"David A. Kyle - Lensman 10 - Z- Lensman" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kyle David A)

can't describe them."
"Well, I can describe them," one of the crew said. "They're repulsive,
poisonous monsters.
Unless there's money to steal, or we can sell their bones or skin, I say let's
forget 'em and
find a safe port and bust loose from this tin can."
"Well, that's the point," the captain said, scratching his whiskers and
obviously becoming
inpatient. "I don't believe they're poor. I think Val-d'or's right. The way
they're forever
furtively poking around the weirdest corners of the galaxy, always loners,
acting like misers,
my guess is they got unlimited funds. Ill bet they have hoards of valuable
things waiting for
some enterprising freebooters like us to lift 'em. Val-d'or got us here. I say
we attack. How
say you?"
There were two mild dissents, but after the briefest of arguments, there was
an unanimous
agreement. Captain Balltis wasted no time. He accelerated toward the station,
barking
orders. The crew scrambled into frantic action, five of them suiting up in
armor and arming
themselves as a boarding party, although seven wanted to go and only two or
three should
have been going.
"Gimme a reading," the captain said. "What're we up against?"
"Nothing. Absolutely. No defense screen. No weapons. A lead-pipe cinch."
With the speed and skill developed over their years as an outlaw team, the
pirates, their
ship firmly pressed against the docking port of the station, assaulted the
space station.
Three of the five penetrated the station's inner hull in a shower of sparks
and swirling
smoke, while the other two covered them. Brownish-green gas, the station's
deadly
atmosphere, boiled out under pressure and crystallized in space.
The trio in the vanguard died first, inexplicably. At one moment they were
charging forward,
irresistible; in the next moment, for no apparent reason, they were sprawled
out in the
passageway, dead. They had made no .outcry, showed no reaction.
Then the other two, weapons weightlessly spinning free, collapsed in silence,
equally
unmarred and equally dead.
In the pilothouse there was panic among the remaining pirates. The captain
attempted to
disengage and flee, even with plates extended, the side of his ship open. His
hands froze
over the control buttons, quivering, and his face rippled under his whiskers