"13 Sentinels 01 - The Devils Hand" - читать интересную книгу автора (McKinney Jack)

words. Besides, the two Tiresians seemed to be aware of the things already.
Angry flashes of orange and white brilliance were piercing the groundsmoke up ahead of them. Jack heard the characteristic chatter of the Beta's in-close weapons, and follow-up explosions he hoped accounted for the last of the enemy drones. The old man, Cabell, had most of Jack's weight now; Rem was moving out front through a hail of white-phosphoruslike debris.
Then all at once the firing was over as quickly as it had begun, and Karen's voice echoed out of an eerie silence.
She called Jack's name, but he was too weak to respond. Rem and Cabell exchanged a few unintelligible sentences, got Jack between them once again, and hastened toward the call. They were close enough to hear the Veritech's whistling hum and feel the heat its thrusters were spreading across the bottom of the crater.
The glow of running lights brought out a low moan of relief from Jack. Cabell voiced a Zentraedi greeting; Karen picked up on it after a moment and instructed them to come out with their hands raised.
She was waiting in a combat crouch by one of the VT's backswept wings when the Tiresians appeared out of the smoke. Jack thought he saw a look of astonishment on her face before Cabell and Rem set him down on the ground. She uttered something he couldn't catch and directed a question toward the Beta's open canopy.
Cabell stepped forward and addressed her.
Jack heard her nervous laugh. She had lowered the muzzle of her Wolverine, and was repeating Cabell's words for the pilot.
"You've got to be kidding."
"No, I swear it," Karen confirmed. "He said, `Take me to your leader!'"


CHAPTER TWELVE
Cabell impressed all of us as a kind, peace-loving man. And I knew he was one of us when he suggested that we might be able to rendezvous with the Masters in deepspace and give them what they were after (the Protoculture matrix). He'd just finished describing the horrors the Masters had spread through the Fourth Quadrant, and now he was telling us that we still had a chance to make our peace with them. Only a Human could think like that.
The Collected Journals of Admiral Rick Hunter

I don't give a damn about what your little escapade turned up!" Vince Grant was saying two hours later. "The only thing keeping me from throwing both of you in the brig is Admiral Hunter's request for leniency on your behalf. And when all the details of this are known, I'm sure he's going to change his mind as well. Do you read me?"
Karen and Jack swallowed hard and managed to find a collective voice. "Yes, sir; perfectly, sir."
Grant glared at them. He had his large hands pressed flat against the desk, but straightened up now and advanced to where the two former ensigns were standing at stiff attention. They had returned to the GMU scarcely an hour ago, just enough time for a pit stop at sick bay before being dragged off to Grant's office. Jack's right arm was in a sling, his head shaved and bandaged along his forehead. Karen had fared somewhat better, but perhaps because of that the commander was directing most of the flak her way.
"I would have expected as much from him," Grant continued, gesturing to Jack, "but I'd been led to expect better things from you, Cadet Penn. Much better things! Are you aware of the several other ways your self-appointed rescue mission could have turned out? Are you aware that your rescue endangered lives? Well?"
Karen gulped. "I am, sir. I apologize, sir."
Grant stared at her in surprise. " `Apologize,' Penn-apologize! That is the least of what you're going to be doing, believe me. Now I want to know which one of you came up with this bright idea."
"The cadet doesn't recall, sir," Karen said, eyes straight ahead.
"Really," Grant sneered, looking back and forth between Karen and Jack. "A conspiracy, huh?" Arms akimbo, he sidestepped, dark eyes flashing as he regarded Jack from his towering height. "And you, Baker...Born-to-be-a-hero, Baker." Grant motioned behind him. "I read you were looking for a VT assignment, is that true?"
Jack raised his eyes. "Yes, sir," he said weakly.
"You'll be lucky if you end up piloting a fanjet for the sanitation squad, mister!"
Jack blanched. "The cadet would consider it an honor to fly for the s-sanitation squad, Commander, sir."
"You bet you will, Baker."
Grant returned to his desk. "Where are the prisoners?" he asked one of his aides.
"In the holding area, sir. The shuttle and Skull Squadron are awaiting the commander's word."
Grant ran his eyes over Penn and Baker a final time. It was incredible that they had stumbled on the two Tiresians, that their joyride could possibly have resulted in just the break the RDF needed right now. But breaches of discipline couldn't be treated lightly, even when the results were more than anyone could have hoped for.
Vince knew Karen's father, and was aware of the friction between the two of them. Busted now, she would have little recourse but to follow Harry Penn's lead into research. Max, however, had appealed to Vince to go as lightly as possible; seemed that he and Rick had a special interest in Karen's fight for independence. And Baker's cause as well, although Vince couldn't quite figure it. Baker was too independent already.
"Get the prisoners aboard the shuttle, Captain. And as for these two," he said, twisting in his chair, "confine them to quarters. I don't want to see their faces. Understood?" Karen saluted, and Jack did the best he could.
"Sir!"
"Now get them out of here."
Jack followed Karen out of the office. "How about dinner in, say, six months, if we're out of this by then?" he asked under his breath.
Karen bit off a laugh. ""Try me in about six years, Baker. Just maybe I'll be ready to talk to you."
Jack made a face. This wasn't supposed to be the way it worked out. But, then again, at least he had some great stories to tell over at the garbage dump.

Rick was hoping to have first crack at the prisoners, but the council wouldn't hear of it. He had presented his case directly to Lang: the Tiresians were essentially military property; and if indeed they were the same group that had made contact with the GMU, their knowledge of the Invid's command and control was of vital importance. "We will be certain to address that," Lang had told him. The Council had even found unexpected support from General Edwards, who still considered the Tiresian message suspect. Rick, however, had succeeded in limiting the interrogation committee to four members of the Plenipotentiary-Dr. Lang, Lord Exedore, Justine Huxley, and Niles Obstat-and four members of the RDF-himself, Lisa, Edwards, and Reinhardt.
The eight, along with security personnel, secretaries, and translators, were assembled in one of the Council's briefing chambers now, a long, narrow room with a single table and two rectangular viewports that dominated the starboard bulkhead. Tirol would be fully visible for the session, while the SDF-3's position had reduced Fantoma itself to little more than a slender background crescent. Presently, Cabell and Rem were escorted in and seated at one end of the table opposite Justine Huxley, a UEG Superior Court judge, and Niles Obstat, former senator and head of Monument City's regional legislature.
Rick heard someone gasp; when he leaned in to look to his left, he saw Lang half out of his chair.
"Is it you?" Lang was asking of the young Tiresian.
Lang's mind was racing, recalling a day more than twenty years before when he had stood in front of a data screen on the recently arrived SDF-1, and a face with elfin features and almond eyes had greeted Gloval's recon team. Then a robot with reconfigured wiring had walked into their midst, and while everyone was preoccupied, Lang had tried to activate that mainframe, had inadvertantly taken the mind-boost and altered his very life...
"Is it you?"
The caped Tiresian wore a puzzled look; he turned in his seat, certain that Lang was speaking to someone behind him.
"Zor," Lang said, more shaken than Rick could ever remember seeing him. "You, you were the one..."
Cabell cleared his throat meaningfully and smiled, one hand on the youth's shoulder. "No." He laughed. "No, there is some resemblance-around the eyes and mouth, perhaps-but this is not Zor. Zor has been dead a long time."
Lang seemed to come to his senses. "Of course...I knew that."
Cabell followed Lang's gaze down the table, where it came to rest on a uncommon-looking man with dwarfish features, cropped red hair, and a thick brow ridge. The Tiresian's mouth dropped open.