details in
advance. How long do I have? A year?"

Eldr├зs shook her head.

"Six months?"

She shook her head again.

"Don't tell me," said Courane. "I really don't want to know." The woman from the future
held up a hand. "Calm down, Mr. Courane. I'm here to help you."

"Help me do what? You've already made sure that however much time I've got left is
going to be miserable. I'm going to wake up every morning from now on wondering if this is
the day. What kind of a life is that?"

Eldr├зs sighed. "Some people do that their whole lives, no matter how old they live to be.
I'm telling you this for a reason. I'm giving you the chance to fill the great gap you left when
you died in my time line."
"You've come back to change the past, is that it?" said Courane.

"I've got it on good authority that such a thing is impossible."

Eldr├зs found that amusing. "Whom are you going to believe," she said, "me or one of
your science fiction writer friends?"
"Time travel is impossible," said Courane. "Changing the past is even more
impossible."
"I can take your pain away," she said softly.

That caught Courane's attention. "How? By getting the nurse for me? I'm due for a shot of
Demerol."
"My way is much better than Demerol," said Eldr├зs,

"What do you mean? Morphine? That stuff makes me throw up."