"Steve Perry - Aliens 01 - Earth Hive" - читать интересную книгу автора (Perry Steven)

recording gear going full blast right now I’ll eat that fucking table. Probably the colonel is in the next
room watching in full holographic surround. Give me a break, Orona, or whatever your name really
is.”
“All right,” Orona said. “We’ll play it your way. Stop me if I get any of it wrong.
“After you managed to escape from Rim, you spend six months in quarantine, to make sure
you weren’t infected with some kind of alien virus or bacteria. Nobody even tried to see you, no
personal visits, nada. You wouldn’t let them reconstruct your face.”
“Women love scars,” Wilks said. “Makes “em sympathetic.”
Orona continued. “When you were put back on active duty, you turned into a chemhound.
Nine arrests and subsequent terms in the brig for Stoned and Disorderly. Three for assault, two for
damage to property, one for attempted homicide.”
“Guy had a big mouth,” Wilks offered.
“I specialize in genetics, Corporal, but anybody who’s ever taken a psych course can see
you’re on a one-way trip down the reaction tubes.”
“So? It’s my life. What do you care?”
“Before those two Coast Guard clowns blew themselves up, they downloaded the derelict’s
data banks. We have a trajectory of that old ship. We know where it came from before it came
home to die.”
“Ask me if I care.”
“Oh, you should, Corporal. You’re going there. Whatever your problems are don’t matter. I
need a specimen of the thing the Coast Guard found. You’re going to bring me one.”
“I won’t volunteer for it.”
“Oh, but you will.” Orona grinned.
Wilks blinked. Something unhappy roiled around in Wilks’s belly, like a trapped beast wanting
to get out. While he was still wondering if he were about to vomit whatever was left from his most
recent meal, Orona hit him with another one.
“You know that little girl you rescued? She’s here. On Earth. In a mental center. They keep her
sedated and run a lot of tests on her. She has these nightmares, you see. Apparently the brainwipe
didn’t completely take. She remembers things, in her dreams.
“You could wind up in a place like that, if you don’t do the right thing.”
Billie was here? He hadn’t thought he’d ever see her again. He had been curious about her
more than once. She was the only person who’d seen those things the way he had, least the only one
he knew about. He stared at Orona. Then he nodded. If they wanted you, they would get you, he’d
been in the Corps long enough to know that. He would go or damn sure wish he had. There were
worse things than dying.
He took a deep breath. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll go.” Orona smiled, and when he did, it reminded
Wilks of the aliens. Damn.
 4
Billie slept. She could hear voices in her dream, a distant overlay of ghostly sound wound
among the shimmering and frightful images.
“—dreaming again. What’d you give her?”
A door loomed in front of Billie, partially open. Behind the door, blackness. Eyes gleamed in
the dark there, and light flashed briefly on rows of serrated teeth.
“—thirty of Trinomine—”
The undulating door swung wide, creaking loudly. A kind of… presence oozed through. Billie
couldn’t see it clearly….
“—thirty? That’s twice the usual dosage. Aren’t you worried about brain damage?”
The presence coalesced, forming a quavery image. Black, tall, toothed. The monster. It grinned
at Billie. Gnashed those teeth. Moved toward her.
Billie was frozen. Couldn’t even turn away as it came for her. She opened her mouth to