"Paul Mcauley - Red Dust" - читать интересную книгу автора (Mcauley Paul J)

"Still searching. You're going hunting?"

Guoquiang grinned. He was as tall and burly as a Yankee,
with a shock of bristly hair, a craggy face with heavy brows.
 RED DUST
5

Like Xiao Bing he was dressed in rust-coloured field clothes.
A rifle was slung at one shoulder, and a pistol was buttoned
into a holster at his hip. "We're not here to shovel shit. The
low-pressure cell shifted. The probability that the storm will
hit us has dropped to twenty per cent. It's spring, Wei Lee!
All kinds of furry critters are stirring in their burrows! Here,
put these on." He tossed Lee a bundle of clothes: padded
cotton trousers; a long many-pocketed jacket; a zippered
shirt; knee-high hiking boots. "A good idea to get out, but
we've a better one. And we're good enough to share it with
you."

"Besides," Xiao Bing said, "someone has to lead this bact,
Contract Agronomist Technician Wei Lee, and it isn't going
to be me."
Two


T

he terraced cliffs of the Red Valley rose step by step to
a scalloped rim that stood out sharply against the hard
pink sky. As the three cadres marched through the
sours, a straggling V of geese flew out over the cliffs, honking
each to each as they headed north to their breeding

grounds in the polar sinks.

Spring!

Wei Lee shaded his eyes to watch the birds, and out of
casual spitefulness, an attribute some gene cutter had forgotten
to edit out of the camel-derived genome of its kind,
the draft bact took advantage of the slack harness rope to
try and snatch at his hair. Lee felt the rope swing out and
ducked the bact's swipe, then whacked it on its muzzle.

"Ho! Ho there! Don't you know I'm cleverer than you!"

He mopped his face with his kerchief and whacked the
bact again, to get it moving.