"Foster, Alan Dean - Alien Nation" - читать интересную книгу автора (Foster Alan Dean)

Nowhere left to go except to the next car. Not too far away up the street.
Ten feet. A lousy ten feet. No time left to think, either. He rose and ran.
Two steps from the second car the next blast hit him in the side, knocking
him to his right, his arms flailing wildly at the air like those of a rag
doll dropped from a speeding car. A second blast caught him in the chest as
he was spun around by the first, but it didn't hurt him. He couldn't be
hurt any further. The first shot had cut through his spine. He was dead
before he struck the asphalt.
Sykes saw it happen and could only stare. Tuggle had been his partner for
nine years. Tuggle had been his friend for nine years. And Tug was down
hard in the street.
The big alien loosed one, two, three additional shots in the direction of
the motionless detective. One blast caught the prone body and tumbled it
over like a loose stone. Then he grabbed at his buddy and threw him toward
the rear of the market. As he did so the shotgun fell from Raincoat's
fingers. Neither paused to recover the dropped weapon as they searched
wildly for the store's rear exit.
Sykes could have charged in then, might have had a good shot at them.
Instead he was racing across the street. He slowed as he approached Bill
Tuggle's body. There was no need to check for a pulse, no need to tum it
over for closer inspection. The three powerful blasts had reduced the body
of his partner to something unrecognizable.
One minute he'd been nearby, exchanging sotw gags,
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alive and warm and wise-cracking across the pavement. Now he was gone. It
wasn't always necessary to check for the heartbeat of a gunshot victim.
Sykes had been on the street a long time. He didn't check. Nobody had ever
looked deader than Bill Tuggle looked right then.
"Aw shit, Tug, Jesus! Goddamnit!"
Sometimes all you can do is stare and curse. Not all cops pray in the
conventional sense, but most do something similar. Sykes's lips didn't
move, but anyone could see what he was feeling in his eyes. Words and
images rushed through his dazed brain, all jumbled up together like one of
Edie's stews, and his lousy mind wasn't equal to the task of sorting them
out. He couldn't make sense of any of it.
Then his expression changed, his gaze came alive with something else. It
spilled over into his entire being and took possession of him. By rights he
ought to have stayed where he was. Sirens were wailing against the night.
Their backup on its way, too late, too far away. By rights he had no
business leaving the scene to pursue, one against two. Crazy, insane,
madness. Why not sweep him up in it also? What did anything matter, with
Tug a limp pile of meat in the middle of a Slagtown street?
He took off toward the store, eyes wild, rage giving wings to his feet.
The store was deserted, the proprietor's wife having fled. He nearly fell
twice, slipping and sliding on broken glass, heedless of sharp-edged
shelving and the possibility of catching a surprise shell. The rear door
stood ajar. He plunged through just in time to catch a glimpse of the two
tall aliens rounding the comer at the far end of the service alley. He felt
as though he were flying along, his feet hardly touching the ground, the