file:///F|/rah/Neal%20Stephenson/Stephenson,%20Neal%20-%20Snow%20Crash.txt

ROC

Publishedby the Penguin Group
Penguin Books Ltd, 27 Wrights Lane, London W8 5TZ, England
Penguin Books USA Inc.. 375 Hudson Street. New York, New York 10014, USA
Penguin Books Australia Ltd, Ringwood, Victoria, Australia
Penguin Books Canada Ltd. 10 Alcorn Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4V 3B2
Penguin Books (NZ) Lid, 182-190 Wair.iu Road. Auckland 10, New Zealand

Penguin Books Ltd. Registered Offices: Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England


First published in the USA by Bantam Books, a division of Bantam Doubleday Dell
Published Group. inc. 1992
First published in Great Britain by Roc 1993
7 9 10 8 6


Copyright ~ Neal Stephenson, 1992
All rights reserved


(iratefui acknowledgement is made for permission to reprint a drawing from
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind by Julian Jaynes.
Copyright ~ Julian Jaynes, 1976. Reprinted by permission of
Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.




Roe is a trademark of Penguin Books Ltd.


Printed in England by Clays Ltd. St ives plc


Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject
to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent,
re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher's
prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in
which it is published and without a similar condition including this
condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser
snow n... 2.a. Anything resembling snow. b. The white specks on a television screen resulting from
weak reception.

crashv.., .-infr.. . . 5, To fail suddenly,as abusiness or an economy.
-The Amencan I-Ientizge Dictionary

virus.. . . [L. virus slimy liquid, poison, offensive odour or taste.] 1. Venom, such as is
emitted by a poisonous animal. 2. Path. a. A morbid principle or poisonous substance produced in
the body as the result of some disease, esp. one capable of being introduced into other persons or
animals by inoculations or otherwise and of developing the same disease in them.. . . 3. fIg. A
moral or intellectual poison, or poisonous influence.
-The Oxford English Dictionary




1
The Deliverator belongs to an elite order, a hallowed subcategory. He's got esprit up to here.
Right now, he is preparing to carry out his third mission of the night. His uniform is black as
activated charcoal, filtering the very light out of the air. A bullet will bounce off its
arachnofiber weave like a wren hitting a patio door, but excess perspiration wafts through it like
a breeze through a freshly napalmed forest, Where his body has bony extremities, the suit has



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sintered armorgel: feels like gritty jello, protects like a stack of telephone books.
When they gave him the job, they gave him a gun. The Dcliverator never deals in cash, but someone
might come after him anyway-might want his car, or his cargo. The gun is tiny, acm-
2
SNOW CRASH
styled, lightweight, the kind of gun a fashion designer would carry; it fires teensy darts that
fly at five times the velocity of an SR-71 spy plane, and when you get done using it, you have to
plug it into the cigarette lighter, because it runs on electricity.
The Deiverator never pulled that gun in anger, or in fear. He pulled it once in Gila Highlands.
Some punks in Gila Highlands, a fancy Burbclave, wanted themselves a delivery, and they didn't
want to pay for it. Thought they would impress the Deliverator with a baseball bat. The Deiverator
took out his gun, centered its laser doohickey on that poised Louisville Slugger, fired it. The
recoil was immense, as though the weapon had blown up in his hand. The middle third of the
baseball bat turned into a column of burning sawdust accelerating in all directions like a
bursting star. Punk ended up holding this bat handle with milky smoke pouring out the end. Stupid
look on his face. Didn't get nothing but trouble from the Deiverator.
Since then the Deliverator has kept the gun in the glove compartment and relied, instead, on a
matched set of samurai swords, which have always been his weapon of choice anyhow. The punks in
Gila Highlands weren't afraid of the gun, so the Dcliverator was forced to use it. But swords need