"Shane Tourtellotte - Swap-Out" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tourtellotte Shane)

insulates you if you're confrontational with other employees."
"I wasn't having a confrontation." Egan called up a model. "I've got nothing against
Kelly Borzas -- as an employee."
Larssen walked away, having had enough. Egan knew he wasn't finished, yet.
***
He sneaked a camera into work the next day. Fortunately, Kell still had her trial headgear.
He snapped a pair of photos without being spotted.
That evening, he and two other pals from his Zone with similar pictures distributed
them to one of the largest advocacy websites for cybers. Egan had composed captions,
but the webmaster thought them excessive. Egan didn't mind. The ludicrous images
spoke for themselves.
Those images got picked up by other sites, and eventually made it to one of the larger
newspages for an article on external brain adjuncts. The piece wasn't derisive enough of
externals for Egan's tastes, but it was a start.
Kell had stopped wearing her device the next day. Egan said nothing to her. If she had
come to her senses, he didn't want to bungle it with a misplaced word. The next Monday,
though, he wished he had said something.
This device looked almost the same as the first, but the big giveaway was the cable
now running from the neck-band beneath her right ear to her desktop computer. Kell had
gone cyber, in her pathetic little way.
Egan could see from across the room how happy she was with her toy. Officemates
were equally enraptured, making excuses to come over and ask questions. He heard Kell
answering them, her voice carrying more than usual.
"Yes, much faster."
"No, it doesn't hurt. Not even the tingles Doctor Shea told me about."
"My thinking isn't different. It's ... more. I feel in control, and that's a relief."
She was the center of attention, the same way he was back when fourth grade
began. No, not quite. These people were more childlike, all innocence and wonder and
uncritical acceptance. Egan's old classmates -- the ones who taunted him, made up
insolently clever and humiliating rhymes, or just shunned him -- they had the more adult
attitudes.
So typical of people, proclaiming their openness to change, as long as it doesn't
change much, doesn't give them some appearance they can't get their minds past. Kids
were better. At their most brutal, they were more honest about what they thought.
He had proved himself better than his boyhood tormentors. He'd do it again with this
self-satisfied choirgirl playing at being just like him. He had the first step in mind already.
All he needed was a couple of days to get himself ready.
***
"How's that thing working?"
Kell's half-closed eyes didn't blink. She was probably still having trouble getting
accustomed to internal projection. "All right," she said.
"It's crunching all of your numbers properly? Wait, your desktop always did that job. I
guess you just shuffle those numbers into place faster now."
"Oh, I do some of the math myself. I always did. I enjoy it." She opened a drawer on
the side closer to him, and lifted out a calculator that had once occupied her desk. "I don't
need this anymore, though. Not that I always did before."
"Wow. You're pretty confident of your abilities."
She finally smiled. "I've always been excellent at math. With this," she said, tapping
her headset, "I'm faster than ... well, faster than you with your implants, I'd bet."
Egan fought not to grin. This was almost too easy. "Bet? Sounds like a challenge, Kell.