"Christopher Hinz - Paratwa 02 - Ash Ock" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hinz Christopher)

“No.”



“E-Tech?”



The pilot hesitated. “I don't know. I've never seen a beacon like this before. A sporadically pulsed
cardioid pattern. Extremely low power. I doubt whether anyone beyond a twenty-mile radius could even
pick it up. I'm sure it's a distress signal, but whether or not it's E-Tech, I couldn't say.”



“What could you say?” grilled the captain.



The pilot shrugged.



The captain's eyes drifted shut, a retreat into deep thoughts. Ghandi knew what those thoughts were.



If it's an E-Tech ship, it could be a trap. Sucker us down to the surface with a phony distress signal, then
arrest us for illegal trespass. We're on a dirty flight—unlisted with E-Tech's orbital control—and we're in
restricted airspace to boot. Lately, the bastards were getting tougher—penalties for such intrusions were
becoming harsher. Whatever moral qualms E-Tech had once boasted regarding entrapment had vanished
years ago. Pirate captains, caught on the surface without permission, were being levied heavy fines. Some
Costeaus had even been stripped of their vessels.



Good reasons for not responding to distress calls.



But maybe this ship isn't E-Tech. Maybe it's colony-bred treasure hunters, just as dirty down here as we
are. Maybe they had engine failure and can't lift off.



An E-Tech outpost existed inTexas , seven hundred miles to the southeast. But if the captain of this
shuttle was on a dirty flight, probably he would not risk contacting that base, at least not until things got
desperate. A short-range, low-powered distress beacon offered a fair shot of reaching one of the
numerous Costeau flights that constantly scavenged the planet. And pirates, whether down here legally or