MirnyiAtom: переводы

→“Go on,” he grated. “I’m sure there’s more and better yet to come.”

→Albrecht stared at him for several more seconds. Then he shook himself and inhaled deeply.

→Albrecht Detweiler stared at his oldest son, and the consternation in his expression would have shocked any of the relatively small number of people who’d ever met him.

→“What did you say?”

→“Manticorans are accustomed to being a long way away from home, Captain. And we’re accustomed to taking care of ourselves when we are. No doubt a sufficiently strong SLN detachment could push me off this terminus, but I guarantee you that before it does, it’ll lose many times the tonnage of my squadron.”

→“Really?” Pálffi looked at him skeptically, then shrugged. “Maybe you do mean that, but it doesn’t matter what you’d ‘just as soon’ happen, Commodore. Not anymore. You’ve stepped across the line this time, and you’re a hell of a long way away from home.”

→“Good. As I say, I would genuinely prefer for no one to be hurt on either side. I’m not going to pretend I’m not as pissed off as any other Manticoran, but I’m also aware that no one here in the Stine System bears any responsibility for what’s happened in the Talbott Quadrant. I’d just as soon not contribute any more to the bad blood between the Star Empire and the League then I have to under the letter of my orders.”

→The astro control officer’s complexion turned darker than ever and his jaw muscles quivered as he glared incredulously at the commodore. He opened his mouth, but nothing came out of it, as if the sheer power of his fury had paralyzed his vocal cords, and Magellan gave him a thin, cold smile.

→Magellan saw the dark-faced captain’s expression change abruptly as his own image appeared on the other man’s display. For a moment, the Solarian looked blank, but then his eyes first widened and then, almost as quickly, narrowed again as he recognized Magellan’s black-and-gold uniform.

→Malcolm Taylor peeled off on a sharply divergent vector, accelerating just as hard as Otter, and Magellan nodded in satisfaction. Although even a relatively small terminus was an enormous volume of space, trying something like this into or out of the Manticoran Junction would have been extraordinarily dangerous. Despite the separation between inbound and outbound lanes, there was so much traffic through the Junction that the probability of a wedge-on-wedge collision would have been only too real. In Stine’s case, however, there were only a single inbound and a single outbound lane, and traffic was sparse, to say the least. He saw a single freighter’s icon on the tactical display, swinging wildly away from the terminus, even though Otter was a good forty thousand kilometers clear of her. But that was fine with him.

→“By the strangest coincidence, Captain Pálffi, there’s quite a lot more headed this way,” Magellan informed him. “Although, to be honest, I don’t think we’re going to need as much more as you may believe.”

→“Thank you, Captain Pálffi.” Magellan nodded courteously. “I’m sure you’re well aware of the tension between the Star Empire and the League. My Empress and her Foreign Ministry have tried from the very beginning to get someone—anyone—in the League’s government to show even a modicum of willingness to find a nonmilitary way to resolve that tension. You may have noticed that we haven’t had a great deal of success in that respect.” He smiled, showing his teeth. “So Her Majesty’s Government has decided that since we can’t seem to get the League’s attention through normal diplomatic channels, it’s time to try another approach. This one.”

→“That’s what I thought,” Magellan said much more gently. And glanced back at the tactical display as HMS Wolf, the last of his cruisers emerged from the terminus…closely followed by HMS Selkie, his remaining CLAC. He didn’t know what the Solarian captain thought Selkie was, but she sure looked like a ship-of-the-wall.

→The icons of half a dozen Ghost Rider recon platforms arced away from Otter’s larger, stronger light code on the tactical plot, and he saw HMS Tiger Cub, the squadron’s third cruiser emerging from the terminus behind Malcolm Taylor.

→“As I say, Captain Pálffi, I’d really prefer for no one to get hurt. So we’ll just get you and your people out of the way. Because,” Magellan’s expression hardened once again, his eyes bleak, “if the League does try to retake this terminus, a lot of people are going to get hurt.”

→“Appreciate it,” he said grudgingly, with obvious reluctance.

→Pálffi’s eyes examined his expression closely for several seconds. Then the Solarian nodded slowly.

→“I suppose that’s one way to look at it,” Magellan conceded. “I prefer to think of it as getting your people safely out of the line of fire, however. If the Solarian Navy is rash enough to attempt to retake control of this terminus by force, I don’t want any stray missiles taking out control platforms full of innocent bystanders.”

→“You’re kicking us off our own platforms?”

→“Mostly just keep an eye on you until I can contact President Zell and get some transport dispatched out here to take your people off.”