"Daniel Keys Moran - A Tale of the Continuing Time 01 - Emerald Eyes" - читать интересную книгу автора (Moran Daniel Keys)

They made plans, you see, and the universe, which cared no more for them than for you or I, struck
them down; and its tool was nothing less than a pair of Gods of the Zaradin Church, one of them myself,
fighting a battle in a war that was ended near sixty-five thousand years before they were ever born.
I will tell you of those days.

Darryl Amnier was a man without a title.
A title makes one knowable.
"Tell me about them," he said softly.
"Oui." Amnier's assistant was French; a depressingly large number of government employees were these
days. "The director's name is Montignet, Suzanne Montignet. She is French born, but arrived in the United
States in 2015. It is thought that her parents were fleeing the European theater of the War. She was fourteen
then. We do not have accurate records for her after leaving France; she arrived in America just a year before
the Unification War reached that continent. Her parents were killed, apparently by Americans, after the War
began. One would have expected this to turn a young girl against the country in which she found herself, but
obviously not. When next we have accurate records of her, beginning in 2018, she was studying under a
scholarship at the College of the Camden Protectorate, in New Jersey. She had by then, and retains today, a
substantially American accent. Though she spells her name 'Suzanne' she had further taken to pronouncing
her name 'Susan' in the American style, a habit which she also retains. In 2024 she graduated with high
honors; two years ago, her work in geneticsтАФit says here, sir, dee en ay, and ar en ay, Monsieur Amnier,
which are explained to meanтАФ"
"I know what they mean."
". . . oui. This work led to her current position with the United Nations Advanced Biotechnology Research
Laboratory in New Jersey, this 'Project Superman.' "
"Don't use that name. It's not correct."
The command did not seem to require an answer; after a pause Amnier's aide continued. "The Ministry of
Population Control has granted her an unlimited parenting license. She seems apolitical, aside from her
personal habits."
"By which you mean?"
"Monsieur, she lives in Occupied America, among a proud people who have been, hmm, conquered?
Conquered. An apparent distaste for the United Nations might be expedient."
"Not when dealing with the United Nations purse strings."
"Oui. As you say."
"What of Malko Kalharri?"
"What of Kalharri?" Amnier's aide seemed to find the question amusing. "Sir, I think there is very little I
can tell you which you do not already know about Colonel Kalharri."

With a shower of gamma rays I came into existence at the fast end of time.
A wind was raised with my appearance in the empty corridor. Had there been any to observe, they would
have heard the sharp crack created as air was moved aside at greater than the speed of sound, and might
have felt a brief warmth. Those with sharp eyes might have noticed a shadow in the fraction of an instant
before I moved away from the spot of my appearance. They would not have seen any more of me. Even at
my end of time they would have seen little to note; a human, dressed all in white, from the boots on my feet
to the white cowl that covered my head. Even with the visual distortion that is unavoidable when time is sped
so drastically, men of their century would have found the lack of focus upon the surface of a white shadow
cloak a striking thing.
Of course they were not in fast time, nor could be.
I began trudging through the air, toward my destination. The corridor was almost entirely dark; flashes of
ultraviolet light marked the passage of X-rays, each flash illuminating the corridor like a small lightning. The
normal visible spectrum was shifted too deeply into the radio to be of use to me.
I was in a hurry, pushing through the resisting atmosphere, and I am a man unaccustomed to hurrying;