"Bisson, Terry - Macs (txt)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Bisson Terry)

TERRY BISSON

MACS

WHAT DID I THINK? SAME thing I think today. I thought it was slightly weird even
if it was legal. But I guess I agreed with the families that there had to be
Closure. Look out that window there. I can guarantee you, it's unusual to be so
high in Oklahoma City. Ever since it happened, this town has had a thing about
tall buildings. It's almost like that son of a bitch leveled this town.

Hell, we wanted Closure too, but they had a court order all the way from the
Supreme Court. I thought it was about politics at first, and I admit I was a
little pissed'. Don't use the word pissed. What paper did you say you were with?

Never heard of it, but that's me. Anyway, I was miffed -- is that a word?
miffed? -- until I understood it was about Victims' Rights. So we canceled the
execution, and built the vats, and you know the rest.

Well, if you want to know the details you should start with my assistant warden
at the time, who handled the details. He's now the warden. Tell him I sent you.
Give him my regards.

I thought it opened a Pandora's box, and I said so at the time. It turns out of
course that there haven't been that many, and none on that scale. The ones that
there are, we get them all. We're the sort of Sloan-Ketterings of the thing. See
that scum on the vats? You're looking at eleven of the guy who abducted the
little girls in Ohio, the genital mutilation thing, remember? Even eleven's
unusual. We usually build four, maybe five tops. And never anything on the scale
of the macs.

Build, grow, whatever. If you're interested in the technology, you'll have to
talk with the vat vet himself. That's what we call him, he's a good old boy. He
came in from the ag school for the macs and he's been here in Corrections ever
since. He was an exchange student, but he met a girl from MacAlester and never
went home. Isn't it funny how that stuff works? She was my second cousin, so now
I have a Hindu second cousin-in-law. Of course he's not actually a Hindu.

A Unitarian, actually. There are several of us here in MacAlester, but I'm the
only one from the prison. I was fresh out of Ag and it was my first assignment.
How would one describe such an assignment? In my country, we had no such...well,
you know. It was repellent and fascinating at the same time.

Everyone has the cloning technology. It's the growth rate that gives difficulty.
Animals grow to maturity so much faster, and we had done significant work.
Six-week cattle, ten-day ducks. Gene tweaking. Enzyme accelerators. They wanted
full-grown macs in two and a half years; we gave them 168 thirty-year-old men in
eleven months! I used to come down here and watch them grow. Don't tell anyone,
especially my wife, lean, but I grew sort of fond of them.