"Friedman,.C.S.-.Coldfire.2.-.When.True.Night.Falls" - читать интересную книгу автора (Friedman C. S)

planet like an errant moon. They had brought all the data down with
them, each nanosecond's record of the ninety-year survey - and he
had studied it so often that sometimes it seemed he knew each
byte of it by heart. To what end? Even if he could find some hint of
danger in the seedship's study, what good would it do them now?
They couldn't go back. They couldn't get help. This far out in the
galaxy they couldn't even get advice from home. The seedship's
programmers were long since dead, as was the culture that had
nurtured them. Communication with Earth would mean waiting more
than forty thousand years for an answer - and that was if Earth was
there to respond, and if it would bother. What had the mother
planet become, in the millennia it had taken this seedship to find a
home? The temporal gulf was almost too vast, too awesome to
contemplate. And it didn't really matter, Case told himself grimly.
The act that they were alone here, absolutely and forever, was all
that counted. As far as this colony was concerned, there was no
Earth.

He shifted uncomfortably in his mossy trench, all too aware of the
darkness that was gathering around him. It was a thick darkness,
cold and ominous, as unlike the darknesses of Earth as this new
sun's cold light was unlike the warm splendor of Sol. For a moment
homesickness filled him, made doubly powerful by the fact that
home as he knew it no longer existed. The colonists had made
their commitment to Eden only to find that it had a serpent's soul,
but there was no escaping it now. Not with the figures for coldsleep
mortality in excess of 86% for second immersion.

He heard a rustling beside him and stiffened; his left hand moved
for his weapon, even as he imagined all the sorts of winged
nightmares that might even now be descending on him. But it was
only Lise, come to join him. He nodded a greeting and scrunched
to one side, making room for her to crawl forward. There was
barely room for both of them in the shallow gully.

Lise Perez, M.D. Thank God for her. She had saved his life a few
nights back, under circumstances he shuddered to recall. She had
almost saved Tom Bennet when that thing got past the eastern
fence and launched itself into the mess cabin, and in any case she
had prevented it from grabbing anyone else, until a cook finally
brought it down by severing head from body with a meat cleaver.
She was a competent officer, always collected, she had a nose for
trouble - and she had been keeping tabs on Ian Casca for nearly a
month now. God bless her for it.

"How long?" he whispered.

She looked at her watch. "Half an hour." And glanced up at him.
"He'll be here before that," she assured him.