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(c) С.Лукьяненко
Л А Б И Р И Н Т О Т Р А Ж Е Н И Й
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продолжение
Я забираюсь на спину волка, и тот неторопливой рысцой бежит по
лесу. Я инстинктивно уворачиваюсь от веток, волк тонко хихикает.
Ладно, пусть веселится.
Через пару минут мы выскакиваем из леса. Под ногами - желтый
песок. Жарко, очень жарко, порывы ветра заставляют щуриться.
Впереди - пропасть метров в сто шириной, заney - eastern
city. Minarets, domes, everything is in orange-yellow-green tones.
Quite beautiful. Not far away, thrown over an abyss... hmm...
Well, let's call it a bridge. A string-thin thread. One end of it
ends on the wall that encircles the city, the other is held in his hand
an ugly stone statue about ten meters high. muzzle
The statue is disgusting.
“There will still be work,” the wolf notes. - You didn’t sell yourself short,
Ivan Tsarevich?
“God knows...” I say, studying the statue. - About bridge me
warned...
- Steal what?
- Bulk apples...
“Oh, that’s what this masquerade is for...” the wolf giggles again. - A
what's in apples?
“I don’t know,” I jump off the wolf’s back, stand with my hand on
wool - Listen, I’ll drink some lemonade for a second...
“Go ahead,” says the wolf, looking around.
I close my eyes.
Depth, depth, I’m not yours... Let me go, depth...
I jerked and stood up. There are tiny screens in front of your eyes, on them
desert, abyss, statue, city in the distance. Very good
drawn. Al-Kabar has good designers.
The virtual helmet is heavy, this is the most sophisticated model of
mass-produced by Sony. With beautiful color screens,
excellent speakers and built-in microphone, with
an air conditioner that blows air at the desired temperature onto your face.
Now this is the heat of the desert... I took off my helmet, put it on the table, next to
keyboardcomputer. A familiar female figure appeared on the monitor.
face, from the speakers came:
- Lenya, are you interrupting the dive?
- No, wait.
In the real world my room is the same as in the virtual one
space. Only outside the window is not a summer evening in Deeptown -
rainy St. Petersburg autumn. A light rain is drizzling, honking in the distance
car. I opened the refrigerator and took out a can of Sprite. I'll have a drink
real... Unable to resist, I looked out from the balcony. Empty jars
which in virtual space I threw out onto the street, there
Of course not. Well, let's eliminate the differences.
My hair was sweaty, I wiped it with a shirt lying on the chair,
sat down at the computer, checked the cable coming from the virtual
suit onto the computer's deep board. The suit worked, slightly
slowing down my movements as if I were walking on sand. Left leg
it dragged a little more - the program crashed again. Okay, later
Let's calibrate.
Putting on a helmet is like putting your head in an oven. Here
the bastards from Al-Kabar surrounded themselves with the most unpleasant
conditions...
I looked at the virtual world again, but for now it is conditional, like
cheap cartoon. Grainy image, beautiful but rough
drawing. The computer can't handle more.
No need to. What is depth without a person?
I blinked, relaxed, trying to enter virtuality
on your own. Of course, nothing works out. I'm not in the desert, I'mat home at the keyboard... I had to reach out and type
command:
deep
And now - "input".
The multicolored deep program flashes across the desert. Just a second
I also saw the screens, the soft lining of the helmet, then consciousness
started to float. The brain tried to resist, but no way!
The deep program works for everyone.
They just come across it - with a frequency of one in three hundred thousand, people
without completely losing touch with reality. Capable
swim out of the depths on your own. Divers.
Me, for example.
The wolf grins at me.
- Did you wet your neck, hero?
- Yes.
I look around myself - is everything okay? My body in virtuality -
a simple drawing transmitted by a computer to a particular point
Deeptown and its surroundings. But the sword is on the belt, and the little things in
bag - not just a drawing. These are "shortcuts", trigger fragments
programs that will now become necessary.
“We act like this,” I decide. - I walk across the bridge myself. Then
I take out the trophies and head off.
“It’s up to you,” the wolf agrees.
I walk on the sand, the hot wind does not subside, it even seems that
grains of sand tingle my eyes. This is no longer the merit of the helmet. This is mine
the brain feels what it should feel in real life
desert.
The statue is getting closer and more real. Horned head with bared teeth
mouth, paws lumpy with stone muscles. Ifrit, probably.
I'm weak in Arabic mythology. INIfrit's left hand is clenched
thin thread.
Horsehair bridge.
I begin to climb up the monster’s leg. How ridiculous now
my body looks like in an empty apartment - twitching,
pulling yourself up by the air... don't get distracted...
The last meter is the most difficult. I lean on a spiky stone
knee, trying to grab onto my palm - it doesn’t work. Surely
for legitimate visitors of Al-Kabar there is some other way...
I have to first climb onto the granite phallus
monsters. I hear the wolf chuckle. Crap. He's funny...
Finally I'm in the palm of your hand. I try the thread with my foot - it is slightly
sways. Like a string. Below, far, far away, rocks and blue
river snake.
- Be brave, hero! - the wolf screams.
Ordinary virtual workers cannot walk across this bridge. Something's wrong
so...
The palm on which I stand suddenly begins to tremble and slowly
shrinks. The bridge-thread trembles, ready to break. And above me
the grinning face of a revived monster looms.
- Who are you? - he roars so hard that his ears are blocked. In Russian,
by the way!
- Guest! - I scream, trying to snatch my legs from the grip of the granite
fingers.
The monster laughs:
- A guest does not come with forbidden things!
The index finger of the right hand rushes towards me, as if
intending to flatten. I involuntarily squint my eyes. But the monster only pokes
finger into the sword.
Yes, this is not a simple defenseless driver program"Deep conductor". This is an excellent watchdog system with
pseudointelligence is an order of magnitude better than Windows Home. How did he
determined my native language?
- A guest does not come uninvited!
- They called me!
- Who?
We'll have to go all in...
- You have no right to hear his name!
“I have the right to do everything,” says the monster.
And the fingers clench.
to be continued...
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