"Alan Dean Foster - Splinter of the Mind's Eye" - читать интересную книгу автора (Foster Alan Dean)

Princess."
Her reply was filled with irritation. "My port engine is beginning to generate unequal radiation
pulses." Even when bothered, to him that voice was as naturally sweet and pleasing as sugar-laden
fruit. "How bad?" he inquired, frowning worriedly. "Bad enough, Luke." The words sounded strained.
"I'm losing control already, and the inequality's getting worse. I don't think I'm going to be able to
compensate. We'll have to stop at the first base down below on Mimban and have the problem
corrected." Luke opened his mouth to reply, did so after hesitating briefly. "You can't possibly make it
safely to Circarpous IV?"
"I don't think so, Luke. I might make near-orbit, but then we'd have to deal with official repair systems
and couldn't set down as planned. We'd miss the meeting, and we can't miss it. Resistance groups from
all over the Circarpous system are going to be there. If I don't arrive, they'll panic. We'll have one
Stang of a time getting them to surface again. And the Circarpous, worlds are vital to the Rebellion,
Luke."
"I still don't think..." he began.
"Don't make me make it an order, Luke."
Biting back his initial response, he hurriedly began a check of visual readout charts and records.
"According to my information tapes, Mimban doesn't have a repair station, Leia. In fact," he added
with a glance at the murky green-white sphere below and to one side, "Mimban might not even have
an emergency standby station."
"It doesn't matter, Luke. I have to make the conference, and I'm going down while I still have some
real control. Surely, in a system as populous as this one, any world with a breathable atmosphere's
going to be equipped with facilities for emergency repair. Your data must be old or else you're
searching the wrong tapes." A pause, then, "You can prove it by shifting your communicator monitor
to frequency oh-four-six-one."


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Splinter Of The Mind's Eye by Alan Dean Foster

Luke adjusted the requisite controls. Instantly a steady whine filled the small cabin.
"Sound familiar?" she asked him.
"That's a directional landing beacon, all right," he replied, confused. Several further queries, however,
revealed no records of a station on Mimban. "But there's still nothing in the listings on either Imperial
or Alliance tapes. If we..." He broke off as a puff of gas glowed brightly from the Princess' Y-wing,
expanded brightly and vanished. "Leia! Princess Leia!"
Her small ship was already curving away from him. "Lost lateral controls completely now, Luke! I've
got to go down!"
Luke rushed to match her glide path. "I don't deny the presence of the beacon. Maybe we'll be lucky!
Try to shift power to your port controls!"
"I'm doing the best I can." A brief silence, followed by, "Stop moving around, Threepio, and watch
your ventral manipulators!"
A contrite, metallic, "Sorry, Princess Leia," sounded from her cabin companion, the bronzed human-
cyborg relations 'droid See Threepio. "But what if Master Luke is correct and there is no station
below? We could find ourselves marooned forever on this empty world, without companionship,
without knowledge tapes, without... without lubricants!"
"You heard the beacon, didn't you?" Luke saw a small explosion whereupon the Y-wing dove surface-
ward at an abruptly sharper angle. For a few moments only static answered his frantic calls. Then the
interference cleared. "Close, Luke. I lost my starboard dorsal engine completely. I cut port dorsal
ninety percent to balance guidance systems."
"I know. I've cut power to slow with you."