"Will McCarthy - Bloom" - читать интересную книгу автора (McCarty Sarah)

"Flash it to me," Jinacio insisted, not quite rudely. His face looked as though he'd skipped a day shaving,
though his short hair was immaculately brushed; the tone of voice matched this image perfectly, at once
careless and deliberate and attentive. He seemed the sort of casual charmer who could hover at the edge
of rudeness and never quite cross it. Probably common in his usual circles: he was a Response lieutenant,
twice decorated, most recently in charge of a unit of eight rowdy veterans and a pair of trainees. I'd read
through the bio an hour or two before, and found it impressive. Nobody called him by the name it gave:
Christofolo. Nobody questioned his right to speak as he pleased.

The woman, Jenna Davenroy, interested me less. A nuclear engineer a little over half my mother's age,
she was slated to be Pasteur's ladderdown expert and chief propulsion monitor. Her bona fides seemed
more academic in nature; she had rescued no children, but had apparently contributed to the body of
knowledge that kept the lights on, the caverns warm. Just now she was nodding, agreeing with what Tug
Jinacio had said.

"What better way to get to know you than rifling through your private thoughts? Do please allow us."

The lines in her face were not numerous, but they cut deep, and moved readily when she talked. Her
gaze was weighty.

"Really, it's nothing," I insisted, conscious suddenly of being the only one at the table not wearing spacer
blues. But I flashed them copies of my windows.

Jinacio whistled. Davenroy's eyebrows went up. "Cluttered," she said, her tone amused but also oddly
approving.

I blushed and ducked my head. "I don't usually run so opaque; I'm just trying to psych myself up for this.
IтАж I don't know. I saw the ship today."

"Ah," Davenroy said, nodding. "A little anticipatory cabin fever. That's normal. I take it you haven't done
ship time before?"

I shuddered, my nostrils filling with the mingled scents of sweat and excrement, my ears with the moans
of those who'd been confined too long to their bunks. Free movement shifts limited to four hours, day
after day. "No," I said quietly, "not since the Evacuation."

"Doesn't count. Conditions have improved a lot since then. Still, the zee is your friend; you should keep
that in mind at all times. You don't dabble much in visual ideation, I take it? Most people don't."

"No," I agreed, "I don't."

"But you have no specific objection to the practice?"

I shrugged. Ideation was a habit, like sweets or stimulants or alcohol, not inherently deviant or harmful in
and of itself. Useful in the arts and sciences, of course, and practiced by many respectable citizens. And
yet, most of the Immunity's ideators simply had too much time on their hands, and too little energy. Why
change the world, or even yourself, when you could craft or purchase fantasy environments optimized to
your taste and habits? Illegal spec mods aside, the eyes and ears could absorb a great many pleasurable
stimuliтАФnot so different, really, from listening to music or going out to the theater or flashing down the
occasional VR drama. The temptation was an entirely natural one, and suspect for precisely that reason.
Yes, I had done it from time to time, but not often. We had a society to run, now, didn't we?