"Steve Perry - The Man Who Never Missed" - читать интересную книгу автора (Perry Steven)

"Excuse me?"

"Me. I'm the leader of the Shamba Freedom Forces. In fact, I'm the whole
army."

Creg's eyes widened, then narrowed. "I don't much care for jokes, mister—!"

Khadaji took a deep breath, centered the flickstick in his mouth, and blew,
hard. There was a paper tube inside the thinly packed flickstick and inside
the tube, a single dart of fluroproj-transparent plastic, just in case. The
dart tore through the tip of the smoldering flickstick and across the desk,
hitting Befalhavare Creg's throat. The poison took him, one knee snapping up
into his desk, throwing him forward. Number twenty-three-eighty-eight, Khadaji
thought. He wouldn't be able to top this one.

He stood and walked to the door, slid it aside and was out. He locked the door
behind him. The Lojtnant looked startled.

"Time to go," Khadaji said.

"That didn't take long."
Khadaji shrugged. "Who are we to question the C.O.?"

"I should check with him—"

"I wouldn't. He told me he wanted a few minutes to think about what I told
him. No calls short of planetary emergency, I think he said."

The Lojt nodded. "All right. This way."

It would take five minutes to get back to the Jade Flower; it would probably
be another twenty or thirty minutes after that before anybody seriously tried
to disturb Befalhavare Creg; there would be another few minutes of confusion
after he was found before the chain-of-command collected itself enough to
check the recording and figure out what happened; finally, a few more minutes
would elapse before troopers stormed the Jade Flower, looking for the Shamba
Scum. He could figure on an hour, at least. Plenty of time.

Inside the Flower, Khadaji found Sleel. "Clear everybody out," he said. "We're
closing." "Huh?"

"The Jade Flower is going to close. Tell Anjue to start herding the troops
out; I want the place cleared in fifteen minutes."

"But—but—"

"Just do it." Khadaji was aware of Sleel's stare at his back as he walked
toward the drug room. He rapped on the densecris window and got Butch's
attention. "What's happenin', Boss?" "Open up, Butch."