"Brian Daley "Han Solo at Stars' End"" - читать интересную книгу автора

low tones. "I didn't know what else to do. Solo-
Captain, Hirken is putting BoUux in with that Execu-
tioner machine of hisl"
"I know. Max has some kind of angle on that." He saw one of the Espos speaking on a tom-link. "Listen, the lost ones are here, thousands of 'cm. Max rigged the tower; Hirken'll have to let everybody go if he wants to keep breathing. Go get the ship ready. If I can just get my hands on a blaster, the fix is in, sister."
"Captain, I meant to tell you," Max interrupted. "I
was rechecking the figures. I think you should
know-"
"Not now, Max? Han pulled Atuarre and Pakka back toward the elevator, hitting both the up and the down buttons. One of the Espos fell in with the Tri-anti again, but the other stationed himseft with Han, explaining, "The Viceprex says it's all right for you to come up. You can take home what's left of your 'droid after the fight."
The techs and Espos hurried Bollux down into the arena as the transparisteel slabs raised from their hid-den slots in the floor. Hirken knew now that this was no gladiator 'droid, and so gave the command that Bollux be equipped with a blast shield, to make things more interesting. The shield, an oblong of dura-armor plate fitted with grips, weighed down the old 'droid's long arm as he tried to adjust to what was happening.
Bollux knew he would never escape so many armed men. He had known many humans in his long years of function and could recognize hatred by now. That was what he saw on the Viceprex's face. But Bollux had come through a number of seemingly terminal situations and had no intention of being demolished now ff he could avoid it.
A door panel slid up in the far wall forming one are of the arena. There was a squeal of drive wheels, the rattling of treads. The Mark-X Executioner rolled out into the light.
It was half again as tall as Bollux and far broader, though it moved on two thick caterpillar tracks in-stead of legs. From the treads and support housing rose a thick trunk, armored in gray alloy plate. The Exe-cutioner's many arms were folded close to it now, in-active, each one furnished with a different weapon.
Bollux employed a trick he had learned from one of his first human owners, and simply omitted from com-putations the logical conclusion that his destruction was now a high order of probability. Among humans, he knew, this tactic was called ignoring certain death. Bollux thought of it as excluding counterproductive data. He'd been doing it for a long time now, which was why he was still functional.
The Executioner's cranial turret swung, its sensors locking in on the 'droid. The Mark X was the latest word in combat automata, an extremely successful, highly specialized killing machine. It could have zeroed in on the unarmed, general-purpose labor 'droid and vaporized him fight then and there, but was, naturally, programmed to give its owner a more enjoyable show than that. The Executioner was also a machine with a purpose.
The Mark X began rolling, moving with quick pre-cision, maneuvering toward Bollux. The 'droid backed away clumsily, contending with the unfamiliar task of holding and manipulating his blast shield. The Execu-tioner circled, studying Bollux from all sides, gauging his reactions, while the 'droid watched from behind his shield.
"Commencet" called Viceprex Hirken through the arena's amplifiers. The Mark X, voice-keyed to him, changed to attack mode. It came directly to bear on BoUux, rushing at him at top speed. The 'droid dodged one way, then another, but his efforts were all antici-pated by the Executioner. It compensated for his every move, rumbling to crush him under its treads.
"Cancell" rasped Hirken over the amplifiers. The Mark X stopped just short of Bollux, allowing the old 'droid to totter awkwardly back from it.
"Resume!" ordered the Vieeprex. The Executioner cranked into motion again; selecting another destruc-tive option from its arsenal. Servos hummed and a weapon arm came up, its end supporting a flame pro-jector. Bollux saw it and brought his shield up just in time.
A gush of fire arced from the nozzle of the flame gun, splashing against the walls of the arena, throwing a burning stream across BoUux's shield. The Mark X brought the nozzle of its weapon back for another pass at low angle, to cut the 'droid's legs out from under him. BoUux barely managed to crash clumsily to his knees and ground his shield before flame washed across it, making puddles of fire on the floor around him. The Mark X was rolling again, preparing for a clearer shot, when Hirken canceled that mode, too.
Bollux struggled to his feet, using the shield for lev-erage. He could feel his interual mechanisms over-heating, his bearings especially. His gyro-balance circuitry hadn't been built with this sort of constant punishment in mind.
Then the Mark X was coming in again. Bollux ig-nored the inevitable, making his sluggish parts re-spond, moving with some mechanical equivalent of pain, but still functional.
Han came out of the elevator at a run. The Espos there, aware that the Viceprex wished him to see the spectacle, let him pass.
He skidded to a stop at the top row of the little amphitheater. Hitken was seated below with his wife and subordinates, cheering theft champion and laugh-ing at the ludicrous Bollux as the Executioner raised another weapon arm. This one was provided with a bracket of fiechette-missile pods.
Bollux saw it, too, and used a trick, or, as he thought of it, a last variable. Crouching, still holding his shield, he loosed the heavy-duty suspension in his legs and jumped out of the Mark X's cross hairs like some giant red insect. Miniature missiles exploded against the clear arena walls in a cloud, filling the amphitheater with crashing eruptions in spite of the sound-suppression system out in the seating area.
