"Stephen Kenson - Technobabel" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kenson Stephen)

make sure you're all right. The Resonance is a difficult experience and it
sounds like you've had a harder time than most."
He lifts a slim cable ending in a chrome jack toward my

temple. I grab his wrist and he looks at me with hard, dark eyes for a moment.
"This is for your own good, my son. You must trust me."
I realize that if Papa Lo or any of his people wanted to kill me they would
have done it already, or simply left me in the alley to die, so I take the
cable from his hand and slot it into the jack behind my ear like I've done it
a thousand times before. It slides home with a faint click that shudders
through my being, and I feel a sense of completeness I haven't since I was
disconnected by the body-snatchers. I know I never feel so complete as when
I'm jacked in, the connection between me and the machine fills my spirit and
makes me feel whole again.
When Papa Lo powers the diagnostic deck, I can feel the trickle of power
flowing along the cable and into my jack, pulses of light and energy dancing
along the fibers like a kind of music filling my mind, like the rhythmic beat
of a drum or a living heart. Listening to the steady beat of the electrons, I
slip into a kind of trance and time does strange things as Papa Lo works the
keys and command surfaces of the deck. He's quiet and composed, carrying out
his work like an artist who seeks to achieve a perfect and peaceful state of
Zen as he works his art.
We sit there in silence I don't know how long as the energy trickles through
my system, probing and sifting like millions of invisible fingers. I can feel
them all, probing into all parts of my mind, but I relax and don't resist
their gentle brush against my mind. I know they can do me no harm and I feel
somewhere inside me that I could stop them if I really wanted to.
When Papa Lo powers down the deck, I start a bit, not realizing he is
finished.
"Your hardware is online," he says with his serene smile. "The memory is
wiped, but that has happened before. I thought there might be something in
there to help you, but no. The hardware is still good, and the casing is a bit
beat up," he says, gently touching my bruised arm, "but now we need to check
the wetware. Follow me." He gets up and makes to leave.

"Where are we going?" I ask. The old man glances up at me over his shoulder,
then begins slowly walking out of the room again. His voice carries back to me
as he goes.
"We're going to see if you can find your name," he replies, and I quickly move
to follow. Papa Lo guides me out of the room and into the hall of what I now
see is a deserted church, made over by the Netwalkers tribe into part of their
home, our home, I suppose, if I am one of them. The place still has a quiet
air of the sacred to it; not a place where people live day-to-day, but where
serious and important spiritual matters are handled.
In the basement of the church there is a room I had not expected to see, but
which strikes me with an overwhelming sense of deja vu as I step across the
threshold. I know I have been here before.
The room fills most of the long basement space. The low-beamed ceiling makes
it feel somewhat cramped and close. The walls are covered with hardware,
displays, and complex paintings and drawings done on the gray concrete with