[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] predators are in control?" Badger didn't have anything to say to that. I didn't say anything, either. I was in a deep, despairing funk. The bastard on Smithbright's World had ruptured my kidney, and I would have died if Fedara Contei hadn't pulled strings to get the two of us through customs and back to the Reward . The medichamber returned me to perfect physical health, but I was uncomfortably aware of my own mortality when I rejoined the world of the living. Uncomfortably aware that I had made a machine the sole link between me and death, and that I had let myself get too far from the machine. I didn't want to die, and now, if Fedara Contei was correct, I had people who were better than I was stronger, faster, maybe even smarter and they were violent and they were hunters and they wanted me dead. And I didn't know why. Perhaps I was close to finding out the answer to that, but I didn't have it yet. I had another name Cal Basqueian but there was a good chance his name wouldn't give me anything more useful than I'd gotten from any of the other names. It was probably just another name. I had a lot of questions, but I wasn't having much luck making sense of them, Page 81 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html and I certainly wasn't finding any answers, no matter how close to the answers I might have been. My biggest question, the one that wouldn't let go, was Why was the man who followed us so much better than me ? Why was he so much better than Badger? Restored to health, I was no longer whole. Every step I'd made since I was seventeen, I'd made based upon what I believed was the unassailable fact that I was capable of taking care of myself. I had done everything humanly possible to ensure that my self-confidence wasn't misplaced. All the training, all the fighting, all the heavy-gravity speed drills, all the meditation and education and focus on making myself ready for anything; what had it been for? Nothing. The pale man in the black coat dealt with me just as he would have if I'd been careless and sloppy and slow. No , the voice in my head argued, if you had been careless and sloppy and slow, he would have killed you right there. As it is, you're still alive . file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/Lisle,%20Holly%20-%20Hunting%20The%20Corrigan's%20Bl ood%20(v1.0).html (108 of 231)8-12-2006 23:45:40 Lisle, Holly - Hunting the Corrigan's Blood I was in no mood for inner rationality. I'd lost, and Badger, who trained as hard and long as I did, had lost, and we had been rescued by the enemy who was hired to kill us. We were shamed and shamed again. How? That was what I wanted to know. How? Badger finally said, "I came in to tell you that we have some useful information. Cal Basqueian used his real name." I switched off the holo and swiveled around to stare at him. "You're joking." "His real name," Badger repeated. He handed me an infochip. I popped it into my compac and discovered that not only had Cal Basqueian used his real name, but that he'd made a mistake in doing so. He wasn't unknown, a model citizen, someone with no recorded past. Badgers query on him had yielded a list of sins that stretched from Tassamarkis to Old Earth. Basqueian had been convicted of armed robbery, assault, and forgery; he'd been charged with both manslaughter and murder; he'd escaped from two prisons; and he had a list of known associates that read like a criminals' Who's Who. His whereabouts were listed as unknown. No surprise. We knew where he was, sort of. He wasn't a member of any known criminal organization. Most criminals aren't, so discovering that he wasn't shattered no hopes and gave no great disappointment. He was, however, a member in good standing of the Universal Society of Antiquarian Gothicans, which I'd never heard of. According to the first report back from a query Badger ran, the membership was comprised entirely of people who liked to dress up in funny clothes and pretend they lived in early nineteenth-century London. London, according to the report, had been a dark, polluted city on Old Earth, known at that time for its foreboding atmosphere and for the suspenseful fictional stories set there. That bit of information on Basqueian felt like finding out that in his spare time Attila the Hun grew pansies. I reread the highlights of the report, then handed the chip back to Badger. I laughed, for lack of a more appropriate response. "The Universal Society of Antiquarian Gothicans, for God's sake." "That was my response, too. I'd never heard of them, but maybe they can help us. I'm running a query to locate other USAG members. Maybe, since he's still listed as a member in good standing, we can find out something about him from another member." Page 82 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html "I doubt that his criminal activities are going to have been a major topic of conversation at USAG [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] zanotowane.pl doc.pisz.pl pdf.pisz.pl blacksoulman.xlx.pl