Gods and Pawns Read Online Free PDF Page A

chewed, paused, and then said: “Is it me, or does this taste like a brownie steeped in beef gravy?”
    Mendoza opened her pouch and ate some. “You’re right.” She looked into the pouch. “Not bad, though. So anyway—”
    “So anyway it was Roman Britain by that time, and I was stationed at the Dr. Zeus HQ in Londinium. Oh, it was wonderful there! Heated rooms. Neighbors from all corners of the empire. Quite cosmopolitan, you know, you’d hardly think you were in a barbarian country at all. But then, of course, just as I’d got to taking clean clothes and indoor plumbing for granted—”
    “Isn’t that the way it always is?”
    “—I was sent to Ireland. Which was quite a contrast.”
    “I’ll bet it was. What the hell would a Literature Specialist have to do in Ireland, in that era?”
    “Quite a bit, actually,” said Lewis. “Learning tribal lays, and all that. So I just made the best of things. Learned to forage, make fire, get myself out of difficult situations. I did so well I was rewarded with a job in Greece for a few decades, but then—back to rainy old Eire. I got work as a druid.”
    “At least I was never sent anywhere that primitive,” said Mendoza with a shudder. “How long were you in Ireland?”
    “Until—” Lewis halted, frowned. “Until I…ow.” He put his hands up to his head and squinted his eyes.
    “What’s wrong?”
    “Old programming error. Something…I’m so sorry, my memory’s never been right since. I had an accident. Spent ten years in a regeneration vat, would you believe it? And ages in reprogramming therapists’ offices after that,” he babbled. He had begun to sweat profusely.
    “Did it happen in Ireland?” Mendoza was watching him closely, concern in her eyes.
    “I don’t know! I was in France afterward. Old World One, in the Cevennes. Lovely place. Have you ever been there?”
    “No. Lewis, are you okay?”
    “I’m fine, I’m just—there’s just that little glitch. Something fairly traumatic happened, apparently.” Lewis shook himself, trying to regain some composure. Mendoza reached over and took his hand in hers, which sent his composure flying again, but he smiled at her and hoped she wouldn’t notice the way his heart was pounding.
    “Happens to all of us,” said Mendoza gently. “Damned tertiary-consciousness programming. The Company hides all sorts of little traumas down there, and they spring out and nail you at the worst times—usually just as you’re about to do something Dr. Zeus doesn’t want you to do. Like me with Nicholas.”
    “I’m so sorry,” said Lewis, sitting very still so she wouldn’t take her hand away.
    “You should have seen the panic attack I had the first time some mortal suggested I might be a Jew,” said Mendoza. “Complete hysterical collapse. Utterly humiliating. All pulled out of suppressed memories of being in the dungeons of the Inquisition. And the nightmares…”
    “I have nightmares, too,” said Lewis sadly.
    “Like last night?”
    “Yes. Usually…I’m lost somewhere, and there are these tremendous domed hills or, or mounds or something…and then I’m being pulled down a hole. Or a tunnel. It’s hot and suffocating and I’m trapped…and I wake up yelling, which doesn’t much impress—well, anyone who happens to hear me.”
    Mendoza gave him a thoughtful look.
    “Well,” she said finally, “maybe romance just doesn’t work for immortals, eh, Lewis? It certainly didn’t work for me. And maybe it’s just as well. No passion, no pain. Good friendship’s just as important, after all. Maybe even more so.”
    She withdrew her hand.
    “To get back to the subject of roughing it—I’ve heard stories of some of these older field operatives who are really good at it. Don’t take any gear with them at all. They’ve trained themselves to sleep upright, only it isn’t sleep, it’s a sort of altered consciousness—like their perception of time and the exterior world changes. They