Neuropath by R. Scott Bakker Read Free Book Online

saying, As easy as flicking the switch …
    The Ocean Voice mentioning an argument…
    It can't be. No way.
    He thought of Neil working for the NSA, rewiring living breathing people, cheerfully lying for all these years. He thought of their Princeton days, of the fateful class they took with Professor Skeat. He thought of how they used to argue the end of the world at parties, not the end that was coming, but the end that had already passed.
    He thought of the Argument.
    Ocean Voice. Neil. The FBI. Cynthia Powski.
    No fucking way.
    Thomas nearly cried out when the door bell rang.
    He peered through the curtains, saw Mia standing impatiently on the porch. Thomas opened the door, doing his best to look normal.
    'Hi, Mia.'
    Over his neighbor's shoulder, he glimpsed a white Ford—a new Mustang hybrid—driving slowly down the street.
    'Everything OK?' Mia asked. 'The kids saw your car in the driveway. I thought I should—'
    'No. Just forgot a couple of important things for a committee presentation this afternoon.' He leaned out the door, saw Frankie and Ripley standing on Mia's porch.
    ' Daddeee !' Frankie called.
    Strange, the power of that word. Pretty much every kid used it, the same name on millions of innocent lips, over and over, and yet it seemed to thrive on this universality. You could feel sorry for all the Wangs and Smiths—who wanted to be one among millions?—but somehow 'Daddy' was different. Thomas had visited colleagues whose kids called them by name: 'Hey, Janice, can I have supper at Johnny's? Please-please?' There was something wrong about it, something that triggered an exchange of slack looks—a premonition of some budding rot.
    Dad. A single name on a billion lips, and nothing could undo it. No court order. No lifestyle choice. No divorce.
    Thomas blinked at the heat in his eyes, called back laughing to his son, asked him if he was being good for Mia. Frankie bounced up and down, as though he waved from a distant mountaintop.
    Maybe there were heroes after all.

    As much as he longed to spend a moment with his boy, he apologized to Mia and climbed back into his car. Among the wild peculiarities of the previous night's drinking session was something Neil had said about Nora, a throw-away comment really, about talking to her or something. But of course that was impossible, given that Nora was in San Francisco, which was why Thomas had the kids on this, the busiest of all summer weeks.
    What was it he had said? Something. Something… Enough to warrant sharing a word or two.
    He called out her name to his palmtop as he accelerated down the street, but all he got was her inbox recording. He told himself she might know something. At least that was what he allowed himself to think. The real concern, the worry that clamped his foot to the accelerator was altogether different.
    Maybe she was in danger.
    Think clear , he reminded himself. Think straight .
    The Argument.
    Ocean Voice had said he was making an argument, as well as 'making' love. But what argument? Was it the Argument?
    Was it Neil holding the camera? Was he the shadow behind the occluded frame?
    The Argument, as they would come to call it, was something from their undergraduate days at Princeton. Both he and Neil had been scholarship students, which meant they had no money for anything. Where their more affluent friends bar-hopped or jetted home for the holidays, they would buy a few bottles of Old English Malt Liquor, or 'Chateau Ghetto' as Neil used to call it, and get fucked up in their room.
    Everyone debated things in college. It was a reflex of sorts, an attempt to recover the certainty of childhood indoctrination for some, a kind of experimental drug for others. Neil and Thomas had definitely belonged to the latter group. Questions—that was how humans made ignorance visible, and the two of them would spend hours asking question after question. Grounds became flimsy stage props. Assumptions became religious chicanery.
    For a time it seemed