"Lawrence Watt-Evans - War Surplus 01 - The Cyborg And The Sorcerers" - читать интересную книгу автора (Watt-Evans Lawrence)

He started. It had been months since he had heard anything—really heard, through his ears—except the
steady, quiet hum of the ship going about its business, and the little rustles and mumps he made in going
about his own.

"What's up?" he asked the computer. He spoke aloud, unnecessarily, and his voice sounded strange in
his ears.
"Ship is now entering a star system. Standard procedure calls for cyborg unit to assume control," it
replied silently through the telepathic device in his skull.

Slant grunted and reached for the direct-control cable at the head of the couch. He had been
disconnected for months, maybe years, letting the computer run the ship since they had left the last
system, and his hair had grown down over the socket in the back of his neck; he pulled the hair aside and
plugged the cable in. It took a moment's effort; he was out of practice and had to work entirely by feel,
not having eyes in the back of his head. He suspected that the long disconnection had let his body's
natural growth and healing processes twist the socket a bit out of line, as well. Eventually, though, the
thousands of phi-contacts slid home, and he was in control of the ship, hooked directly into the main
computer as well as in telepathic radio contact with it through the terminal in his brain.

It took two or three seconds before his piloting skills came back; for a moment the data came through as
a jumbled mass of sensation. Then his conditioning took over, unscrambling the signals, and he felt the
ship as his body, felt the gravity-well of the star-sun ahead, knew exactly the ship's relative velocity,
knew what radiation, electromagnetic or otherwise, was reaching the ship. The interstellar hydrogen that
served as some of the fuel for the fusion drive was much thicker here; that was usual in the neighborhood
of a star.

He was decelerating steadily; the near-light velocities that were necessary for interstellar travel were
downright dangerous within a system, where meteors, asteroids, or even small uncharted moons or
planets might get in one's way. Although the computer had, of course, been slowing the ship for weeks,
his speed still seemed uncomfortably great; an outer planet slipped by too quickly to examine properly,
though he noted it was an ordinary gas giant of unimpressive size.

This system, the computer informed him, was listed as enemy-held and heavily populated. An attack
force of conventional warships had been sent to this area, but there was no record of what had become
of it, no indication whether or not it had reached this system.

He stepped up the deceleration and turned the scanners ahead, so that the next planet provided rather
more information. According to the records, this one had a Marslike climate and had been lightly settled
at last contact

Slant found no evidence of life; there were no lights on the nightside, no radio emanations, no detectable
electromagnetic radiation at all. There were a great many craters, not of particularly natural appearance,
and considerable residual radioactivity.

It seemed that the war had reached this system. Regretfully, he settled back and waited for the next
planet to come into range. Records indicated that this next one was the major population center, with
some two billion people at last count. It was the second planet out, and assuming its orbit hadn't changed
and had been accurately recorded in the first place, it would be found on the far side of the sun. By
traveling in a hyperbolic path down close to the star, he could use its gravity to further decelerate the
ship.