"Zach Hughes - Gold Star" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hughes Zach)

stars, to the last established blink beacon, and turn left.

There was no way she could be out there beyond the 47's station.

Pete punched in the buttons for home, felt the leap, and the old 47 was
back within fractions of an inch of her original position at the junction of
four lonely blink routes leading from nowhere to nothing. The homebase
blink beacon had dutifully recorded the Blinkstat for Rimfire and relayed
it.

Pete was glumly silent for a long time.

"Hungry?" Jan asked.

"Not very."

"Bowl of kanji fruit?"
 "Sounds good."

She started to rise, and the tone of his voice stopped her. She settled
back.

"What we're gonna hear, and pretty soon, is an all-points alert on
Rimfire." he said.

"Oh, no," Jan said.

"Let's eat," he said. "It'll take a while."

It took twelve hours. The Blinkstat came from New Earth, and it was a
blockbuster, carrying the preliminary code which indicated that it was
being sent simultaneously along all established blink routes. The general
transmission, in itself, was a tipoff to the seriousness of the situation, even
if the wording was not. The message was merely a formal request to all
ships in space, all stations, all fleet installations to report any knowledge
of U.P.S. Rimfire.

It was when the stat gave Rimfire's last known position that Pete began
to dream. Rimfire's arrival had been recorded at blink beacon
7C3X99-34R-NE793. Her next jump should have been recorded at blink
beacon 7C3X99-34R-NE794.

"NE794," Pete muttered.

"That's where we went," Jan said.

"She arrived at NE793." Now he was beginning to regret that he hadn't
had more courage, that he had not jumped on downrange to NE793.

"She's lost," he said.