Legar: переводы

→Alex took a long, shuddering breath. “Ah. Hey?”

→“Oh my, yes,” the doctor said, with a sigh. “Half a dozen of our finest. Probably more than we need, but we’re not in a place where anyone wants to take risks.”

→The construction sphere of Tycho Station glittered around Holden, brighter than stars. Ships hung in their berths in all states of undress, the Rocinante just one among many. Other ships hung in the center, awaiting clearance to leave. The sparks of welding rigs and the white plumes of maneuvering thrusters blinked into and out of existence like fireflies. The only sound he heard was his own breath, the only smell the too clean scent of bottled air. The dirty green gray EVA suit had TYCHO SECURITY stenciled on the arm in orange, and the rifle in his hand had come from Fred’s weapons locker.

→“We could go,” he said. “Take a look. Probably it’s nothing.”

→“Anyone shot at us, at least we’d see it coming,” Bobbie said, her nonchalance radiating a kind of excitement. Or perhaps it was the alcohol and the prospect of being in a pilot’s chair again making Alex see what he wanted to see.

→“You’ve got a ship. There’s nothing we can do here,” Alex said. “Seems like something we could do.”

→Bobbie blinked. Her shrug was noncommittal, but there was a gleam in her eyes. “You’re thinking about that backwater asteroid Holden was asking about?”

→The body was on the kitchen table in its uniform jumper. The blood had pooled under the chair and spattered along the wall and ceiling. A pistol still hung in the limp right hand. Alex coughed out a laugh of mixed disbelief and despair, then he pulled out his hand terminal and called the MPs.

→Kaarlo Henderson Charles’ hole was in a stretch of a hundred just like it, spare and spartan. There was nothing on the gray green door to identify it beyond numbers. No flowers in the planter, only dry soil. Alex rang the bell. When he knocked, the door opened under his knuckles. He heard someone grumbling angrily under their breath. No. Not a person. The recyclers on high, scrubbing the air. He caught a whiff of cordite and something like rotten meat.

→The Navy had always been the thing in his life that didn’t change. The permanent factor. His relationship to it might shift. He did his tours, he mustered out, but those changes were all about him. His life, his fragility and mortality and impermanence. The idea that the Navy itself could be fragile, that the government of Mars might stumble or collapse, was like saying the sun might go out. If that wasn’t solid, then nothing was.

→“Could you… give him cover?”

→“No,” Duarte said, with his sad smile. “I’m not ordering anyone to do anything with you. No offense. You’re not Navy anymore. Whatever we do, you and I, we do as part of my investigation. And I report all of it, down to the letter, to the admiral.”

→“While you’re here, I’d recommend talking to Kaarlo. He’s a senior programmer that’s been working on a project that was supposed to coordinate the databases. He was the one who came to me first to say he was seeing problems. If you have specific questions, he may be able to give you answers. Or he may be able to point you to where they are.”

→“Or?”

→“Downplaying it,” Duarte said. “Prime Minister Smith is making a big show right now of taking a convoy to Luna to meet with the UN secretary general and swearing that everything’s fine, and he’s doing that because it isn’t true. If I were a criminal and a black marketer, all this would look like a permanent Christmas.”

→“I’m telling you that the tracking of supplies, ships, and material has all but collapsed. We don’t know what’s missing because we don’t know . And I’m telling you that the leadership is so focused on trying not to lose face in front of Earth and the OPA that they’re downplaying it.”

→Duarte clenched his jaw in disappointment. “There was something about that one that bothers me, but I can’t put my finger on it. The timing was precise. The attack was well coordinated. And for what? To loot a shipyard?”

→“Have you come across anything about it particularly?”

→Duarte didn’t finish his thought. “There has been a pattern of attacks too. They may be political or it may just be theft and piracy. You heard about the attack on Callisto?”

→“Inventories are running slow. I think more of them are being dry labbed than anyone wants to admit. I’ve been trying to convince the admiral that it’s a problem, but either she doesn’t understand or…”