"John DeChancie - Skyway 2 - Red Limit Freeway" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dechancie John)

to fit pages together, with Winnie's help.
"See, Jake? The intercluster road comes in here at Andromeda and exits at the same point. Let's call it
the Intercluster Thruway."
"And if you follow it," I said, "you go ... wait a minute. Is the Local Group associated with other galactic
clusters? Or do we go our own way?"
"I don't know. We'll have plenty of time to check this. It may be that the Intercluster Thruway and the big
road, the intermetacluster one, are one and the same, at least locally."
"Okay. So, whatever this big road is, we have to take the Transgalactic Extension to Andromeda in
order to pick it up. On the way we hit these little globular galaxies. Did you say you knew the names for
them?"
"They're just New General Catalogue numbers. Can't remember."
"Doesn't matter. Okay, you come into Andromeda here, presumably with the option of taking local
routes into the galaxy or making a huge jump to the next cluster or metacluster, whatever the case may
be."
Roland refilled his mug. "Yes, that's the way it looks."
I sat back and puffed on a long clay pipe someone had handed me. It was charged with an untobaccoish
weed. "So what does it all mean?"
"It means," Roland said, "that as you travel the main in- termetacluster road, you take backward leaps in
time in billions of years."
"Yeah." I puffed. "Yeah. But are we sure of that?"
"No. But put this all together with what we know about how the Skyway works, along with the legends
that have grown around you, and it makes sense." Roland was drunker than I was. A dizzy spell hit him,
and he shook his head to clear it. "But what the punk do I know," he added thickly.
"I think it makes perfect sense," Fitzgore said. "And I wish to hell I were going with you."
"Where am I going?" I wanted to know.
"To the Big Bang, mate," another of the loggers said.
I nodded toward the maps. "It's one hell of a long way to the end of the road." I slid one sheet over to
Fitzgore and pointed to it. "Look at the Local Group map. You pick up the big road in Andromeda.
Now, from here, that means you have to somehow get on the Galactic Beltway and go about 10,000
light-years to the rim of the Milky Way. How many road klicks would that be?"
"Doesn't Winnie's journey-poem give some indication?" Fitzgore asked.
"Darla's still working on the translation," I said. "Anyway, you then take the Transgalactic Extension out
to this little splotch here. Hey, Roland. What did you say this could be?"
"Huh?"
"Wake up. This little cloud here?"
"Oh. Uh, an undiscovered extra burp galactic star cloud. Makes a nice little bridge to Andromeda."
"Yeah, but even with that, the jump is in the neighborhood of a million light-years."
"Prolly is. Gimme that pitcher, willya?"
"Sure you can handle it, Egg Roll?" a mountain-size logger said.
"Don't call me 'Egg Roll,' you tree-humping moron." "Easy, son. Didn't mean anything by it."
"Then shut up and gimme that pitcher, or I'll teach you some punking manners."
"You'll find me a willing pupil, mate. Anytime you've got the time."
"The time," Roland breathed, struggling to his feet, "is now. Would you care to take the evening air with
me, sir?"
"I would indeed."
"Gee, that rhymes," Susan said, nose wrinkling as she smiled. "Would you care ... to take the eve-ning
airrr. . ." She had a good singing voice.
"Oh, Roland," John said. "Sit down. Your honor has hardly been besmirched."
Susan laughed.
"`Besmirched'?" I said. "How 'bout just smirched?" I took a good inhale on the pipe and let it out. "Never