"Samuel R. Delany - The Star Pit" - читать интересную книгу автора (Delaney Samuel R)

his wrist centered on which was a tiny crescent of pinpricks. Then he pointed jerkily to the creature.

It was shivering, and bloody froth spluttered from its lip flaps. All the while it was digging futilely at the
sand with its clumsy cups, eyes retracted. Now it fell over, kicked, tried to right itself, breath going like a
flutter valve. "It can't take the heat," I explained, reaching down to pick it up.
It snapped at me, and I jerked back. "Sunstroke, kid-boy. Yeah, it is crazy."

Suddenly it opened its mouth wide, let out all its air, and didn't take in any more. "It's all right now," I
said.

Two more of the baby sloths were at the door, front cups over the sill, staring with bright, black eyes. I
pushed them back with a piece of seashell and closed the door. Antoni kept looking at the white fur ball
on the sand. "Not crazy now?"

"It's dead," I told him.

"Dead because it went outside, Da?"

I nodded.

"And crazy?" He made a fist and ground something already soft and wet around his upper lip.

I decided to change the subject, which was already too close to something I didn't like to think about.
"Who's been taking care of you, anyway?" I asked. "You're a mess, kid-boy. Let's go and fix up that
arm. They shouldn't leave a fellow your age all by himself." We started back to the compound. Those
bites infect easily, and this one was swelling.

"Why it go crazy? Why it die when it go outside, Da?"

"Can't take the light," I said as we reached the jungle. "They're animals that live in shadow most of the
time. The plastic cuts out the ultraviolet rays, just like the leaves that shade them when they run loose in
the jungle. Sigma-prime's high on ultraviolet. That's why you're so good-looking, kid-boy. I think your
ma told me their nervous systems are on the surface, all that fuzz. Under the ultraviolet, the enzymes
break down so quickly thatтАФdoes this mean anything to you at all?"

"Uh-uh." Antoni shook his head. Then he came out with, "Wouldn't it be nice, DaтАФ" he admired his bite
while we walked "тАФif some of them could go outside, just a few?"

That stopped me. There were sunspots on his blue-black hair. Fronds reflected faint green on his brown
cheek. He was grinning, little, and wonderful. Something that had been anger in me a lot of times
momentarily melted to raging tenderness, whirling about him like the dust in the light striking down at my
shoulders, raging to protect my son. "I don't know about that, kid-boy."

"Why not?"

"It might be pretty bad for the ones who had to stay inside," I told him. "I mean after a while."

"Why?"

I started walking again. "Come on, let's fix your arm and get you cleaned up."