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

The hologram shimmered and vanished.
Green Silks said, “Listen, we need to talk about the biowarfare project.”
Red nodded. “Anything from the government?”
The two of them stood and moved away from the table. Green said, “Nah, you know how
these guys get when they want to keep things secret.”
“We need to be in on this,” Red said. “We are talking about major credits here. We’ve had
offers from every milsupply corporation in the system if we can come up with the right product. We
can’t let the military get the jump on us here.”
Green smiled. “Don’t worry. I’m going to put Massey on it.”
They reached a door. It thwiped open to admit them into an office the size of a small home.
One wall was airglas, giving a view of the megapolis. On a clear day like today, the view was
spectacular from eighty stories high. Rank certainly had its privileges.
“Okay, I’ve been hearing about this guy Massey, but I don’t know him. Tell me.”
 Red moved to a desk big enough to seat five people without crowding.
Green went to a dispenser set into the wall across from the desk. “Devil dust,” he said to the
dispenser. “Haifa gram. You want anything.”
“Yeah, get me an orgy-inhaler.”
Green added Red’s order to his own. After a second a small tray extruded itself from the
machine. On the tray were a small mound of pink powder inside a hemispherical cup set next to a
one-shot nasal tube. Green tossed the tube to Red and picked up the cup. He pressed the dust
against his left eye as Red fired the compressed gas charge of the inhaler into his right nostril. Both
men grinned as the chemicals took hold.
“You were saying about Massey?”
“Oh. Yeah. Him. Well, this guy is something else. MBA from New Harvard, doctorate in corp
law from Cornell, post-doc work at Mitsubishi U. Could have had his pick of any company in the
system but he enlisted in the Colonial Marines. Got a Silver Star in the Oil Wars, four Purple Hearts.
Commanded a recon unit in the Tansu Rebellion on Wakahashi’s World, picked up a few
decorations there.”
“Real patriot, huh?” Red said. He squirmed in his chair as another chemically powered orgasm
rippled through him.
“Nah. He liked killing. Probably would have gone pretty high up but they court-martialed him.
Tried to kill his CO.”
“No shit?”
“Yeah. Thought the CO was a coward when he wouldn’t order an attack on a bunch of
civilians Massey thought might be hiding enemy sympathizers. Might be. Knocked the officer
senseless and led the attack himself. Killed eighty-five men, women, and children. Word is more than
half of them got dispatched by Massey personally.”
“Man loved his job, hey?”
“Oh, yeah. We bought the tribunal off and put him to work for us. Good help is so hard to find,
you know?”
Green laughed. Red joined him.

Massey sat at the table in his kitchen, his six-year-old son on his lap. Behind him, Maria
punched the controls on the coffee maker.
“Be ready in a sec, hon,” Maria said. She moved up behind Massey and kissed his neck.
Massey smiled. “Thanks, babe.” lb his son he said, “So, what’s my boy up to today?”
“We’re gonna go on a field trip to the zoo,” the boy said. “See a Denebian slime spider and
maybe the Bardett snakes, if they’ll come out.”
“Sounds great,” Massey said. He lifted the boy, put him on the floor. “But Daddy’s got to go
to work now. Say hello to the slime spider for me.”