by Diane Duane
"A mighty polar cap straddled the world's nadir," Grawl said, "and a lesser one the pole which pointed toward the sun. Seasonal, we reckoned the difference, for the ambient temperature—" "It was cold," Angela cut her off. Gabriel looked at Enda.
"Well, cold is not sufficient to disallow colonization, as we have seen elsewhere," Enda suggested. "Distance is likely to be more of a preventative factor. Still. ."
The back of Gabriel's mind was caught in a noisy argument. One part of it was claiming that this rich girl was just trying to cut her losses and make some money off a wasted investment. . possibly adding to this the amusement of selling someone something worthless. Another part of his mind was sure that she had missed something and that this might be a good idea… a very good idea. "By the way," Enda said, "I did not have a chance to mention that Helm is in the system. He just got within detection range." "What kept him?"
Enda shrugged. " 'Standard error,' he said. You know as well as I that there can be a considerable difference in arrival distance between vessels departing at the same time and from the same area."
"He's just got me spoiled," Gabriel said. "He's such a hot pilot. That's a relief, though."
He looked back at Angela, then. "How much money are we discussing here?"
"I'll give you a flat price for the whole thing," Angela said. "Half what we paid: contracts, exploration pack, the support software, all that."
" 'Support software'?" Enda asked.
Angela laughed and said, "It's just a big reference library on survival in hostile environments, a translator, and some other stuff. I never even configured some parts of it. The manuals are terrible, and when we got there and realized the environment wasn't anything we couldn't handle with overcoats and common sense, and there wasn't anything to use the translator on…" She shrugged. "And you paid. .?" Gabriel asked. "Seven thousand Concord."
Gabriel thought about that. "Refund guarantee? If we go to these coordinates and don't find a planet—" Rather suddenly, Grawl loomed over him. "Thereis," she growled, "a planet."
"Grawl, I think he was making a joke," Enda said hurriedly. "It can be a strange thing, the human sense of humor. There is this story about a wire brush—"
"Contract becomes effective immediately on sale?" Gabriel said, refusing to move, no matter how Grawl tried to intimidate him.
Angela nodded. "The only thing that would affect the contract would be transmission time to a Concord Survey facility."
"Well," Gabriel said, "we're infotraders. We can carry the contract transfer ourselves, if you're comfortable with that."
"It's going encrypted, so it's fine with me," Angela said with a shrug. "A deal, then," Gabriel said. They struck hands on it.
The remainder of the deal took little time. Gabriel had to go back over toSunshine for his accounting chip. He brought it back aboardLalique, and they recorded the sale in both ship's computers at the same time, passing the software and other files intoSunshine's databanks. Gabriel took possession of the "hard" documentation and software copies on solids, and then looked around one last time.
"Well, a pleasure doing business with you," he said. "I hope all this works out well for you."
"So do I," Angela said, "because otherwise we're going to need a ride to Aegis."
"Well," Gabriel said, hoping this wouldn't happen, "let's see what happens first. We'll break the ships' connection and stand away the usual safe distance—"
"Right," Angela said. Suddenly she looked anxious to be gone, as well. "Come on, Grawl, let's get her hot."
At least she walked them down to the airlock first. "Listen, Gabriel, Enda," she said, "if this does work out all right, our comms info is in the solids and the contracts. Get in touch when you make Aegis. We can get together."
"Certainly," Enda said, They slipped into the tube again, and the door closed behind them.
When they were on their side again, Enda asked Gabriel, "Is that what humans call 'impulse buying'?"
"Probably," Gabriel said. He looked down at the solids in his hands. "It was kind of a hunch."
"I think it was stress," Enda said. "Having things burn holes in your pocket seems to make money do the same."
Gabriel smiled, though weakly, and they made their way back up to the pilot's cabin. Gabriel paused by the door and reached down to gingerly touch the stone. It was as cool as it had ever been. "Weird." "You do not seem terribly eager to put it in your pocket at the moment," Enda said as Gabriel stowed the manual and contract solids.
"No, and you won't see me acting eager until we're out of this system. Let it just sit there until I'm sure it wants to behave." Gabriel sat down in the right-hand chair and opened a comms channel. "Helm?"
"Hey, you're back. How bad was her drive busted?"
"Maybe not at all. We'll find out." He changed channels."Lalique?"
"Here," said Angela's voice. "We'll be ready to test in thirty seconds. Hey, Gabriel, I meant it about dinner."
"Uh, thanks," Gabriel said. "Half a moment while we move out of range."
He backedSunshine well away, then gave the system drive a two-second pulse, pushing them some kilometers away fromLalique. "Good luck," Gabriel said. "Thanks"
The seconds ticked by as they watched out the viewport. "Please," Gabriel muttered, "please let it work." Enda threw him an amused glance. "Here we go," said Angela. "Five, four, three—"
She broke off. Gabriel swallowed, hoping desperately that their drive had not failed again. Starfall light sheeted in brilliant gold all overLalique s shape, and she vanished. Gabriel breathed out.
From Longshot, Helm said, "Are they gone now? Can we talk?"
"There's plenty of time for that," Gabriel said. "A few days to recharge, then we'll get out of here. Come on over and we'll have dinner." "Bring the autolaser," Enda said.
FB2 document info
Document ID: fc129490-d0b6-42a4-adc5-80bcbeaff89e
Document version: 1
Document creation date: 15 July 2011
Created using: FictionBook Editor Release 2.6 software
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1.0 — создание, структура, скрипт "Ген. уборка" — Isais.
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