Gregory Benford T
Mirski Andrzej MineśÂo 100 lat
Jan DobraczyśÂski CieśÂ Ojca
(30) Niemirski Arkadiusz Pan Samochodzik i... Arsen Lupin tom 1
29 MiśÂośÂć Lucyfera
Milburne Melanie Harlequin Medical 464 Ucieczka z miasta
Miernicki Sebastian Pan Samochodzik i ... Pruska korona
Hoover Colleen Hopeless 02 Losing Hope
Klucz maj 2010
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danced with Besen, had some of the crisp fresh wine, let its heady essence
swarm up into his head.
Not enough to addle him, though. His own father had faced a big
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problem with alcohol, in the long time after the death of Toby's mother.
Then Killeen met Shibo and got the hard drinking behind him, pulled himself
together and then became Cap'n. Toby knew little biology, but he understood
that there could be a tendency for the son to carry a potential
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FURIOUS GULF
57
weakness of the father--so he watched his drinking. He couldn't just depend on
the helpful little enzyme friends.
It was a fine Gathering. He was even starting to feel real affection for
Cermo. Considering how Cermo had been riding him, that had to be attributed to
the alcohol.
Cermo had a creamy chocolate skin, gleaming sugar-rich in the soft lighting.
One of the things Toby liked about the Family was that they kept the age-old
differences in humans alive. Eyes were brown and blue and black, skins rough
or smooth, yellow or pink or chocolate, noses lean and pointed or broad and
commanding or perky and upturned. Something in their genes didn't let these
differences get ironed out, smoothed away through the generations. It added
interest and spice, a flavor of a time when humans adapted to different places
by slanting their eyes to see better, smudging their skin to ward off the sun,
tapering their faces to keep warm.
He didn't care that nature had done it for them, through slow, natural
selection. Differences were like an ancient book, incomprehensible messages
from an honored past, worth preserving. His own broad nose and slanted eyes
seemed imminently practical. So did his swarthy skin and scratchy beard, just
coming in. Inheritances. Deep history.
Then the throbbing music ebbed. Time to decide.
Killeen began to speak. He was not an ornate talker, like some Toby had heard,
but his plain, flat way of putting things had a kind of simple eloquence. He
told them the hard facts of their predicament. The mechs coming. Argo's fuel
reserves. Air and water and fluid balances. Fine for a while, but not enough
for an extended, high-boost flight out of Galactic
Center and into some possible refuge.
Quath testified to the mech's probable plans. They would box in Argo, trap her
in the whirlpool near True Center.
Then he used the Family sensorium. Every member saw in one eye the ancient
engraving, with its meaning superimposed. Killeen read passages, his voice
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booming.
"'Consumed the five kinds of living dead in still-glowing holy heat.'
There was a time when the mechs fell before us!"
The Family stirred, eyes staring into a dusty past.
"'She shall rise as shall we all who plunge inward to the lair and library.'"
Killeen stood on a raised platform, dominating the crowd. His voice became
more powerful, not by trick of timing but from a fullness of conviction. "They
went there. Long ago. Even though she and they were
'fevered still in ardor for humanity's pearl palaces' --they left."
Voices rose in agreement. There was in them a plaintive note, calling for
connection with their own fabled history. Some sobbed. Others cursed.
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"We are now besieged by mechs. They bear down upon us. True"--Killeen gestured
to Quath--"we have allies. Quath's species is following
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58
Gregory Benford us, too, carrying that huge device of theirs, the Cosmic
Circle. Powers we do not master, yes. Methods we cannot comprehend, yes. They
are living creatures and offer us aid because of that holy connection, a
sharing of all those who arose naturally from the very atoms of the galaxy
itself."
Hoarse calls of thanks to Quath. Of sputtering, cold-eyed rage against mechs.
He paused, fury trickling awa) reason returning to the strong face.
"But even with their help, only we can decide where we shall go."
Killeen slowly cast his gaze across the faces he knew so well, over three
hundred strong. "We all had relatives who died fighting Quath's kind. That
time is over. Now we fight alongside those we called the
Cybers, and now term the Myriapodia.'
Something in his bearing called up that past, and used it in Killeen's cause.
Toby could see the effect on the crowd. Killeen was the man who had plunged
through a Cyber-carved hole, clean through a planet--and lived. Killeen had
ridden inside the Cyber Quath, prisoner--and had gotten away alive. He had
talked with a magnetic being who spoke through the sky itself. And still
earlier, Killeen had dealt with the Mantis and won them their freedom.
Now all that weight of history pressed down in Killeen's favor. His eyes
burned. His grave manner commanded. His people heard.
"We have a choice of turning to fight, against odds we do not and cannot know.
Or we can choose to run and hope to escape."
Glittering eyes sweeping them all in. "Is that it? Is that all?" Scornful
curled lip. "No! No! I say there is a third way--a way opened by this tablet
from our own distant ancestors."
Toby growled, seeing how firmly the Cap'n held the room in his grasp. The
rolling voice that lapped across Family Bishop was sure, ertain--but Toby was
not. He saw what was coming with a sense of elpless dread.
"We can follow them--the ancients. Into whatever lair they sought. It may
still be there!"
Family stirred, murmured.
"Again, they had powers we cannot match--yeasay. Methods we cannot
comprehend--yeasay. So their descendants--our cousins!-- could still be there.
The Family of Families--'where eternity abides.' What can that mean? What does
it promise? Let us go--go and find out!"
From the roar of hot assent that rose and vibrated hard around him, Toby knew
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they were bound on a desperate course, and though he loved his father and
wanted to follow him, the fear that coursed cold through him brought a
shameful weakness to his knees.
Why was his father doing this? Where had his caution flown? He's risking the
Family to find out.., what? About the past. What the Family means.
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His Shibo Personality came forward unbidden. Her pale presence was a soft [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
