"Brian Lumley - E-Branch 1 - Defilers" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lumley Brian)

"Personally, I don't see nearly enough of it," she said.
"What. . ."? Manolis barked, startling her.
"The sun," she said. "I said I don't see nearly enough-" But then, as she glanced sideways at him,
she saw that his eyes were fixed not on her but on his rearview mirror.
"Why, whatever is-?" she started to say, craning her neck to look back. Just a few feet behind,
the other car was bearing down on them like some great blind snarling beast!
Manolis couldn't hit the brakes because the black car was immediately behind him. He couldn't
accelerate because the road ahead made a sharp right turn and disappeared from view. On the right,
a wall of rock where the road had been cut from the mountainside. And on the left... a sheer drop
of a hundred or more feet to jutting rocks and the tideless sea. And no safety barrier between.
When the big car's horn blared, Manolis was trying to negotiate the bend. Centrifugal force sent
his Fiat sliding across double white lines into the oncoming lane. Gritting his teeth, hauling
desperately on the steering wheel, he gasped his relief when he saw that the road ahead was empty.
But it made no difference. His car was out of control and skidding. Which was when the heavier
vehicle, its horn still blaring continuously, slammed into the Fiat from behind.


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The collision served to slow the big car down, whiplashed Manolis and his passenger, and sent the
smaller vehicle rocketing out into empty space. And all of it happening that fast, as accidents
usually do, so that human reactions and even thoughts are almost impossible. Except this wasn't an
accident. And:


55
NECROSCOPE: DEFILERS
Well, I suppose it's goodbye to all that! Manolis did manage to think, quite calmly and uselessly.
And I don't even know why, or maybe I do. And where's my safety belt! Oh, shit!
Eleni had just started screaming when the car hit a jutting outcrop, sliced through a clump of
stunted, cliff-clinging heather, and struck something far more solid that sent it hurtling
outwards again, spinning end over end.
And glimpsed through a crazily whirling pinwheel of stone and sky, the rocky base of the cliffs,
washed by a slow-surging ocean, came rushing to meet them . . .
In London it was 9 P.M. and almost cool. In all the hotels the air-conditioning systems were
running at full blast, and people were in the streets and the bars in their shirt-sleeves,
enjoying the Indian-summer atmosphere. But for others there was work to be done.
At E-Branch HQ the work hadn't stopped, Trask's espers did their various things, but theirs was
work with a difference. As for Trask himself: he was just about through for the day, looking
forward to a drink and a good night's sleep. He would sleep at the HQ, which had been his habit
for almost three years now. But waiting-still waiting-to see Lardis Lidesci and Jake, he'd found
plenty to occupy his time. For where news, theories, or any information in general about the
invaders from Starside was concerned, Trask's office door was always open.
Last of several people to come and see him was Millicent Cleary. Millie was a telepath and
competent computer operator,- she was also a member of E-Branch's master think tank, Trask's
current affairs adviser, and one of his favourite people-the kid sister he'd never had. But she
wasn't a kid anymore,-none of the gang from the "good old days" was. Like Trask himself, they'd
been here too long and E-Branch had aged them.
Such were his thoughts . . . just a second or so before she looked at him in a certain way that he