"Jeffrey Lord - Blade 19 - Looters of Tharn" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lord Jeffery)

Blade slowed down to about two hundred miles an hour and climbed to a hundred feet. He could now
see for miles across the plains and there was far less danger of the ground suddenly and disastrously
rising to meet him. The machine looked indestructible but probably wasn't. Blade knew he certainly
wasn't.

From the position of the sun Blade guessed he must be heading almost due west. An hour later he came
to a stop and landed. By that time he knew he must be a good three hundred miles from the city. If
anyone was going to chase him, they would almost certainly have done so long since. As far as he could
tell, he was alone on the plain.
 Blade did not bother deploying the legs, but simply brought the machine down on its metal belly. It
rocked back and forth once or twice, then dug itself into the earth with its own weight. Blade unstrapped
himself and began examining the machine more carefully.

The first thing he looked for was food and water. He was not particularly hungry. But he was as thirsty
as if he had been marooned in a desert for three weeks. Fortunately the first thing to turn up was a water
tap lurking under the control panel, complete with plasticlike cups. Blade emptied his cup seven or eight
times before he stopped feeling thirsty.

After that Blade scrambled up into the turret and examined the controls for the ray-tube. They were as
simply and carefully laid out as the main controls. After a few minutes Blade felt he could hit anything he
aimed at with the purple ray. What the ray would do when it hit was still very much a mystery.

In lockers on either side of the hatch Blade found boxes and cans of concentrated food, as well as sets
of clothing. The food was just edible, like emergency rations in every dimension. The clothing was
obviously combat uniforms of some sort, camouflaged coveralls with heavy padding from throat to groin,
and knee-length boots. The belts, packs, and helmets were made of something that looked like leather
but weighed a good deal more. When it came to finding an outfit that he could get into comfortably,
Blade had his usual struggle. There were times when he couldn't help wishing he was about three inches
shorter and thirty pounds lighter.

There were no hand weapons, but there were a couple of businesslike knives on each belt. There was
also a long sharp-pointed tool, rather like a short crowbar with a heavy needle on the end. Blade realized
that this was probably the tool for opening the hatch from the outside. After pressing the button to release
the hatch and climbing outside, a quick test confirmed his guess. Now he could climb in and out of the
machine without having to let those grisly tentacles fumble over him.

He turned on the power, lifted the machine into the air, and headed west again.

The sun sank down toward the horizon, swelling and turning from yellow to orange and from orange to
red as it did so. Blade began to think about landing for the night. He did not want to push on in the
darkness and risk missing something important or suddenly running out of power.

Then on the plain two miles ahead he saw the horsemen.

There were at least twenty of them. Blade's machine was coming at them out of the twilight, so he saw
them before they saw him. But when they did see him, they scattered in all directions, as fast as their
horses would carry them.

Blade swooped down and examined the fleeing riders on the screens. All the horses were of the same
kind-heavy-chested, heavy-rumped, short-legged, shaggy. They looked enormously tough. They also