Pokrewne

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Chelsea Handler Chelsea Chelsea Bang Bang (epub
Brit Brinson [Dia of the Dead Dia of the Dead (epub)
Cody Goodfellow [Radiant Dawn Radiant Dawn (epub)
Cate Tiernan [Immortal Belove Immortal Beloved (epub)
C J Busby [Deep Amber 01] Deep Amber (retail) (epub)
Carl Ashmore [Time Hunters 01 The Time Hunters (epub)
Drew Hayes [Super Powereds 02 Super Powereds Year 2 (epub) i
Beth Harbison [Shoe Addict 02 Secrets of a Shoe Addict (epub)
Cara Lynn Shultz [Dark World The Dark World (retail) (epub)
Augustinus, Aurelius Bekenntnisse

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.It’s been nearly a week, and the excitement of action is wearing off.People are getting surly again and resentful of Marvin.We can’t wait forever.”“I’ll be happy to be moving on,” she said, leaning toward me.“You sure?” I asked earnestly as I reached over to run my fingers through her long golden hair and stare into her azure eyes.“Without Marvin we’ll be groping in the dark.Heading back into danger, too.Maybe there will be more killing and dying.”Adrienne shuddered, incidentally causing some interesting jiggles.“None of us really like that part—except the marines, maybe.You just like the challenge of pitting yourself against the universe and winning.” She grabbed my hand from off her head and held it tight.“You’re not so good at losing.”“I never will be.But losing won’t crush me if that’s what you’re worried about.”Adrienne shook her head, hair cascading down over her face as she rolled her naked body on top of me with a smile.“No, but I might.”We made love then, and it was fantastic as always.One of the perks of being parked on a planet in relative safety was free time and a feeling of security.The lighter gravity made things fun, too.There was one bad thing about making love with Adrienne.Most of the time I was able to remember who I was with, but every once in a while her dead sister Olivia’s face seemed to intrude into my mind’s eye.Fortunately, that didn’t happen today.Afterward, we talked over breakfast.“We’re down to less than a week to repair Valiant,” Adrienne said.“After that, we’ll have nothing to do but wait around.”“Excellent work, hon,” I said.“I’m going to do a quick inspection.”Adrienne rolled her eyes.“I don’t know why you bother.Everything’s running fine.They all know their jobs.Take a break.”“That’s when things go wrong—when the boss starts slacking off.Besides, it helps people to know I’m watching.”She shrugged and stretched like a cat.“You sure you don’t want to stick around for another hour or so?”I watched as she deliberately tossed her hair and made eyes at me.“I’d love to,” I said, “but duty calls.” I finished my coffee, kissed her deeply once more and headed off to take a look at the progress on the ship.Three months had passed since Valiant set down on Orn Six next to the city of golden cubes we called the Square.Marvin had made progress understanding the place, at least by his own account, but I hadn’t seen a lot of evidence of it.He hadn’t provided one piece of alien tech in any way useful for helping us to get home or defend ourselves against a hostile universe despite pulling bits of stuff out of the windows.Every week until this last one I’d sat through a briefing and every week I’d left the table more frustrated.The only real benefit we’d had from the Square was a new version of the Star Force game of pool.We’d set up a pool room by building a temporary structure in the Square of roughly the right shape and size.The Pigs had come up with this, not Marvin.The metallic walls returned shots with no loss of speed and several of the windows happened to connect to each other so they could be used to make exotic plays.We’d slapped a roof over the area and covered some of the windows to keep from losing balls.They even had a team version now, which transformed the play-style into a hybrid of lacrosse and dodge ball.I needed the pool room as a release for my people.It served to stop the Pigs from killing each other out of boredom.I’d kept them busy at the mining site a mile away digging ore and hauling it to the factory in cargo rovers we’d built, but even with double shifts marines always seem to find ways to cause trouble.Kwon was having to knock heads more and more often as the weeks passed.I knew I’d have to get Valiant going soon or risk a serious breakdown in discipline.The monsters and the search for Marvin had only provided a temporary relief valve.Fortunately, we’d found abundant rare earths and radioactive ores so we could rebuild Valiant into whatever we wanted.What I’d decided on was a combination battleship and drone carrier, a battlecarrier instead of a battlecruiser.The bigger version of our ship had been born from experience.I’d learned my lesson with fragile frigates.Our factory could make equipment and brainboxes but not more personnel.I couldn’t afford to lose pilots in smaller ships.Therefore, my new strategy had to be prodigal with machines and miserly with human beings.I wasn’t going to put people into flimsy shells again.In that sense, Hansen had been right to protest my old strategy even if he’d misjudged my motives.I’d briefly toyed with the idea of trying to get Hoon to hatch some new children and train them as crew—I was willing to bet he had more eggs with him—but they would take years to reach adolescence and the logistics of modifying the ship for them was prohibitive.No, there was simply no way around it.We had to preserve our numbers with an almost paranoid obsession.Every crewmember was precious.That’s why working closely with my key staff—Hansen, Adrienne, Sakura, Kwon and Bradley—I’d laboriously reconfigured Valiant.She still looked like a thick manta ray just bigger.Valiant now sported four heavy lasers plus four anti-proton beams alongside them and twenty-four secondary-sized beam pairs.We also had twice as many small point-defense pairs, all of which could depress to nearly touch our own hull, allowing them to target boarders on the skin.Combined with drone capability, heavier armor and a system of layered configurable magnetic shields, Valiant was now as tough, flexible and survivable as we could make her.Of course, everything comes at a price.The new Valiant was more sluggish than she used to be and even slower than her original form before we were blown through the ring into the Panda system.Also, no matter how configured, Valiant never had enough power.Though we’d installed four times as many generators and capacitor batteries, Valiant could suck at least ten times the juice of the old battlecruiser configuration and when pushed to full capacity she gulped fuel like an American muscle car with a lead-footed teenager at the wheel.The improved bridge was my first stop during my tour.The CAG, Chief Bradley, was on duty supervising technicians, who installed the last of his upgraded combat flight director stations.Two watchstanders monitored flights of the new Dagger drones patrolling above.We exchanged salutes.“How’s it look?” I asked.“All good, sir.” Bradley had gained confidence and was running exercises with his drone directors and growing into his new position.“The Dagger designs are very capable.”“What about your people?”“Eager for battle, sir,” he said.“That’s what I like to hear.”Of course, it was easy to be eager for battle when your weapons did the dying for you, but that wasn’t a sentiment I would ever voice.“Sorry we haven’t found the robot,” Bradley offered.I sighed.“Not your fault.We tried sending sensors and comms packages with cables into the window and even a small flying probe the eggheads made.Nothing.The scientists are still trying, but I’m not risking any lives by sending a live person through.”“I understand, sir.No robot is worth a human being.”I didn’t comment on that, either [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]