The Widowmaker - Mike Resnick, ebook
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
The Widowmaker 1Copyright ©1996 by Mike ResnickPrologueA mile beneath the glittering surface of Deluros VIII, the capital of mankind's sprawling Oligarchy, twomen rode a slidewalk down a long, dimly-lit corridor, their voices echoing in the vast emptiness. Onewore gray, one white. They passed a door, then four more.“I wonder what he'll be like?” mused the man in gray.The man in white shrugged. “Old and sick.”“I know,” agreed the man in gray. “But I've seen so many holos of him when he was ... well, you know.”“When he was the most famous killer in the galaxy?” asked his companion sardonically.“He did most of his killing on the side of the law.”“So the legend goes.”“You sound like you think otherwise,” said the man in gray.“No. But I know how legends get made.”The slidewalk brought them to a security checkpoint, then stopped until their ID badges and retinas hadbeen scanned. It began moving again, only to stop once more at a second checkpoint fifty yards fartheron.“Is this really necessary?” asked the man in gray.“The richest men and women in the Oligarchy lie helpless down here,” came the answer. “They aretotally defenseless—and believe me,nobody gets that rich without making enemies.”“I know,” said the man in gray. He gestured ahead to two more checkpoints. “I was just wondering ifwe're going to have to pass through one of these stations every forty or fifty yards.”“Absolutely.”“I was afraid of that.”“Add it to your bill,” said the man in white.After another two hundred yards the corridor branched off, and they chose the slidewalk that veered tothe right. The doors came more frequently now, as did the checkpoints, but finally they came to a halt infront of a door that appeared no different from any of the others.“We're here,” said the man in white, allowing the scanner above the door to verify his retina and hispalm print.“I feel nervous,” said the man in gray, as the door slid into the wall long enough for them to passthrough.“It's a simple enough procedure.”“But he doesn't know who we are.”“So?”“What if he's happy the way he is? What if we annoy him? What if he kills people for bothering him?”“If he was in any condition to kill people, he wouldn't be here,” said the man in white. “Lights!”The room was instantly bathed in a dim blue light.“Can't you make it any brighter than this?” asked the man in gray.“He hasn't opened his eyes in more than a century,” replied his companion. “The room will wait until itknows his pupils are adjusting before it gets any brighter.” He walked past a number of drawers builtinto the wall, checking their numbers, then came to a stop. “Drawer 10547.”A drawer slowly emerged from the wall, stretching to its full eight-foot length. The two men couldbarely make out the shape of a human body beneath the transluscent covering.“Jefferson Nighthawk,” mused the man in gray. “The Jefferson Nighthawk.” He paused. “It's not what Iexpected.”“Oh?”“I thought there's be all kinds of wires and tubes attached to him.”“Barbaric,” snorted the man in white. “There are three monitoring devices implanted in his body. That'sall he needs.”“How does he breathe?”“He's breathing right now.”The man in gray stared, trying to detect the tiniest sign of movement.“I don't see anything.”“He's doing it so slowly that only the computer can tell. DeepSleep slows the metabolism down to acrawl; it doesn't stop it, or we'd be down here with thirty thousand corpses.”“So what do you do now?”“I'm doing it,” said the man in white. He walked over to the drawer where the body lay, laid his handover a scanner until it identified his fingerprints, then tapped in a code on a keyboard that suddenlyextended from the scanner.“How long will this take?”“For you or me, probably a minute. For the people we've got down here, maybe four or five minutes.”“Why so long?”“If they weren't dying, they wouldn't be here in the first place. In their weakened conditions, they takelonger to respond to external stimuli.” The man in white looked up from the body. “More than one hasdied from the shock of being awakened.”“Will he...?”“Not likely. His heart reads pretty close to normal, considering.”“Good.”“But if I were you, I'd brace myself for when he finally wakes up.”“You've already told me he won't die, and that he's too sick to pose a threat even if he wanted to, sowhat's the problem?”“Have you ever seen a man in the advanced stages of eplasia ?”“No,” admitted the man in gray.