Naked God_Part 2_Faith by Peter F. Hamilton

Author:Peter F. Hamilton [Hamilton, Peter F.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780446605182
Amazon: 0446605182
Publisher: Aspect
Published: 2000-12-02T00:00:00+00:00

Jack McGovern drifted back into consciousness aware of a sharp, deep stinging coming from his nose. His eyes fluttered open to see dark-brown wood crushed against his cheek. He was lying on floorboards in near darkness in the most uncomfortable position possible, with his legs bent so his feet were pressing into his arse and his arms twisted behind his back. Blood was pounding painfully in his forearms. His hangover was the greatest yet. When he tried to stir, he couldn’t. His wrists and ankles were all bound up together by what felt like a ball of red hot insulating tape. An attempt to groan revealed his mouth was also covered with tape. One nostril was clogged with dry blood.

That frightened him badly, sending pulse and breathing wild. Air hissed and thrummed through his one small vulnerable air passage. It was like reinforcement feedback, making him even more aware of how dependant he was. Attempting to hyperventilate and half-suffocating because of it made his head pound worse than ever. His vision vanished under a red sparkle.

Insensate panic dragged on for an indeterminable time. All he knew was that when his sight finally returned along with his sluggish thoughts, his breathing was slowing. His attempted thrashing had shifted him several centimetres across the floorboards. He calmed a lot then, still wishing his hangover would fuck off and leave him alone. The memory of what had happened in the Black Bull’s toilet trickled back into his mind. He found that the tape across his mouth didn’t stop him from whimpering at the back of his throat.

A possessed! He’d been mugged by a possessed. Yet . . . he wasn’t possessed himself, which is what they always did to people—everyone knew that. Unless this was the beyond?

Jack managed to roll round onto his side and take a look round. Definitely not the beyond. He was in some kind of ancient cube of a room, a half-moon window set high up on one wall. Old store display placards were stacked opposite him, fading holophorescent print advertising brands of bathroom accessories he could dimly remember from his childhood. A heavy chain led from his ankles to a set of metal pipes that ran straight up from the floor to the ceiling.

He shuffled along the floor for all of half a metre, until the chain was tight. Nothing he did after that even scratched the pipes, let alone weakened them or made them bend away from the wall. He was still three metres from the door. Bracing and clenching his arm and shoulder muscles had the solitary effect of making his wrists hurt more. That was it then. No escape.

His hangover had long abated when the door finally opened. He didn’t know when; only that hours and hours had passed. Cold arcology night light slithered in through the high window, painting the bare plaster walls a grubby sodium yellow. It was the possessed man who came in first, moving without sound, his black monk robe swirling round him like orderly mist.

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