"Alex Irvine - Intimations of Immortality" - читать интересную книгу автора (Irvine Alexander C)

one of his eat-the-rich diatribes. Telomerase therapy was so expensive that practically nobody could
afford it, and Matt wanted to be immortal as much as the next guy.

Except Norm. Live forever? Sounded like a nightmare to him. He'd probably see a hundred anyway, and
that seemed like enough to him. As it was, he doubted he'd recognize the world in his old age.

But was that really true? Here it is, halfway through the twenty-first century, Norm thought, and all the
old tensions are alive and well. It's amazing how nobody ever predicts that the future will be exactly like
their present. He broke again, was lucky to sink a ball because of a rack loose enough that it sounded
like maracas when he hit it, and was struck by the idea that a hundred years ago, bars were probably full
of guys shooting pool after an evening of loading office furniture and paper onto box trucks. Like him,
they probably didn't do their runs on Fridays, coming in on Sunday night instead when there were fewer
drunks on the roads. It was snowing outside, and Norm was glad he didn't have to go to Cheyenne.

One difference, though, between the nineteen fifties and now -- let alone desegregation, VR, electric
cars, the Water Crisis, and whatever else -- was that back then, young women who went slumming
weren't immortal.

The Greek gods coming down to Earth, Norm thought. Zeus sowing his wild oats, Apollo chasing
Daphne through the forest. He caught himself. Were they really that far apart, people on the T and the
rest of the world?

The four women sat in a corner booth by the fire exit. They watched TV, joked with each other --
probably sniggering about a bar that doesn't have terminals at every table, Norm thought. He missed his
next shot, pool invincibility clearly slipping away, and realized that deep down he was more sympathetic
to Matt Amidor than he'd thought. He looked at his three friends, laughing and waving their arms,
finishing the pitcher he'd just bought. Well into a Friday night.

This is not so bad, Norm thought. I like my job, I like my friends, I make enough money to have some
fun, and the world is full of pretty women. Who needs immortality?

Still, when the brunette immortal bought him a beer, Norm found himself as much curious as horny.

3

Sasha stayed a little ahead of Norman as they followed the stream down Herman Gulch. No wonder he's
excited, Norman thought. Eighteen years old, and for the first time he's about to go into a town during
daylight. Norman experienced a flush of pride, thinking that in twenty-first-century America, a nation of
three hundred eighty million people, he'd managed to raise a son who was completely at home in the real
world of trees, stone, and water.

Not that he'd stunted the boy. The battered terminal with its solar attachment and VR headgear had been
a pain in the ass to haul around --at least until he'd destroyed it when Sasha was six -- but Norman had
done it so Sasha would be educated. So he would have some exposure to the world of cities and human
society. So he would know about literature, history, government, politics. So he would be able to make
an informed choice when the time came for the choice to be made.

They stopped at the last big bend in the trail before it terminated in a dirt parking lot. Sasha's eyes were
wide like a deer's as he watched cars whirring up the slope to the Eisenhower Tunnel, and Norman
wondered what he was feeling. I've created a real-life Victorian novel two hundred years late, Norman