“They're not pretty. And that's an understatement.”They both fell silent as the body in front of them gradually began acquiring color. After two moreminutes the transluscent top slid into the wall, revealing an emaciated man whose flesh was hideouslydisfigured by the ravages of a virulent skin disease. Patches of shining white cheekbone protrudedthrough the flesh of the face, knuckles pierced the skin of the hands, and even where the skin remainedintact it looked like there was some malignancy crawling across it and discoloring it.The man in gray turned away in disgust, then forced himself to look back. He half expected the air tosmell of rotting flesh, but it remained pure and filtered.Finally the eyelids flickered, once, twice, and then, slowly, they opened, revealing light blue, almostcolorless eyes. The diseased man remained motionless for a full minute, then frowned.“Where did Acosta go?” he croaked at last.“Who is Acosta?” asked the man in gray.“My doctor. He was here just a minute ago.”“Ah,” said the man in white, smiling. “Dr. Acosta has been dead for more than eighty years. Youyourself have been here for one hundred and seven years, Mr. Nighthawk.”Nighthawk looked confused. “One hundred and...?”“And seven years. I am Dr. Gilbert Egan.”“What year is it?”“5101 G. E,” said Egan. “May I help you sit up?”“Yes.”Egan lifted the frail, skeletal figure until it was sitting erect. The moment he stopped supporting it, itcollapsed onto its side.“We'll try again when you're feeling a little stronger,” said Egan, adjusting Nighthawk so that noravaged limbs flopped over the side. “You've been asleep a long time. How do you feel?”“I'm starving,” said Nighthawk.“Of course you are,” said Egan with a smile. “You've gone more than a century without a meal. Evenwith your metabolism slowed down a hundredfold, your stomach has probably been empty for a decadeor more.” Egan attached a tube to Nighthawk's left arm. “Unfortunately, you're in no condition to eat,but this will supply your body with the nourishment it needs.”“I might as well get used to eating,” rasped Nighthawk, “now that I'm cured.” He paused. “A hundred and seven years. It sure as hell took you long enough.”Egan looked at the frail, diseased man with some compassion. “I am afraid that a cure for eplasia has not yet been developed.”Nighthawk turned and stared at the doctor. It was the kind of stare that made Egan happy that his patient was not armed and healthy.“I left explicit instructions that I wasn't to be awakened until I was cured.”“Conditions have changed, Mr. Nighthawk,” said the man in gray, stepping forward.“Who the hell areyou ?” demanded Nighthawk.“My name is Marcus Dinnisen. I am your solicitor.”Nighthawk frowned. “My lawyer?”Marcus Dinnisen nodded. “I am a senior partner in the firm of Hubbs, Wilkinson, Raith and Jiminez.”“Raith,” said Nighthawk, nodding vaguely. “He's my lawyer.”“Morris Raith joined the firm of Hubbs and Wilkinson three years before his death, in the year 5012. Hisgreat-grandson worked for us until his retirement last year.”“All right,” said Nighthawk. “You're my lawyer. Why did you feel I had to be awakened?”“This is somewhat awkward to explain, Mr. Nighthawk,” began Dinnisen uneasily.“Spit it out.”“At the time you elected to undergo DeepSleep, you turned your entire portfolio over to my firm.”“It wasn't a portfolio,” said Nighthawk. “It was six and a half million credits.”“Exactly so,” said Dinnisen. “We were instructed to invest it and to keep up the payments for thisfacility in perpetuity, or until a cure for your disease was developed.”“So it took you one hundred and seven years to lose all my money?”“Absolutely not!” said Dinnisen heatedly. “Your money remains intact, and has been earning an average of 9.32% per annum for more than a century. I can supply you with all the figures if you wish to review them.”Nighthawk blinked his eyes, a puzzled expression on his grotesque face. “Then if I'm not broke and I'mnot cured, what the hell is going on?”“Your account has been earning slightly more than six hundred thousand credits a year,” explainedDinnisen. “Unfortunately, due to an inflationary spiral in the Deluros economy, this facility now chargesa million credits a year. This makes for a shortfall of almost four hundred thousand credits per annum.We cannot make the payments with your dividends, and if we dip into capital, you will be destitute in adecade, and there is no guarantee that a cure for eplasia will be found by then.”“So you're telling me that I'm being thrown out of here?” asked Nighthawk.“No.”“Well, then?”“I require a decision from you,” responded Dinnisen, staring at the hideous countenance in fascination.“If anyone else could make it, I would never have awakened you until...”“Until I was broke,” Nighthawk concluded wryly. “All right, go on.”“We—that is to say, your solicitors—have received a most unusual communication, one that may solveyour financial problems and allow you to remain here until the cure for your disease has finally beenfound.”“I'm listening.”“Have you ever heard of Solio II?”“It's a planet on the Inner Frontier. Why?”“The g...
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]