"Alan Dean Foster - Ye Who Would Sing" - читать интересную книгу автора (Foster Alan Dean)

Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html




Ye Who Would Sing



By Alan Dean Foster




Caitlanddidn't hate the storm anymore.than he had the man he'd just killed, but he was less indifferent to
it. It wouldn't have mattered, except that his victim had been armed. Not well enough to savehimself , but
sufficiently to make things awkward forCaitland .

Even so, the damagedfanship could easily have made it back to theVaanland outpost, had not the
freakish thunderstorm abruptly congealed from a clear blue sky. It was driving him relentlessly northward,
away from one of the few chicken scratches of civilization man had made on this world.

If adrenalin and muscle power could have turned the craft,Caitland would have done better than anyone.
But every time it seemed he'd succeeded in wrenching the fan around to a proper course, a fresh gust
would leap from the nearest thunderhead and toss the tiny vehicle ass over rotor.

He glanced upward through the rain-smearedplex-idome . Only different shades of blackness
differentiated the sky above. If theStyx was overhead, what lay below?тАФgranite talons and claws of
gneiss, the empty-wild peaks of theSilverSparRange . He'd been blown further north than he'd thought.

Time and again the winds sought to hammer the fan into the ground. Time and again he somehow
managed to coax enough from the weakening engine to avoid the next ledge, the next crag, the next cliff.

He could not get above the ice-scoured spires; soon he was fighting just to stay in the air, thefanship
dancing through the glacier valleys like a leaf running rapids. The weather was playing a wailing game with
bis life, but he was almost too tired to care. The fuel gauge hovered near empty. He'd stalled the
inevitable, hoping for even a slight break in the storm, hoping for a minute's chance at a controlled
landing. It seemed even that was to be denied him.

The elements had grown progressively' more inimical. Lightning lit the surrounding mountains in rapid-fire
surreal flashes, sounded in the thin-shelled ship cabin like a million kilos of frying bacon. Adhesive rain
defeated the best efforts of the wipers to keep the front port clear. Navigation instrumentation told him
that he was surrounded by sheer rock walls on all sides. As the canyon he'd worked his way into
narrowed still further, updrafts became downdrafts, downdrafts becamesidedrafts , andsidedrafts
becameaeolian aberrations without names.Mobiusdrafts.

If tie didn't set the fan down soon, the storm would set it down for him. Better to retain a modicum of
control. He pushed the control wheel. If he could get down in one piece, he ought to be home free. There
 Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html