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Termination Shock [calibre 4.99.4]
- Автор: Стивенсон Нил Таун
- Год: 2021
- Язык: английский
- Год: HarperCollinsPublishers
- Жанр: Научная фантастика
Электронная книга - «Termination Shock [calibre 4.99.4]». Краткое содержание книги:
Today, though, the only vessels of any consequence were pleasure craft. Two of them. Tied up on opposite sides of the pier. They couldn’t have been much more different. The larger—much larger—of the two was one of those yachts so huge it might be mistaken for a cruise liner if not for its rakish and cool-looking design. It had two helipads, both occupied at the moment, and a berth out of which a smaller, more nimble superyacht could be deployed.
The yacht on the opposite side of the pier might have looked big in some anchorages, but not here. It was perhaps half the length of the other. Nearly as tall, though, because of two sails projecting from amidships. Really not so much sails as wings that were pointed straight up.
Saskia swung the plane round past the mouth of the cove, shedding altitude, then banked back and brought it in for a landing. It came nearly to a stop several hundred meters abaft of the larger yacht. The name Crescent was emblazoned across her stern in both Roman and Arabic script. As Saskia piloted the Beaver toward the end of the pier, the stern of the sail-powered vessel came into view; she was christened Bøkesuden. Staff were on hand to help make the plane fast and handle luggage and so on, but some crew from the yachts had also come down to greet them. The ones from Crescent were Arabs and Turks. Those from Bøkesuden were Norwegians. Two ethnic groups that had little in common, save that they got all their money from oil.
And the similarities ended there. The differences were conspicuous in the way each group felt about the protocol around welcoming a royal visitor. Both ships’ captains had come down to greet her. The Norwegian captain, a woman in her forties, treated her in a respectful but basically matter-of-fact way a Dutch person would. Saskia got a clue as to why as they walked down the pier and she saw the coat of arms of the Norwegian royal house blazoned on the stern of Bøkesuden. This thing was actually a royal yacht. She’d heard about it. It was completely green, wind- and solar-powered from stem to stern, a floating showcase both for the latest climate-conscious technology and for traditional Norwegian shipbuilding know-how. But the royal ensign was not flying from it today, so apparently the king was not aboard.
The captain of Crescent was English and treated Princess Frederika with the deference he might have shown to the reigning monarch of his native land. Below him, in the yacht’s considerable org chart, tended to be Turks near the top giving way to Filipinos and Bangladeshis filling out the ranks of deckhands, housekeeping staff, and food service.
Saskia wasn’t a yacht person. But she knew people who were, and had got the picture, through them, that when boats like this exceeded a certain size, the expectation was that they would basically be staffed and operated as resorts. If you were going to provide toys—parasails, Jet Skis, scuba gear, fishing tackle, and all the rest—you had to provide staff who knew how to keep all that stuff running and who could show the guests a good time while making sure no one got killed. Those staff all needed places to sleep and to eat, separate from guest cabins of course. Throw in a full-time security detail and the yacht had to be that enormous just to carry out its basic functions.
Crescent was one of those. The owner was a Saudi prince. Which wasn’t saying much; there were many. As far as she could tell, this guy—Fahd bin Talal—wasn’t the type who cut journalists up with bone saws. Dressed in a long white dishdasha and red-and-white headscarf, accessorized with gilt-edged sunglasses, he greeted Saskia at the gangway, flanked by at least a dozen uniformed crew members, and handed her a bouquet before escorting her aboard—where a woman was waiting just so that Saskia could hand the bouquet off to her and not have to lug it around. After a brief walkaround she was escorted to the royal suite, or at least a royal suite, and introduced to a phalanx of butlers, stewards, housekeepers, and so on who would see to her every need.
None of which was exactly unheard of, when you were a queen; but Dutch royals steered clear of it. She knew she’d have felt much more at home on the Norwegian eco-yacht.
She’d lost track of Michiel during all this. No formal activities were slated for this evening. She spent a few minutes freshening up and changing clothes, then ventured out, bracing herself for more aggressive hospitality. Michiel had sent her a selfie as a clue as to where he might be tracked down. The sun was dropping below the horizon when she found him sitting in one of the yacht’s bars, an open-air, tiki-themed establishment beside the swimming pool. Why you’d have a swimming pool on a boat that floated in the water wasn’t clear to her. Maybe so that you could have a poolside bar. Anyway, Michiel—who’d been assigned to a slightly less palatial stateroom—was sitting there in a Hawaiian shirt and white slacks enjoying a cocktail with a shirtless and even more good-looking man who bore an uncanny resemblance to—
He stood up when he saw her coming. “Ma’am,” he said. Then, worried—hilariously—that she wouldn’t recognize him, he added, “I’m—”
“Jules. The Family Jules. Such a pleasure to see you again.”
He seemed chuffed to be recognized. Michiel was just grinning, enjoying the moment.
“In case you’re wondering,” Jules offered, “I was looking for work on this side of the ol’ pond, so I could—”
“So you could be within striking distance of Fenna!”
He nodded and grinned. “Oil rig work and such is hard to break into because of unions and certs, but—”
“There was an opening on a yacht, for a personable young man who could teach guests how to scuba dive.”
“Exactly, ma’am.”
“Well! That explains—”
“Why Fenna’s coming to help you get ready for the big party tomorrow evenin’!” Jules said, now smiling broadly.
“She seemed incredibly eager to do so. I fancied she was doing me a favor.”
“I’m real glad it worked out!”
“Not as glad as you’re going to be, I’m quite sure.”
If it was possible for a man as deeply and perfectly tanned as Jules to blush, he did so.
Something about the knowledge that Fenna and Jules were tomorrow going to be fucking each other’s brains out in the manner that had been so conspicuous in Texas made it seem not merely okay but almost a matter of some urgency that Saskia and Michiel get to it first. After Jules politely excused himself and left them alone together, they had dinner brought out and they dined poolside, al fresco, in a setting as romantic as it was possible for a decommissioned Cold War Soviet nerve gas depot to be. Then they went back to Saskia’s suite and got the Beaver up to cruising altitude. The next morning they had another go. After a little doze, Michiel got out of bed and began taking a shower. Saskia put on one of the provided bathrobes, ordered coffee, and was sitting there in a condition of pleasant post-coital disarray when a knock came at the door.