"Stephen Goldin - The Eternity Brigade" - читать интересную книгу автора (Goldin Stephen)

The squad moved quickly through the empty streets, crouched low to
avoid possible gunfire and taking cover behind deserted buildings along
the way. Overhead, an occasional ball of blue flame would drift lazily
through the sky. Hawker had never seen anything quite like them in battle
before, but he hardly had to be told they were dangerous. His guesses
about them were confirmed when one of the blue fireballs brushed lightly
against the top of a building several hundred meters away. The structure
promptly exploded, knocking the entire squad to their knees and
showering the area with tiny bits of rubble, hardly more than a fine dust.
Hawker instinctively covered his head, but he needn't have bothered; the
blue fireballs didn't leave pieces big enough to cause any damage.

Their sector, it turned out, was an area of some ten square blocks near
the outskirts of the inner city. The neighborhood had been oriented
toward small businesses and shops, with few tall buildings and only a
scattering of residences. As a result, it had fared better than some other,
more important target areas. Only a couple of structures had suffered even
minor damage, there were no casualties lying about, and the streets were
quite passable.

Probably too passable, Hawker thought, surveying the scene with a
professional eye. The enemy could march a battalion through these
streets, and all we've got is a ten-man squad to stop them. He was
already making mental notes of the most effective places to use his
grenades to block the streets, should it be necessary.

They came to a halt and the squad leader broke them down into
two-man teams, each to patrol its own area within the sector. Since the
Spardian was the only squad member Hawker could communicate with,
he found himself teamed up with her again. They said little as they
marched out to their post, at the most forward area of the sector. Hawker
surmised his squad leader wasn't happy having someone he couldn't talk
to, and had purposely assigned him to the front lines. Hawker was the
most expendable person in the group.

He and the Spardian woman scouted their area and quickly found a
secure vantage point in a narrow stairway leading down to a cellar.
Peering over the top they had an almost unobstructed view of the street in
both directions, while being reasonably safe themselves. With that
accomplished, they settled in to wait.

He tried to talk some more with the woman, to find out whether she
knew any more of the situation than he did. Their mutual command of the
Vandik language, however, was only good enough for the most basic
communication, and the woman was not very talkative anyway. Perhaps
she resented being sacrificed at the front lines merely because she was the
only one who could communicate with Hawker. She told him tersely that
she, like he, was a resurrectee, and that the sergeant had only sketched the
situation briefly. Then she reverted to sullen silence, implying that Hawker
should do the same.