I read the following passage (from the first book
of my Top 100 Challenge) and felt that something was missing. The fight seemed to instigate to quickly. I also didn't feel there was enough of a logical sequence of the main character (Rick Deckard) realising that Kadalyi was in fact the android he'd been hunting, Polokov. I also couldn't find a reference to Deckard activating the sine wave. Possibly I missed it, but I guess I felt there was a pacing issue.
So just for fun, I decided to rewrite the section (my attempt is in blue font below), trying to retain similar prose. I’ve repeated the original text beneath my version for comparison.
So just for fun, I decided to rewrite the section (my attempt is in blue font below), trying to retain similar prose. I’ve repeated the original text beneath my version for comparison.
Looking at my rewrite, I'm not sure
if I accomplished what I intended. What do you think?
Rewrite
‘Mr
Deckard?’ the man asked with a Slavic accent.
‘The bounty hunter for the San Francisco Police Department?’ The empty taxi rose, and the Russian watched
it go, absently. ‘I’m Sandor Kadalyi,’
the man said, and opened the car door to squeeze in beside Rick.
As
he shook hands with Kadalyi, Rick noticed that the WPO representative carried
an unusual type of laser tube, a subform which he had never seen before.
‘Oh,
this?’ Kadalyi said. ‘Interesting, isn’t
it?’ He tugged it from his belt
holster. ‘I got this on Mars.’
‘I
thought I knew every handgun made,’ Rick said.
‘Even those manufactured at and for use in the colonies.’
‘We
made this ourselves,’ Kadalayi said, beaming like a Slavic Santa, his ruddy
face inscribed with pride. ‘You like
it? What is different about it,
functionally, is – here, take it.’ He
passed the gun over to Rick, who inspected it expertly, by way of years of
experience.
‘How
does it differ functionally?’ Rick asked.
He couldn’t tell.
‘Press
the trigger.’
Aiming
upward, out the window of the car, Rick squeezed the trigger of the
weapon. Nothing happened; no beam
emerged. Puzzled, he turned to Kadalyi.
‘The
triggering circuit,’ Kadalyi said cheerfully, ‘isn’t attached. It remains with me. You see?’ He opened his hands, revealed a
tiny unit. ‘And I can also direct it,
within certain limits. Irrespective of
where it’s aimed.’
Rick returned the
man’s smile, but felt somewhat uncomfortable.
There was something about Kadalyi’s accent that seemed odd.
‘Ingenious, no?’
Kadalyi said, then held his hand out to take the gun back. Rick leaned forward to pass him the weapon,
and as he did he slipped his left hand into his coat pocket, triggering the
device inside.
The Russian
smiled down at the gun in his hand, slotted the circuit back in, then pointed
it at Rick’s face.
‘I don’t even
have to aim it like this to kill you, but old habits die hard.’
Rick shook his
head slowly.
‘You’re not
Kadalyi. You’re Polokov,’ he said
without humour. ‘Why didn’t you just
shoot me the moment you got in?’
Polokov shrugged
with his eyebrows.
‘There’s nobody
around now. I can easily make my escape. Again.’
He laughed. ‘You bounty hunters
are all the same. Stupid and slow.’
‘I wouldn’t be so
sure about that,’ Rick said.
‘Oh really?’
Polokov said and pulled the trigger.
The gun failed to
go off. Polokov fired again with no
response. He frowned down at the
weapon.
‘What …?’
Rick punched
Polokov.
‘Sine wave,
genius. Phases out laser emanation into
harmless light.’
Polokov swung,
latching onto Rick’s neck before he could even blink.
‘Looks like I’ll
just have to break your pencil neck instead,’ he said.
The android’s
hands felt like an industrial clamp, crushing his throat so hard his eyes began
watering. Rick tried to yank Polokov’s
arms downwards and away from his neck, but Polokov's grip held firm. Rick could feel his head swimming, a
blackness beginning to creep around the edge of his vision.
Struggling, Rick
reached into his jacket pocket, felt the cool metal of the gun in his shoulder
holster, and pulled the trigger. The android’s
face exploded inwards as the bullet tore itself through the circuitry and out
the other end, shattering the car window.
Lucky shot.
The death grip loosened, but was still firmly clamped around his throat. It took Rick a good five minutes to peel the
hands away, finger by finger, leaving him coughing and gasping for air.
Original
‘Mr
Deckard?’ the man asked with a Slavic accent.
‘The bounty hunter for the San Francisco Police Department?’ The empty taxi rose, and the Russian watched
it go, absently. ‘I’m Sandor Kadalyi,’
the man said, and opened the car door to squeeze in beside Rick.
As
he shook hands with Kadalyi, Rick noticed that the WPO representative carried
an unusual type of laser tube, a subform which he had never seen before.
‘Oh,
this?’ Kadalyi said. ‘Interesting, isn’t
it?’ He tugged it from his belt holster. ‘I got this on Mars.’
‘I
thought I knew every handgun made,’ Rick said.
‘Even those manufactured at and for use in the colonies.’
‘We
made this ourselves,’ Kadalayi said, beaming like a Slavic Santa, his ruddy
face inscribed with pride. ‘You like it? What is different about it, functionally, is
– here, take it.’ He passed the gun over
to Rick, who inspected it expertly, by way of years of experience.
‘How
does it differ functionally?’ Rick asked.
He couldn’t tell.
‘Press
the trigger.’
Aiming
upward, out the window of the car, Rick squeezed the trigger of the
weapon. Nothing happened; no beam
emerged. Puzzled, he turned to Kadalyi.
‘The
triggering circuit,’ Kadalyi said cheerfully, ‘isn’t attached. It remains with me. You see?’ He opened his hands, revealed a
tiny unit. ‘And I can also direct it,
within certain limits. Irrespective of
where it’s aimed.’
‘You’re
not Polokov, you’re Kadalyi,’ Rick said.
‘Don’t
you mean that the other way around?
You’re a bit confused.’
‘I
mean you’re Polokov, the android; you’re not from the Soviet police.’ Rick,
with his toe, pressed the emergency button on the floor of his car.
‘Why
won’t my laser tube fire?’ Kadalyi-Polokov said, switching on and off the
miniaturized triggering and aiming device which he held in the palm of his
hand.
‘A
sine wave,’ Rick said. ‘That phases out
laser emanation and spreads the beam into ordinary light.’
‘Then
I’ll have to break your pencil neck.’
The android dropped the device and, with a snarl, grabbed with both
hands for Rick’s throat.
As
the android’s hands sank into his throat Rick fired his regulation issue
old-style pistol from its shoulder holster; the .38 magnum slug struck the
android in the head and its brain box burst.
The Nexus-6 unit which operated it blew into pieces, a raging, mad wind
which carried throughout the car. Bits
of it, like the radioactive dust itself, whirled down on Rick. The retired remains of the android rocked
back, collided with the car door, bounced off and struck heavily against him;
he found himself struggling to shove the twitching remnants of the android
away.
Shakily,
he at last reached for the car phone, called in to the Hall of Justice. ‘Shall I make my report?’ he said. ‘Tell Harry Bryant that I got Polokov.’
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