"Robert Reed - 555" - читать интересную книгу автора (Reed Robert)

to understand. It occurs to me, not for the first time, that Claudia is
merely a feminized version of his ideals, her popularity born from every
soul's natural desire to acquire power and fame and some form of wealth,
whether it is gold or goats or ghostly electronic credits.
"Thank you, Joan. Thank you."
He is a god, but his simple brown hair is messy and his office needs to
be swept clean. I notice the colorless dust that dulls the top of his desk,
and I notice the tiny flakes of dead skin sloughed off the backs of his small,
ugly hands. "You're welcome, sir," I reply. My own hands are quite
smooth. A flexible plastic body has been configured to my size and
proportions, my features projected onto the blank form of the head. My
soul is elsewhere. Like Mitchell, I am a projection. A visitor. I have been
dressed as if I am a guest at a casual party. My sandals are a little too
small. I wriggle my toes, playing with the new pain. And I quietly ask,
"Where is Mitchell now?"
"Cleaning out his office, naturally. With my security people watching
over him. For good measure."
I nod, allowing myself a little smile.
"That bastard," the Producer growls.
 Apparently writers have few admirers. This is interesting, I think.
Everything here is interesting.
"May I look out your window?" I ask.
"By all means. Look outside, or walk around the studios. You can keep
the body for the entire day, if you want."
What do I want?
He watches as I stroll past his enormous desk. Then with an
appreciative voice, he asks, "How did you know what Mitchell was
planning?"
"He isn't a very good liar," I admit. The world outside his window is flat
and brown, square buildings and very few trees stretching off into a grimy,
gray distance. "When I looked at Mitchell, I could see what he wanted."
"To kill Claudia."
"He hated her, I think. From what she has told me, they have had some
arguments--"
"Only a few thousand, yes."
"And it was easy to sense that something had happened. Mitchell was
manipulating a minor component of the City in a desperate effort to
extract a measure of revenge."
"He had just been fired."
"I imagined something like that," I reply. "That's why I shot his
projection, alerting your security features that something was amiss."
"But you're wrong," he assures me. "You're not a minor component in
any world, Joan. I mean that."
A fond arm drops over my shoulder.
I make a show of smiling, and then I deftly turn and slip out from under
his grasp.
"How's the view?" he inquires hopefully.
"It's interesting," I say. Then I lie, telling him, "You have a beautiful
view from this window."
Set on his enormous and dusty desk is a telephone much like mine. I