"04 - Mirror of Ice by Gary Wright" - читать интересную книгу автора (Nebula Awards)

in the nose of the sled. There were seven charges, quite often
not enough. But when everything failed, including the man,
there was the lever by his left hip. The Final Folly, it was
called; a firm pull and, depending on a hundred unknown
"if's" and "maybe's," he might be lucky enough to find him-
self hanging from a parachute some 300 feet up. Or it might
be the last voluntary act of his life.
He had used it twice. Once steaking into the tall wall of
the Wingover, he had lost a runner . . . and was almost fired
into the opposite grandstand, missing the top tier of seats by
less than four feet. Another time six sleds suddenly tangled
directly in front of him, and he had blasted himself through
the over-hanging limbs of a large fir tree.
But others had not been so lucky.
Hans Kroger: they finally dug his body out of eighteen feet
of snow; he'd gone -all the way to the dirt. His sled had been
airborne -when he blewand upside-down!
Jarl Yorgensen: his sled tumbling and he ejected directly
under the following sleds. No one was certain that all of him
was ever found)
Max Conrad: a perfect blowout! At least 350 feet up and
slightly downhill . . . His chute never opened.
Wayne Barley:
He jarred himself hard in the cockpit and felt the sudden
seizure of his G-suit. He wanted to hit something. But he
could feel the watching eyes and the TV cameras, and there
wasn't room in the cockpit to get a decent swing anyway.
His countdown light flickered for attention and biinked
once, and a single red rocket flashed into the sky.
One minuteGod, had time stopped?
But that was part of it all: the waiting, the God-awful
waiting, staring down at the valley over a mile below. And
how many men had irrevocably slammed back their canopy
in this lifetime of two minutes and stayed behind? A few, yes.
And he could too. Simply open his canopy, that was the sig-
nal, and when the start came the other sleds would dive down
and away and he would be sitting here alone. But, God, so
alone! And he would be alone for the rest of his life. He
might see some of the Kin again, sometime, somewhere. But
they would not see him. It was a kind of death to stay behind.
. . . and a real death to go. Death, the silent rider with
every man in every race . . .
He frowned at the other sleds, sixteen in staggered rows
of eight. Sixteen bright and beautiful, trim fast projectiles
hanging from their starting clamps. He knew them, every
one; they were his brothers. They were the Kinbut not
here. Not now.
Years ago when he was a novice he had asked old Franz
Cashner, "Did you see the way I took Basher Bend right
beside you?"