"Scott G. Gier - Genellan 02 - In the Shadow of the Moon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gier Scott G)

another runoff, a foamy cascade of green and gray.

The bear of a man, floppy cap in hand, backed off from the icy runnel,
took three powerful running steps, and leapt. He flailed his arms and
crashed against a damp boulder. Stones clattered down the slant toward the
rushing torrent far below.

Chastain dipped his shaggy head and hunched his mountainous
shoulders. A sheepish smile crinkled his soft brown eyes, swelled his fat
brown cheeks, and flickered through his wild brown whiskers.

Buccari let Lizard Lips by. The cliff dweller was a guilder, a steam user,
taller than Buccari but with shorter legs. His private parts were covered with
a dun kilt; his vestigial talons were wrapped with stout leather. A pelt of
silky gray grew from the guilder's knobby head and narrow shoulders.
Creamy white fur adorned the rest of his body. The creature tossed the
Legion communicator to Chastain and then threw his rucksack. Cluttering
nervously, the cliff dweller unlimbered atrophied flying membranes, took a
short run at the tributary, and jumped. His down-stroking appendages
whooshed with apprehensive energy, but the ugly creature easily cleared the
impediment. Overhead an army of hunters wheeling on midday thermals
whistled derisively at such feeble flight.

"Careful, Lieutenant," Chastain bellowed, brow furrowed. Beyond
Chastain glacier-hung ridges heaved skyward. They had climbed to the
boulder-strewn margins of the riparian valley. Isolated clumps of scraggly,
yellow-barked spruce and russet-limbed rockberry flourished, but only
where spreading flows of talus and rock tumble permitted.

"Kinda slick, Lieutenant," Chastain shouted.

The glacier-melt defile was not wide, but its torrent was powerful.
Buccari settled her pack, sucked in a mind-clearing breath, and looked up
the river valley to the immense rise of the monolithic plateau, home to cliff
dwellers. Beyond the plateau were the ageless mountains, a towering
snow-shrouded continental spine stark against an iron-blue skyтАФgeologic
monsters, ancient and imperturbable. She looked down at her sleeping child.

"Sir, you want to hand Charlie over?" Chastain asked. The marine placed
a grimy, sandaled foot to the brink, lips working beneath shaggy mustaches.
He leaned over the splashing feeder and extended a powerful arm. His pack
shifted, but Chastain moderated his piston-legged stance only slightly.

Buccari exhaled. The plateau was not getting any closer.

"Here I come, Jocko," she said through clenched teeth. She pushed hard,
accelerating with each step. With one hand she held her child; with the other
she reached for Chastain's hairy arm. And jumped.

"Aw, LieutenтАФ!" Chastain blurted. Lizard Lips screeched.