"Alan Dean Foster - Aliens Vs Predator - War" - читать интересную книгу автора (Foster Alan Dean)

Behind her, Scar clattered an angry warning for her to move faster and kicked at the back of her leg. It
would have hurt if she hadn't stepped quickly forward at the sound of his voice. As unpopular as Shorty
was, he was yautjaтАФand even after such a monumental fuckup, he was still more popular than she.

So much for appreciation. Noguchi clenched her jaw and reminded herself that the queen was close.

2



Ellis was strapped in and asleep, and Jess obviously wasn't in the mood to talk; he stared sullenly at the
vidscreen from the copilot seat, at the passing black of space as he'd done for the last four hours. Not a
word, and although Lara wouldn't have minded a little conversation, she didn't want to invade his privacy.
Privacy on the small shuttle meant closing your eyes when someone needed to pee, a difficult enough
activity in zero grav; if Jess wanted to be alone with his thoughts, she could at least give him that.

Not much point in making small talk anyway . . .

Lara closed her tired, grainy eyes for a moment, amazed that the thought of their upcoming deaths hadn't
lost any of its punch. They'd lived with it for al-most three days, and it still made her stomach knot each
time she thought of it, even after the nightmare of 949. She'd been prepared, then, with other lives
de-pending on her actions. Now, though . . . she didn't want to die, and she particularly didn't want to die
from asphyxiation in a cramped, cold shuttle in the depths of space. Even with the patch job on the filters.

they only had another fifteen, twenty hours of breathe time. And though DS 949 hadn't been as DS as
most, the shuttle's bare-bones navigation system was strictly self-contained, no hookups, not even a list
of planets or 'toids in the quadrant; it had been designed as a go-between, ship to shore, not for
deep-space transportтАФ which meant, simply, that if there was anywhere to go, they weren't going to find
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it.

She opened her eyes, looking again at the trail of glowing green numbers on the small console screen.
They'd been headed .82 since bailing from the termi-nal, only because she thought she remembered a
sur-vey office somewhere in the low eights; it was a long shot, but it wasn't like they had any alternatives.
If they were on theNemesis, they'd have been picked up by now; their old ship had been wired for
serious rangeтАФ

тАФand it was blown to shit along with Pop, the station, and about a million alien bugs. Why not
wish for something you can have, like freeze-dried bean curd? Or a nap?

Sleep sounded good. She'd caught a few hours ear-lier, but it had been more like falling unconscious
than real sleep. Ellis had been knocked out for most of their trip, which was just as well; the Max
interface had done a number on him, and not just physically. The kid had saved their lives, for what it was
worth, but it had cost him.

Lara glanced at Jess and tried to remember the last time he'd slept. Just after the escape, she thought.