"Baxter, Stephen - Manifold 03 - Origin" - читать интересную книгу автора (Baxter Stephen)

'What a shithole,' Malenfant said, his voice a whisper over the jet's roar.
'Africa. Cradle of mankind my ass.'

'Malenfant -'

He hurled the T-38 forward with a powerful afterburner surge.

Within seconds they had reached 45,000 feet and had gone through a bone-shaking
Mach 1. The vibrations damped away and the noise of the jets dwindled - for, of
course, they were outstripping most of the sound they made - and the plane
seemed to hang in shining stillness.

Emma, as she had before, felt a surge of exhilaration. It was at such
paradoxical moments of stillness and speed that she felt closest to Malenfant.

But Malenfant was consumed by his gripes.

'Two years. I can't fucking believe it. Two years of training, two years of
meetings and planning sessions, and paddling around in hydro labs and spinning
around in centrifuges. All of it for nothing.'

'Come on, Malenfant. It's not the end of the world. It's not as if Station work
was ever such a prize anyhow. Looking at stars, pissing in Jars. That's what you
used to say -'

'Nobody was flying to fucking Mars. Station was all that was available, so I
took it. Two flights, two lousy flights. I never even got to command a mission,
for Christ's sake.'

'You got washed out this time. That doesn't mean you won't fly again. A lot of
crew are flying past your age.' That was true, of course, partly because NASA
was having such difficulty finding willing applicants from younger generations.

But Malenfant growled, 'It's that asshole Bridges. He even called me into the
JSC director's office to explain the shafting. That fucking horse holder has
always had it in for me. This will be the excuse he needs to send me to
purgatory.'

Emma knew whom he meant. Joe Bridges was the director of flight operations - in
effect, in NASA's Byzantine, smothering internal bureaucracy, in charge of
astronaut selection for missions.

Malenfant was still muttering. 'You know what Bridges offered me? ASP.'

Emma riffled through her mental file of NASA acronyms. ASP:

Astronaut Support Personnel, a non-flying astronaut assigned to support the crew
of a mission.