"Fenwick, Keith - Skid 02 - Skid2" - читать интересную книгу автора (Fenwick Keith)

There was the hint of a foreign smell in the air though, one that Raele couldn't identify, like the flesh that the offworlder used to prepare for eating. The offworlder was half the universe away so it couldn't be that.
Raele stepped gingerly through the hatch and started across the space port to the controllers office.
'Probably asleep,' Raele decided wondering why nobody hustled out to to meet him. No officious clerks or attendants. No special messenger from Inel. Not even any other pilots greeting fellow travellers and swapping stories of the latest mission with. Nobody, nothing.
The only sign of normality was the service crew unobtrusively going about it's business on his ship.
Raele walked across the space port which was flanked by tall structures the offworlder had called trees. He was headed toward the building that housed the senate when it was in session and where Inel also had his offices. Surely someone would be there?
Raele found the building empty as he had half expected, his footsteps echoed hollowly and he shivered slightly. Where had everyone gone? Raele searched Inel's private apartments and found them empty as well. He sat behind Inel's desk and looked at his console. From here Inel kept tabs on every part of Skidian life. It also meant death for anybody to intrude into this inner sanctum, though Raele was beginning to doubt that anyone would disturb him.
The console came to life surprising Raele and then began to make its preprogrammed status report as if he were Inel.
Raele read as the report scrolled down, noting that everything seemed normal enough. Even the problems with the syn plants had been solved while he had been away. Skids vast industrial complex was running as it always had, a monument to Skid's technological abilities and sophistication.
So where was everybody?
The report continued scrolling, detailing production of different essential industries, the status of defense systems, inbound and outbound flights. Only his own had been logged Raele noted. Population statistics.
Raele gazed at the figures scrolling off the bottom of the screen and then scrolled them back up not believing what he was seeing.
Almost the entire population of the planet had disappeared! Raele sat stunned for, he didn't know how long, staring at the figures. That they were true he had no reason to doubt, so where was everyone?





one


Sue looked at her doctor expectantly, wondering why he had such a congratulatory expression on his face. She had visited him a few days previously, complaining of nausea. After filling the toilet bowl with vomit for the third or fourth time she decided she must have picked up some kind of bug.
Who knew what nasties really lurked in the streams where they'd drunk? Or hid in the rough cooking areas where they had prepared their food during the trip into the forest she'd recently returned from?
A slight bout of food poisoning or a tummy bug, Sue wasn't too concerned though she visited the doctor just in case.
The doctor was a small frail looking man, with a tight skin that fitted him like a scrubbed plastic glove. His soft clammy hands had made her shiver uncontrollably when he had run them over her bare abdomen as Sue had described her symptoms.
After a cursory examination, the doctor had asked a few seemingly meaningless questions about her periods that left her a little bewildered. He didn't think she was pregnant did he? The mere thought was laughable, not only was she on the pill but she hadn't slept with anyone in months, almost a year.
The idea of pregnancy didn't cross her mind again. Sue lay stiffly on the examination table made up with crisp white sheets that almost crackled beneath her and rested her head on the small pillow.
The doctor took her pulse, holding Sue's hand limply in his clammy paw, checked her blood pressure and then asked her to untuck her blouse. Sue tried not to shudder as the doctors clammy hands slid over her abdomen again. Pressing here, tapping there.
"All right Miss Clarke." Did he emphasise the 'Miss? ' Sue wondered as he withdrew his hands and stepped away so that Sue could tuck in her blouse and slip off the table.
She watched the doctor mince around his desk with an action that reminded her more of a dog than any human she'd ever seen.
"Woof!" A dog barked an affirmative reply somewhere close and Sue allowed herself a secret smile.
Sue watched the doctor scribble something on a form as she straightened her clothing and sat in the chair across the other side of the desk.
"There isn't to be anything to be unduly worried about," the doctor had begun with a smile. "It's a good idea to get some tests done just to be sure," he had added handing over the form. "If you see the nurse outside, she'll look after you."
Sue found herself unable to ask the questions she had been meaning to. Instead she stood passively as the doctor opened the door and showed her out of his surgery wondering where the dog was.
That had been two days ago.
This morning the doctor's receptionist had rung asking Sue to return to the surgery as her test results had returned from the lab.
Sue was a little surprised to find that the doctor wanted to see her again. She had thought all she would need was a tonic of some kind, a few pills from the chemist and 'she'd be right!'.
She began to worry that she had contracted some fatal disease, cancer, aids even. Sue didn't have much time to run through the whole gamut of possibilities as the nurse ushered her into the doctor's office.
The doctor had risen as she entered with this congratulatory smile on his face and motioned Sue to sit.
Surely there wasn't anything seriously wrong she thought but the doctors first words confused her.
"I'm pleased to confirm your pregnancy Miss Clarke."
Sue sat bolt upright in her chair, hands clenched at her side, unable to speak for a moment.
"How?" She gasped, not meaning to speak aloud.
"Surely you realise that contraceptives aren't entirely infallible?"
"No, sorry," Sue replied, her face feeling hot and flushed, "the news just comes as a bit of a shock, that's all."
What she didn't ask was whether he believed in immaculate conception. Before she thought of anything else Sue began to worry about what she would tell her parents. How her mother might react, let alone her father.
"There is nothing to worry about," the doctor droned on, blissfully unaware that this pregnancy could create modern medical history. "You're a fit healthy young woman and it's only early days yet. Make an appointment for a month so we can monitor your progress. Until then carry on as usual."
The doctor stared at Sue, noting that she was clearly distressed at the news. Well he was a doctor his work was done. He wasn't a psychiatrist or social counsellor. If this woman had problems with the father or candidates for father then that was someone else's problem, not his.
It couldn't, just wasn't physically possible. It just couldn't be true!
"Bloody hell." Sue was as surprised as the doctor who looked across the desk at her a pained look on his face. Sue froze at the disjionted image that flashed in her head before she could comprehend it. Like an elusive word on the tip of her tongue she couldn't quite grasp it's significance. It wasn't her voice that had uttered the words, but one that was intimately familiar to her.
But? Sue asked herself.