"Robertson, R Garcia - Gone To Glory" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robertson R Garcia Y)

R. GARCIA ROBERTSON

GONE TO GLORY

THE SAD CAFE

Defoe sat at one of the Sad Cafe's outdoor tables, soaking up gin slings and
watching an energetic couple attempting to mate in midair, wearing nothing but
gossamer wings and happy smiles. This pair of human mayflies had to be used to
the exercise -- neither showed a gram of fat or a bit of shame.

The four-hundred-year-old bistro stood in an open air park on the Rue Sportif
near Spindle's main axis, where g forces were low and the fun never slowed.
Holodomes and hanging gardens arched overhead. Beyond the mating couple, halfway
up Spindle's curve, nude bathers raised slow motion splashes in a low-g pool.
Not a shoddy spot for doing nothing. Defoe ordered his third (or maybe sixth)
sloe gin sling from a roving cocktail bar, a barrel-shaped dispenser doing a
lazy drunkard's walk between the tables, happily doling out drinks. Never asking
for credit or expecting a tip. Human service was rarer than saber-tooth's teeth
on Spindle.

Sipping his sloe gin, Defoe listened with mild disinterest to priority beeps
coming over the comlink clipped to his ear. The first calls weren't for him, but
they were coming fast and close together. Always a sad sign. Hoping not to be
dragged too deeply into other people's troubles, he had his navmatrix decode the
binary signals. The pilot's navmatrix grafted into the back of his skull was
immune to alcohol. Defoe could down a dozen gin slings and still pilot a
tilt-rotor VTOL in a blinding sand storm, or rendezvous with a starship -- if
the need arose. Only the need never arose. Not here. Not now.

First came a distress bulletin, direct from dirtside.

Then a standby alert.

Followed by a formal AID action request.

The final call was for him. Defoe answered in his off-duty voice.

Salome, his section head, came on line. Her parents had been ultra-orthodox
Satanists (who believed John the Baptist had it coming) and her strict religious
upbringing made Salome controlled and precise, with barely a wayward impulse.
Except for her hair, which tumbled in untamed curls and wild midnight blue
ringlets past her hips, almost to the floor. She sounded soft and winsome over
the comlink, a sure sign HQ was in second degree alarm -- Salome never courted
underlings unless she needed something. "There's an AID team down in Tuch-Dah
country. They want us to send someone."

Defoe snickered. "Who's the lucky sucker?"