"Clark, Brian - Dinoshift" - читать интересную книгу автора (Clark Brian)

Sideways? Sorry Doctor, you just lost me."
"The experiment was on a modest scale of course,
involving nuclear reactions over nano-seconds of time.
Partitions are simply the boundaries separating the
alternate continuums from each other as well as from Prime,
which is our own continuum. Sideways refers to our ability
to shift across those partitions."
"Getting back to Christianity--"
Suspecting he should have chosen a less controversial
example, Degruton sighed. "If our time traveller somehow
prevents Christianity 'getting off the ground' so-to-speak,
he then has the remarkable option of being able to follow
the development of a non-christian continuum at any moment
during its history, up to and including the alternate's
calendar equivalent of our present."
"But not beyond?"
"Beyond?"
"Into the future."
Degruton looked wistful. "That would be interesting,
wouldn't it?" He frowned and shook his head. "Unfortunately,
that is one barrier beyond which we cannot go. As with the
speed of light, nature has its limits."
"So the future can only arrive the old fashioned way?"
"By becoming the present? Precisely."
Sovergarde pursed her lips with disappointment and
consulted her notes. "About this technique--"
"We call it Shift Dispersion, or S.D."
"Alright, S.D. Does it have a practical application?"
"Does a baby, Ms Sovergarde? Give it time."
"Then do you have anything in mind? I mean, on a larger
scale than the experiment you just described?"
"Oh indeed."
"Can you tell me what it is?"
"Not really. After all, we are at the beginning of
years of development work. But perhaps--" Degruton
hesitated, added weakly. "Really, it is rather premature."
The famous, Sovergarde smile. "Oh Doctor, do tell."
Degruton blushed, took a deep breath. "Dinosaurs."

Ten years later.
The Francis Bacon was a big ship, originally
constructed as a bulk carrier for the Mars run. Now rebuilt
to carry the massive SD generator in the main hold, her
Sovergarde fusion-drive had brought her to station above the
ecliptic in just over nine weeks.
Despite the ship's size, personnel quarters were
limited and cramped. So the presence of Gail Sovergarde, in
addition to a dozen scientists and technicians, was
initially resented by those of the ship's crew who assumed
the journalist's only asset, other than her looks and her