FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   >>  
e fought another Nipe. And that didn't work. I had the reach on him, and I could maneuver faster. Besides, he can't throw a straight punch with those shoulders of his." "It appeared to me," Yoritomo said with a broad grin, "that you were fighting him as you would fight another human being. Eh?" Stanton grinned back. "I was, in a modified way. But I wasn't confined to a pattern. Besides, I won--the Nipe didn't. And that's all that counts." "It is, indeed. Well, I'll let you know when I'm ready for your impressions of the fight. Probably tomorrow some time--say, in the afternoon?" "Fine." George Yoritomo nodded his thanks, and his image collapsed and faded from the screen. Stanton walked back over to the window, but this time he looked at the horizon, not the street. George Yoritomo had called him "Bart". It's funny, Stanton thought, how habit can get the best of a man. Yoritomo had known the truth all along. And now he knew that his pupil--or patient--whichever it was--was aware of the truth. And still, he had called him "Bart". _And I still think of myself as Bart_, he thought. _I probably always will._ And why not? Why shouldn't he? Martin Stanton no longer existed--in a sense, he had never existed. And in actual fact, he had never had much of a real existence. He was only a bad dream. He had always been a bad dream. And now that the dream was over, only "Bart" was real. He thought back, remembering George Yoritomo's explanation. "Take two people," he had said. "Two people genetically identical. Damage one of them so badly that he is helpless and useless--to himself and to others. Damage him so badly that he is always only a step away from death. "The vague telepathic bond that always links identical twins (they 'think alike', they say) becomes unbalanced under such conditions. "Normally, there is a give-and-take. One mind is as strong as the other, and each preserves the sense of his own identity, since the two different sets of sense receptors give different viewpoints. But if one of the twins is damaged badly enough, then something must happen to that telepathic linkage. "Usually it is broken. "But the link between you and your brother was not broken. Instead, it became a one-way channel. "What happens in such a case? The damaged brother, in order to escape the intolerable prison of his own body, becomes a receptor for the stronger brother's thoughts. The weaker feels as the str
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   >>  



Top keywords:
Yoritomo
 

Stanton

 

brother

 

thought

 

George

 
damaged
 
telepathic
 

called

 
broken
 

people


existed

 

Besides

 
identical
 

Damage

 
remembering
 

genetically

 
useless
 
helpless
 

explanation

 

channel


Instead

 

linkage

 

Usually

 

escape

 

thoughts

 

weaker

 

stronger

 

receptor

 

intolerable

 

prison


happen

 
strong
 

Normally

 

unbalanced

 

conditions

 
viewpoints
 

receptors

 
preserves
 

identity

 
confined

pattern
 

counts

 
modified
 
grinned
 

impressions

 

Probably

 
tomorrow
 

maneuver

 
faster
 

fought