"Michael McCollum - The Sails of Tau Ceti" - читать интересную книгу автора (McCollum Michael)

тАЬMessage from the university. Professor Pierce requests your presence at an emergency meeting
of the governing board.тАЭ

тАЬWhen?тАЭ

тАЬTonight. Zero eight hundred hours, Conference Room 100, Lowell Hall.тАЭ

тАЬIтАЩll attend via screen.тАЭ

тАЬNegative. The message says тАШin person.тАЩтАЭ

тАЬBut thatтАЩs silly. DoesnтАЩt he know how much work weтАЩve got to do before next monthтАЩs launch?тАЭ

тАЬI presume heтАЩs been reading our progress reports.тАЭ

тАЬThen he should know that software certification is a week behind schedule and still slipping.тАЭ

тАЬNo argument there, partner.тАЭ

Tory let her anger cool a moment.тАЬDoes he say what this meeting is about?тАЭ

тАЬNo. Shall I tell him you canтАЩt make it?тАЭ

Tory shook her head. The habit of a lifetime was hard to break though Vance was a kilometer distant
and the conversation was taking place inside her skull.тАЬNegative. You know how fragile the coalition
is. How long before the afternoon shuttle leaves for Olympus?тАЭ
тАЬTwenty seven minutes.тАЭ

тАЬGet me a seat. Tell them to hold until I get there.тАЭ

#

The ground steward who helped passengers aboard the Phobos-to-Olympus shuttle let his gaze linger on
Tory Bronson as she made her way up the embarkation tube. He saw an attractive woman of some 25
standard years. Like many Martians she was tall and lithe, her alabaster skin unmarked by the sun. Her
green eyes possessed a barely discernable slant and her hair was so black that it shown with a blue
luster. She wore it in a hair net to keep it out of her face in PhobosтАЩ minuscule gravity field. He noted her
pert nose set above a wide mouth, the lines of which fell most naturally into a smile. She was not smiling
now. She had that absentminded look common to people deep in thought or those actively accessing a
computer implant.

Tory swarmed through the embarkation tube by pulling herself hand over hand, ignoring the small moonтАЩs
two-tenths-percent of a standard gee. She found an empty seat near a port and strapped down. Tory
failed to notice the stares of the other passengers as the steward went immediately into his pre-launch
briefing. She stared at her own dull reflection in the viewport and considered what could possibly have
triggered an emergency meeting of the project governing board. Whatever had happened, one thing was
certain. It could not be good news.

Almost as complex as the design ofStarhopper were the politics that went to sustain it. The University of
Olympus managed the project for a consortium of institutions of higher learning. Funding was provided