"Philip Jose Farmer - Tongues of the Moon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Farmer Phillip Jose)

She gestured at the dead men. "The Axes got them, too?"
"Yes," said Scone. "But I don't know if any Axes are in there."
He pointed at the door to the control room.
"If there were, we'd all be screaming with pain," said the captain. "Anyway, they would have had to take the
key from the officer on guard."
She looked suspiciously at the two, but Scone said, "You'll have to search him. I didn't touch him, of course."
She dropped to one knee and unbuttoned the officer's inner coatpocket, which Scone had not neglected to
rebutton after replacing the key.
Rising with the key, she said, "I think you two must go back to the dome."
Scone's face did not change expression at this evidence of distrust. Broward smiled slightly.
"By the way," she said, "what are you doing here?"
"We escaped from the dome," said Broward. "We heard firing down this way, and we thought we should
protect our rear before going back into the dome. We found dead Russians, but we never did see the enemy. They
must have been the ones you ran into."
"Perhaps," she said. "You must go. You know the rules. No unauthorized personnel near the BR."
"No non-Russians, anyway," said Scone flatly. "I know. But this is an emergency."
"You must go," she said, raising the barrel of her gun. She did not point it at them, but they did not doubt she
would.
Scone turned and strode off, Broward following. When they had turned the first corner, Scone said, "We
must leave the base on the first excuse. We have to get back to Clavius."
"So we can start our own war?"
"Not necessarily. Just declare independence. The Russ may have their belly full of death."
"Why not wait until we find out what the situation on Earth is? If the Russians have any strength left on
Earth, we may be crushed."
"Now!" said Scone. "If we give the Russ and the Chinese time to recover from the shock, we lose our
advantage."
"Things are going too fast for me, too," said Broward. "I haven't time or ability to think straight now. But I
have thought of this. Earth could be wiped out. If so, we on the Moon are the only human beings left alive in the
universe. And..."
"There are the Martian colonies. And the Ganymedan and Mercutian bases."
"We don't know what's happened to them. Why start something which may end the entire human species?
Perhaps, ideology should be subordinated for survival. We need every man and woman, every..."
"We must take the chance that the Russians and Chinese won't care to risk making Homo sapiens extinct.
They'll have to cooperate, let us go free."
"We don't have time to talk. Act now; talk after it's all over."
But Scone did not stop talking. During their passage through the corridors, he made one more statement
"The key to peace on the Moon, and to control of this situation, is the Zemlya."
Broward was puzzled. He knew Scone was referring to the Brobdingnagian interstellar exploration vessel
which had just been built and outfitted and was now orbiting around Earth. The Zemlya (Russian for Earth) had been
scheduled to leave within a few days for its ten-year voyage to Alpha Centaurus and, perhaps, the stars beyond.
What the Zemlya could have to do with establishing peace on the Moon was beyond Broward. And Scone did not
seem disposed to explain.
Just then, they passed a full-length mirror, and Broward saw their images. Scone looked like a mountain of
stone walking. And he, Broward thought, he himself looked like a man of leather. His shorter image, dark brown where
the skin showed, his head shaven so the naked skull seemed to be overlaid with leather, his brown eyes contrasting
with the rock-pale eyes of Scone, his lips too thick compared with Scone's, which were like a thin groove cut into
granite, Leather against stone. Stone could outwear leather. But leather was more flexible.
Was the analogy, as so many, false? Or only partly true?
Broward tended to think in analogies; Scone, directly. At the moment, a man like Scone was needed. Practical,
quick reacting. But, like so many practical men, impractical when it came to long range and philosophical thinking. Not