Polity 03 - Shadow of the Scorpion by Neal Asher

Author:Neal Asher [Asher, Neal]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Polity Universe
ISBN: 9780230738591
Publisher: Tor Books
Published: 2009-11-16T05:00:00+00:00

9.

Cormac gazed at the crowds standing in the large waiting area of the editing clinic and briefly wondered where Dax had got to. Perhaps he had gone to the toilet, or to buy more cigarettes. Soon, he knew, they would enter Door Eight where a smaller waiting room was situated, then they would go into the editing suite itself, where a Golem nurse, telefactored from a local AI, would conduct the editing process on Dax. It would take some time, of course, because Dax was a medic, and much of what lay between his ears was too useful to lose. Ah, perhaps Dax was already in there being worked on... no, that couldn’t be right, for they had remained in the smaller waiting room until the work was done... but that was in the past... it had already been done.

Cormac looked around, realised he was sitting, then glanced across at his mother who was sitting beside him doing something with her lap-top. She had a look of extreme concentration until she realised Cormac was gazing at her.

“I was just making sure I kept copies,” she explained. “They’re notoriously unstable in the carbon memstores they’re using here.” Then she paused, as if reviewing what she had just said, and cursed quietly to herself. After a moment she went on, “Are you all right now?”

Cormac had absolutely no idea what she was talking about. He just gazed at her, unable to articulate the weird déjà vu he was experiencing—the sensation of reliving memory, and being offended because memory wasn’t matching up to reality. Hannah popped a memtab from the side of her lap-top and dropped it into the top pocket of her shirt, slid the device back into its carrycase and hung the strap from her shoulder. He continued staring at her while something tried to realign inside his head, then he abruptly realised that memory came after reality, not before it. They were not here with Dax—that was all in the past and Dax was, right now, many light years away on a world called Cheyne III.

“What?” he said, then after a long pause. “What happened?”

Hannah stood, her hand closing on his and pulling him to his feet. He felt a bit wobbly and realised he must have been asleep or something.

“You felt faint,” she explained, “and this was the nearest place where you could sit down.” They moved back into the aisle and started heading towards the exit. “Best I have you checked out,” she added, “though it’s probably due to the excitement of the last few days.”

Cormac still could not quite get things clear in his mind. They’d seen off Dax at the runcible port in Paris, then returned by lev-train to Tritonia, but he couldn’t remember if they’d returned to The Watts Hotel or were still on their way back there.

They stepped out into the street where his mother scanned about carefully before towing him off in the direction of The Watts. Yes, he remembered now. They had returned to the hotel to clean up and change, before heading out to try a local restaurant.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.