"Jody Lynn Nye - Muchness" - читать интересную книгу автора (Nye Jody Lynn)

"combat pinny" and felt the surface under her. Rubbery but not slick, flexible but not pliable, it was
made of the same stuff as the air, but thicker. It moved by itself, too, changing in texture and
topography. As she tried to get to her knees to stand, she toppled over into a shallow pit that hadn't been
under her left hip the moment before. Gasping, Valerie rolled onto her belly. The gray formlessness
changed into swirls of color and raised up high beneath her feet, precipitating her down a slope that
ended sharply in a low protrusion like a garden wall. She fell forward, catching herself on her spread
palms. Sparks flew out from beneath her hands, and she noticed a faint glow around her fingers. Her
whole body was enveloped in a second skin made of light. Valerie's heart began to pound. No, the
experience wasn't a joke; it was real. Connor Fitzhugh didn't have the budget to create an environment
like this. She was on the other side of the door, the first human being to follow the lab rats to oblivion, or
to Chicago, if she could find her way there.
She forced herself to calm down. Swiftly, before the terrain could change again, she clambered to her
knees, and thence to her feet. Standing on one foot was easier for keeping her balance at first, until she
thought of keeping her heels very close together. This usually unstable position perversely permitted less
chance of losing her balance than a legs-apart stance. And now that she was standing, where should she
go? Connor Fitzhugh said that she would find herself instantaneously in Chicago. Since that was
palpably untrue, she had to find her own way to the receiver site. She scanned the panchromatic
landscape. But would she have to walk all the way to Chicago?
Muchness. She thought of Clyde's shamefaced grin as he tried to describe to her a sensation that
involved none of the normal five senses. What did he say? More. Where was more? Which way should
she go? She tried to open herself to any input, any direction, where something made her feel different
from the other ways, and, closing her eyes, spun in a slow circle.
Suddenly, she knew. There it wasтАФas if a light breeze brushed against her skin, but on the inside. The
muchness was at a great distance off to her left. Leaping off the slowly gathering mound underneath her
feet, she strode swiftly off toward the light touch with a surge of joy, knowing she was heading the right
way. The landscape seemed to share her elation, forming a series of mounds like stepping stones that
reached up one at a time to meet her feet. She felt a rush through her body each time she swung her leg
forward, as if each step encompassed miles. Within the protective bubble of energy, her body kept
changing shape. Sometimes she had dozens of legs, all wanting to go in different directions.
I'm making history, she kept telling herself. I am about to do a new thing no one else has ever done
before.
As a technician, Valerie wondered about the source of the light. Within a singularity traveling thousands

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 Muchness by Jody Lynn Nye

of miles per second, she shouldn't be able to see, yet the area around her was lit in some way. Everything
was suffused with a neutral light. She cast no shadow, not between her fingers or under the hem of her
skirts, not even underfoot. Ahead of her, now to the left, now to the rear, was a node of the matter that
made up the terrain, but it felt different to her from the rest. The skin of light around her brightened in
intensity, but even without that clue, Valerie knew that here was muchness. She moved toward it,
excited. What should she say to the scientists in Chicago? Would she have to grow larger again? The
terrain parted into a kind of trough, leading her down toward a wall, where the light inner touch called to
her joyfully.
Something did not feel quite right. Valerie knew it even as she passed through the grayness.
One foot set down more forcefully than she intended upon a polished length of wood. To her right and
left were dozens and dozens of bottles. She had come in through the mirror over the rear bar of a tavern
of some kind, though not English. By the unmistakable noise of traffic coming in the open door, the
urban styles of dress and the depressed expressions of most of the patrons sitting on stools around the
room, she guessed she must be in New York City.