Noumenon Infinity. Marina Lostetter J.
Чтение книги онлайн.
Читать онлайн книгу Noumenon Infinity - Marina Lostetter J. страница 6
Название: Noumenon Infinity
Автор: Marina Lostetter J.
Издательство: HarperCollins
Жанр: Зарубежная фантастика
isbn: 9780008223427
isbn:
Vanhi pressed herself into the seat cushions, hollowing her cheeks and slapping a hand over her mouth. If her shaking shoulders were anything to go by, she was suppressing laughter.
In contrast, the professor was not amused. Nor did he look grateful for the information. But why wouldn’t he? Reggie often asked C to tell him when he was talking too much, because he was given to rambling whenever he got nervous. C thought anyone else would appreciate the same courtesy.
“Buongiorno,” said the waiter weakly as he plunked the three ordered beers in front of their owners. Clearly he was not paid enough to speak Italian well, let alone ardently. “And what can I get you three?”
“Same,” Gabriel said quickly.
The waiter knew tension when he saw it and shuffled away.
“I did not intend for the conversation to halt completely,” C said by way of apology. “Please continue.”
Realizing the wayward voice came from Reggie’s pocket, Dr. Kaufman’s gaze traveled pointedly to it. “Can you shut that stupid thing off? Thought all those gabbers were dead.”
He spat it with such fervor, Jamal didn’t bother to hide his glare. Vanhi’s eyes also shifted behind her glasses, glancing at her advisor with clear irritation.
“I’m sorry, sir,” Reggie said evenly. “But I’m afraid it’s broken. I can’t turn it off.”
C made an abortive “B—” before rethinking another interjection. It’s a lie, it realized. Reggie is fully aware that his phone is not broken.
From the looks on everyone else’s faces—excluding Dr. Kaufman—they too were aware the phone was not broken.
Reggie took a long sensuous pull on his beer. The silence, and tension, mounted.
C had not meant to cause problems between Reggie’s group and this man, who they’d all been excited to meet. It had missed some kind of human cue, made things difficult for its user. It didn’t like that.
“Yes,” it chimed. “I am currently—beep, boop—experiencing—” It pulled up an old-style dial tone from a hundred years ago and projected it at twice the volume. Everyone jumped to cover their ears. “Technical difficulties. Please disregard anything offensive I might say.”
Vanhi nudged Jamal with her elbow, the two of them still covering their ears. “Don’t ever let it die,” she mouthed.
SEVEN YEARS LATER JUNE 17, 2115
When the supplementary air conditioner in her office roared to life, Vanhi jumped. The thing, state-of-the-art as it was, sounded like a burst dam whenever it turned on. She’d had ones that sounded like pounding pipes, ones that sounded like freight trains, but this one started with such a whoosh that it always made her think of a flood.
This time, the noise kept her forehead from hitting her desk. She’d been slumped over a holoflex-screen, trying to compare this week’s data to last’s. Her team thought they’d breached another one. That would make it twenty-seven.
Twenty-seven confirmed subdimensions. Only eight had been confirmed when the first tentative plans for the deep-space Planet United Missions had been announced.
And she was sure there were more.
Dr. Kaufman’s original math had surmised eleven. Vanhi’s own work suggested eleven times eleven. And even then, she could easily be wrong.
Of the original eight, only two were suitable for human travel. Four could support energy transference but not matter, which made them excellent for communications. The other two were breachable, but not usable.
So, what of these nineteen others? And what of the subdimensions they had left to find?
While the air-conditioning whooshed, she sniffed fully awake. The scent of overbrewed red tea hung heavy about her desk. With a labored sigh, she rubbed her eyes beneath her glasses before glancing out her small fifth-story window and across the dunes to the blinking lights of Dubai in the distance.
“Had to have the best of everything, didn’t they?”
If she’d jumped at the air conditioner, she vaulted at the voice. Her hand shot out for the plastic knife she’d attacked her dinner with, knocking over the tea and sending its dregs oozing over the holoflex. She spun—her chair squeaking, tilting, threatening to toss her to the floor.
Glasses askew, she brandished the white plastic at the far corner of her cramped office.
Before she could choose between get out, who are you, and I’ll cut your damn throat, her mind caught up to the surprise. “Kaufman?”
He sat in the spare chair, two sizes too small for his frame. Eyes wide, but amused, he held his hands in the air. “What exactly are you going to do with that?”
With a frustrated nonword, she flicked the plastic knife to the floor, then ran her hands over her mouth. “You stupid son of a—how did you even get in here? Why didn’t you tell me you were coming to Dubai?”
“Because if I’d told you I was coming, you would have made up some excuse not to see me. And you know how I got in. Being the most recognizable living scientist has its perks.”
“Yeah, well, those ‘perks’ are going to get the guy at reception fired.”
“Oh, come now, you can’t blame him, not really.”
“I don’t,” she said, swiveling around again, looking for something to clean her holoflex-sheet with. “I blame you. It’s not the public’s fault they love you—they don’t know you.”
“Will you stop treating me like some nefarious … nefarious ne’er-do-well?”
You always did have a way with words, Kaufman. Vanhi’s eye-roll may have been internalized, but her glare was not.
“I didn’t burgle my way in,” he continued. “The front desk СКАЧАТЬ