"Michael McCollum - Thunderstrike" - читать интересную книгу автора (McCollum Michael)

“Better be careful with that jumping!” a woman’s voice said in his earphones. “I’d hate to see you break
anything.”

Thorpe gazed down at the figure standing on the plain some thirty meters below him. The figure in the
red-orange vacuum suit was anonymous. Only in his mind’s eye could he see the short, slightly plump
figure of Nina Pavolev. Two years his junior, Nina was his executive assistant, and his sometimes lover.

“I’ve been doing this for ten years now,” he said over the general communications band, “and haven’t
broken my neck yet!”
“That’s what they all say just before they do!”

Thorpe settled slowly back toward the surface, grounding a full three minutes after the gentle push had
sent him skyward. He took the impact with flexed knees, absorbing just enough energy to keep from
rebounding into the sky.

“When I was a boy back on Earth, I always dreamed of flying like an Eagle. Now I can. It is
exhilarating. You ought to try it.”

“No thank you. Life is too short to take needless risks.”

“You don’t know what you’re missing,” he persisted.

“I’ll take your word for it. Shall we begin the tour, Boss?”

“Anytime you’re ready, oh conscience mine!”

Tom Thorpe had not remained a vacuum monkey. In the three years following his return to The Rock, he
had moved up to gang boss, then shift leader. Those had been the years they had spent turning The
Rock into the Solar System’s largest spaceship. The modifications had begun by blasting a thrust
chamber out of the heavy end of the asteroid, the end they had dubbed “The Acorn’s Cap.” While
Thorpe’s crew worked at excavating the chamber and its connecting tunnels, other crews installed giant
clusters of attitude control jets. These had begun the long process of lengthening the eight-hour day of
the asteroid. Shortly after the despinning process began, Perry Allen was killed in a freak accident. Tom
Thorpe found himself thrust suddenly into the position of Second Assistant Power Engineer.

One of his new duties had involved overseeing the operation of The Rock’s propulsion system. Like
most large spacecraft, the asteroid was powered by antimatter. Thousands of power packs had been
shipped from the big power satellites. These were simple toroidal pipes filled with hard vacuum and
surrounded by self-sustaining magnetic fields. Each contained enough antimatter to power a normal
spacecraft for a hundred round trips to the Moon. Yet, each fed The Rock’s massive ion engines for less
than a day before exhaustion.

It had taken four years of powered flight to move The Rock into an orbit that ranged from 800,000 to
1.2 million kilometers above the Earth. With the end of powered flight had come reassignment for all
personnel. Thorpe was promoted to the position of Supervisor, Surface Operations. Later he was
advanced to Assistant Manager of Operations, and finally, to Manager of Operations. Despite his rise to
the asteroid’s top job, he still made it a point to inspect The Rock’s various facilities once each week.

Thorpe and Nina Pavolev hooked up to one of the many guide cables that ran across the surface of the