"Dafydd ab Hugh, Brad Linaweawer DOOM: Infernal Sky (english)" - читать интересную книгу автора

stood over to the side, as if deferring to the scientist.
Before the director even opened his mouth I had
the sinking feeling that all our personal problems were
about to be put on the back burner. Again.



10

"Corporal Taggart," the director addressed
me. "How did you like your time in space?"
I'm always honest when no life is at stake. "I always
wanted to go, sir. If you know my record, you're
aware I didn't get up there in the way I intended."
"If ever a court-martial was a miscarriage of jus-
tice, yours would've been," volunteered Colonel
Hooker, looking directly at me. "One good thing
about wartime is that it makes it easy to cut through
the red tape. I enjoyed pencil-whipping that problem
for you, marine!"
"Thank you, sir."
The director returned us to the subject. "I bring up
the matter of fighting in space for a reason. We intend
to take the battle back to the Freds. We know that you
and PFC Sanders"—he nodded in Arlene's
direction—"have a unique capacity in this regard."
I knew that vacation time was over. I also wondered
who the hell the Freds were.
Williams let us have it right between the ears.
"Over a year ago, before I joined the team, this
installation received a coherent signal from space. No
other radio telescope picked it up. At first the men
who received it thought it was mechanical failure or
someone playing a joke on them. It could have come
from a small radio a couple of klicks away, but it
didn't."
He took a moment to check the notes on his
clipboard. We all listened in rapt attention. I was
ready to learn something new about the enemy,
anything to speed up their final defeat.
"They analyzed the signal," he continued, "and
established that it was a narrow-beam microwave
transmission. There were variations and holes in the
message. We did a sophisticated computer analysis
using the Dornburg system, the best satellite-and-
astronomy program ever developed. We were receiv-
ing a complex billiard-shot message that had been
successively bounced off seven bodies in our solar
system on its way to Earth. When we connected the
various holes and occlusions, the result was an arrow