"Jack McKinney - Kaduna Memories" - читать интересную книгу автора (McKinney Jack)

And to think what the Excalibur had run into out thereтАж

"So tell me what you've been doing with yourself," Emeric said, adjusting his suit to ward off the coolness
of the REC room.

The AI was quiet for a moment. "Well, I've been thinking, of course. And fooling with words and
numbers. In fact I wanted to tell you an important thought I had. It has to do with Earth and the problem
of atmospheric pollutionтАФ"

"Can it wait, REC?"

"Waiting is," REC said, and made a surprised sound. "I don't know why I said that. I understand that I
retrieved the phrase from my memory of speculative fiction literature, but I'm not sure why I made the
connection. Have I told a joke?"

Bulkroad struck a thoughtful pose for the scanners. "Not a joke exactly, REC. You've summoned an
erudite and quite appropriate reference."

"You are smiling, I see."

"Yes," Bulkroad said. "Your response was unexpected. I am both amused and impressed."

"That's good, I think."

"That's very good, indeed."

Emeric regarded the AI with unabashed delight. REC had been assembled and birthed in that very cabin.
Unique, immobile; a complex of heuristic devices and multiple optimizers devoted to pattern recognition,
planning algebras, and recursive administrative procedures that filled the entirety of an adjoining room.
But the sculpted facade Emeric addressed was to some extent patterned on the shape and bulbous
features of his own enormous head, and in the end resembled nothing so much as a
mid-twentieth-century curved-top jukebox.

"I was hoping we could talk about aliens today," Bulkroad said, settling himself in front of blue-lensed
opticals. "Extraterrestrial biological entities."

REC scanned Emeric head to toe, searching for nuance. "This has something to do with Project Kaduna,
doesn't it?"

Emeric offered an exaggerated nod for the cameras. All communiques orginating from the Excalibur had
been processed through an Ultra-clearance program initially labeled KDNAтАФa randomly generated
hash code designation that had come to be expressed Kaduna.

Almost six months had passed since "the find" on asteroid 2008FC. Clay Nugget's fears of XT reprisal
or outright cosmic war appeared to have been unfounded. The beings aboard the alien ship had gone into
a suspended state, as had the ship systems themselves. A space derelict now, the lightsail vessel was
under the watchful eyes of two human -and robot-crewed pod-probes, while the Excalibur transported
the sole surviving XT to Earthspace, where OLD's scientific staff were eager to get a good look at it.
The members of Offworld's board of directors were in agreement that secrecy had to be