"L. Neil Smith - Forge of the Elders" - читать интересную книгу автора (Smith L. Neil)

Gutierrez, commonly referred to as "the Captain" by virtue of his appointment as expedition commander.

"Aye, aye, Commodore!"

The source of this facetious reply was the team's geologist, Dr. Piotr Kamanov, one of a few token
Russians participating in what, in due course, would be advertised at home—provided they could stake a
claim to anything resembling success out here—as an international undertaking. It was accompanied by a
characteristic grin, and a wicked twinkle which contrasted with the icy and penetrating blue of the eyes
that had produced it, neither of which the remark's intended recipient was present to appreciate,
separated, as the two men were, by 250 centimeters of hard vacuum and a pair of
aluminum-epoxy-graphite bulkheads.

From several others who were present, a ripple of nervous laughter followed. Despite the technical fact
that he rated it, Gutierrez, a career Aerospace Force officer, had admonished them all, with an identical
grin, just after the voyage had begun, that any crewperson addressing him by that irredeemably naval title
would be immediately ejected from the air lock. Since this was precisely the fate now awaiting the EVA
team, perhaps it had seemed worth the risk.

"Major?" Technical Sergeant Toya Pulaski whispered. "The EVA team's about buttoned up—everyone
but Dr. Kamanov, of course—would you like some help with your suit-seals?"

The gloves, with their knurled lock-rings, were the hardest part to finish by yourself. Pulaski was one
member of the EVA team who wouldn't be venturing outside with the others. To anyone who'd given it a
thought (no one ever had), it wouldn't have seemed in character for the hesitant-voiced young woman
who offered every appearance, deceptive though it must be, of frail timidity. It was her job to see that
those suiting up got through their checklists without skipping items that might cost them their lives.

"What?"

In many ways a perfect contrast to Pulaski, Marine Corps Major Estrellita Reille y Sanchez, the EVA
team's nominal leader, blinked and shook her head at her subordinate, a bit chagrined to be caught
wool-gathering at a crucial moment. The multilayered bulk of the vacuum-armor enveloping and
disguising her full, feminine form (one of several differences between the major and the less-endowed
sergeant) failed as yet to conceal her thick, wavy red hair, trimmed just short of shoulder-length. Giving
the fabric an overly positive tug, she pulled the suit's upper torso flap down over the waist ring and
reached for the soft helmet which the yellowed NASA manuals labeled "communications carrier," but
which everybody else called a "Snoopy cap."

"No thank you, Sergeant, I believe I can manage."

Reille y Sanchez faced the forward bulkhead, every meter of which was bedecked with storage lockers,
shelf grating, and gear attachment points. The bulkhead stood between her and, across a narrow gap of
empty space, the flight deck of the refitted and rechristened shuttleHonorable Robert Dole . Once the
property of NASA, it now served as flagship to the little fleet it was a part of. The major's small,
space-booted feet were tucked into nylon stirrups projecting from the curved wall of the cargo bay
passenger insert, a twelve-faceted cylinder, four meters by fifteen, which had been home to more people,
for a longer time, than she liked to think about even now, when at long last they'd reached their
destination. Her sense of smell alone, she felt, would never be the same for having made this journey.

Others, flight crews, scientists, engineers, mining and ag specialists, refinery technicians, the