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

space. And on the very day I get washed out of the programme, the very same day,
space comes to me. Wherever the hell this thing comes from, whatever mother ship
orbiting fucking Neptune, you can bet there's going to be a clamour to get out
there. Those NASA assholes must be jumping up and down; it's their best day
since Neil and Buzz. At last we've got someplace to go - but whoever they send
it isn't going to be me. Makes you laugh, doesn't it? If Mohammed can't get to
the mountain...'

She closed her hand on the stick before her, letting it pull her passively to
and fro. What if she grabbed the stick hard, yanked it to left or right? Could
she take over the plane? And then what? 'Malenfant, I'm scared.'

'Of the UFO?'

'No. Of you.'

'Just a little closer,' he said, his voice a thin crackle over the intercom. 'I
won't let you come to any harm, Emma.'

Suddenly she screamed.'... Watch the Moon, Malenfant. Watch the Moon!'



Reid Malenfant:

It was a Moon, but not the Moon. A new Moon. A Red Moon.

It was a day of strange lights in the sky. But it was a sky that was forever
barred to him.

The plane was flung sideways.

It was like a barrel roll. Suddenly his head was jammed into his shoulders and
his vision tunnelled, worse than any eyeballs-back launch he had ever endured
and harder, much harder, than he would have wanted to put Emma through.

His systems went dead: softscreens, the clunky old dials, even the hiss of the
comms, everything. He wrestled with the stick, but got no response; the plane
was just falling through an angry sky, helpless as an autumn leaf.

The rate of roll increased, and the Gs just piled on. He knew he was already
close to blacking out; perhaps Emma had succumbed already, and soon after that
the damn plane was going to break up.

With difficulty he readied the ejection controls. 'Emma! Remember the drill!'
But she couldn't hear, of course.

Just for a second, the panels flickered back to life. He felt the stick jerk,
the controls bite.