"Thunderstrike" - читать интересную книгу автора (McCollum Michael)

knees, absorbing just enough energy to keep from rebounding into the sky.
УWhen I was a boy back on Earth, I always dreamed of flying like an Eagle. Now I
can. It is exhilarating. You ought to try it.Ф
УNo thank you. Life is too short to take needless risks.Ф
УYou donТt know what youТre missing,Ф he persisted.
УIТll take your word for it. Shall we begin the tour, Boss?Ф
УAnytime youТre ready, oh conscience mine!Ф
Tom Thorpe had not remained a vacuum monkey. In the three years following his
return to The Rock, he had moved up to gang boss, then shift leader. Those had
been the years they had spent turning The Rock into the Solar SystemТs largest
spaceship. The modifications had begun by blasting a thrust chamber out of the
heavy end of the asteroid, the end they had dubbed УThe AcornТs Cap.Ф While
ThorpeТs crew worked at excavating the chamber and its connecting tunnels, other
crews installed giant clusters of attitude control jets. These had begun the
long process of lengthening the eight-hour day of the asteroid. Shortly after
the despinning process began, Perry Allen was killed in a freak accident. Tom
Thorpe found himself thrust suddenly into the position of Second Assistant Power
Engineer.
One of his new duties had involved overseeing the operation of The RockТs
propulsion system. Like most large spacecraft, the asteroid was powered by
antimatter. Thousands of power packs had been shipped from the big power
satellites. These were simple toroidal pipes filled with hard vacuum and
surrounded by self-sustaining magnetic fields. Each contained enough antimatter
to power a normal spacecraft for a hundred round trips to the Moon. Yet, each
fed The RockТs massive ion engines for less than a day before exhaustion.
It had taken four years of powered flight to move The Rock into an orbit that
ranged from 800,000 to 1.2 million kilometers above the Earth. With the end of
powered flight had come reassignment for all personnel. Thorpe was promoted to
the position of Supervisor, Surface Operations. Later he was advanced to
Assistant Manager of Operations, and finally, to Manager of Operations. Despite
his rise to the asteroidТs top job, he still made it a point to inspect The
RockТs various facilities once each week.
Thorpe and Nina Pavolev hooked up to one of the many guide cables that ran
across the surface of the asteroid. Soon they were making their way toward the
horizon in a series of giant bounds. After a few hundred meters, the large
Mylar covered panels of the solar furnace began to rise above the horizon.
Thorpe shouted a warning to Nina to adjust her faceplate glare shields, and then
did the same just as the sun rose above the horizon. The two paused long enough
to let their eyes adjust before moving on.
Off to their left, Thorpe could see the warning beacons that stretched in a line
around The AcornТs Cap. That end of the asteroid was still УhotФ from the
nuclear cauldron that had operated there. The annihilation reaction had boiled
a million tons of The RockТs substance into space. It would be a more than a
century before the area around the thrust chamber would be cool enough for
mining. Even then, it was doubtful that the metal would be needed.
Thorpe leaned back and gazed up at three large conical shapes that were taking
shape overhead. These ore bodies were The RockТs delivery system for refined
metal. Constructed of vacuum foamed iron, each OB had a specific gravity less
than one. When dropped into the EarthТs atmosphere, they quickly slowed to a
few hundred kilometers per hour. At the end of their long dive, they splashed