"Charles Ingrid - The Sand Wars 01 - Solar Kill" - читать интересную книгу автора (Ingrid Charles)

on a console.
Jack was aware that he eyed the man with caution and flicked his gaze away, wondering what it was the captain was
going to ask him.
But when the captain spoke, it wasn’t to ask him anything, it was to tell him. “I washed out of the infantry,” he said,
his voice deepened and mellowed by the whiskey. “I came this close to being approved to be an Elite Knight, then I
lost it all ... on account of my family. I’d been a farm boy, and had a certain regard for the cycle of things, and the
psychotherapists thought I’d make a poor killing machine. So they washed me out, and the closest I got to battle armor
was being seventeen and watching it march by me and the other recruits on the parade field, the Flexalinks shining
brighter than a baby’s first tooth.” He laughed softly, a bitter laugh. “Then I learned later that you damned Knights
lived by a code and that code was the same thing I’d been washed out for ... only I’d had the code before I became a
Knight instead of after, and that was the difference.”
“That was before Rikor and Milos and Dor-man’s Stand fell before the Thrakian swarm. If I knew then what I know
now, I’d not have been such an unhappy kid. I’d have stayed in ballistics instead of deserting, knowing that the
psychs had just kept me out of the worst war fought and lost by mankind in their history.” With a sigh, Marciane
colored his confession with another gulp of amber Tantalos whiskey.
Storm sipped gingerly at his again, feeling it reach down inside with its glow, knowing that Marciane was not the type
of man to open up without reciprocation. He sat there, wondering what of his past he could trade the man, without
endangering either of their lives. He’d never been presented as the last survivor of the Sand Wars on Milos ... when
he’d been found, he’d been shuffled quietly from emergency clinic to hospital to rehab center. And he knew that all
the suits of battle armor on the transport had been destroyed, except for his, which the nurse had unknowingly
smuggled to him. He had been allowed to live, but his life had never been celebrated. Jack could not shake the feeling
that to know exactly who he was and where he came from would not be healthy for the general public. He caught up
the thread of Marciane’s voice again, having missed the first word or two.
“... but try telling that to a green kid. Even the odds of two out of seventy-six were better than no odds at all. Ballistics
seemed unimaginative and unimportant after that. Push a button and a sector blows. What is there to that? Blowing up
dirt, instead of facing the enemy. So I left.”
“You’re a deserter?”
“Was. Was. I took the general amnesty six years ago, when Emperor Pepys came in. But I’ve been a fighter all my life
... just not in the Dominion forces. I fight in nasty, grimy little wars where you know who the enemy is and you see the
look on his face just after you blow away his face plate and he knows you’ve got him. I like a war where you know who
the winners are.” He eyed Jack, taking a drink, then asked abruptly. “What’s it like to kill a Thrak?”
Without thinking, Jack answered, “Like squashing a bug.” Then became aware that a deadly silence had settled into
the galley. He hesitated too long to recall his mistake.
Marciane dropped his feet to the floor. Their gazes met and held. Then Jack said quietly, “You didn’t hear that. If you
value your life, you didn’t hear that.”
“Maybe I did and maybe I didn’t!’ the captain of the Montreal answered. “But it was worth it. I always wondered.
They looked like they’d crack and squish real good.” He tossed back the last of his drink. “So if I asked you when and
where you did it—not how—you got that goddamn suit hanging back there shows me how— you wouldn’t tell me.
Because there’s supposed to be a treaty against stomping Thraks. So I won’t ask.”
For a moment, Jack’s mind flipped back to when he was drifting and hallucinating about basic training, and thought,
here’s a kid who never asked when the sarge said, “Don’t ask.” He felt an eyebrow arch up, and remained silent.
Marciane put both elbows on the tiny plastic table and leaned forward, his weight making the table shift and the bottle
of Tantalos whiskey shimmer. “What are your plans? Will you stay with me, Jack? We could use you.”
Storm was careful not to let his emotions play across his face as he answered. “Thanks for the offer, Marciane. You’ve
got a good crew here, but I think my interests lie elsewhere right now. What happened to Claron deserves answers,
and I don’t feel like waiting around for subcommittees to decide if they should ask the questions.”
The middle-aged man sank back a little, and forced a thin smile.’ Worth a try, anyway. Guess you heard already that
the Emperor’s reforming the Knights again. He’s starting them up as a personal guard.”
The Tantalos whiskey kept Jack from going ice cold. The disbanded Knights being reformed? The shock ran through
him. He held his gaze and his voice steady as he looked back to Marciane. “Can’t keep much from you, captain.”