"Allen Steele - A King of Infinite Space" - читать интересную книгу автора (Steele Allen)

"Very good," the voice says, and that makes me feel better. Another abstract figure, this one curled over
like a crooked finger, appears before me. "Two. . ."

"T-t-ttt... too ... too!"

"Very good." Another figure: two backward curls, one atop of the other. "Three ..."

"Thrrpp ..." I spit saliva on the sheets. "Thrrr... threeee ..."

"You're doing very well" the voice says, and now I'm bouncing up and down in bed, proud of myself. A
stick crossed with a right-angle replaces the earlier numeral, and this time I identify it without any
trouble.

We get through the last six digits without any trouble, and when we're done the voice asks me to recite
all ten numbers. I really have to concentrate on this one, but after a few seconds it comes back to me:
"W-won . . . too . . . threeee . . . foh . . . fi-fyve . . . sex... se-se-seppen ... ate ... n-n-nyne ... tin!"

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 Steele, Allen - [Near-Space 05] - A King of Infinite Space



"Very good," the voice says. "Now there's only one last question, and after that you can go back to
sleep."

I wait anxiously, hoping that it won't ask me for the next number after ten. I know what two ones placed
next to each other look likeтАФI can visualize it in my mind's eye, and don't need to blink three times to
see itтАФbut I don't have the word for it.

"What is your name?" the voice asks.

I open my mouth, close it, open it again, close it once more. There's something in the back of my mindтАФ
a stream of half-recognized images that are at once as familiar as my toes and yet as unreal as this room,
that are real and significant and mean everything to me, but nonetheless untouchable ... and yet, at the
nucleus of this strange atom, I perceive a sound, a feeling, a word . ..

"Ah ... ah ... al... al... aleh ... aleh ... alekk ... alekk. .."

"Yes," the voice says. "That's correct. Your name is Alec. You may go to sleep now, Alec. You have
done very well, and we will continue this when you wake up."

Exhausted, I fall back against the pillows, pulling the sheets and blanket around me as I curl into a fetal
position with my hands tucked into my crotch. The voice loves me. The voice is proud of me. My name
is Alec, and I can stand up and walk and count to ten, and the voice says that's okay.

I slept, and woke up when the voice told me to wake up, and practiced walking some more, this time to a
small table and chair a few feet from my bed where a bowl of soup was waiting for me.

I don't know how to use a spoon, but when the voice tells me to blink three times, the stick man appears