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Автор Чарльз Стросс
Charles Stross
Neptune's Brood
For everyone, everywhere, who’s ever looked at the stars and thought, “I wonder if we could live there?”
And what of the Grail, that mysterious object that all the knights-errant were ultimately seeking? Oddly enough, Richard Wagner, composer of the opera
part one
INCOMING
Beacon Departure
“I can get you a cheaper ticket if you let me amputate your legs: I can even take your thighs as a deposit,” said the travel agent. He was clearly trying hard to be helpful: “It’s not as if you’ll need them where you’re going, is it?”
“Is it possible to find a better price by booking me on a different routing?” I asked. “I’m very attached to my limbs. ” (Quaint and old-fashioned, that’s me. ) “Also,” I hedged, “I don’t have much fast money. ”
The agent sighed. His two eyes were beautiful: enormous violet photoreceptors that gleamed with a birefringent sheen. “Ms. Alizond. Krina. How can I put this? That could be a problem. ” He hesitated for only a moment: “Do you have any longer-term funds? Anything you can convert .
. . ?”I shook my head. “I only got here ten days—sorry, about a million seconds—ago, and I haven’t had time to cash in any investments. I need to get to Shin-Tethys as fast as possible. ”
He looked pained. It was a warning sign I recognized well—he was on the cusp of deciding that I was just another penniless refugee, and any moment now he was going to slam down the shutters:
“I converted everything I had into slow money before I emigrated, as viscous as possible,” I said hastily.
At least he didn’t tell me to get out of his office. I could see his cupidity battling his cynicism—
“Badly. ” He’d finally stepped out of role, revealing irrelevant curiosity; that was an opening I could use. Pathos first: “I’ve been sleeping on park benches and eating municipal gash to reduce my outgoings. ” (The raw, unprocessed hydrocarbon feedstock is vile but free: the good burghers of Taj Beacon provide it because it’s cheaper than employing police to pacify the lumpen cattle by force. ) “What cents I have I can’t afford to up-convert in a hurry. ”
“So you’ve gone long? All the way long, everything locked down in slow money? Not even some medium dollars?” His eyes widened very slightly at the hint of cents, plural—which meant I had his full and undivided attention.
