"10 - Invid Invasion" - читать интересную книгу автора (McKinney Jack)

"`You got that right, soldier!' their leader told Scott."
"They were only a dozen strong, men, women, and children, and they were unarmed; but there was an attitude of defiance about them that rattled us. The rest of the audience was glaring down at us from their cells in those shells of buildings."
"`You've got to leave here!' the man continued. `I'm sorry, but we don't want any soldiers in this town. So get out-now!'"
"I had to hand it to the guy. He wasn't especially large or well built, and his glasses and workman's blues gave him a kind of paternal look; but here he was standing up to an offworlder in Cyclone battle armor. I thought Scott would take the poor man apart; instead, I heard him laugh."
"`Well, was it something we said?' Scott asked."
"`There is nothing funny about the situation, young man,' the man responded angrily. `I am in deadly earnest. Nobody here even wanted your Robotech Expeditionary Mission to begin with, and if it wasn't for you soldiers, this planet would still be living in peace! Now, get out! Save your rescues for somewhere else!'"
"I winced at hearing this, knowing the man had gone too far. Scott stepped into the guy's face, shouting back: `Why you...Don't you realize that without any kind of resistance, you've got no hope?!'"
"`We know,' Ken chimed in from behind Scott. `But we still want you to leave.'"
"`Terrific,' Scott snarled. `You're going to sit back and relax and let the Invid rule over you and the entire planet-'"
"'Fighting the Invid will aggravate the whole situation!' the crowd leader interrupted. `All we want is a peaceful life. What difference does it make who's at the top-some corrupt Council or the Invid? There's no such thing as freedom!'"
"The man must have caught a whiff of his own words, because all of a sudden he was soft-spoken and rational. `Look, anybody who hasn't seen it our way has already left. So will you please go?'"
"I had heard the same speech so often that I hardly paid any attention to it, but you just didn't go throwing the reality of the situation into the face of a guy who had come halfway across the galaxy to fight your battles for you. Before I could open my mouth, Scott had grabbed the guy by the shirtfront and was ready to split his head open."
"I told Scott to leave him alone. After all, in their own way they were right: They had peaceful lives, even without the so-called freedoms that were so important thirty years ago. Besides, nothing Scott or I could say or do was going to change the way they felt."
"`Look around you,' I told Scott."
"He did, and the truth of it seemed to sink in some. He shoved the man aside and spat in the street. `I don't believe what I'm witnessing here,' he rebuked the crowd. `You people make me sick! You think I'm the only one fighting the Invid? Well, there are plenty of others. People who aren't ready to roll over and play dead, understand?'"
"The crowd looked at him pityingly. He donned his helmet, mounted the Cyclone, and took off without a word to any of us."
"I felt that I had to back Scott up and made some kind of silly speech about selling out strangers, but it all fell on deaf ears. Except Annie's."
"`That goes for me, too,' she told the crowd. `I wouldn't want to live in this rotten town anyway.' With that, she threw herself onto the cycle's rear seat and told me to `let 'er rip.'"
"Annie hugged herself to me for all it was worth, and I could almost feel her tears through my shirt. But when I asked if she was okay, she said she would make it all right. I was certain she had known worse moments in her life..."
"When we caught up with Scott, I asked about his plans."
"`Somehow or other I've got to find Reflex Point,' he yelled without bothering to look over at me."
"He had mentioned this when we first met and once or twice since but had never explained its meaning. `You keep talking about this place as if it's the most important thing in the world.'"
"`It is,' Scott threw back sternly, and accelerated out front."
"There was something about his attitude that put me off, or maybe I was just hoping for an argument that would split us up and return me to my solo riding. I said, `You know what your problem is? You don't know how to communicate with people! Now that you've had a taste of the old homeworld, don't you think you'd be a lot happier back in space with your girlfriend?'"
"His silence told me I'd gotten to him."
"`Lay off,' he snapped back, accelerating again. 'Marlene's dead.'"
"It literally stopped me cold in my tracks."
"`He never told you?' Annie said as we watched Scott disappear over a rise up ahead."
"`Not one word about it,' I mumbled. It explained a lot about Scott's behavior, his obsession with waging this one-man war of his..."
"`I know how he feels,' Annie was saying. `Being the woman so many men dream of, and yet so unlucky in love, has made me very sensitive to this sort of thing.'"
"I didn't know whether she was trying to make me laugh or what, but her comment succeeded in lightening my spirits. Then she slammed me on the back: `Hey, come on! We're gonna lose Scott if we don't get a move on!'"
"I asked her if she was sure about leaving Ken behind, and she made a face."
"`Uh-huh. I have a feeling my next lover's going to be my last. Now, let's get moving, Rand!'"
"She pounded her tiny fists against my back again, and we were gone."


CHAPTER FIVE
Mom was, as they used to say at the turn of the century, one tough broad. She was the most respected member of the Blue Angels, and even after her falling out with Romy and her flight from Cavern City, her name was adopted by only those riders who shot for the narrows, and scrawled on many a wall.
Maria Bartley-Rand, Flower of Life: Journey Beyond Protoculture

It wasn't much of a town-strictly Main-Street frontier, run-down and dirty-and it wasn't much of a bar, but at least the place offered cold beer (even if it was locally brewed and bitter-tasting), shade, and a singer backed by a decent pickup band.

After all of the battles are over
After all of the fighting is done
Will you be the one
To find yourself alone with your heart
Looking for the answer?

Rook Bartley lifted her glass and toasted the singer. The song was soft and downbeat, just what she needed to ease herself into the blues, trip through memories she couldn't do anything about.
Rook took a look around the place over the rim of her mug. It was dimly lit and poorly ventilated but surprisingly clean and tidy for a joint in the wastes. There was the usual assortment of types, Foragers mostly, keeping to themselves in the corners, nursing drinks and private thoughts. A couple or two wrapped around each other on the cleared space that passed for a dance floor. And several bad boys on the upper tier, boots up on the table, midnight shades. Rook judged they were locals from the way they were scanning the room for action, your basic rough trade feeling safe on the barren piece of turf they had secured for themselves. Rook returned to her drink, unimpressed.