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

"Yeah, sure. And how much will the Brides be giving to their legal
defense?"
"We deplore their tactics, not their cause. Certainly they made a
mistake. We don't believe in violence, Sam. There has to be a better way to
purge the world of ..."
"Goodbye, Terry." I was too disgusted to bother with the niceties; I
had to cut her off.
Whatever the tactical disagreements within the Purge movement, all
could agree that getting at the aliens to expel them was the major problem.
They could intimidate the aliens' human collaborators. But the true enemies of
the faith were safe within their well-guarded silos. How could they achieve
their goal of purging the world of aliens? Terrorism and prayer proved
equally unsatisfactory. Politics remained.
Pride was the key to their plan. Throughout the twentieth century
Americans had believed themselves to be the most advanced people in the
universe. Suddenly we were no longer first; that place was reserved for the
aliens. Worse, we were not even second; with the aliens' help the Soviets had
surpassed us. Wounded pride is intangible; you cannot build guns out of it.
But with the proper manipulation of the facts, you can turn wounded pride into
votes. The strategy was to purge the United States, then the other industrial
states, the Third World, and then ... Then a Purger will smile with the
confidence of one who is fighting the Lord's fight. It is not hard to see
behind that smile to the inevitability of a Third World War with the Soviets.
AlienLine had to cover the Purge Movement. I wanted to expose them for
what they were, but I was overruled. The Demographics Department was able to
demonstrate that forty percent of our subscribers were either Purgers or
sympathizers. Know thy enemy and all that. Since I was unable to match their
propaganda with some of my own, I decided to let them indict themselves with
their own words. God help me.
My idea was to stage a debate between an alien and a leader of the
Purge movement. I fought for weeks to sell it to my own people at AlienLine,
and then to top management at InfoLine. Finally I won permission to approach
the State Department with the plan. I thought it might take several months to
work out an agreement but State acted as if we were negotiating a nuclear
disarmament treaty. I found out later that the Purgers in government were
holding the project up for their own purposes.
****
Nicole had a disastrous miscarriage her second trimester while I was covering
the aliens' first visit to South Africa. I did not know until I found Terry
waiting for me when I got home instead of Nicole.
"I want to see her."
"She's asleep. Let her rest."
I poured three fingers of Scotch and drank it neat. Terry watched me,
her eyes alight with disapproval. I did not want to see her; I wanted to be
with Nicole, to hold her and tell her how sorry I was. If Terry had had one
milligram of the compassion that saints are reputed to have, she would have
gone away to leave me alone with my guilt and sorrow.
"It doesn't matter that you don't like me, Sam." She worried the
rosary beads that hung from the belt of her black habit. "I had to come; she
had no one else."