"Edward M. Lerner - Part I of IV - A New Order of Things" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lerner Edward M)

Before InterstellarNet, amateurs had directed their often-ingenious antenna arrays towards those same
nearby stars in search of extraterrestrials. Now that ETs had been found, and humanity's dealings with
those aliens entrusted to securely encrypted commercial communications, the hobbyists, too, had lost
interest in the immediate neighborhood.

In short, there was no good reason for anyone but the ICU to monitor Barnard's Star. The only reason
for someone else to start looking would be a disruption to InterstellarNet. The fast-approaching Snakes
appeared to have worked that out--they limited their high-powered communications to bursts brief and
infrequent enough to avoid clobbering redundant copies of the many-times-repeated interstellar
messages. Megacorps across the solar system started griping about brief delays in receiving
long-expected messages, and the ICU's presumed incompetence. The ICU accepted the grumbling with
uncharacteristic good humor.

And so the imminent arrival of the Snake starship remained a secret of the United Planets, and of the
great powers to whom the UP secretary-general confided.
****
The courier had loomed encouragingly large as the shuttle from Earth approached it for docking. That
appearance was deceiving; the hull enclosed mostly fuel tanks. The airlock's inner hatch closed with what
Art objectively knew to be a soft sigh; he heard, as always, a reverberating boom of finality. The
habitable quarters were, to be charitable, compact; his cabin scarcely accommodated its fold-down cot.
After dumping his flight bag and switching to microgravity Velcro slippers, Art went searching for
someplace less claustrophobic.

The Snakes, still a light-day away, had signaled that, low on fuel and supplies, they were heading for
Jupiter. There seemed little point in arguing, since a response would take two days to receive and might
change nothing. The UP's still-secret diplomatic mission, having discreetly recruited the best of the best
from across the solar system, now scrambled to assemble itself at Callisto base, orbiting Jupiter.

"Hey," he offered neutrally to the silent man and woman he found in the ship's mess. They looked to be
about his forty years old, give or take a few. Neither was in uniform, which made them fellow members
of the mission. It took them a few seconds to look his way, presumably meaning they'd been off
somewhere in the infosphere, before they stood. "Art Walsh. I'm with the ICU."

"I am Eva Gutierrez, from the Universidad Tecnol├Г┬│gica Nacional, the Buenos Aires campus." The
Spanish grace notes in her English were less noticeable than her British accent. She approached Art's
180 centimeters in height and seemed fitter than he--not a challenge. Her thick black hair was pulled
back into a shoulder-length ponytail, from which a few errant wisps had escaped. Her hazel eyes were
widely spaced.

"Keizo Matsunaga, Stanford." He was short and barrel-chested, with a thin mustache and a slightly
askew smile. His T-shirt bore a faded image of one of the Rodin sculptures that adorned the Stanford
campus.

They swapped bio files as earlier generations exchanged cardboard business cards. Art's new colleagues
startled, although their reactions showed only briefly. He got that response often enough not to react.
Apparently he didn't look the part of ICU Chief Technology Officer--whatever a CTO should look like.
Older and wizened, perhaps. Smart enough to water ski without breaking things.

Acceleration warnings and pilot announcements truncated the social pleasantries.