"Nicola Griffith - Ammonite" - читать интересную книгу автора (Griffith Nicola)

here a long time. I know that mustтАФтАЭ
тАЬDonтАЩt patronize me,тАЭ Hiam said wearily. тАЬIf you donтАЩt want to believe me, then
thatтАЩs your privilege, but donтАЩt patronize me.тАЭ
Marghe shook her head. тАЬIтАЩm sorry.тАЭ
Silence.
To go down to GrenchstomтАЩs PlanetтАФGP, JeepтАФwould be the culmination of
years of study that had started when she was just a child, first with her mother, then
her father, had continued at Universities, and as assistant SEC rep on Gallipoli, then
Beaver. This was the reason she had swallowed her pride and set aside her
misgivings about Company, why she had recontracted with SEC alter they had
betrayed her, why she had traveled vast distances, literally and metaphorically: to
come to Jeep and study over a million people who had been out of contact with
humanity for two or three hundred years. There would never be another chance like
this, never.
тАЬSara, I have to do this.тАЭ
Hiam turned away abruptly. тАЬThen youтАЩd better go ahead and do it.тАЭ
Marghe looked at HiamтАЩs thin back, hesitated. тАЬIтАЩm sorry,тАЭ she said again, then
tongued off the comm channel and turned slowly to face the flaring red panel. Red
for danger.
The known dangers she had prepared for, as far as humanly possible. The
vaccine would be waiting for her in D Section.
As for the unknown dangersтАж Well, they were unknown. Nothing she could do
about them.
She stretched out her hand, clumsy in the gauntlet, and tapped out the sequence
slowly and carefully. The red panel blinked off and the lights around the door flared
green.
The door slid open.
B Section was silent and dark. Ice glimmered in the dim sodium glow of the
emergency floor lights. Marghe stepped over the sill and the door closed behind her.
It was done.
The lights ran like runway flares down a narrow corridor between stripped, bare
beds, each with its entertainment hookup coiled neatly at the head. MargheтАЩs boots
glowed orange as she walked. Her breathing was loud. She felt utterly alone.
She was the first person who had walked here for five years; five years since the
glittering dumbbell shape that was Estrade had been hurriedly converted from an
orbital monitoring and communications station to a research and decontamination
facility. Five years since the station crew had taken refuge in Section A, leaving
Sections D and C for the decontamination of occasional Jeep personnel. B Section,
and the long corridor beyondтАФthe shaft of the dumbbellтАФwas the crewтАЩs
insurance, their buffer zone, with movement allowed one way only: to the dirty
sections.
Marghe watched her boots rise and fall through the orange glow; there was no
dust.
The lights at the airlock blinked a reassuring green. The door opened and the wall
display told her to blank her visor and hold out her arms; she keyed in the sequence
on the next door, stepped through.
The corridor seemed a mile long. The familiar orange running lights gleamed on
unsheathed metal and exposed wiring. Gravity decreased rapidly as she approached
the center of the shaft; her suit automatically activated the electromagnets in her
boots and she had to slide her feet instead of striding.