Rick took a sip of champagne from the gla.s.s he was holding and looked at the couple with an arrogant expression, "Well, what questions would you like to ask, Mr. Anderson? Let"s just keep our conversation short, otherwise, business topics can make your pretty companion feel a bit bored," the man nodded to Corey and winked at her.
"I want to know what you are you trying to achieve with all this masquerade? If you manage to scramble brains of all those present, don"t expect this to work out with the others," Daniel replied.
He immediately noticed that Stein"s behavior was different from what he saw in Ashley and Corey"s memories. It was like they were three different people, with Corey he looked like he had no memory, with Ashley he looked like a caring father, and now... Now he was a copy of the one Daniel saw in David"s memories about the past life.
"Hmm, I see, Marcus did some brainwashing with you as well, huh, Ricky? And how do you like being his experimental little animal?" Daniel asked with a sneer, and with Rick"s frowning eyebrow, he realized that he had hit the bull"s eye.
"You can think what you want, your opinion has never interested me. But I can a.s.sure you that Rick Stein, whom you knew as a friend of your precious younger brother, no longer exists. So don"t have false illusions that we can find some compromise," Rick cast a glance at Corey, letting the woman know that their common past didn"t bother him at all, "The weak in this world are destined either to die or to obey."
"So you have chosen the second option and are helping this madman make others obey him too? Do you think everyone around is that stupid that they won"t notice this?"
"Yes, that"s exactly what I think," Rick replied to Daniel"s remark in a melancholic voice and took a new sip of champagne. Bubbles of air began to play in the man"s gla.s.s; he lifted it up, watching with interest how the lighting of the hall helped them to shimmer in different shades.
"Do you know such a thing as the "Overton Window"? I"m sure you are familiar with this term," he asked Anderson, not taking his eyes off the champagne.
"You can take any, even the most absurd idea, even cannibalism, to that extent, which no sane society can accept, and begin to gradually popularize it. First, it will cause terrible disputes and protests, then it will attract public attention, scientists and opinion leaders will begin to cover it in their works and articles. Over time, there will be those who begin to claim that there is nothing wrong with this, and there will be evidence in the history of mankind.
There will be tolerance to this issue, and the idea, which some time ago was considered absurd, will gradually become the norm. It will be supported by an increasing number of people and, voila, not even ten or twenty years have pa.s.sed before restaurants appeared offering fresh men"s meat as a delicacy," Rick swallowed the rest of the champagne and pointedly licked his lips.
"It"s disgusting! This will never happen!" Corey was indignant. She looked at the man, the father of her daughter, and tried to find in him at least something that she knew, but apart from his appearance, this man seemed completely strange to her.
"My dear Corey, you are too naive to see such obvious things," Rick said in a condescending voice, "The government of almost any country uses this technique to control its people. They seek the enemy outside and allocate huge funds to the military budget to hide their own mistakes and selfish ends.
They bribe the media and fill the information s.p.a.ce with the same topic, and people believe in it. So you can not even doubt it, no one will even guess when Marc Technologies will take control of most of the population. People themselves will line up in order to get a new chip sample.
Therefore, I advise you not to worry. You lost this war without even entering the first battle. And all that remains for you is to lie in the sand and wait for your final fate, like a fish thrown ash.o.r.e," the man said the last words with a triumphant grin on his face.
"Have you thought about your daughter?! Do you want her to live in such a world?!" Corey did not count on a peaceful conversation with Rick when she was going to this event, but she hoped that his plans were not to harm his own child. How wrong she was. Now she was convinced that Rick Stein, whom she loved, had finally died six years ago.
"Daughter? Do I look like a man who will care about such trifles?" The man raised an eyebrow, as if Corey mistook him for an idiot, "Baby, I understand that girls often fall in love with bad guys, so you need to be aware of the consequences. You yourself decided to give birth to her. Now, what do you expect from me? In my opinion, I made it clear even in Germany that I didn"t give a d.a.m.n," he put one hand in his trouser pocket, and scratched his chin with the second hand, it looked like they were discussing the most trivial things,
"But you"re right, maybe such a world will not suit her very much. It"s a pity that I missed when I shot. If I hit your abdomen back then, this conversation would not be relevant right now."
