"Daniel Keys Moran - A Tale of the Continuing Time 04 - The AI War" - читать интересную книгу автора (Moran Daniel Keys)

preventing any more Peaceforcers from coming out after him; if they couldn't shut the outer door, they
couldn't open the inner door, not until everyone in the corvette got into p-suits. It bought Trent some
desperately needed time.

Trent took a deep breath and immediately regretted it. The pain struck like a maser, washing over and
through him. He floated just inside the airlock, holding on to the airlock's edge, panting for air in short
quick breaths; he slowly became aware of his right knee, of a throbbing pain almost as bad as the pain in
his ribs. He tried to remember when the knee had gone out, and couldn't --

Trent straightened his head and looked around. The corvette continued to drift along its last vector; if
they hit the rockets again Trent had few real options; he would duck back down into the airlock and ride
it out, hoping that the Vatsayama caught them. The Vatsayama could not be far away at this point,
following his beacon.

They were drifting over the surface of Ceres. Radar gave Trent the distance, two hundred fourteen
meters and growing slightly more distant with each second. Bad news; the corvette had taken Trent
nearly ten klicks away from the nearest airlock leading down into pressure. But --

They were only four klicks away from the Temple of 'Toons asteroid, and drawing closer.

First things first; from his tool belt Trent withdrew an emblade, a knife with a blade one molecule wide at
its edge, only eighty molecules wide at the back of the blade, and turned it on. He might be able to go
around the ship, and cut the cannon directly; but Trent knew the PKF inside the ship were looking for
that. If it even looked as though he were going to try it they would boost to shake him free, come back
around and fry him while he tried to escape on wrist and ankle rockets -- if he left the airlock he had to
do it quickly.

The corvette's schematics and alternates popped up into Trent's awareness. Provisionally good news; on
roughly eighty-five percent of current corvette models the fuel lines, carrying monatomic hydrogen, ran
only four meters back along the hull -- and a bonus: right next to them was the optical link between the
cockpit, engines and weapons.

On the alternates, the other fifteen percent --

On the other fifteen percent Trent was going to die trying it. On those models the fuel lines ran along the
other side of the hull. The instant they realized he was out of the airlock they would boost on him, come
back around and chop him up.

Nobody lives forever, Trent thought. But let's try.

He pulled himself up out of the airlock and shoved himself off down the length of the corvette. He didn't
try to slow himself; a meter before the correct spot, he dropped the tip of the emblade down to touch the
hull. The emblade skittered along the hull, and then abruptly dug in, bit all the way down to the handle.
Slowly as he was moving, the blade's drag still barely impeded Trent's progress along the hull; he coasted
another five meters before coming to a stop. If his luck was up he had just sliced through the main fuel
lines and the optical link --

If his luck wasn't up he was about to die.
He stood up on the hull of the ship, looked at the small bubble of rock now a mere three kilometers
away, the Temple of 'Toons Asteroid --