"C. Sanford Lowe & G. David Nordley - The Small Pond" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lowe C Sanford)

He nodded. “Everyone’s here and accounted for.”
“Very good. I will try to get back before departure for Minot, but if not, go
ahead without me; I may be some time, and can take this shuttle back.”
Ned looked at David oddly, then smiled. “You? Late?”
David forced a smile. “The collision apparently will not be late, and there is
still much to do.”
Ned patted him on the shoulder; the lack of an effort to divert the planetoid
had been a downer for all of them. They shook hands, and Ned followed his group
down the corridor.
David boarded the shuttle and stowed his gear. Settling at the controls, he
contacted the busy port manager. “I need to make a fast trip down to the surface.
There is a last minute discovery at a new ice lake.”
The man, tall and light haired with a bushy mustache and an easygoing
manner, squinted and smiled. “Well, now, someone might think you just wanted to
be the last one off the planet.”
David smiled back nervously and didn’t say anything. Let him believe what he
wanted.
The man shrugged. “Okay, it’s fueled and ready. No other traffic, so you’re
cleared.”
The trip down to the planet took four hours. The ice lake actually existed; he
landed on its shore. If nothing else, he would find out one or two more things about
this world. He pulled one of two boxes out of the duffel bag and replaced it with a
survival tent and a couple of days’ worth of rations. He carried the box down the
ladder and set it down outside the shuttle’s airlock. Then he went back up, opened
the panel to the ship’s main processor, and disconnected it. That should set some
alarms going, he thought.
On his way out, he touched the box and hesitated, going over everything
again. No, he had to do it this way. There could be only one way to get him off the
planet alive, and that would be to divert the planetoid. He took a breath, threw the
switch on the timer, climbed down the ladder, picked up his gear, and headed for the
lakeshore.
 Ten minutes later, the blast severed his only way off the planet.
They had not really listened before; perhaps they would listen now.
Later, on a small rise, he looked out over the lake. At early evening by local
time, the scenery here, in one of the few places on Martin’s surface not covered with
ice, was breathtaking. The steep sides of the caldera were a study in deep red and
black, with glints here and there of volcanic glass. The ground was cracked and
brittle—he would have to watch his step; getting himself killed too soon would
defeat the whole purpose of this mad exercise.
Would Liz or Mutori pull out the stops and divert the planetoid? Or would
they let him be blown to smithereens along with the planet? He looked at the still
lake, reflecting the glowing crags of the caldera’s rim. Was it really still, he thought,
or was it, too, teaming with life, every bit as deserving of saving as the damned, all
too important, Black Hole Project?
****
Liz was deep in concentration on an idea that just might work. Array
construction robots in orbit about Canning were hurriedly fabricating a huge net, a
thousand kilometers in radius. A large magsail, meant for a starship, would be
attached to the net, along with several million tons of ballast weighted around the rim
of the net. If everything went right, the whole assembly could be pushed with