"Paul Di Filippo - Shipbreaker" - читать интересную книгу автора (Di Filippo Paul)

The Quetzal screeched in frustration, his wing stubs twitching beneath his embroidered shirt. "Go
anyplace you want, you unreasoning curdled egg! But you'll never earn more than base pay if you persist
in this foolish strategy. And my own bonuses will fall accordingly!"

Klom said, "I will be going into the decommissioned areas then." He sat down, occupying two seats.

Muttering, Rapaille signaled liftoff to the transport's pilotтАФa diminutive Melungeon with one tendril
wrapped around a joystick and five others free for the separate controls. The transport lost mass until it
floated half a meter above the waves. Surging forward through a channel opened in the baffles, the craft
headed toward the Vixen ship. The Great Sun and the Lesser Sun raised the temperature of the air to a
comfortable, shirtsleeve level. By the time the Least Sun arose, rendering the muggy atmosphere tropical,
the breakers would be taking their lunch deep within the hulk.

The crossing of the kilometer of open water by Klom's craft and its mates resembled the engulfment
of a school of minnows by a leviathan. The minor-city-sized disabled starcruiserтАФwith the waterline
halfway up its height, and its lower portions resting on the seabedтАФthrust out artificial peninsulas and
lesser promontories. Once into its shadow and embrace, the transports assumed the insignificance of
ticks on the hide of a Dominikono widestrider. Additionally, the ancient interstellar vessel seemed to be
reradiating all the immeasurable chill it had accumulated over its millennia of high vacuum service.

It would take the gangs nearly a year to finish stripping the interior of the craft, and another six
months to disassemble its hull. Of course, the whole process could have been accomplished in a fraction
of that time by employing sufficient swarms of self-replicating majestatics. But such technologiesтАФalong
with ensouled machinesтАФwere forbidden to anyone not at least a four-strand. And the four-strands and
other galactic elites were both relatively small in number and disdainful of performing any such "labor,"
even distanced by layers of autonomic supervisors. With the fecund and subservient two-strands so
handy, it only made sense to keep them profitably occupied.

The Yards at Asperna not only saw ships come in, but also go out, as salable constituent pieces.
Brokers arrived and departed continuously, both from offplanet and from other parts of Asperna, leaving
with cargoes for a hundred thousand destinations. Workers in the warehouse and sales end of the Yards
felt their positions to be superior to the gritty, effortful tasks of the breakers and sorters, and a rough
caste system existed, further fragmented into various levels according to the perceived crudity of
assignments.

Klom's boat arrived at a sloping paw of the inorganic leviathan. Far, far above them, a different
portion of the starliner formed a concave roof. A shoulder of the starliner constituted a distant wall
running roughly parallel to the arm. A chaotic illumination came into this partial gallery as sunlight
refracted from the bouncing sea.

The Melungeon shut down the lifting units, then secured the transport by a cable to a handy U-bar on
the Vixen vessel. The breakers utilized the fractally porous surface of the starcraft's skin as handholds
and toeholds to climb up several gently sloping meters of wall, their tools racketing against each other.
Once aboard this small leg of the starlinerтАФbroad enough to host a ballgameтАФthey waited for Rapaille's
commands.

"Follow me, you wittolds! The nearest port is just a few minutes' walk in this direction."

The paw sloped upward, the roof sloped down, and the shoulder angled in, rendering the passage