"George R. R. Martin - WC 8 - One Eyed Jacks" - читать интересную книгу автора (Martin George R R)

voices-passengers in the car ahead, looking through the window as she'd done,
making fun, demanding action.
As the train trundled down into the tunnel beneath the East River, the joker
stirred. Perhaps, Cody thought, he senses the presence of the water? What's he
doing still on land, anyway-unless, my God, to give him a body designed for an
aquatic environment without the gills that would enable him to live there! Not
the cruelest joker deal by far, she knew, but it still provoked a silent snarl.
Hell, even if he is amphibian-if he was an adult when the virus activated, who's
to say he could hack abandoning the world he knew, friends, family, job,
everything that's familiar, that gives his existence purpose and meaning, for a
new world. As unknown and alien as another planet, where he'd be all alone.
Could I go, if he was me?
And her thoughts turned to Dr. Tachyon, the man--and she laughed softly,
bitterly at that, because Tachyon was less of a 'man' in any human sense than
she-responsible for the wild card. Whose people had sent it to Earth and turned
humanity inside out. She wondered if she should hate the little geek for what
he'd done? And yet, hadn't he spent the forty-odd years since trying to make up
for that, fighting for the health and welfare of the 'people' his virus had
created? There were probably worse fates than working by his side.
It helped, of course, that she needed the job.
His eyes were open. Black eyes, a shark's eyes, no depth, no emotion, flat,
opaque plates, bright as gleaming lacquer except that they absorbed everything
they gazed upon. Looking at Cody. She shifted on her feet, figuring to stand and
slip back the way she came, into the comparative safety of the next car. But
when she moved, so did he. Not much, just enough to let her know he was aware of
her intention. Shit. She had a gun-a service .45 she'd carried ever since the
'Nam-but it was locked in its case at the bottom of her carryall. Useless. Her
shoulder blades contracted, as if she had an itch down her spine, and she
crossed her wrists beneath her breasts, huddling close about herself. A vague
glitter drew her eyes downward and her breath caught ever so slightly as she saw
her skin glisten like the joker's. For the briefest moment, flesh and bone
seemed to flow together, twisting and curling where it once was straight,
tentacle instead of arm. When she looked back at the joker, he was showing
teeth.
"Stop it," she hissed. "Leave me alone!"
Something wriggled beneath her blouse, an itching, tickling sensation under the
armpits that set her to looking frantically about the car for a weapon.
"Damn you," she snarled, "leave me alone!"
A bounce and a jerk and a screech heralded their arrival at Lexington Avenue,
the first stop in Manhattan, and the brakes snagged again, as they had in
Queens, pitching Cody forward on hands and knees, sending her sprawling full
length. The joker had anchored himself with one tentacle, was reaching for her
with the others. Baring her teeth, she groped for her foot, coming up with a
shoe-thankful now it had a heel-swinging as hard as she could toward the
creature's face. It was like hitting sponge rubber, the flesh simply gave
beneath the impact. But the joker howl-yowled in surprise and pain and rage,
flinching away from her, gathering one set of tentacles protectively around its
face while the other reached again for her, snagging hold even as Cody spasmed
reflexively backward against the doors, which miraculously-a split second too
late-opened. She heard a cry of rage and alarm, sensed rather than saw a pair of