"Steven Popkes - Holding Pattern" - читать интересную книгу автора (Popkes Steven)

nearly twenty years ago and the mileage on each had been different. This man had never pursued
anonymity with Coban's intensity. But the resemblance was still close enough to see.
"Tomas Tikal," said the man on the bench. He fiddled with his cane again.

"Tomas Coban," Coban replied.

"I know. I've been expecting you." Tikal smiled briefly.

Coban shrugged and sat next to him. He looked up and watched the drones circle each other, each
executing intricate handshake maneuvers to determine the other's authenticity. A brief flash and one of
Tikal's drones flared and fell to the ground.

"I was wondering about that one," Tikal said dryly. "I suppose its signature didn't match up."

"What are you doing here?" Coban asked. "We're not supposed to seek each other out."

"That's not exactly true." Tikal crossed his arms against the cold and Coban wondered where he had
been living for the last twenty years. "We're allowed to interact under precisely controlled conditions and
when we're thoroughly monitored." He waved to the drones. "I think we're being monitored sufficiently."

"What do you want?"

Tikal didn't answer. Instead, he watched the drones fly over them. "Things would have been completely
different if it had been the French that had taken us down. They would have picked one of us at random,
declared him the right one and executed him."

Coban stared at him. What was going on here? "If it had been the Russians, we would all be dead the
moment a glorious victory was declared. A quick mock trial and then on to the next. So what? Our own
people wouldn't have needed a trial or proof. You know that. Only the Americans were interested. And
then only because we slaughtered some American nuns." Coban glanced away. It wouldn't do to let Tikal
watch his face too closely. They were alike enough Tikal might be able to detect what he was thinking.
"They should have killed us and been done with it. That's what I would have done."

Tikal laughed. "Me, also. A peculiarity of the American psychology, do you think? The messianic
determination to blame a single human face for a crime. Hitler, Pol Pot, Hussein, Ho Chi Minh. Now,
Tomas. That could be why they have kept us in custody."

"Perhaps." He thought about his so-called brothers. There were seven of them: each changed to resemble
Tomas. All of them had the same plastic surgery scars on face, hands, and feet. At first they were thought
to be clones, but DNA comparisons dispelled that immediately. It would have been easier if they had
been clones. Tomas, the original Tomas who must have been hiding among them, had mixed samples of
his own DNA with the others in all of the places where he had been known to reside. A bed where
Tomas had been known to sleep had skin and hair from all seven of them. A razor with which he had cut
his face was stained with multiple samples of blood. Bloody Tomas, without kin, without family, without
even a surname, had disappeared in plain sight.

After several years of investigation, the Americans gave up and decided they could not determine which
of the seven was the real Tomas. Each was given a surname according to where they had been found:
Tulate, Tikal, Coban, Dolores, Pasion, San Jose, and Livingston.