"John Meaney - Blood and Verse" - читать интересную книгу автора (Meaney John)

Her eyes widen.

тАЬYou donтАЩt meanтАФ?тАЭ

With a nod: тАЬI untangled.тАЭ

For a long moment, she can think of nothing to say.

Who am I, she must be wondering, to have been implanted thus before birth?
Nervous system wired with tanglethreads, able to make the instantaneousтАФbut
one-wayтАФno-time trip to anywhere. To be reconstituted in any tangledrop station in
the galaxy.
 тАЬIтАФтАЭ

Growing pale, her skin.

She could not have guessed. Ordinary lightspeed vessels use tangledrop
stations, tooтАФbut purely as orbiting way-stations for passengers who disembark on
their own two feet. Those passengers are few enough in number; fewer still, are
those whose quantum-entangled selves are rebuilt inside the great attocompilers,
while their original selves decohere into messy chaos.

тАЬWhere did you say youтАЩre from?тАЭ

тАЬMy homeworld is Calazzo IV.тАЭ

Her skin is bone-white now. Even her lips are bloodless.

тАЬThis is a civilised society, Blood Poet.тАЭ She is shaking, with fear or rage.
тАЬYour kindтАЩs not welcome here.тАЭ

***

Entangled particles can belong to many pairs simultaneously: hence the
overlapping connections of the galaxy-wide topology, so that tangledrop stations
orbit all the civilised worlds. Each journey is instantaneous and irreversible.

Once my commission is done, I can choose to remain hereтАФfor life (if that is
safe)тАФor to voyage home at lightspeed. There, perhaps, I will undergo years-long
resetting, involving weekly boring sojourns in the House tanglewomb, until I am
tangle-enabled once more, and ready for a second commission.

At least I could catch up on my reading.

But Mother, if not Father as well, will be two centuries dead by the time I set
foot upon CalazzoтАЩs soil.

***

ItтАЩs not as though I wasnтАЩt warned. Scant comfort.