"Jack McKinney - Robotech 12 - Symphony of Light" - читать интересную книгу автора (McKinney Jack)

"As you command, Regis," she responded as confidently as she was able, her scanners
focused on the seven Humans huddled around the fire. "We now have them completely surrounded. And
with our superior abilities, we will succeed in carrying out your...your orders." Somewhat more
mechanically, she added, "Nothing will stop us."
Had the Regis heard her falter? Sera asked herself. She waited for some suggestion of
displeasure, but none was forthcoming. It was only then that she allowed herself to increase the
magnification of her scanner and zero in on the Human whose face had caused her lapse of purpose.
It's him! she thought, once again taking in the fine features of the one whose strange,
seductive, and achingly beautiful sounds had drawn her to that jungle pool; the one who had
surprised her there, stood naked before her, holding her in the grip of his strong hands and
assaulting her with questions she could not answer. And it was this same Human she had glimpsed
later during the heat of battle when her own hand had betrayed her...
"Sera! You're waiting too long!" the Regis shouted through the bio-construct's comlink.
Sera felt the strength of the Queen-Mother begin to creep into her own will and force her
hand toward the weapon's trigger stud, but one part of her struggled against it, and at the last
moment, even as the weapon was firing, she managed to swing the ship's cannon aside, so that the
shot went astray...

Lancer was just commenting on the beauty of the snowfall when the first enemy blast
struck, flaring overhead and erupting like a midnight sun in the snowfields near the grounded VTs-
a single short burst of annihilation discs that had somehow missed their mark. Scott was the first
to react, propelling himself out of the circle into a tuck-and-roll, which landed him on his knees
in the perimeter snow, his MARS-Gallant handgun raised. But before he could squeeze off a quantum
of return fire, a second Invid volley skimmed into the team's midst, sending him head over heels
and flat on his face. He inhaled a faceful of snow and rolled over in time to see a series of
explosions rip through the camp, brilliant white geysers leaping from plasma pools of hellfire. On
the ridgeline he caught a brief glimpse of an Invid Trooper before it was eclipsed by clouds of
swirling snow.
The rest of the team had already scattered for cover. Scott spied Lancer hunkering down
behind an arc of moraine slide and yelled for him to stay put as Invid fusillades swooshed down
into a gully below the ridge, throwing up a storm of ice and shale. Rand, meanwhile, was closing
on the Alpha Fighter, discs nipping at his boot heels from two Invid Troopers who had positioned
themselves just short of the saddle. Running a broken course through the snow, he clambered up
onto the nose of the Veritech and managed to fling open its canopy. But the next instant he was
flat on his back beneath the radome of the fighter, a Shock Trooper towering above him.
Frantically, Rand brought his hands to his face, certain the Trooper's backhand pincer swipe had
opened him up. But the thing had missed.
Now, he thought, all I've gotta do is keep from being roasted alive!
Radiant priming globes had formed at the tip of the cannon muzzles; as these winked out,
platters of blinding orange light flew toward him like some demon's idea of Frisbee. Rand cursed
and rolled, thinking vaguely back to that deer he had killed down below...
Two hundred yards away Scott was on his feet, blasting away at the Invid command ship
positioned on the ridge. Unless his eyes betrayed him, it was the same ship that had been sent
against them during their ocean crossing to the Northlands. And that was a bad sign indeed,
because it meant that the Regis had finally gotten around to singling the team out as a quarry
worthy of pursuit. He squinted into the storm and fired, uncertain if the ship was still there.
The wind had picked up now, and icy flakes of biting snow were adding to the chaos. From somewhere
nearby he heard Lancer shout: "Behind you, Scott!" and swung around to face off with a Trooper
that was using the Veritechs for cover. Scott traded half a dozen shots with it before a deafening
explosion threw him violently out of the fray; he felt an intense flashburn against his back and