" Perry Rhodan 0056 - (48) The Dead Live" - читать интересную книгу автора (Perry Rhodan)

 "Thank you," said Rhodan. "Remain on the alert and let me know immediately if you hear anything more
from theLotus ."

The screen went dark again.

"Well?" said Bell anxiously, "What does all that mean?"

"That means," answered Rhodan, looking past him, "that 4300 light-years from here, in the Heperais
System to be exact, something has gone wrong. What that is, we’ll soon find out, perhaps even yet
today."

"And the settlers?" twittered Pucky.

"They can wait. They aren’t so important now. At the moment, in fact, it seems to me that only Capt.
Markus is at all important."

Bell stood up. "I’m going to the spaceport. Markus surely won’t be long in coming across a measly
4000 light-years. That’s just a stone’s throw across the cosmos, a cat’s jump through Hyperspace."

Pucky shivered and teleported down to the floor. "Why must Reggie be so tactless and talk about cats
when I’m around? There must be someway to break him of that habit…"

Rhodan watched them go but his face lacked the smile it usually bore when the 2 friends fell to plaguing
one another with affectionate insults and banter… which they were now doing, although out in the
corridor and no longer in his office.



****



Capt. James Markus landed only after 20 hours had passed.

He explained that his delay had been due to waiting as long as possible for further messages from the
cosmic agent Fellmer Lloyd, who was missing somewhere on the mysterious planet Volat. But no word
was forthcoming from Lloyd and Markus had at length decided to return to Earth and report to Rhodan.

Along with Bell and Pucky, the mutant André Noir, an excellent hypno and of late a telepath as well,
was also present at the meeting.

"And then you landed our agent Lloyd according to plan?" asked Rhodan for the sake of confirmation
once Markus had begun his recital. "Then what happened?"

"I don’t know all that much myself," the Captain apologized. "Lloyd impersonated a Preboner and
attempted to get in touch with our man Sikeron, who was killed. While he was trying to find Sikeron,
Lloyd met Kuri Oneré, the daughter of a Galactic Trader who had settled on Volat.

"Now the indigenous inhabitants of Volat are giant insects. Not much is known about them except that
their leader is a female, the one they call the ‘Omniscient Mother’. With her help, Lloyd was able to