Hirken and his people roared their frustration. Hah flung hunself down the steps to the arena, three at a time. Bollux had landed badly; the strain on his mechanisms was becoming insuperable. The Vieeprex changed his combat-automaton's programming once more.
The Executioner retracted its missile-arm. Articu-lated catch-cables extended from ports in its sides, like metallic tentacles, and two circular saws swung out, their arms locking into position. The sawblades spun, creating a peculiar sound, the molecules of their cut-ting edges vibrating in a way that would shear through metal as easily as through air. The Mark X moved toward Bollux, its cables weaving, for a terminal em-brace.
Hirken spied Han reaching the arena's edge. "Fraudl Now, watch a true combat-automaton at workV' He shook with gruesome laughter, all the af-fected charms of corporate board rooms stripped from him now. His wife and subordinates followed suit duti-fully.
Hah ignored them and held up the computer. "Max, tell himl" Blue Max sent burst-signals at top volume, concentrated pulses of information. Bollux turned his red photoreceptors to home in on the probe. He lis-tened for a moment, then returned his attention to the onrushing Mark X. Hall, knowing it was crazy, still found himself holding his breath.
As the Executioner bore down on him, BoHux made no move to avoid it or raise his shield. The Execu-tioner recognized that as only logical. The 'droid had no hope. Questing catch-cables spread wide to seize Bollux; circular saws swung close.
Bollux hefted his shield and threw it at the Mark X. Cables and cutters changed course; the shield was easily intercepted, caught, and sliced to pieces. But in the moment's reprieve, Bollux had thrown himself, stiffiymwith a huge metallic bong---down between the crushing treads of the Executioner.
The combat-automaton ground to a halt, but not in time. Bollux, lying beneath it, fastened one hand to its undercarriage and locked his servo-grip there. The other hand reached in among the components of the Mark X, ripping at its cooling circuitry.
The Executioner emitted an electronic scream. If it had sat there and pondered for an age, the killing ma-chine would still never have considered the possibility that a general-labor 'droid could have learned how to do the irrational.
The Mark X broke into motion, rolling this way and that, randomly. It had no way to get at Bollux, who clung beneath it. No one had ever programmed the Executioner to shoot at itself, or cut at itself, or to crush something it couldn't reach. Bollux was in the single safe place in the entire arena.
The Mark X's internal temperature began rising at once; the killing machine produced enormous amounts of heat.
Hirken was on his feet now, screaming: "Cancell Cancell Executioner, I order you to cancel?' Techs began rnnning around, bumping into one another, but the Mark X was no longer receiving orders. Its com-plicated voice-keyed command circuitry had been among the first things to go out of whack. Now it charged aimlessly around the arena, discharging blast-ers, flame guns, and missile pods at random, threaten-ing to overload the noise-suppression system.
The arena's transparisteel walls became a window into an inferno as the Executioner roamed, its trunk rotating, its weapons blazing, its malfunctioning guid-ance system seeking an enemy that it could confront It was hit by shrapnel from its own missiles. Smoke and fire could be seen pouring from its ventilators. Bollux hung on to the Mark X's undercarriage with both hands now, being dragged back and forth, won-dering calmly if his grip would fail.
The Executioner rebounded from one of the arena's walls. Surviving targeting circuits thought the killing machine had found its enemy at last. It backed up, preparing for another charge, its engine revving.
Bollux decided correctly that it was tune to part company. He simply let go. The Executioner howled off again, all its remaining attention focused on the un-offending wall. The 'droid began to drag himself, squeaking laboriously, toward the exit.
The Executioner crashed head-on into the arena wall, bouncing back with a mighty concussion. Frus-trated, it fired all weapons at close range and was en-gulfed in the backwash of blaster beams, fiechette fragments, and acid spray. Then, as Hitken cried a last 'Wo.-oool", the Mark X's internal heat reached critical, compounded by external damage.
The Mark-X Executioner, latest word in combat automata, was ruptured open by a spectacular explo-sion just as Bolhtx, semiobsolete general4abor 'droid, got his tired chassis out of the arena.
Han knelt by him. pounding the old 'droid on the back while Blue Max somehow produced a cheer from his vocoder. The pilot threw his head back and laughed, forgetting everything else in the absurdity of the moment.
"Give me a minute, please," Bollux begged, his drawl even slower now. "I must try to bring my mech-anisms into some sort of order."
"I can help? Max squeaked. "Link me through to your brain circuits, Bollux, and I'll handle all the by-passes. That'll leave you free to deal with the cybero-stasis problems."
Bollux opened his plastron. "Captain, if you'd be so kind?" Han put the little computer back into place.
"Touching, whoever you are," said a smooth, dry voice behind Han, "but pointless. We'll pick them both apart for the information we want. What happened to all your pretty braid and medals, by the way?"
Hah turned and stood fast. Uul-Rha-Shan was wait-ing there, gun in hand. Hall's holstered blaster hung over the reptilian gunman's shoulder.
I-Iirken came up behind Uul-Rha-Shan, followed by the major and the other Espos, his execs, and his wife, all the trappings of his corporate importance. The air was filled with the smell of charred circuitry and molten metal, all that remained of the precious Mark X. Hirken's face held inexpressible rage.
He pointed a quivering finger at Hah. "I should've
known you're part of the conspiracyl Trianii, 'droids,
the Entertainers' Guildmthey're all in on it. No one