"Arcady And Boris Strugatsky. Prisoners of Power" - читать интересную книгу автораalways thought it was birds."
"It's a strange cry." "Strange - I don't know, but it's damned frightening. When those screams start tearing through the forest at night, you get the shakes. How many stories we've heard about those cries. In fact, one prisoner even bragged that he understood their language. Translated it." "What did they say?" "Oh, rubbish! You call that a language?" "Where's the prisoner now?" "Disappeared," replied Zef. "He was in a construction unit and his team got lost in the forest." They turned left. Ahead, in the distance, they thought they saw a faint spot of light. Zef turned off the flashlight and put it in his pocket. Now he took the lead, and when he halted abruptly, without warning, Maxim almost bumped into him. "Massaraksh!" muttered Zef. A human skeleton lay crosswise on the floor of the corridor. Zef removed the grenade thrower from his shoulder and looked around. "This wasn't here before." "You're right," said Maxim. "They just put it there." Suddenly from far behind them, from the depths of the underground complex, a chorus of guttural wails rang out. The wails, amplified by their echoes, sounded like a thousand throats crying out. They wailed in unison, as if chanting some strange four-syllable word. Maxim sensed that they were sneering at the intruders, mocking and challenging them. Suddenly the chorus ceased as abruptly as it had begun. looked at the skeleton again. "I guess they're trying to drop a gentle hint." "Sure looks like it. Let's get the hell out of here." They reached the gap in the ceiling quickly, climbed onto the mound of earth, and saw Vepr's anxious face peering down at them. He was lying with his chest over the edge of the hole, dangling a rope with a loop at the end. "What happened?" he asked. "Was that you screaming?" "Tell you in a minute," replied Zef. "Is the rope fastened?" When they reached the surface, Zef rolled cigarettes for Vepr and himself. He lit them and then sat in silence for some time, apparently trying to make sense of his recent adventure. "All right," he said finally. "Here's what it's all about. This is the Fortress. Below are control panels, an electronic brain, and the like. Everything's in bad shape, but energy is available, and if we're to use it to our advantage, we must find knowledgeable people to help us. Next: from all appearances, I'd say that the place is inhabited by dogs. And what dogs! With enormous heads. How they howled! But when you start thinking about it, you wonder if it was them, because, you see... how can I put it? Well, while Mac and I were wandering through the place, someone placed a human skeleton in the corridor. And that's the whole story." Vepr glanced from Zef to Mac. "Mutants?" "Possibly," replied Zef. "I didn't see a damn thing, but Mac claims he saw dogs - but not with his eyes. Massaraksh, how did you see them?" |
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