"David Drake - Hammer's Slammers 10 - Paying The Piper" - читать интересную книгу автора (Drake David)

Sergeant Tatzig looked up. He grunted an order to his driver, then replied over the unit push, "Roger,
will do."

There was a clang from the hold. A spacer had just hit the turnbuckle with a heavy hammer.

A huge, hollow metallic racket sounded from the field; the dirigible had dropped its four shipping
containers. The instant the big metal boxes hit the ground, the sides facing the starship fell open. Three of
them did, anyway: the fourth container opened halfway, then stuck.

The containers were full of armed men wearing uniforms of chameleon cloth that mimicked the hue of
whatever it was close to. The troops looked like pools of shadow from which slugthrowers and
anti-armor missiles protruded.

"Incoming!" Huber screamed. "We're under attack!"

One of the attacking soldiers had a buzzbomb, a shoulder-launched missile, already aimed at Huber's
face. He fired. Huber reacted by instinct, grabbing his two companions and throwing himself down the
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ramp instead of back into the open hold.

The missile howled overhead and detonated onFencing Master 's bow. White fire filled the universe for
an instant. The blast made the ramp jump, flipping Huber from his belly to his right side. He got up. He
was seeing double, but he could see; details didn't matter at times like this.

The attack had obviously been carefully planned, but things went wrong for the hostiles as sure as they
had for Huber and his troopers. The buzzbomber had launched early instead of stepping away from the
shipping container as he should've done. The steel box caught the missile's backblast and reflected it onto
the shooter and those of his fellows who hadn't jumped clear. They spun out of the container, screaming
as flames licked from their tattered uniforms.

A dozen automatic weapons rakedFoghorn , killing Tatzig and his crewmen instantly. The attackers'
weapons used electromagnets to accelerate heavy-metal slugs down the bore at hypersonic velocity.
When slugs hit the car's iridium armor, they ricocheted as neon streaks that were brilliant even in sunlight.

Slugs that hit troopers chewed their bodies into a mist of blood and bone.

The starship's hold was full of roiling white smoke, harsh as a wood rasp on the back of Huber's throat
in the instant before his helmet slapped filters down over his nostrils. The buzzbomb had hitFencing
Master 's bow slope at an angle. Its shaped-charge warhead had gouged a long trough across the armor
instead of punching through into the car's vitals. There was no sign of Kolbe.

The tie-down, jammed turnbuckle and all, had vanished in the explosion. Two pairs of legs lay beside
the vehicle. They'd probably belonged to spacers rather than Huber's troopers, but the blast had blown
the victims' clothing off at the same time it pureed their heads and torsos.

Slugs snapped through the starship's hatchway, clanging and howling as they ricocheted deeper into the