"George Zebrowski - The Star Web" - читать интересную книгу автора (Zebrowski George)

Such a control of the fluid aspects of matter-energy was a dream. Its reality implied a revolution in the
world's economic system through the capability for the synthesis of any scarce items from any kind of
raw material. And here the application was used to operate doors! There had to be other applications
elsewhere in the structure.

He felt lucky to be here. Raising his head, he looked around in the dark at the sleeping bodies in the
cabin. Through the small window the sky was already light blue with dawn. He thought of the radio
beacon marking a new world below the ice. Where was Malachi now, he wondered. What strange things
was he seeing?

The question was like a solid object in his brain as he fell asleep.

Hands reached out to Malachi as he fell, hands which seemed to grow longer with the downward effort.
He saw the look of horror in the faces of his friends as the world opened to swallow him. Their
expressions added to his terror, despite the sensation that he was sinking into quicksand rather than
falling. He shouted, but gradually the circle of the opening above him grew smaller and disappeared. And
suddenly he seemed to be moving faster. At any moment the bottom would rush up to meet him. His
head would crack against a hard surface, snapping his spine…

Malachi screamed.

And a sadness took hold of him like the iron fist of some mad puppeteer jamming itself into the glove of
the mannequin. He moved his arms wildly. But behind the crisis he remembered his grandmother telling
him a story from a park bench. It was a story about a boy who fell into a bottomless well and reached a
large ocean under the earth, where he learned to sail a pirate vessel, taking it to all the ports of the
strange ocean where there was no sky or stars, only the glow of things which flew high in the caverns.
The boy grew old in his new life, until a giant dropped a bucket into the well and fished him up ship and
all…

Suddenly Malachi alighted on a small platform jutting out from the side of the drop tunnel. He stood
shaking, surprised and frightened, but grateful for the reprieve. He noticed the small alcove which seemed
to lead back into the complex. As he stepped into it, the wall dissolved to let him through—

—into a large circular room. The floor sloped downward toward the middle as in an amphitheater; the
only chairs seemed to be standing in the center where the stage would be. Above him the space of the
room was enormous.
Slowly he started to walk down the slope. Looking more closely toward the center, he noticed what
looked like consoles of some kind spaced around the chairs, as if planned for some kind of work. For a
moment it seemed to him that he should be able to guess what all this was for. His excitement increased
as he drew near, almost as if his entire life had been lived to bring him to this place at this moment.

Juan dreamed of a large red weather balloon carrying him across the face of Antarctica. Lena was with
him in the open basket, unafraid of the cold wind rushing by them. It seemed that the dream had been
going on for ages when someone shook him gently awake. He opened his eyes, ready to push the
intruder away.

Malachi was grinning at him, and motioning for him to be silent. "Get dressed," he whispered, "wake the
others, except for Summet and his tag-along, and meet me at the entrance to the find." He got up from his
kneeling position and turned to go, opening the inner door to the hut as Obrion was putting on his