"Bunch, Chris - Last Legion 01 - The Last Legion 2.0" - читать интересную книгу автора (Bunch Chris)

'Better honk.'

'Can we come?' Garvin asked. 'Damned if I want to become any sort of
pirate.'

'Don't be a prime idjiit,' Kipchak snapped. 'You'd just...' He stopped,
looked at Garvin and Njangu critically.

'You serious?'

'Yeh.'

Njangu thought for a moment, then nodded. 'I've already got one strike
on me, don't need another. I'll go, if you'll have us.'

'Well... I owe you, like I said. And being solo on a lifeboat can create
problems, especially on a long jump, which I suspect we'll be making if
we get that far.

''Kay. You can't take anything with you. We're gonna move backward, real
slow. When the guards look at you, freeze. Don't look back. And for
gossakes don't smile. Pretty soon they'll come for the others, which is
when we go down past the refresher in the confusion, undog the hatch at
the far end of the bay, then follow me. Hopefully that passageway's got
air in it. We're going for one of the E-craft-escape ships-which should
be on the mid-deck. All these goddamned troopships are built pretty much
the same. If we're in luck, it'll be supplied and fueled. Otherwise...
so let's go.'

Step... step... statue, I'm a statue, one of those bastards with the gun
just glanced down the line, but not at me, not at me... step...

Half an eternity later, the blond officer, Celidon, came back.

'All right,' his amplified voice cracked. 'Pick up your gear, and come
toward me in single file. We're going to search you, then move you all
to a smaller compartment, to keep you from getting yourselves into
trouble. If any of you have a weapon, drop it right now. Otherwise,
you'll be shot where you stand.

'First man!'

The recruits shuffled forward slowly.

Petr Kipchak slid down a side aisle. Behind him were Garvin and Njangu.
Crablike, they scuttled away from the main bay entrance.

They passed the rumpled bunk Maev had taken Njangu to, and he had a
moment of pain for what might've been but would never be.