"Lumley, Brian - E-Branch 3 - Avengers" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lumley Brian)

'The air-sea rescue chopper has spotted something starboard of the wreck,' the pilot came back.

'Something?'

'Someone,' the other specified. 'A living ,omuonc, still on board and active. Do you want me to patch you through?'

'Yes,' said Argyle. 'Of course. Patch us through. We may as well all hear what's going on. Who knows? That way I might actually get to learn something, too!'


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Roger,' said the pilot. 'And I'll take us starboard of the wreck so you can see what's happening.'

The air-sea rescue helicopter had accompanied them out from the carrier HMS Invincible where she lay at anchor like a small land mass in her own right on the horizon some five or six miles away. Starboard of the wreck, about the same distance away from her as Argyle, Trask and party were to port, now the big rescue chopper sat like a great hawk on the air, with the ripples from her down draught spreading out in choppy concentric circles on the surface of the dead-calm sea.

Along with its regular crew, the rescue chopper carried two other members of E-Branch's contingent: a roguish, leathery old Gypsy by the name of Lardis Lidesci - possibly of Hungarian or Romanian descent, if Argyle was any judge of ethnic origins - and a young Englishman called Jake Cutter, who seemed to stand somewhat apart from the rest of the team, as if he wasn't quite one of them. Like the others, he had a very definite 'attitude'. But where theirs seemed intense beyond the demands of the situation, his was . . . different. Argyle had spoken to him on first meeting, and it had seemed to him that Cutter wasn't all there; not meaning that he was in any way mentally deficient, but just that he appeared very much preoccupied despite that he tried to hide it. And, while the Commander had no way of knowing it, he'd hit the nail right on the head.

Preoccupied: to engross or fill the mind of (someone) or to dominate (someone's) attention, thoughts, mind, etc., and so on. And therefore, from a defining viewpoint, Jake Cutter could be said to be very preoccupied. But, for the moment at least, he was concentrating . . . on what could be seen through his binoculars: that tiny human figure on the shielding collar almost a small deck in its own right - that protected the upper deck from the hot stench of the ship's slipstreamed 'chimney' array, a delta-shaped set of six massive exhaust flues high over the stern.

Right now, however, with the engines at a standstill, there were no exhaust fumes, and the small, lonely figure was leaning or propping itself up against an open service hatch in the foremost chimney, from which it had emerged only a few seconds ago. Jake could see now that it was a man, but he looked so tattered and dirty in grimy coveralls that at first it had been hard to tell. And he was looking up open-mouthed at the two helicopters in a kind of stunned disbelief. Or was he simply in shock?

'Mr Cutter?' (The pilot's voice crackled in Jake's headset, causing him to start.) 'Mr Trask is asking to speak to you. I'm patching him through now.'

'Roger,' said Jake, as he leaned out a little from the open hatch to watch the anti-submarine jet-copter come whup-whupping through one hundred


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and eighty degrees to the starboard side of the wreck, giving it a wide berth. And in the next moment:

Jake?' Ben Trask's harsh, gravelly, unmistakable voice was sounding in his ears. 'Where is he? Where's this . . . survivor?'

'Our side of the exhaust flues,' Jake answered. 'In fact, he just a moment ago climbed out of one! You should be able to see him by now. He looks done in.'

'Yes, we see him,' said Trask. 'But done in by what? By his experience, or by the sunlight?'

'Doesn't look like he's shrinking from the sun to me,' Jake answered. 'He's just shrinking, on the point of collapse. Maybe you should let Liz take a look at him.'

'Wait,' said Trask. And a few seconds later: 'She says he's in shock. He's almost a blank in there, his mind shot to pieces. So he probably is a survivor!'

'I can go down on their rescue gear and get him off there,' Jake suggested. 'Or I could do it my way and get him off faster still.'

'No!' Trask answered at once. 'Keep the Continuum as a last resort. Send down the gear by all means, yes, but if he's going to make it off that ship it will have to be under his own steam. You see that chopper standing idle on the promenade deck?'

'I know, I know,' said Jake. 'That's what happened the last time someone landed on her. They stayed landed.'

Right,' said Trask grimly, and Jake sensed his nod. 'So we won't be making the same mistake. If this one really wants off, he gets off on his own. By the time you've reeled him in, Lardis will know if he's okay or not. If he is okay, then it's a lucky break - not only for him but also for us. And if he isn't okay, well, Lardis will be able to handle that, too. It's one hell of a drop back down to the deck or onto those rocks. Either way it won't make too much difference.'