"Charles Stross - Lobsters" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stross Charles)

After a momentТs thought she rolls socks onto his exposed feet, then, expertly wielding a tiny tube of cyanoacrylate, glues his fingertips together. Then she switches off the air conditioning. HeТs twisting and straining, testing the cuffs: tough, itТs about the nearest thing to sensory deprivation she can arrange without a flotation tank and suxamethonium injection. She controls all his senses, only his ears unstoppered. The glasses give her a high-bandwidth channel right into his brain, a fake metacortex to whisper lies at her command. The idea of what sheТs about to do excites her, puts a tremor in her thighs: itТs the first time sheТs been able to get inside his mind as well as his body. She leans forward and whispers in hisr ear: "Manfred. Can you hear me?"
He twitches. Mouth gagged, fingers glued: good. No back channels. HeТs powerless.
"This is what itТs like to be tetraplegic, Manfred. Bedridden with motor neurone disease. Locked inside your own body by nv-CJD. I could spike you with MPPP and youТd stay in this position for the rest of your life, shitting in a bag, pissing through a tube. Unable to talk and with nobody to look after you. Do you think youТd like that?"
HeТs trying to grunt or whimper around the ball gag. She hikes her skirt up around her waist and climbs onto the bed, straddling him. The goggles are replaying scenes she picked up around Cambridge this winter; soup kitchen scenes, hospice scenes. She kneels atop him, whispering in his ear.
"Twelve million in tax, baby, thatТs what they think you owe them. What do you think you owe me? ThatТs six million in net income, Manny, six million that isnТt going into your virtual childrenТs mouths."
HeТs rolling his head from side to side, as if trying to argue. That wonТt do: she slaps him hard, thrills to his frightened expression. "Today I watched you give uncounted millions away, Manny. Millions, to a bunch of crusties and a MassPike pirate! You bastard. Do you know what I should do with you?" HeТs cringing, unsure whether sheТs serious or doing this just to get him turned on. Good.
ThereТs no point trying to hold a conversation. She leans forward until she can feel his breath in her ear. "Meat and mind, Manny. Meat, and mind. YouТre not interested in meat, are you? Just mind. You could be boiled alive before you noticed what was happening in the meatspace around you. Just another lobster in a pot." She reaches down and tears away the gel pouch, exposing his penis: itТs stiff as a post from the vasodilators, dripping with gel, numb. Straightening up, she eases herself slowly down on it. It doesnТt hurt as much as she expected, and the sensation is utterly different from what sheТs used to. She begins to lean forward, grabs hold of his straining arms, feels his thrilling helplessness. She canТt control herself: she almost bites through her lip with the intensity of the sensation. Afterward, she reaches down and massages him until he begins to spasm, shuddering uncontrollably, emptying the darwinian river of his source code into her, communicating via his only output device.
She rolls off his hips and carefully uses the last of the superglue to gum her labia together. Humans donТt produce seminiferous plugs, and although sheТs fertile she wants to be absolutely sure: the glue will last for a day or two. She feels hot and flushed, almost out of control. Boiling to death with febrile expectancy, now sheТs nailed him down at last.
When she removes his glasses his eyes are naked and vulnerable, stripped down to the human kernel of his nearly transcendent mind. "You can come and sign the marriage license tomorrow morning after breakfast," she whispers in his ear: "otherwise my lawyers will be in touch. Your parents will want a ceremony, but we can arrange that later."
He looks as if he has something to say, so she finally relents and loosens the gag: kisses him tenderly on one cheek. He swallows, coughs, then looks away. "Why? Why do it this way?"
She taps him on the chest: "Property rights." She pauses for a momentТs thought: thereТs a huge ideological chasm to bridge, after all. "You finally convinced me about this agalmic thing of yours, this giving everything away for brownie points. I wasnТt going to lose you to a bunch of lobsters or uploaded kittens, or whatever else is going to inherit this smart matter singularity youТre busy creating. So I decided to take whatТs mine first. Who knows? In a few months IТll give you back a new intelligence, and you can look after it to your heartТs content."
"But you didnТt need to do it this way-"
"DidnТt I?" She slides off the bed and pulls down her dress. "You give too much away too easily, Manny! Slow down, or there wonТt be anything left." Leaning over the bed she dribbles acetone onto the fingers of his left hand, then unlocks the cuff: puts the bottle conveniently close to hand so he can untangle himself.
"See you tomorrow. Remember, after breakfast."
SheТs in the doorway when he calls: "But you didnТt say why!"
"Think of it as spreading your memes around," she says; blows a kiss at him and closes the door. She bends down and thoughtfully places another cardboard box containing an uploaded kitten right outside it. Then she returns to her suite to make arrangements for the alchemical wedding.


й 2001 by Charles Stross
First published in AsimovТs Science Fiction, June 2001

Version History

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Ver 1.5 - 18/8/2003 - Anarchy Publications, HaVoK - This version was originally downloaded from the #bookz channel on undernet using mIRC. The final proof was done with Atlantis by Rising Sun Solutions.