Goldengirl

Начало книги

A girl in a white vest and gold satin shorts stood alone in a narrow corridor thirty meters in length. Across the floor in front of her was a thin metal strip with two small terminals at the left end. Behind it, a set of starting blocks. Ahead, a rubber mat, flush with the floor. The wall at the end of the corridor was padded.

‘Na Mesta.’

The instruction in Russian came from behind a glass observation panel to her rear. She advanced to the blocks and got into the hunched position for the crouch start, with her fingertips splayed on the metal strip.

‘Gotovo.’

She raised her buttocks and leaned forward, distributing her weight on a tripod formed by the front foot and two hands. The only movements were the pulsing of her temple and a strand of blond hair that slipped from her left shoulder.

The crack of a shot.

The girl screamed in pain, cannoned from the blocks and crashed heavily on the mat.

‘I got a reading of.17,’ the voice indifferently announced from behind the panel, speaking now in an American West Coast accent. ‘You’re not going anyplace this way. On your feet and try again. When your reaction is down to.15, you’ll beat the electric shock. But if you come away slower, by Jesus, I’ll step up the impulse.’

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