"Oh you b.a.s.t.a.r.d," Daniel hissed and was ready to throw himself at the man, ignoring the high-ranking guests around and all the White House guards, but Corey stopped him.
The woman"s eyes were filled with shock and confusion, Daniel thought she was looking at Rick, but then he realized that Corey was looking behind the man.
d.a.m.n.
Rick felt something strange when Daniel stopped abruptly and became silent. Realizing that they were looking behind him, Rick turned around and saw a little girl.
Ashley was standing there, frozen like a statue, and looking at the man. There was an armful of sweets in her hands, but it seems she completely forgot about them.
"Ash-Ashley, my girl," Corey said in a low voice, she hoped that her daughter was simply taken aback when she saw her father, but the next second tears appeared in her eyes.
Rick swallowed a lump coming up to his throat. s.h.i.t. She definitely heard everything.
"Ashley!" Corey shouted and rushed after her daughter, when the small figure of the child, like lightning, disappeared into the crowd. Rick, at a loss, looked at the pile of chocolates scattered under his feet.
"Maybe girls often fall in love with bad guys, but they prefer to marry the good guys," Daniel took a step forward and stood next to Rick, "Don"t even dare to think to get closer to my woman and my daughter," he said to Rick in his ear in a cold tone, pushed him off with his shoulder and followed Corey.
Rick said nothing in response, his gaze focused on small round sweets on the floor. He looked up and noticed an unfamiliar young man standing nearby and not taking his eyes off him.
"I"m not interested in boys, so stop staring and get out of my eyes if you don"t want to get in trouble," Rick barked irritably, he didn"t care whose rich family this young belonged to. All that a man wanted was to throw out his fury on someone.
But the young man was not hooked by his words, he went up to Rick and extended a hand with a smile, "I am very happy to meet you. My name is Nick Anderson, I"m David"s cousin, you know my brother, right?"
Ashley was so glad that she found her favorite sweets among the treats that she picked them up a whole bunch before Nick persuaded her to go back to the place where everyone else was standing. But he did not expect that at the moment when they came, they would hear such an unpleasant conversation.
Rick was looking at the young man with an appraising gaze, vague details surfaced in his memory, which seems to be true that David had a cousin with that name, but what the h.e.l.l did this boy want to get acquainted with him after he witnessed such an unpleasant conversation?
The man lowered his eyes to the hand extended to him, Rick had no desire to shake it, but this guy Nick was standing there, smiling like an idiot and did not move.
Rick held out his hand and at that moment regretted it.
All sounds and movements around him froze like the whole was being put on the pause, the floor under his feet began to fall through, and it seemed to the man that his body fell into the abyss.
He felt like a huge mountain with thousands of feet high was dropped on him by a huge t.i.tan and crushed his bones as if his body was under heavy pressure.
Physically, he was standing in the same place in the hall, but he felt like he was in h.e.l.l.
"What? Is something wrong?" Nick said with the same smile on his face.
Rick tried to open his mouth to utter a word, but the air around him became liquid and sticky like mercury, he felt this air penetrating inside, displacing the last remaining oxygen.
Nick shortened the distance that their bodies were now a few inches apart and laid a hand on Rick"s shoulder. The heat from his palm was like molten metal slowly corroding the man"s flesh.
Rick turned his head and his eyes met a cold searing gaze, a sense of fear and horror in itself captured the man from the inside, something he did not even experience even when being next to Marcus.
"*If this girl cries at least one more time because of your fault, I promise you such a painful death that you will regret being reborn, Richard Rudolf Steiner*," Nick whispered to Rick in his ear in German.
W-What? Who is this man?
Richard"s full German name was known only to his mother, who died long before the war. Even on the Ahnenerbe lists, he was listed only as Richard Steiner. No, he himself mentioned this only to a couple of people in his circle, but they have all been dead for a long time, including the father of the twins. No one knows about this except Rick.
"What are you?" the man said, barely audible, which required a lot of effort from him.
Nick removed his palm from Rick"s shoulder, let go of his hand, smiled, and walked away without saying anything in return.