"Monica Hughes - Devil On My Back" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hughes Monica)

dug painfully into his hip. He pried it out of the dirt with his fingernails and threw it away. He pulled up all
the long grass he could reach and made it into a wad to support his neck. If only he weren't so cold and
hungry he would be able to sleep.
In ArcOne everyone would be sleeping. Oh, if only he were back in his warm bed, with the
computer to tell him when to sleep and when to wake. Why wasn't his lifepak helping him to go to sleep?
His infopaks worked all right. Why couldn't he sleep? It was ridiculous to be awake in the middle of the
night.
He groaned and struggled up on one elbow. Above his head the stars were a bright scatter of
cold points of light. He stared until they slowly sorted themselves into patterns he could recognize. He
accessed Astronomy. Yes, there was Andromeda... there Casseiopeia. And Ursa Minor low down in the
north, up river, right over the place where ArcOne must be.
His astropak had never told him how very far away the stars would look, how very empty the
spaces between them, how very lonely a single person on the surface of the planet Earth must feel, staring
up at them, seeing them stare coldly down.
"I want to go home. Oh, I want to go home." But his voice made the loneliness more intense.
There was no other human sound. Nothing but the liquid murmur of the river and the dry whisper of wind
in the reeds. He crouched down in the grass and wept. After a long time he fell asleep.
***
He woke, stiff and sore, hungrier than ever. He pushed himself onto his knees and used a sapling
to haul himself to his feet. The ceremonial toga that had probably saved his life, wrapped around his body
with air trapped within its folds, was now a damp creased mess. He stripped it off, shook it out and hung
it over a bush to dry in the sun. Then he looked down to see what had happened to him.
Both knees were raw and there was a long but shallow gash on his right thigh. Purple bruises had
come up across his belly and on his arms and legs. What had happened after the sleeping gas had hit
him? He must have turned as he fell and landed face down in the sewer that had shot him with the City
waste out into the river. That would account for the bruises and scrapes. If he'd landed on his back his
paks would have been torn right off. He was luckyтАФup to a point.
Only what now? He clutched his drooping belly. He had no idea that hunger would hurt so much.
In all his life the only pain he had suffered had been from overeating. Oh, how he hurt! He had got to find
something to eat.
Dressed in his underpants and shirt and sandals he picked his way along the shore, looking for a
likely place to fish. It was easy, Denn had said. Find a pool where the fish lie still and just hook them
through the gill flaps with your fingers. Nothing to it. But then in the dream Denn had said that making fire
was easy too. Even if he did catch a fish, could he bear to eat it raw? He shuddered.
Slowly he made his way back along the shore to where he had hung his toga. There was a brisk
breeze off the river and the sun was rising above the hill. His toga was dry enough to wear.
He put it on carefully, draping the folds precisely around his infopaks. He would not try to make
a fire. He would not waste time trying to fish. He would set out immediately to walk back to ArcOne. It
couldn't be far upriver. If he started right away he might be back in time for lunch. He should certainly be
back for dinner. All he had to do was to follow the river upstream. There was no way he could get lost.
It was a pity he was on the left bank instead of the right. But the river was too wide to think of crossing
here. He would find ArcOne and then think about crossing the river.
He began to walk briskly along the shore. After a few minutes he found that sandals designed for
the stroll from apartment to dining hall to library or study were not the best kind of footwear to protect
toes and ankles from stones, sharp reeds and unexpected pieces of dead wood. He limped painfully on.
Before long he noticed a dazzle of light in his eyes. He was facing east instead of north. He must
be on a deep bay, he told himself. In a minute or two the shore will straighten out and turn north again.
The sun began to warm his left cheek. Then his back. He stopped, looked around puzzled, and
saw something on the ground that set his heart pounding. Footprints! He was not alone. There was
someone else, perhaps someone as knowledgeable as Denn, who could make a fire and catch fish. "Hi!"