"Robert Weinberg - Logical Magician 01 - A Logical Magician" - читать интересную книгу автора (Weinberg Robert)

rotten. First in the office building, now in his apartment. Not that he had much choice the
time before, when Merlin and Megan had been kidnapped. Megan! With a start, he
recognized her as the girl in his sleep.
Anxiously, he tried to grasp the fleeting figments of his dream. Jack felt sure that
Merlin's daughter had been trying to contact him. Perhaps she even had a message from
her father. Or wanted to pass along some clue to where they were being held. The
literature of fantasy was filled with tales of dream messages. Unfortunately, the stories
never dealt with the specifics of such communications.
Under normal circumstances, Jack slept fitfully, and rarely remembered a thing
when waking. Today was no exception. No matter how hard he concentrated, he couldn't
recollect a thing about his dream. If Megan had told him anything, it had been lost on
awakening.
Yawning, he padded into the kitchenette and made himself some breakfast.
Originally, he had balked on returning to his rooms after his encounter with the vampire. If
Walsh had been able to locate him there, so would any of the monster's allies. Simon
considered the apartment a death trap. Which ultimately was the reason Jack decided to
spend the night there after all.
"They know the location," he had told the changeling after they had finished
cleaning the gym. "And they know that I know that they know the location. So,
understandably they know that I know the place isn't safe. Continuing that chain of logic,
they therefore accept the fact that I would never risk staying in the apartment. Since
they're convinced I would never use it, that makes it the perfect spot for me to hide. It's
elementary games theory. Besides, I'm tired, I don't have any other place to go, and the
bad guys all probably think I'm dead."
"You left me way behind on the 'I know, they know' routine," said Simon, shaking
his head, "but you're right about them thinking you dead. Most supernatural, particularly
those dedicated to evil, hold humans in pretty low regard. The notion that you could
possibly defeat a vampire on your own would strike them as sheer lunacy. Until one of
their sensitives finally notices Walsh's gone, you're safe."
"All I want is a good night's sleep," said Jack. But even that had been denied, due
to Megan's unsuccessful attempt to contact him through his dreams. Chewing on a
Pop-Tart, Jack wondered why the heroes of all the novels he consumed never worried
about what to do next. They always had such nice, clear-cut plans of action to follow. Or
stumbled about the scene until they discovered what to do. He didn't even know where to
start stumbling. Life was unfair.
After a few minutes of feeling sorry for himself, Jack perked up. While the world
might be doomed in a few months, he had held his own last night against the forces of
darkness. Even Simon had been impressed by his handling of Walsh.
Jack grinned. The garlic powder and the sun lamp caught the vampire completely
by surprise. The trick was applying modern logic to legendary beasts. The supernatural
beings of long ago had evolved through the ages. It made perfect sense to Jack that the
methods of dealing with them would change as well. Cause and effect never went out of
date. The only problem was deducing the new rules before it was too late.
Jack still was at a loss why running water and artificial sunlight had affected the
vampire while prayer and a cross had not. As a mathematician, contradictions like that
bothered him. They bothered him a great deal until he figured out the logical structure
behind them. Which, he decided cheerfully, might have been the reason Merlin selected
him as mankind's champion.
Feeling quite satisfied with himself, Jack stepped to the front window of his
apartment. April in Chicago was usually a bizarre month for weather. Either the