"William Sleator - Interstellar Pig" - читать интересную книгу автора (Sleator William)

"You know what?" Zena said abruptly. "All of a j sudden I have a powerful
nagging itch to get back j to the game. How about it?" :

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"Nice," Manny said. "I always want to play the game."

They turned on the lights, pulled their chairs up to the table and sat down
around the board I had noticed when I first came in. They hadn't asked me to
play, so I stood behind Zena and looked down at it. It was the first chance I
had had to study it, and I saw now that it was not like any board game I had
even encountered before.

"Hey, what game is this, anyway?" I asked, beginning to feel extremely
excited. It seemed to be a space fantasy, with dreamlike, but detailed,
planets. "I love games, but I've never seen anything like this. Where on earth
did you get it?"

There was a moment of silence. Then Zena said, "It's a very new game. I
suppose it isn't even on the market yet. It's still being . . . uh, what's the
word? . . . Consumer tested, that's it."

"How did you get your hands on it then?"

"Because ..."

"Because we ... encountered somebody in the business," Joe explained. "He
borrowed us an advance set."

"It was the best event that ever happened to us," Manny said with conviction.

"It's a noble game," Joe said. "We've been playing it every night, and we
still can't wrench ourselves away from it."

"But what's it called?" I asked again. "How do you play it?" I reached down to
pick up one of the pieces.

"Don't touch, you'll distress it!" Zena slapped my hand a lot harder than
seemed necessary.

"Questions, questions, questions," Joe murmured.

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