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

find my voice, to bring my mind back into synch with my body. That's it. I
feel like my mind has lost touch with my body, like I've only forgotten how to
use it properly. If I

could only open my eyes. Of course, all there is to see right now is the
inside of a dark body bag. I just need to try a little harder.
We slow to a stop, and the driver kills the engine. We've arrived somewhere. I
start to work feverishly to regain some movement, any kind of movement. I have
to tell them I'm not dead, that they've made a mistake. I have to get out of
here. I hear the doors of the van clunk open, and I can hear the men talking
again. Weizack is saying something about the Urban Brawl game he lost some
money on last night. His partner Riley just grunts in response to his
ramblings.
Rough hands lift me out of the back of the van, and I try to squirm or
struggle inside the body bag to tell these two they're not handling a corpse.
I manage to flex my hands a bit, curling the fingers in to form fists, but I
still can't move my arms. The thought of Weizack and his chummer dropping me
in fright and cracking my skull on whatever is under me if I move flashes
briefly through my mind. I could end up needing a body bag for real then, but
I have to try and make them aware of me.
Then I hear a new voice speaking.
"Is this him?" the voice asks, barely audible through the thick vinyl body
bag. The sound of it is low and whispery.
"Yeah, right where you said he would be," Weizack says, his voice gone flat
and cold. The newcomer is obviously not a friend.
"Let me see," the other whispers.
I am lowered to the ground, and someone unzips the body bag. There is a rush
of cool night air, and a foul stench assaults my nostrils. It is the smell of
death and decay from the meat-wagon, but much worse and without the acidic
tang of the disinfectant to cover it. The touch of the cool air and the
terrible smell send another surge of adrenaline through my system, and I fight
to move or see what is going on.
"Good, good," the new voice whispers, and I shiver a bit at the sound. Did
they see that? "He's still in good shape, his aura is still bright and
strong."

A dry hand gently caresses my cheek and I nearly gag at the touch. It's like
the touch of a corpse. I can feel sharp nails like claws just barely grazing
my skin.
"Ah, fresh meat," the same voice whispers again with a sigh of pleasure,
sending a whiff of hot, foul breath wafting across my face. Hearing those
words, I regain some control over myself. My eyes snap open and I stare up
into what looks like the face of death itself. The figure crouched above me is
pale and hairless, with skin tinged the gray of the grave and drawn tight over
his bones. Thin lips curl back in a cruel smile, exposing sharp teeth that
remind me of a small, meat-eating animal. A narrow tongue of a darker shade of
gray emerges to lick his lips like a man sitting down to a feast. His hands
are bony claws tipped with sharp, rending nails, and his eyes are the worst of
all. White and blind, they seem to focus on my face, and yet look past my
flesh as if they were peering straight into my soul.