Flash - Hardcover

Modesitt, L. E.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0765311283 ISBN 13: 9780765311283

Verlag: Tor Books, 2004

Inhaltsangabe

Return to the future of Archform: Beauty. In the twenty-fourth century, Earth is vastly changed. Ecological and biological catastrophe have raged across the planet, but for the survivors, it is a world of plenty. Even the poorest live in abundance, and the upper class -- the ascendant -- command technological marvels.

Ten years ago, Jonat deVrai was a rising star in the Marines. But he shocked his superiors by walking away from the Corps after witnessing atrocity and hypocrisy during the Reclamation of Guyana. Starting his life over, he established himself as the world's expert on the effectiveness of "prod"-- product placement, the only advertising which viewers will allow through the sophisticated filters they all use against unwanted intrusions on their electronic link networks. Prod, reinforced with sublims and the "res" -- resonant frequencies, a form of sonic branding -- is the wave of the future.

Jonat now advises multinational corporations on their prod campaigns, his busy life only occasionally disturbed by vivid flashbacks to his military years. Then his comfortable world is upset when the Centre for Societal Research approaches him to study the effects of res and prod on political campaigns.

After a res-heavy political rally for Laborite Republican Senatorial candidate Juan Carlismo, armed thugs jump deVrai in a parking garage. A day later, a sniper ambushes him. What looked like a safe, lucrative contract has suddenly turned dangerous. The stakes raise further when deVrai foils a remote-controlled cydroid assassination attempt on a Popular Democrat candidate. Cydroids built from deVrai's stolen DNA are turning up dead throughout NorAm.

Suspicion and conspiracy race around Jonat. Who wants him dead? Candidate Juan Carlismo's use of prod is skirting the limits of legality. The Centre has its own obscure agenda and may want deVrai as a martyr. The terrorist group PAMD is targeting ascendents in deVrai's family. And one of his clients is known for holding legendary grudges - could he have gone over the edge?

With his life on the line, deVrai must sort flash from fact before it's too late.

Flash is a blend of all-out thriller and thoughtful social, political, and technological exploration that that gets into your mind in a way even res and prod could never match.

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorinnen und Autoren

L. E. MODESITT JR., is the bestselling author of the fantasy series The Saga of Recluce. His science fiction includes Adiamante, the Ecolitan novels, and Archform: Beauty. He lives in Cedar City, Utah.

L. E. Modesitt, Jr., is the bestselling author of the fantasy series The Saga of Recluce. His science fiction includes Adiamante, the Ecolitan novels, and Archform: Beauty. He lives in Cedar City, Utah.

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Flash

By L. E. Modesitt Jr., David G. Hartwell

Tom Doherty Associates

Copyright © 2004 L. E. Modesitt, Jr.
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-0-7653-1128-3

CHAPTER 1

Cracckk!

"Down!" Down! At the sound of the ancient slug-thrower, I dropped flat onto the squashed soyl plants at the edge of the field. The illegal crops — soyl and caak — were mostly shielded by the taller overgrowth of what had once been part of a rain forest. My three companies were spread along nearly a kay from north to south so that the illegals didn't get past. CI wanted a bunch for interrogation. Somewhere to the west of us was the Berbice River, but that didn't matter. Everything around us was wet. Nothing ever dried out, not even the tropical uniforms that were supposed to wick away moisture while providing impact protection. They did neither all that well, and certainly didn't do anything to stop the sweating.

Someone might have said that the pattering sound of slugs shredding the taller soyl plants to the east of where I lay sounded almost like rain. It didn't.

Air, Bravo two. Nothing. The uplink was dead.

I clicked the implant to alt ... static-filled, but there. Not supposed to have static on satellite-combat links. Right. Air, Bravo two.

You're breaking up, two. Try main.

Idiots! Would I have been on alt if main worked? Negative. Main dead. Need CAS. Coordinates follow.

Say again coordinates ...

It took three attempts to get the coordinates clear.

Meanwhile, I could hear the deeper sound of an antique heavy machine gun to the south. I could also sense telltales going off.

Bravo two ... Bravo two. Negative on CAS.

No time to question that one. I'd already lost half a platoon on the south end, all because CI wanted troops on the ground, and I had a mixed force, some commandos and some straight Marines, on a search and capture mission without the firepower necessary. I'd rather have just taken my own commandos, but I hadn't been given that choice.

Bravo two ... three-one here ... delta caught in cross fire ... quicksand stuff and deep paddies or something ... couple of ...

The implant transmission flared red and vanished. I'd lost another officer, and without air support, delta units were going to get shredded worse, and with century-old weapons at that. Long-range stunners and lasers didn't work in rain forests. Neither did HV rifles, not well. That was why I had my own antique, a design more than fifty years old, a stun-grenade launcher, but it wasn't that accurate at more than a hundred meters. Gulsan had one, too. He was flanking me.

