"David Gerrold - Starsiders 2 - Bouncing off the Moon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gerrold David)

Starsiders Trilogy

Book 2

Bouncing off the Moon

by David Gerrold

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BOARDING

THERE'S THIS THING THAT DAD used to say, when things didn't work out. He would say, "Well, it
seemed like a good idea at the time." I never knew if he was serious or if he was doing that
deadpan-sarcastic thing he did. The thing is, it usually wasn't a good idea at the time. Like going to the
moon. That was his good idea, not mine. Not Doug's or Bobby's either. But like all of his good ideas, it
worked out backwards. We got to go, and he had to stay behind, still holding his ticket and wondering
what happened-the last time I looked back, he had that look on his face. And that hurt. We made it to
the elevator with less than six minutes to spare. They were just about to give away our cabin to a
worried-looking family waiting on standby. The dad looked upset and the mom started crying when we
showed up. They wanted our cabin on the outbound car so desperately that the dad started waving a
fistful of plastic dollars at us, offering to buy our reservation-we could name any price we wanted. Doug
hesitated. I could tell he was tempted, so was I-poverty does that to you-but Mickey just pushed him
forward and said, "We don't need their money." So we ducked into the transfer pod and the hatch
slammed shut behind us with the finality of a coffin lid. This time, we were going in through the passenger
side, and I knew what to expect, so the shift in pseudogravity as the pod whirled up to speed didn't
bother me as much as it had before. I'd nearly
thrown up when we'd transferred from the car that brought us up the orbital elevator to Geostationary.
Dad's good idea this time had involved smuggling something-or pretending to smuggle something so the
real smugglers would go unnoticed -and in return, he'd get four tickets up the Line, but the only thing he
was smuggling was us. He told us we were going on vacation, and it would have been a great vacation,
except it wasn't really a vacation . The whole time, he was planning/hoping that we'd decide to go
outbound with him to one of the colonies and not go back to Earth and Mom. It would have worked if
Mom hadn't found out. And if whatever it was that we were supposed to be smuggling hadn't been so
important that some really powerful people were trying to track us, bribe us, threaten us, and have us
detained by any means possible. It would have worked because after we thought about it, we wanted to
go. So we went. Without Dad. Without Mom too. The guys in the black hats had shuttled her up. My
cheek was still stinging from her last angry slap. It wasn't a great good-bye. And the hurt went a lot
deeper than my cheek. The hatch of the transfer pod opened and we were looking down a narrow
corridor. "Come on, let's get to our cabin," Mickey said, giving me a gentle nudge on the shoulder. "The
outbound trip is only six and a half hours. I think we should all try to get some sleep while we can." "I'm
not tired!" announced Stinky-he was only Bobby when he wasn't Stinky. "And I'm not going to bed
without a hug from Mommy!" "He's contradicting himself again," I said. Douglas-also known as
Weird-gave me a look, one of the looks he'd learned from Mom. "Charles, if this is going to work, I
need your help." He turned back to Stinky, trying to shush him with logic. "Mommy isn't here,
remember?" We were halfway between nowhere and nothingness, on a cable strung between Ecuador