"Gabriel Mesta - StarCraft 02 - Shadow of the Xel'Naga" - читать интересную книгу автора (Mesta Gabriel)

Few of the other colonists bothered to monitor planetary conditions or track underground activity
anymore, but Lars had thought it important to place seismographs in their automated mining stations out
in the Back Forty foothills. Of course, Octavia had been the one to repair and install the aging monitoring
equipment.

Lars had been right, though. There had been increasing tremors of late, setting off ripples of aftershocks
that originated deep in the mountain range at the far side of the next valley.

Just what we needтАФanother thing to worry about, Octavia thought, looking at the graph with concern.

Lars joined her to read the seismograph strip. The long and shaky line appeared to have been drawn by
a caff-addicted old man. He saw several little blips and spikes, probably echoes of sonic thunder, but no
major seismic events. тАЬNow that's interesting. Aren't you glad we didn't have an earthquake tonight?тАЭ

She knew it would happen even before he finished his sentence. Maybe it was another one of Octavia's
powerful premonitions, or just a discouraged acceptance that things would get worse whenever they had
the opportunity.

Just as Lars formed another of his cocky grins, a tremor rippled through the ground, as if the uneasy
crust of Bhekar Ro were having a nightmare. At first Octavia hoped it was merely a particularly close
blast of sonic thunder, but the tremors continued to build, lurching the floor beneath their feet and shaking
the entire prefab house.

Lars tensed his powerful muscles to ride out the temblor. They both watched the seismograph go wild.
тАЬThe readings are off the scale!тАЭ

Astonished, Octavia pointed out, тАЬThis isn't even centeredhere. It's fifteen klicks away, over the ridge.тАЭ

тАЬGreat. Not far from where we set up all our automated mining equipment.тАЭ The seismograph went
dead, its sensors overloaded, as the quake pounded the ground for what seemed an eternity before it
gradually began to fade. тАЬLooks like you're gonna have some repair work to do tomorrow, Octavia.тАЭ

тАЬI've always got repair work to do,тАЭ she said.

Outside, the storm reached a crescendo. Lars and Octavia sat together in weary silence, just waiting out
the disaster. тАЬDo you want to play cards?тАЭ he asked.

Then all the lights inside their dwelling went out, leaving them in pitch blackness lit only by flares from the
laser-lightning.
тАЬNot tonight,тАЭ she said.



CHAPTER 2
THE QUEEN OF BLADES.

Her name had once been Sarah Kerrigan, back when she'd been something else . . . back when she'd
been human.