"06 - The SSR is Born" - читать интересную книгу автора (Harrison Harry)

some say it was Dirt or Earth, the rumored home of all mankind, but I doubt it. In any case, things didn't work out too well. Maybe the endless labors were too much for themЧthis was certainly no picnic-world in the early days. As the teachers at school remind us as often as they can, particularly when they tell us how spoiled the young folk

are these days. We manage not to tell them that they must be spoiled as well because certainly nothing has changed here in the last thousand years.
In the beginning, sure, it must have been rough. All of

A STAINLESS STEEL RAT IS BORN

the plantlife was pure poison to human metabolisms and had to be cleared away so edible crops could be grown. The native fauna was just as poisonous, with teeth and claws to match. It was tough. So tough that ordinary cows and sheep had a shockingly short life expectancy. Selective gene manipulation took care of that and the first porcuswine were sent here. Imagine if you canЧand you will need a fertile imagination indeedЧa one-tonne angry boar hog with sharp tushes and mean disposition. That's bad enough, but picture the creature covered with long quills like an insane porcupine. Odd as it sounds, the plan worked; since the farms are Stil\ breeding porcuswine in large numbers it had to have worked. Bit 0' Heaven Smoked Porcuswine Hams are famed galaxy-wide.
But you won't find the galaxy rushing to visit this piggy planet. I grew up here, I know. This place is so boring

even the porcuswine fall asleep.
The funny part is that I seem to be the only one who notices it. They all look at me funny. My Morn always thought that it was just growing pains and burnt porcuswine quills in my bedroom, a folk remedy for same. Dad was always afraid of incipient insanity and used to haul me off to the doctor about once a year. The doctor couldn't find anything wrong and theorized that I might be a throwback to the original settlers, a loser in the Mendelian crapshoot. But that was years ago. I haven't been bothered with parental attention since Dad threw me out of the house when I was fifteen. This was after he had gone through my pockets one night and discovered that I had more money than he did. Morn agreed fervently with him and even opened the door. I think they were glad to see the last of

me. I was certainly too much of an irritation in their bovine existence.
What do I think? I think it can be damn lonely at times, being anoutcast. But I don't think I would have it any other way. It can have its problemsЧbut problems have solutions.
For example, one problem I licked was getting beat up all the time by the bigger kids. This began happening as

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soon as I went to school. I made the mistake at first of letting them know I was brighter than they were. Barn, Х black eye. The school bullies liked it w much that they had to take turns to beat up on me. I only broke the punishment cycle by bribing a university physical education teacher to give me lessons in unarmed combat. I waited until I was really proficient before fighting back. Then I creamed my would-be creamer and went on to beat up three more of the, thugs one after another. I can tell you, all the little kids were my friends after that and

never tired of telling me how great it looked to see me chasing six of the worst ruffians- down the block. Like I said, from problems come solutionsЧnot to say pleasures.
And where did I get the money to bribe the teacher? Not from Dad, I can tell you. Three bucks a week was my allowance, enough to buy maybe two Gaspo-Fizzes and a small sized Get-Stuffed candy bar. Need, not greed, taught

me my first economic lesson. Buy cheap and sell dear and keep the profits for yourself.
Of course there was nothing I could buy, having no capital, so I resorted to not paying at all for the basic product. All kids shoplift. They go through the phase and usually get it beaten out of them when they are detected. I saw the unhappy and tear-stained results of failure and decided to do a market survey as well as a time and motion study before I entered on a career of very petty crime.
FirstlyЧstay away from the small merchants. They know their stock and have a strong interest in keeping it intact. So do your shopping at the large multis. All you have to worry about then are the store detectives and alarm systems. Thencareftil study of how they operate will generate techniques to circumvent them.
One of my earliest and most primitive techniquesЧ1 blush at revealing its simplicityЧ1 called the book-trap. I constructed a box that looked exactly like a book. Only it had a spring-loaded, hinged bottom. All I needed to do

was to push it down on an unsuspecting Get-Stuffed bar to have the candy vanish from sight. This was a crude but

6 A STAINLESS STEEL HAT IS BORN

workable device that I used for a good length of time I

was about to abandon it for a superior technique when I perceived an opportunity to finish it off in a most positive

manner. I was going to take care of Smelly.
His name was Bedford Smillingham but Smelly was the only name we ever called him. As some are born dancers

or painters, others are shaped for lesser tasks. Smelly was a born snitch. His only pleasure in life was ratting on his schoolmates. He peeked and watched and snitched. No juvenile peccadillo was too minor for him to note and report to the authorities. They loved him for thisЧwhich will tell you a lot about the "kind of teachers we had. Nor could he be beatup with impunity. His word was always believed and it was the beater-uppers who suffered the punishment.
Smelly had done me some small ill, I forget exactly what, but it was enough to stir dark andbrooding thought, to eventually produce a plan of action. Bragging is a thing all boys enjoy, and I achieved great status by revealing my book-shaped candy bar collector to my peer group. There

were oohs and ahhs, made more ooh and ahhish by portioning out some of the loot free for the taking. Not only did this help my juvenile statusЧbut I made sure that it

was done where Smelly could eavesdrop. It still feels like yesterday, and I glow warmly with the memory.
"Not only does it workЧbut I'll show you just howl Come with me to Ming's Multistore!" "Can we, JimmyЧcan we really?"
"You can. But not in a bunch. Drift over there a few at a time and stand where you can watch the Get-Stuffed counter. Be thereat 1500 hours and you will really see something!"
Something far better than they could possibly have imagined. I dismissed them and watched the Head's office. As