John Varley Gaea 3 Demon

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.He should have expected it.It was an easy enough thing to do, and itwouldn't stop there.But Chris had been away from television for over twentyyears, and had forgotten about that capability.The first had been a Betty Boop cartoon, and had been simple image-substitution.Wherever Betty Boop had appeared in the original, Gaea hadreplaced her with a stylized but easily-recognizable cartoon of MarilynMonroe.The sound track was unaltered.If Earth computers could do it, it stood to reason that Gaea could.Later, she began to appear in the movies Chris knew to be Adam's favorites.This was much more sophisticated stuff, with full-body replacement, facialenhancement, and the Monroe/Gaea voice.It was impossible to detect thefakery.It was seamless movie magic, special effects to the nth degree.And it was distinctly odd to see Marilyn Monroe starring in Fists ofFury.She was a formidable figure, replacing Bruce Lee in every whirl, glower,and leap.All the Chinese actors spoke dubbed English, but Gaea/Lee was lip-synched.Of course, Lee had spent most of his time in those movies with hisshirt off, so Gaea did, too.Then there were the love scenes.After that there was no telling where Gaea might pop up.Chris saw her as SnowWhite, Charlie Chaplin, Cary Grant, and Indiana Jones.She appeared in old RKOserials, which Gaea broadcast at the rate of one episode per day.Pandemonium television had grown increasingly violent.Even the comedy tendedsharply toward the slapstick.There was little Chris could do about it.Having foreseen some of it didn'tmake it any easier.Gaea continued to make her regular visits.She came a bitcloser each time, but was as yet still distant.There was no chance she wouldscare the boy.Chris could only love the child.Which, he reflected, was nothing to sneer at.He knew Adam returned his love.But he knew a child's love can be quite fickle.One day it would come to ashowdown.Nothing could be clearer than that.But the outcome was far fromclear."Hi, Gaea," Adam said, waving at the screen."Hello, Adam, my lovely boy," said Gaea.Chris looked up.The image of Gaea had stopped and turned away from the actionstill happening behind her.She was facing Adam, and smiling.Adam still didn't get it.He giggled, and said hi again."How are you doing, Adam?" Gaea said.The action behind her was a fight scene.Gaea ducked as a chair was thrown.It sailed over her head."Oops!! He almostgot me!"Adam laughed louder."Gotcha!" he shouted."Gotcha!""They can't get me!" Gaea boasted, and turned skillfully to block a blow froma huge guy in a black hat.She hit him a quick one-two-three combination andhe fell on the floor.Gaea dusted her palms together, and grinned at AdamPage 166ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlagain."How'd you like that, Adam?" she said."I like it, I like it!" Adam laughed.Somebody save me, Chris thought, in a daze.SEVENTEENSerpent thundered down the field, clods of turf flying from his hooves, hisforelegs flirting nimbly with the black and white ball.He kicked it with theside of his hoof, and Mandolin reared on her hind legs to butt it with herhead in the general direction of Zampogna, who couldn't take control andwatched helplessly as Kekese of the Sharp team kicked it to Clavecin, whoheaded off toward the Flat's goal.Serpent kept a sharp eye from midfield, andwhen Tjelempang stole it away again and passed it off to Piano, he was inposition to take it on the run.Then he was in control again, running like thewind, the Pele of the four-legged set, bearing down on the Sharp's goalie, whodesperately tried to read Serpent's moves, dodged left, then right, leftagain-and was in the wrong place when Serpent kneed the ball up, thrust hishead forward.deliberately missed the head-butt.The goalie went flyingthrough the air toward the left side of the goal.-and watched helplessly as Serpent twisted around and kicked with a hind leg.The ball sizzled into the center of the opposing net.Flats ahead, four to three.That was still the score when, with only a centirev left to play, Mandolinscored her first goal of the game, to put it out of reach.Serpent gatheredwith the others to congratulate Mandolin, who was still a rookie at theglorious sport of football.It never occurred to him to point out that he,Serpent, had scored the winning goal.He had also scored two of the otherpoints.He was, no doubt about it, the best football player in Gaea.Breathing like steam engines, dripping sweat, the Titanides engaged in thesort of horseplay usual after a hard-fought game.Gradually, Serpent becameaware of another sound.For one moment he was alarmed.It sounded a lot likethe awful day of the riot.But then he discovered a loose group of prisoners gathered near the sidelines,shouting and clapping.They had been congregating there lately, watching the Titanides.This groupwas larger than before.In fact, the group had been getting bigger each day,Serpent realized.A few times, after the Titanide game was over, some of thehuman prisoners had taken the field to kick the ball around.Serpent scooped up the football and kicked it high and long [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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