"Arcady And Boris Strugatsky. Prisoners of Power" - читать интересную книгу автора

"I was in favor of him anyway. Cure or no cure." The doctor puffed on
his pipe. "I have the same impression as Ordi. Although he's not yet one of
us, he will be. It can't be otherwise. In any case he's no good to them.
He's too clever."
"All right," said the General. "What about you. Hoofer?"
"I'm in favor," said Memo. "He'll be useful."
"Well, then," said the General, "I'm in favor of him, too. I'm very
happy for you, Mac. I'd hate to have to get rid of you." He looked at his
watch. "Let's go," he said. "The radiation strike is about due, and Mac will
have a chance to show us his skill. Forester, pour him some beer, and let's
have some of your cheese, Hoofer, get going and take over for Green. He
hasn't eaten since morning."

10.
The General held a final pre-operation briefing at the Castle of the
Twin-headed Horse. It was the ruins of an old museum outside the city,
destroyed during the war. Overgrown with ivy and grass, it was a wild,
lonely place. City dwellers never visited it because of its proximity to a
malarial swamp, and it had a reputation among the local population as a
hideout for bandits and thieves, Maxim arrived on foot with Ordi; Green came
on his motorcycle with Forester. The General and Memo-Hoofer were waiting
for them in a drainage pipe that led directly into the swamp. The General
was smoking, and Memo was frantically waving away the mosquitoes with a
scented stick.
"Did you bring it?" he asked Forester.
"Of course." Forester removed a tube of insect repellent from his
pocket.
Each person smeared himself, and the General opened the briefing.
Memo spread out a map and went over the entire operation again, even
though everyone had already memorized it. Between 12:00 P.M. and 1:00 A.M.
the group would creep up to the barbed-wire barrier from four directions and
set linear charges. Forester and Memo would work alone, coming from the
north and west, respectively. The General and Ordi would come together from
the east. Maxim and Green would come from the south. The charges would
detonate simultaneously at precisely 1:00 A.M., and the General, Green,
Memo, and Forester would rush through the breach in the barbed wire and hurl
grenades at the guardhouse. As soon as firing from the guardhouse ceased or
slowed down. Maxim and Ordi would run over to the tower with magnetic mines
and lay them, after tossing two more grenades at the guardhouse to be sure
it was knocked out. Then they would light the fuses, collect the wounded -
only the wounded! - and head east through the woods toward a village.
Shorty would be waiting for them there with a motorcycle. The seriously
wounded would be loaded onto the motorcycle; those with minor wounds would
escape on foot. Forester's cabin would be the reassembly point. They were to
wait there not more than two hours. After that they must leave the usual
way. Any questions? No? That was that.
The General threw away a butt, slipped his hand under his shirt, and
drew out a vial of yellow tablets. "Attention!" he said. "The staff has
decided on a minor change in our plan. The starting time has been advanced
to twenty-two hundred."