"Michael Flynn - Wreck of The Rivers of Stars" - читать интересную книгу автора (Flynn Michael)

Gorgas, for his part, focused once more on his simulation of Austerlitz. The gameтАЩs intelligence had
shifted the French forces in a most unexpected manner. A glitch in the neural netтАЩs training? A subtle
move whose implications he failed to see? He tried to concentrate on the miniature counters, but the
doctorтАЩs remark kept coming back to him. What had she meant by such a joke? Hidden contempt? He
had puzzled over WongтАЩs presence ever since Hand had brought her on board at Achilles. She had the

file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/WreckofTheRiversofStars,The.html (9 of 424)5-9-2007 13:26:52
 TheWreckofTheRiverofStars

face of a horse and the disposition of a sheep; but Hand had worn such a broad grin that Gorgas
wondered if she had given him more than a set of credentials. The Acts required that any transit of more
than three months carry a medical doctor on the shipтАЩs Articles, but Hand had not hunted very long to
fill the berth. A stroke of luck, he had said. A doctor left behind by her previous ship when sheтАЩd
overslept and missed the departure. Yet it seemed to Gorgas, Achilles being as small as it was, that
theKrasnarov тАЩs crew could not have hunted all that diligently for their missing physician.




Down in the bowels of the lower decks, in the dim, red-lit confines of the engineering control room,
surrounded by sharp, electric odors and bagpipe hums, Ramakrishnan Bhatterji considered the
diagnostic display as another man might a longtime lover who has suddenlyтАФand for no discernable
reasonтАФrefused to come to bed; or more accurately, who has lain in his bed stiff and cold, making no
response to his caress.

тАЬNo fusion,тАЭ he said, half in shock and half in umbrage. тАЬNo power whatever.тАЭ

тАЬThe timing might be off,тАЭ his mate pointed out.

тАЬYesтАжтАЭ The engineer batted his palm with the test harness while he considered the point. тАЬTiming is
everything,тАЭ he said, тАЬin Farnsworth engines as in love. Everything must come together at the proper
moment: the insertion, the clamping, the rapid pulsing, and the all-too-brief release of raw energy.тАЭ He
noted how his mateтАЩs smooth, young cheeks darkened. The flush ran to the scalp, so that the blond
stubble there seemed to redden as well. Bhatterji smiled, but he did not allow his mind to stray to future
delights. That such innocence existed was to be prized; that it must soon be lost, regretted; but that it
would be lost to Ramakrishnan Bhatterji was to be anticipated and savored. He laid a hand on MikoтАЩs
supple and graceful shoulder. тАЬEngines must be coaxed,тАЭ he said. тАЬThey must be teased into
performing.тАЭ He squeezed and felt how firm the flesh was under the concealing coveralls.

Mikoyan Hidei had signed the shipтАЩs Articles at Amalthea and had been aboard now for a little over a
hundred days, and every one of those days had been exquisite agony for the engineer, for his mate was
lithe and supple and beautifulтАФthe most beautiful youth he had seen in many years, Rave Evermore not
excluded. Figures far less graceful adorned the Majapour temple, where every posture known to love
had been frozen in ageless stone. MikoтАЩs age on the Articles was seventeen, but that was surely
hyperbole. A runaway, most likelyтАФbored with farming or with oxygen mining or only with parental
authority, and seeking now after far horizons.

тАЬHow long will we be enziggied?тАЭ demanded an intrusive basso voice. It was an angular voice, chopped
fine by crisp consonants, each word delivered with such distinctness, the ending of one fully complete
before the next dared raise its head, as to endow a simple greeting with the qualities of a pronouncement,