"Simon R. Green - Deathstalker - 1 - Deathstalker" - читать интересную книгу автора (Green Simon R)

luxurious craft at the best of times, but with most of the ship's power diverted to
maintaining the body banks, the old scut seemed even gloomier than usual. Which
took some doing.

Hazel d'Ark, last owner of a once noble name, came to the locked door that led to
the cargo bay and stood waiting impatiently for the door's sensors to recognize
her. Her mood was bad, bordering on foul, and had been ever since they dropped
out of hyperspace six hours ago to take up orbit around Virimonde. Six hours of
waiting for some word from their contacts down below. Something was wrong.

They couldn't afford to stay much longer, but they couldn't leave either. So they
waited. Hazel wasn't expecting any trouble from the planet's security people. The
Shard might be old, but she had state-of-the-art cloaking devices, more than
enough to fool anything the peasants had on Virimonde. Not that there was much
the planet could do, even if it knew the pirates were there. Virimonde was a low-
tech, agricultural world, with more livestock than people. Its only contact with the
Empire was a monthly cargo transporter and an occasional patrolling starcruiser,
neither of which was expected for some weeks.

Hazel glared at the closed door before her and kicked the frame hard. The door
hissed open, and she stepped through into the freezing cold of the cargo bay. The
door locked itself behind her. A pearly haze misted the air and burned in her
lungs. She shuddered quickly and turned up the heating elements in her uniform.
The body banks needed the cold at a specific temperature to preserve and maintain
their cargo of human tissues for cloning. Hazel looked quickly about her and then
accessed her comm implant.

file:///D|/Program%20Files/eMule/Incoming/Green...%201-6/Deathstalker%2001%20-%20Deathstalker.htm (2 of 541) [7/12/2004 2:38:18 AM]
Green, Simon R. - Deathstalker 01 - Deathstalker (v1.0) (html)




"Hannah, this is Hazel. Acknowledge."

"I hear you, Hazel," said the ship's AI. "What can I do for you?"

"Edit the signals from the cargo bay's security sensors so it appears I'm not here."

Hannah sighed. The Artificial Intelligence didn't have human emotions, but it
liked to pretend. "Now, Hazel, you know you're not supposed to be in there. You'll
get us both into trouble."

"Do it anyway, or I'll tell the Captain about your personal video collection of his
private moments."

"I wouldn't have shown you those if I'd known you were going to use them to
blackmail me. They're a perfectly innocent collection, after all."

"ComputerтАж"