Charlie one ... Charlie one, sweeping southeast, vee on me ... After my orders, and before long we were scuttling to the southeast, with more of the slugs shredding the taller soyl plants. Implant positioning showed that fire was coming from a knoll of sorts two hundred meters to the southeast. Some sort of crude revetment, but crude or not, it was good enough to stop lasers and hand weapons.

More telltales flicked red and gone.

At eighty meters from the revetment, with a narrow clear line before us, and slugs coming in at less than a meter above my head, mowing down the tops of the soyl plants, and even the shorter and bushier caak planted between the rows of soyl, I called a halt. Hold. Launchers centered.

Centered.

Fire!

After the first stun-grenade dropped into the revetment, someone tried to swing the old machine gun. They didn't get far.

A handful of illegals vaulted over the revetment and began to run. At that range, even in the fields on the edge of the rain forest, the HVs were effective. One hundred percent effective in the open.

In less than ten minutes, the field and the revetment were ours, but I had the men play it safe, and it was more like a half hour before I climbed over the edge of the makeshift revetment and surveyed what lay there.

The heavy fire had come from more than a dozen locals. Bodies were four men, six women, and two children. That didn't count the others that delta company had taken down when they'd bolted the makeshift revetment. The ones who had stayed inside had been crouching behind rotten logs, plastered with dried mud and covered with vegetation. I could see their ribs. One of the women was ten years older than my mother. She looked that old, maybe wasn't, but one side of her chest was blown away. That was what happened when grenades designed to stun troops in nanite-boosted uniforms went off too close to unprotected flesh. The old woman's teeth were black stubs.

CI, Bravo two. Site secured. This time the uplink was clear. Ready for documentation.

That's a negative, Bravo two. Torch and return. Torch and return. Op concluded. Torch and return.

Interrogative, torch and return?

That's affirm. Torch and return. Notify when you reach pickup area.

Roger.

We were "helping" the Guyanan president. The world knew that. But we weren't supposed to be engaging in operations. The only problem was that the Guyanan army couldn't find its way across a plowed field without tripping, and the multis were screaming to the Legislature and the Executory.

Bravo force. Deploy torches. Deploy torches.

A half hour later, we were trudging westward, patrols out.

I glanced back at the heavy black smoke that rose into the sullen sky. Even with the fields a quarter kay behind us, the odor permeated everything, a combination of burning rubber and rancid cooking oil.

"Why're we here, Colonel? Really?" That was Lieutenant Verglen, fresh-faced and right out of the Academy.

"CI says that a third of the caak coming into NorAm starts in this valley."

"So we've got to pay so that AVia doesn't lose creds on somatin?"

"We're just here to make sure that the Guyanan people stay under the liberated rule of President Amao. That's the official line." That was the official line, and I was a light colonel. I didn't mention what else we all knew — that MultiCor frowned on freelance production of soyl hydrocarbons that might compete with the MultiCor energy consortium.

"And we have to follow the official line, sir, don't we?"

ZZZZZZZZzzzzzz ...

A dull, off-key buzzing rolled through the sky — and the damp of the rain forest was gone. I was still sweating as I sat up and hit the alarm button.

Guyana ... more than ten years ago.

I still had dreams — except they were too real. Flashbacks. Reexperienced reality.

Reexperienced in far too real a fashion.

I lurched up from the bed and staggered toward the exercise clothes on the rack. Food and tea and exercise would help. They always did.

CHAPTER 2

The screen showed a body on the stasis slab. Short dark brown hair topped an oval face — square-jawed and clean-shaven — a face a trace too long to be perfectly proportioned. Dark half-circles lay under open un-seeing eyes and thick eyebrows. No lines crossed the smooth forehead, and none radiated from the corners of the eyes. A sheet covered the lower part of the body, but it could not conceal that the area below the chest had been crushed.

"Almost looks flash," observed Yenci, blade-slender in the dark grays of a safety officer. "Too perfect. No history. Just a pretty face. Except pretty faces don't look so pretty when they're dead."

Silence followed the safo's words.

"Do we have an ID on this one?" Yenci finally asked.

"No ID."

"GIL check?" pursued the safo, the edge in her voice muted.

"No match."

"Not in the...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Tor Books
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2004
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0765311283
• ISBN 13: 9780765311283
• Einband: Gebundene Ausgabe
• Anzahl der Seiten: 480
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Procter & Gamble Service GmbH, Braun; https://in.pg.com/contact-us/; ; Sulzbacher Str. 40-50; Schwalbach/Ts.; 65824; Deutschland