Rainbows End Read Online Free Page B

gangs could acquire it. That was where Keiko Mitsuri was the greatest expert. Even though her work was hidden by cover stories and planted lies, Keiko had saved millions of lives.
    The Red Queen’s Race continued. In all innocence, the marvelous creativity of humankind continued to generate unintended consequences. There were a dozen research trends that could ultimately put world-killer weapons into the hands of anyone having a bad hair day.
Alfred walked back to the nearest cannon, paying the touch fee with a wave of his hand. He leaned against the warm metal, sighting out over the blue mediterranean haze, and imagining a simpler time.
    Poor Günberk. He had the truth exactly backwards. Effective YGBM would not be the end of everything. In the right hands, YGBM technology was the one thing that could solve the modern paradox, harnessing the creativity of humankind without destroying the world in the process. In fact, it was humankind’s only hope for surviving the twenty-first century. And in San Diego, I am so close to success . He had insinuated his project into the bio labs three years earlier. The great breakthrough had come less than a year ago. His test at the soccer match had proven the delivery system. In another year or so, he’d have developed higher semantic controls. With that, he could reliably control those immediately around him. Much more important, he could spread the new infection across whole populations and engineer a few universally viewed transmissions. Then he would be in control. For the first time in history, the world would be under adult supervision.
    That had been the plan. Now incredibly bad luck had jeopardized it. But I should look at the bright side; Günberk came to me to fix the problem ! Alfred had spent a lot of effort digging up “Mr. Rabbit.” The fellow was clearly inexperienced, and every bit the egotistical fool that Günberk believed. Rabbit’s successes were just barely impressive enough to make him acceptable. They could manage Rabbit. I can manage Rabbit . From inside the labs, Alfred would feed the Rabbit just the right misinformation. In the end neither Rabbit nor Alfred’s colleagues in the Indo-European Alliance would realize they had been fooled. And afterward, Alfred could continue undisturbed with what might well be the last, best chance for saving the world.
    Alfred climbed into the gun turret and admired the fittings. The Barcelona tourist commission had spent some real money on rebuilding these artifacts. If their mock battle this evening meshed with this physical reality, it would be very impressive. He glanced at his Mumbai schedule — and decided to stay in Barcelona a few more hours.

The Return
    Robert Gu should be dead. He knew that, he truly did. He had been a long time dying. He wasn’t really clear on how long. In this unending present, he could see only blurs. But that didn’t matter, since Lena had turned the lights down so low that there was nothing to see. And the sounds: for a while he had worn things in his ears, but they were devilishly complicated and always getting lost or worn out. Getting rid of them had been a blessing. What sounds remained were vague mumblings, sometimes Lena complaining at him, pushing and poking. Following him into the John, for God’s sake. All he really wanted was to go home. Lena wouldn’t let him do that simple thing. If it really was Lena at all. Whoever, she wasn’t very nice. I just want to go home ….
    And yet, he never did quite die. The lights were often brighter now, though blurry as ever. There were people around and voices, the high-pitched tones he remembered from home. They talked as if they expected to be understood.
    Things had been better before, when everything was a mumbling blur. Now he hurt all over. There were long drives to see the doctor, and afterward the pain was always worse. There was some guy who claimed to be his son, and claimed that wherever he was now was home. Sometimes they rolled