The Best of Edward M. Lerner by Edward M. Lerner

Author:Edward M. Lerner
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: artificial intelligence, time travel, robots, cyberpunk, alternate history, future crime, alien invasions
Publisher: ReAnimus Press

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The day after my Franklin’s Hole adventure, Terrence didn’t show up for work. Nor, when the chief handyman went looking, was Terrence in his room. All Terrence’s stuff, the clothes and books and whatnot, were there, but I didn’t see any of his personal projects, the gadgets he tinkered with.

One of our maids, thinking back on it, remembered she’d seen a bright light in the distance from her third-story window, gazing out toward the desert. A few of us not on shift that morning trudged out the direction she pointed us. Apart from a scorched area maybe thirty feet across, about a half mile from the hotel, we saw nothing unusual. Certainly, we didn’t find Terrence. But on our return, about halfway back to La Posada, I spotted something familiar. It was standing on end, peeking out from within a clump of mesquite grass, behind a knee-high stand of buffelgrass.

Terrence’s favorite doodad.

That and a stained photograph are all I had to remember the man by. Somehow, don’t ask me to explain, I knew that something I’d said the evening before is why Terrence left.

I never saw him again.

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