"Michael McCollum - The Void" - читать интересную книгу автора (McCollum Michael)

THE VOID
Michael McCollum

End of the world stories are very popular in science fiction. If only the problem was that small!



Captain-First-Rank Tessa Hallowell stood before the mirror and cast a critical eye over the
black-and-silver uniform that hugged her svelte form. It was not vanity that caused her to switch the
mirror camera from viewpoint to viewpoint, but rather a desire to make the proper initial impression on
her newly acquired prisoners. The war council had entrusted her with one of the most important missions
of the impending attack and she was determined not to fail them in the slightest detail.

Having assured herself that her uniform was spotless and wrinkle free, she turned her attention to the
body within. The face was pretty enough, she supposed, with high cheekbones and a mouth that fell too
easily into a pout. Her eyes were her best feature, emerald green and expressive, but as hard as
diamond when she wanted them to be. The blonde hair was cut short in order not to interfere with the
helmet seal of her space armor. The body was muscular, without being manly; properly curved, but
without the excess flesh that some men found attractive. There were many planets in the galaxy where
Tessa Hallowell would be considered beautiful--and, of course, an equal number where her large framed
blondeness was little more than a curiosity.

She smiled as she scanned the mirror one last time. At 28, she was the youngest captain in the fleet and
only one of two women commanding starcruisers. It had taken a great deal of effort and not a little
political maneuvering to achieve her current status and everything she had worked for was about to
culminate in triumph.

Finished with her inspection, she called out, "Yeoman!"

"Yes, Captain?" came the immediate reply from the overhead speaker.

"Have my gig made ready. I'll go over to the observatory now."

"Aye aye, Ma'am."

She picked up the anachronistic helmet that the Hegemonic Navy had adopted for its official headgear
and strapped it on. Moments later she was striding purposefully around the main circumferential corridor
of the busy star cruiser, acknowledging salutes from the crewmen she passed. The salutes were as crisp
and perfect as any to be seen at the Galactic Guard's academy on New Rome, an indication that her
pride was shared by those who served her. Two corridors later and a quick fall down a dropshaft
brought her to one of the bays where they kept the auxiliary craft.

The gig launched into the great blackness less than two minutes later. As they cleared the cruiser, Tessa
glanced up and suppressed a sharp intake of breath as the galaxy came into view. From her current
position some ten thousand light years above the plane of the galaxy's equator, the Milky Way was a vast
river of subdued fire frozen against the utter blackness of space. The great pinwheel was so close that it
seemed three dimensional, yet sufficiently distant that its foreshortened spiral form was easily discerned.
Next to the galaxy's glory, the other patches of light in the ebon sky dimmed to near invisibility.

The Hegemonic Fleet Starcruiser Warwind had been six thousand hours in transit to reach her objective