"Steve Perry - Aliens 03 - The Female War" - читать интересную книгу автора (Perry Steven)

The screen went to static. Billie found her hands clamped to the arms of the chair so hard her
tendons creaked when she managed to loosen her grip. She shook her head back and forth, almost
without realizing that she was doing it. A denial of Amy's pain, of her ownтАФ She was in Gateway's main
broadcast room, alone; the tech had gone on his dinner break.

"Not again," she said, feeling like a little girl herself. Her own childhood of running and hiding on
Rim had never seemed closerтАФeveryone gone, dragged away screaming to be food for the creatures. A
flood of memories hit her: crouched in a ventilation duct while a fat man with bleeding ears howled in fear
and pain a few feet away; gunshots and shouts in the middle of the night; blood splattered in the dark
hallways; and always the terror, the constant, aching terror and hopelessness, the certainty that she would
be discovered by the monsters. And eaten. Or worse.

But Amy was alive! A few years older and still alive.

The tech, an elderly man named Boyd, had mentioned offhand that there were still a few things
coming in from Earth. "Mostly those goddamn religious shitheads," he'd muttered, picking at one ear.

"Any 'casts of a family?" said Billie, not expecting it. That would have been a miracle....

"Oh yeah. Comes in on various channels, pretty random signals. A girl and her dad, couple of
others off and on. Sad."

Boyd had shrugged and left to eat, warning her not to touch anything while he was gone. Billie
figured the old tech hadn't meant he didn't care, it was just that there was nothing to be done. ExceptтАФ

Ripley. Maybe her plan, whatever it was, could mean helping Amy. The same child, now older, she
had seen in the 'casts when she and Wilks had been trapped on that mad military asshole's base. Amy.

Billie took a deep breath and let it out slowly. She saw herself in that little girl on Earth and would
do whatever she could to save her. Anything.



Billie was a few minutes late to the Four Sails, no doubt the sleaziest bar on GatewayтАФand of
course the one that Wilks would come to. It was small and dark. Drinkers and chem-heads sat at round
tables surrounding the tiny stage near the back; according to a schedule posted on the wall, there would
be erotic dancers later, couples and threesomes crowded onto the platform performing to pulsing music.

Billie spotted Ripley by herself at a table in the corner, a pitcher of splash and a few glasses in front
of her.

"Wilks isn't here yet," Ripley said, pouring pale straw-colored liquid into one of the glasses.
"Drink?"

"Yeah, thanks," said Billie. She took the glass. She swallowed half of its contents before setting it
down.

Ripley raised an eyebrow. "Hard day?"