"Eshbach, Lloyd Arthur - Overlord Of Earth" - читать интересную книгу автора (Eshbach Lloyd Arthur)

preparations are complete.
"You have been summoned to learn your part in our plan for freedom. What that
plan is we may not say--but upon each of you and the successful completion of
your individual assignment depends the liberty of humanity. Each of you will be
armed. Each of you will be fitted with a uniform of the Overlord's Guard. Each
of you will be assigned to a city and a man or woman in that city. And that
individual must die!"
Hardinger's hand had indicated the ranks of the men in black. "Upon these men
falls the greater task of the destruction of the Overlord himself. They are the
pick of all The Remnant--and they shall not fail!
"A week from today is the anniversary of man's enslavement, the Overlord's
'Liberation Day'. There will be carousing and riotous celebration, as there
always has been, and when it is at its height, when midnight mantles the
Himalayan peak they call the Overlord's Throne, we strike--for freedom!"
AT LAST that hour was at hand! His hour, he hoped, when he would destroy the
life of the one being he truly hated. The slayer of his father, once one of the
Ten, and the greatest scientist of his day.
Kerry's thoughts veered to Andrev, the Overlord, and his angular features
tightened savagely. Murderer, sadist, spoiler of a civilization. Product of an
earlier, more violent day who, so the tale was told, had discovered the secret
of physical immortality, and had lain in a crypt for three hundred years, to
awaken and enslave a world. Men in their growing wisdom had finally realized the
stupidity of international slaughter and had forgotten the so-called art of war.
Andrev, steeped in the foul knowledge of a century--the twentieth--redolent with
wars, had found the new age easy prey. And, whether or not he was immortal, he
had ruled Earth for a hundred years, yet physically had not changed at all.
Above everything, Andrev must not escape! He would be sought out--and would be
found where masses of his satellites were assembled. For the Overlord was never
alone....was afraid to be alone! Afraid, with a maddening, unbalancing fear born
of his centuries in the tomb. Centuries, it was whispered, when his body had
been as though dead, while his mind was alert, awake, and utterly--alone.
Minutes now--perhaps seconds--and the men from the past would be attacked by an
army recruited from the pages of history. "Paratroopers" had figured in wars in
Andrev's age--and "paratroopers would destroy the head and heart of the
Overlord's system! Invisible, black-clad paratroopers raining from a midnight
sky ....
Momentarily a red light winked over the heads of the waiting men. The signal. A
rustle of synthane swished through the silence. Then a great door slid aside in
the wall of the glider and a blast of frigid air whipped through the opening.
"Jump position!" Kerry barked. "Two and two. Remember your instructions." He was
talking to fill in the gap before the actual leap into the dark. "We'll try to
land on the flying field in front of the Star Tower. If we miss it, we get there
as fast as we can. We join the wedge that blasts its way into the Tower--then,
unless Andrev is blasted in the first assault--and if intelligence knows
anything, he won't be, for he'll run at the first sign of trouble--we hit for
the top of the Tower, blasting everyone before us."
Kerry's words came faster. Time was running out. "If I get mine, Bodey takes
over. If he goes, Gill is in command. If Gill goes--you know the order.
Only--get--through!"
Again that flash of red! And the first pair of men leaped into the night--a