"Ecolitan - 04 - The Ecolitian Enigma" - читать интересную книгу автора (Modesitt L E)

"They'd take me on your recommendation?"
"Not automatically, but I can't recall when the recommendation of a senior professor was last rejected." He cleared his throat and raised his voice above the roar of the landing engines. "That's because we don't make many, and we're held responsible."
"How many have you made?" Sylvia asked with a smile. "You're the first. I don't know of any professor, or even the Prime, who's made more than three. Some never have."

Her eyes dropped to the green of the bulkhead before them. "You make me sound extraordinarily special, and I'm not."

"You're not? How many people would have had the background, the understanding, and the willingness to help me-and to prevent the deaths of billions of human beings?" And that was just where an interstellar war could have led. "I'm not that special."

"We'll talk about that later, Ms. Ferro-Maine," Nathaniel said as the shuttles tires screeched on the permacrete of Accord and he lurched against the harness. "Way too rough . . ." he murmured more to himself than Sylvia.

Even before the shuttle lurched to a halt, prompting another sour look by Nathaniel, the announcement hissed through the passenger compartment.

"Please pick up your bags or any luggage on the way out of the shuttle. You are responsible for carrying your own luggage unless you have made prior arrangements. Please pick up your luggage on the way out."

"Self-sufficiency begins from the moment you set foot on the planet, I see." After the final lurch, Sylvia eased out other harness and stood, stretching.

Nathaniel watched for a moment, enjoying her grace, still half-amazed that she had not been good enough for a professional dancing career on Old Earth. "Dancing takes more than grace."
"How did you-"

"You've said it enough, especially every time I stretch." Another warm smile crossed her lips. "Time to become pack animals."

"With what little you brought?"
"I had very little time to choose, as you may recall?"
"Sorry. I'll see that you get a stipend for that." And he would, even if it came out of his pay. "You arent responsible for everything, dear envoy." No, he thought, we Ecolitans only think we are. One of the uniformed crew members-a woman in olive greens standing behind the baggage racks-looked sharply at the two for a moment as they retrieved their bags, two field packs for Nathaniel and two oblong black synfab cases for Sylvia.

Once they stepped out of the shuttle and into the shuttleway to the port terminal, Nathaniel took a deep breath. "Smells better than ship air."

"It smells like burned hydrocarbons to me," confessed Sylvia. "Professor Whaler?" asked the redheaded young woman in plain greens, waiting by the end of the shuttleway.

"I'm Whaler," Nathaniel acknowledged. "And this is Ms. Ferro-Maine. She's accompanying me to the Institute."

"Trainee Luren, sirs," offered the youngster, probably a fourth-year trainee, Nathaniel suspected. "The Prime sent a flitter when he got your message." Her rust-colored eyebrows lifted just slightly. "If you would follow me?"

"Thank you. " The Ecolitan did not answer the unasked question. Few Ecolitans got private flitters on returning to Accord. Most carried their own luggage and took the monorail.

As they trailed Luren, Sylvia murmured, "I thought you said we'd have to take the monorail."

"I couldn't count on a flitter . . . didn't want to disappoint you."

"You won't be disappointed that you aren't flying it?" She raised her eyebrows.

"A little, but into each life some rain falls."
"Please..."

Luren paused by a narrow doorway. "We're down the steps and across the permacrete."

Nathaniel squinted as they stepped out into the bright sunlight of Harmony, if a shuttle port nearly twenty kilos south of Harmony could be considered part of the Coordinate capital. "There it is, sirs," said Luren.

Nathaniel glanced toward the green flitter as he eased the field packs through the doorway, then looked back toward Sylvia, whose mouth opened. Scritt! Scritt!