"Michael Z. Williamson - The Humans Call it Duty" - читать интересную книгу автора (Williamson Michael Z)

He rose and moved. His motion was tight and slower than before, but he
ignored the pain and glided along the boughs.

Bald Hill, as the humans called it, was not the highest point around. It wasn’t
really a hill, just a jutting end of a smooth ridge. The creek flowed past it from the
highlands, and Cap would have to be ready, as once they crossed the water they’d
be where they could be found, and would have clear space to protect them. He
urged himself forward, breath gurgling slightly. The wound in his side had hurt his
ribs. No matter. He sprang nimbly from tree to tree, skirting the two Enemy and their
burden.

This was good, he thought. They must cross here, with the Litter, as the
ground sloped instead of dropping off. He would wait... there.

****

The Enemy was close now. He could hear them muttering to reassure each other,
and hear their tortured breaths. They would have few more of those. He waited
under the cut bank of the creek, just upstream from the crossing. Their voices
resolved through the chuckling sound of the creek.

“—get across and we can rest,” Sergeant said.

“Thank God,” Gunner heaved out between strangled gasps. His voice was
unclear yet. “We’ll need ... ready... for when evac arrives. How do we ... what
happened?”

“We tell them exactly what happened,” Sergeant said. “There’s enough
evidence in the monitors.”

They stopped at the beach and prepared to cross, and Cap took the moment
to swim closer. A projection covered him, and he waited for them to splash into the
chill water, the same water that tore painfully at the wound in his side.

Now. Their Guns were slung, they were knee-deep in water, and they couldn’t
move as quickly as he did. He clambered up the bank, unheard over the water, and
sprang, muscles releasing like a tensed spring.

He was on Gunner, and clawed his throat out. Six! Sergeant dropped his end
of the Litter, and Cynd tumbled into the water to drown, next to the worms of red
leaking up from Gunners wounds. Seven! Cap turned, and saw Sergeant raising his
Gun. He ducked and leapt, using Gunner as a base and felt the burn of a Bullet
through his shoulder. It spoiled his attack, but he clawed Sergeant savagely with his
right paw, tearing his arm and chest. He tried to force him under water, and Sergeant
fired again with his other hand. He missed.

Cap sprang lightly back to his feet in the rocky shallows, sending agony
through his side and shoulder. Sergeant was scrabbling for purchase, and wasn’t
looking as he pounced again. He shoved the man’s head under water in the deeper