"Geoffrey A. Landis - Elemental (2)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Landis Geoffrey A)

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Geoffrey A. Landis ELEMENTAL


1. Ramsey
Fifty kilometers southeast of Naples, two men sat waiting in the bright
fluorescent-lit power control room of Napoli Spaceport. In front of them
glowed an array of green lights and computer consoles. Behind them, outlined
on the floor in a violet glow only faintly visible in the brightness of the
room, was a complex five-fold symmetric figure: a pentacle.
The younger man watched the array of dials intensely, occasionally touching a
knob to make some infinitesimal adjustment. The older man watched him work.
What he saw seemed to satisfy him, for he strolled over to the window and
gazed out across the landing field.
Without looking up, the younger man spoke: "Luna shuttle's about ready to
lift, Mr. Layr."
"Ready for it, Carlo?"
"Running steady at a hundred ten percent, sir."
"She's all yours." Christian Layr walked over to a monitor screen where he
could watch the youth's performance and take over if necessary. He doubted
that any such necessity would arise. There is a certain skill to controlling
magic, a skill of balance and timing not unlike that of a juggler, and the boy
had it. Layr almost wished something would go wrong, so he could see how the
boy would handle it. The youth had the talent, but Layr would feel uneasy
about certifying him until he saw how he tackled a real problem, one of the
minor emergencies that make power control a job for men with skill and
courage, rather than a simple task for machines. Despite Layr's unspoken wish,
though,
for the last ten days the station had operated smoothly.
Almost too smoothly.
Layr heard the nearly subsonic rumble of power build-up and directed his
attention back to the display. Power level a hundred fifteen percent; there
would be no problem with this one.
"Here it goes."
Layr glanced up to the window. As if by magic, the blunt-nosed spacecraft
appeared from the launch pit to hover for an instant before his eyes. Slowly
it began to inch upward, then to hasten forward with an implacable urgency,
finally to rush with a clap of thunder headlong into the morning sky, as if
all the demons of hell chased after it.
In a sense, they did. Behind him the control pentagram lit the room with a
brilliant violet fire as it transmitted the energy flux to shove the
thousand-ton shuttle up to parking orbit. Far beneath his feet, the main
pentacle glowed, not violet, but gamma. No human eye could ever look upon it
in its full glory. Within the impenetrable walls of the protecting spell was
confined a more powerful magic yet: two hundred kilograms of pure antimatter.
In Chicago it was 7 A.M. Yawning, Ramsey Washington looked out the window of
his third-floor apartment. A soft wet snow fell steadily. It masked the