He smiled cleanly. Yes, sir. She left Ellenshaws office knowing this was the case of her career and pd was giving her extraordinary support; also knowing federal bad deemed her expendable, but not in a minor cause. She would be stupid not to be afraid. To those concerned with basic human dignity Colonel Sir John Yardley was the western worlds prosperous heart of darkness. Mary Choy allowed herself the requisite fear, but no more. The comb towers went dark against the last blue wink of dusk. She drove a slaveway to the pd shade central on Sepulveda and filled out a request for overnight research space, slept an hour in a cop cot, drank a nutrient cocktail and went to work.
LA City of Angels like a horse sleeps on its legs. Ive walked the shade (since before it was shadowed) late night and seen the noctw-nal hc4f conduct itself busily not just machines but people... Dont think the shade ic reckless eccentricity. It has its own life, not clean like the therapied hives perhaps, but rich and full as any past city, as organized; shade has its mayors and councils, bosses and workers, mommies and daddies, neighborhoods and businesses, hospitals and pd stations, churches and libraries, and they are vital. Bootstrapper, perfecter of humanity, dont forget the ground you lift yourself from, unless you want a hard fall!
10 Sure as is, they had him Fausted; Albigoni and Lascal had tempted and Martin Burke was about to succumb. It was all over but the night of pangs. Still the forms must be observed; the night of pangs must pass. Adult enough to realize that the prize might be hollow, Martin Burke tried to deny the temptation but could not. The pair had found his most vulnerable patch in his most pale and yielding underbelly. His life was science and he had been removed from that life through no fault of his own, merely as an accident of bad politics and history. To have it back would mean he could live again. He longed to walk the Country of the Mind. That was a stimulus like no other; knowledge from the frontier that defined all frontiers. Martin grinned in the half dark watching a playback of the AXIS reports. He selfsaw that grin and sobered. He did have one train of questions to answer but Carol Neuman was not taking her calls and she did not have a home manager. Martin closed his eyes and tried to stop shaking. Ethical questions all too obvious and tenacious. Goldsmiths right to deny intrusion. Still, a poet, a murderer whose country of the mind would reflect the artists adaptation of subaware forces... Never such an opportunity. Never. I am not a bad man, he said out loud. I didnt deserve what happened to me and I do not deserve this now. This what. Qualms. Opportunity/temptation. Albigoni had nothing to lose. If Martin would not give him what he wanted nobody could except perhaps the ghostsl doppelgangers of Martin Burke that might exist elsewhere, sucking his discoveries raking his ground with more brutal clawed fingers, the far less scrupulous who might exist in Hispaniola exploiting not developing the Country of the Mind and racing ahead of him even now, alligator versus hare, alligator eats the hare. Martin was not a bad man. Albigoni had not immediately flown Goldsmith to Hispaniola and paid Colonel Sir John Yardley what he might require, so Albigoni was not a bad man, either. Of course Yardleys prisons and labs were rumor; still Albigoni had the connections to have such rumors confirmed or denied. Albigoni did not intend to harm Goldsmith and of course Goldsmith was a bad man; no harm to him but the probe of science a redemption opportunity payment; a recovery of his value to humanity. Martin lay back on the couch, still shaking, fingers laced. Not a bad man. Perhaps not even a bad deed. He got up from the couch and placed another call to Carol. Hello. He started in surprise and pushed his hand back through his hair. Hello, Carol. This is Martin. I thought youd call. Ive been working. Martins tension erupted before he could
LA City of Angels like a horse sleeps on its legs. Ive walked the shade (since before it was shadowed) late night and seen the noctw-nal hc4f conduct itself busily not just machines but people... Dont think the shade ic reckless eccentricity. It has its own life, not clean like the therapied hives perhaps, but rich and full as any past city, as organized; shade has its mayors and councils, bosses and workers, mommies and daddies, neighborhoods and businesses, hospitals and pd stations, churches and libraries, and they are vital. Bootstrapper, perfecter of humanity, dont forget the ground you lift yourself from, unless you want a hard fall!
10 Sure as is, they had him Fausted; Albigoni and Lascal had tempted and Martin Burke was about to succumb. It was all over but the night of pangs. Still the forms must be observed; the night of pangs must pass. Adult enough to realize that the prize might be hollow, Martin Burke tried to deny the temptation but could not. The pair had found his most vulnerable patch in his most pale and yielding underbelly. His life was science and he had been removed from that life through no fault of his own, merely as an accident of bad politics and history. To have it back would mean he could live again. He longed to walk the Country of the Mind. That was a stimulus like no other; knowledge from the frontier that defined all frontiers. Martin grinned in the half dark watching a playback of the AXIS reports. He selfsaw that grin and sobered. He did have one train of questions to answer but Carol Neuman was not taking her calls and she did not have a home manager. Martin closed his eyes and tried to stop shaking. Ethical questions all too obvious and tenacious. Goldsmiths right to deny intrusion. Still, a poet, a murderer whose country of the mind would reflect the artists adaptation of subaware forces... Never such an opportunity. Never. I am not a bad man, he said out loud. I didnt deserve what happened to me and I do not deserve this now. This what. Qualms. Opportunity/temptation. Albigoni had nothing to lose. If Martin would not give him what he wanted nobody could except perhaps the ghostsl doppelgangers of Martin Burke that might exist elsewhere, sucking his discoveries raking his ground with more brutal clawed fingers, the far less scrupulous who might exist in Hispaniola exploiting not developing the Country of the Mind and racing ahead of him even now, alligator versus hare, alligator eats the hare. Martin was not a bad man. Albigoni had not immediately flown Goldsmith to Hispaniola and paid Colonel Sir John Yardley what he might require, so Albigoni was not a bad man, either. Of course Yardleys prisons and labs were rumor; still Albigoni had the connections to have such rumors confirmed or denied. Albigoni did not intend to harm Goldsmith and of course Goldsmith was a bad man; no harm to him but the probe of science a redemption opportunity payment; a recovery of his value to humanity. Martin lay back on the couch, still shaking, fingers laced. Not a bad man. Perhaps not even a bad deed. He got up from the couch and placed another call to Carol. Hello. He started in surprise and pushed his hand back through his hair. Hello, Carol. This is Martin. I thought youd call. Ive been working. Martins tension erupted before he could
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