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

Dire wolves sniffed out two bodies. "Burnt beyond recognition" hardly conveyed
the horror of the charred skeletons, jaws agape in final agony, held together by
shreds of cooked flesh. Riggers watched Ellenor Battle go over the corpses with
cool intensity, calling down DNA signatures and dental data from orbit. "This
guy's kinda short," someone suggested. "Maybe he's a Thal."

"I don't know. Might be human."

"Human as you anyway."

"Just bein' hopeful."

Glad not to be needed, Defoe conducted his own search, using his navmatrix to
find the low black calm, and the fold the Tuch-Dah had burst from. A rigger was
down in the grass on his knees, a strip of gasbag fabric tied around his head
like a bandana holding his hair back. Defoe recognized "Rig'em Right" on the
back of the man's jacket.

Seeing Defoe, he got up. His name was Rayson, which everyone shortened to Ray.
He held up a small finned and pointed object. "There's a mess of these in the
grass." Defoe recognized the spent projectile from a recoilless pistol. The
young AID woman had been firing downslope from up by the wreck. Had she hit
anything? Defoe looked for bloodstains.

Ray glanced upslope to where Ellenor Battle was working over the bodies, then
walked around behind the fire blackened caim, opening his pants to piss.

Defoe called out softly, "That's a shrine."

Taking a sharp step back, Ray zipped his pants. "Shit, I thought it was a
barbecue pit." Just the sort of thing that got people in trouble in Tuch-Dah
country -- you could get brained by a Thal and never know why.

Finding no blood on the grasstops, Defoe stood up, studying the shoreline. The
colder north shore marshes were thin, broken by shimmering white pans. Wind
whipped fine, dry grit off the pans, stinging his eyes, settling in skin
creases. He licked the corners of his mouth, tasting tiny bits of the
Saber-tooth Steppe. It was salty.

A dark object lay between the steppe and the sea, as still as the shrine. Defoe
walked toward it, brittle shore grass crunching underfoot. The big still object
was a bison, down on its knees. Vultures flapped off as Defoe approached. Tail,
ears, eyes, and testicles were gone, but the bison was hideously alive, managing
to lift its head, turning bloody sightless sockets toward Defoe.

"Damn." Ray was right behind him, letting out a low whistle. "I'll fix him." He
produced a recoilless pistol with a folding stock. Shouldering it like a rifle,
he fired.