"James Patrick Kelly - St. Theresa of the Aliens" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kelly James Patrick)

Makes you think about dying. Luckily you don't have to worry, Sam. The
aliens have already done all your thinking for you." She sat up. "Name the
kid after yourself for all I care. Except that she's going to be girl."
I sat beside her. "I'm sorry, Nicole." I kissed her. "I don't know
what I can do but I'm sorry."
****
Perhaps if the aliens had given us the cure for cancer or a wonder grain to
end hunger or the secret of immortality, they might have won people like
Nicole and Terry over. I think what we wanted most from them was freedom from
all the biological traps the earth had set for us. The aliens were not from
earth; they did not understand our biology nor were they particularly
interested in it. A new physics was their principal gift, an arcane and
rigorous discipline that ran counter to common intuition. Who cared that they
had a detailed mathematical model for the first three minutes of the universe?
Or that they had developed from that a theory which linked weak and strong
atomic forces, the electromagnetic spectrum and gravitation?
Of course, there was interstellar flight. Everyone expected a joyride
to the stars. But the aliens could not just toss us the keys to a starship
and wave goodbye. First we had to learn to control gravitrons and squeeze
through the interstices in space-time. Then there was the difficult problem
of life-support. It soon became clear that it would be years, perhaps
decades, before the first ships would be ready. By the anniversary of the
Sverdlovsk landing many Americans were disillusioned and bitter. Which was
exactly what the rapidly-growing Purge movement wanted.
Purge. Sometimes a word will distort under close scrutiny, and its
various meanings will twist back upon themselves. There are spiritual purges,
purifications of the soul. Dangerously high pressures can be relieved by
purging. Certainly there were some in the Purge movement whose goals were
positive. Yet the word also has a bloody legacy of intellectual and religious
intolerance. Purge trials. Popes urging crusades to purge the Holy Lands.
Hitler's unspeakable purge. I think these dark connotations come closer to the
essence of the Purge movement. And it was as a Purger that Terry Burelli came
to the attention of the world.
Assassins stalked the aliens. Someone threw a bomb into the
presidential reviewing stand during a parade in Buenos Aires. Twisted Logic
got a new body and Argentina got a new dictator. A splinter group from the
Purge Movement took credit.
Terry had the bad judgement to make one of her weekly telelink calls
just after the news broke.
"Nicole's taking a nap," I said. "She's having a bad day and I don't
want to wake her up."
"Is she all right?" The old black-and-white camera at her terminal made
Terry look as if she had not slept in days. "What does the doctor say?"
"She's pregnant, Terry. It's hard work. Call back later."
"What's the matter, Sam?" She did her imitation of a smile. "Are you
angry at me again?"
"At you and at all the other goddamned Purgers. Where in the Bible
does Christ say you can go around blowing up your enemies?"
"We have nothing to do with those people, Sam. Sister Laura denounced
them; I wrote the press release myself."