"S. M. Stirling - Draka 04 - Drakon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stirling S. M)

waiting for this data."

The naval officers exchanged glances. "We'll have to leave now anyway," Starns replied. "They're
going to detect us when we run for the transit molehole back to the Centauri system." Modern drives
transferred momentum between ship and cosmos directly, but the process inescapably bled energetic
quanta far above the level of vacuum energy.

"That would cover a minor insertion."

"Very minor," Menendez said thoughtfully. "We've got to be careful about giving them an extra
energy source to detect. If they manage to trace whoever it was they lost, it'll give them a big jump on
mastering the molehole technology."

"Besides a possible bolthole when The Day arrives," Starns said. "Plus . . . well, whoever's on the
other side of that molehole doesn't deserve a live snake running around."

"It might have been a servus, not a drakensis."

"Possible, but can we count on it? And even a servus might be able to set up some sort of beacon;
they're not stupid just because they've been mind-gelded."

Menendez nodded decisively. "One agent, minimal equipment," he said. "I'll revive and brief my
best operative—Lafarge."

"Sure he'll volunteer?" Starns said dubiously.

The spymaster smiled bleakly. "They all volunteered to be inserted on our Earth if necessary," he
said. "Anything else will be a rose garden by comparison."




CHAPTER TWO



JANUARY 1, 1995 A.D.

EARTH/2.



Falling. Consciousness returned, and Gwen was falling, under gravity. Reflex snapped her hands
out and they closed on rough metal, stopping her with a jar that clicked her teeth together. Something fell
past her. She froze, eyes wide with shock. She keyed her transducer, but there was nothing, not even the
location-signal from the navsats. She was out of contact with the Web; it felt like having two limbs
amputated, or part of her brain.

Smells. The air was heavy with them, rank. Rusty iron. Burnt hydrocarbons, enough to gag you. A
stew of chemicals, half of which she couldn't identify. Scorched metal; there was a thin hole burnt through