"Destroyer 022 - Brain Drain.pdb" - читать интересную книгу автора (Williams Remo)

"Of course, lovelies. I wouldn't deprive you of sustenance."
"For a dealer, that's the level truth. Totally level." A girl's voice.
"Hush, hush, lovelies. I'm an artist. I just do other things to live. Besides, the walls have ears."
"You probably put 'em there, mother."
"Hush, hush. No negativities in front of my guest."
"He the one that want something?"
"Yes, he does. His name is Mr. Regal. And he has given me money for you all. Much money. Lovely money."
"And we ain't gonna see but a spit of it."
"There's plenty for you. He wants you to do something in front of him. No, Maria, don't take off your clothes. That's not what he wants. Mr. Regal wants you, as artists, to share your creativity with him."
"What's he doin' with the pipe?"
"I told him that hash helps creativity."
"That dude be goin' through a full ounce. He gotta be blind now."
And then the voice. That chilling flat monotone. Waldman felt a cramp in his legs from kneeling down near the tape. Where had he heard a voice like that before?
"I am not intoxicated, if that is what you suspect. Rather, I have full control of my senses and reflexes. Perhaps this inhibits my creativity. That is why I smoke more than the normal amount, or what you would consider normal, man."
"You jive funny, turkey."
"That is a derogatory term, and I have found that
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for one to tolerate such language often leads to further abuses of one's territorial integrity. Therefore, desist, nigger."
"Now, now, now, lovelies. Let us make pretty. Each of you will show your art to Mr. Regal. Let him see what you do when you are creative."
The tape sounded blank except for shuffling feet. Waldman heard indistinguishable low mumblings. Someone asked for "the red," which Waldman assumed was paint. At one point, someone sang an off-key tune about oppression and how freedom was just another form of deprivation and that the singer needed copulation badly with whomever she was singing to, but she didn't want her head messed with. "Just My Body, Baby" seemed to be the title of the song.
The flat voice again. "Now I noted that the painter seemed highly calm when working, and the singer seemed aroused. Is there an explanation for this, faggot?"
"I hate that word, but everything is so lovely I'll ignore it. Yes, there is a reason. All creativity comes from the heart. While the face and sounds may be different, the heart, the lovely heart, is the center of the creative process, Mr. Regal."
"Incorrect." That flat far-away voice again. "The brain sends all creative signals. The body itself-liver, kidney, intestines or heart-plays no part in the creative process. Do not lie to me, queer."
"Hmmmm. Well, I see you're into an insulting bag. Heart is only a phrase. Hardly do we mean a body organ. Heart is that essence of creativity. Physically, of course, it comes from the brain."
"Which part of the brain?"
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"I don't know."
"Continue."
Waldman heard a heavy banging of feet and assumed it was a dance. Then there was a chopping sound.
"Sculpture, lovelies, might be the ultimate art."
"It looks like a male reproductive organ." The flat voice.
"That's a work of art, too. You'd know, if you ever tasted it." Giggle. The fag.
There were a few mumbled requests to pass a pipe, probably filled with hashish.
"Well, there you have it." The fag.
"Have what?" The flat voice.
"Creativity. A song. A dance. A painting. A piece of sculpture. Perhaps you would like to try, Mr. Regal? What would you like to do? You must remember of course that to be creative you must do something different. Difference is the essence of creativity. Come on now, Mr. Regal. Do something different."
"Other than sculpture and dancing and painting and singing?"
"Oh yes, that would be lovely." The fag.
"I don't know what to do." The flat voice.
"Well, let me give you a hint. Often the beginning of creativity is copying what's already been done, but in a different way. You build creativity by copying in a different medium. For instance, you change a painting into a sculpture. Or vice versa. Look around. Find something and then change it into a different medium."
And suddenly there were screams and awful tearing sounds, cracking bones and joints that came
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apart like thick, soft balloons stretched too far. And the wild desperate screams of the singer.
"No, no, no, no. No I" It was a wail, it was a chant, it was a prayer. And it wasn't answered. Snap! Pop! And there were no more screams. Waldman heard the heavy crunch of plaster, and it hit the ground with a splash. Probably in a pool of blood. Plaster, then splash.
"Lovely." The flat voice. This time it echoed through the room. Then the door closed on the tape.
Inspector Waldman rewound the tape to where the screaming had begun. He played it forward, watching the second hand of his watch. A minute and a half. All that done by one man. In eighty-five seconds.
Waldman rewound the tape and played it back. It had to be one man. There were the voices of the four victims and their references to their guest, their one guest. He listened carefully. It sounded like power tools at work but he did not hear any motors. Eighty-five seconds.
Waldman stumbled trying to straighten up. He had been kneeling too long for his fifty-year-old frame. You knew you were getting old when you couldn't do that anymore. A young patrolman with a happy, glad-to-meet-you smile entered the basement room.
"Yeah?" said Waldman. The patrolman's face was familiar. Then he saw the badge. Of course. It must have been the model for the recruiting poster. Looked just like him, right down to that artificial friendly grin. But that couldn't be a real badge. The commercial artist hired by the police department, some radical freak, had done his defiance bit by
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