"Larry Niven & Steve Barnes - Dreampark" - читать интересную книгу автора (Niven Larry)

O'Brien's voice and ran with Skip's bouncy walk.
The rabbit disappeared from the field. The boy was gone a moment later. One of the techs diddled a
switch, and the image cut to the boy falling through the air.
Alex walked around the group to the transmission booth. By the slanted observation window he found
Melinda O'Brien.
Alex tapped her shoulder. "Looks like he's having fun."
The frown lines that had creased the corners of her mouth shallowed as she turned to him. "He
always does, doesn't he, Alex?" She raised a cheek for him to kiss.
Melinda smelled like perfumed powder, as always. She was handsome in an angular way. She should
wear her hair down, Alex thought, to soften the lines of her face. He'd never dared tell her that.
"It's good for him, Melinda. It's fun to watch, too."
She smiled for him and turned back to watch her husband.
In the field, an awkward white rabbit tumbled through space, mugging ferociously. In the
transmission booth, Skip waved his arms and thrashed in mock-panic. The computer-generated rabbit
animation cloaked him, following his body movements for reference.
Suddenly Skip looked straight at them and grinned. He hopped out of the booth and said, "Just be a
minute. Let me grab my coat."
The other Psych personnel gave him a rousing round of applause, and Skip took a quick bow. He
buttoned his jacket over his modest paunch, and slicked back a thatch of unruly blond hair. The
hair was a good transplant that had cut ten years off Skip's appearance. "Let's go," Skip said
cheerfully, and led the way.
"What was that about, Skip?"
O'Brien had reached the elevator doors. "Oh, yeah, that." He laughed. "We're going to rework the
Gravity Whip."
The doors opened, and Skip turned to Alex. "Where to?"
"Gavagan's?"
Skip raised an eyebrow to Melinda, who nodded quickly. Skip punched the Gavagan's code into the
selector. The door closed. A gentle sway told them they were moving.
"Why redo the Whip? It's still pulling 'em in."
"Because it is there. Alex, the Gravity Whip is almost twelve years old. We can do a lot better


file:///F|/rah/Larry%20Niven/Niven,%20Larry%20-%20Dream%20Park.txt (11 of 137) [1/19/03 5:52:29 PM]
 file:///F|/rah/Larry%20Niven/Niven,%20Larry%20-%20Dream%20Park.txt

now."
Melinda was genuinely curious. "That had something to do with your rabbit act?"
There was a clicking sound as their elevator cage switched rails. It began sliding sideways.
"Absolutely. We're going to rework the Whip for total Environment. Redesign the cars, add
opticals, sound, texture. We've got a dozen scripts waiting for the special effects programs.
Think of an 'Alice in Wonderland' where the customer really falls down the rabbit hole, or a space
trip where your gravity goes out at selected moments. Picture yourself as James Bond in that
skydiving sequence in 'Moonraker'-"
"Sounds good."
"-trying to steal a parachute before you hit ground! It gets better, too. We're working on ways to
stretch that thirty seconds of free-fall time, psychologically."
He got a blank stare from Alex, and Melinda gave a wise, tired sigh.
"Psychological time perception is extremely flexible. Just to start, there's anticipatory time,
time spent waiting for something to occur. There's experiential time, the apparent duration of
involvement in a given set of events, and there's reminiscent time, or 'recalled time' which is