"Keith Laumer - Bolos 9 - Bolo Strike" - читать интересную книгу автора (Laumer Keith)

"I'm not human anymore! . . ."
Of course you are human. What does exterior form have
to do with your true nature? Do not despair.
This transformation was necessary to preserve our world and vrefylsh'ye .
. . what you would call worldview or, perhaps, your way of life.
Elken's horror was receding somewhat, as the initial shock wore
away. The gods themselves took many forms. They were brilliant in their
ability to generate new bodies as cradles for their r'ye, their essential life
force and being. The godforms that took as their responsibility individual
humans like Elken were quite different in outward appearance from the
godforms that ran the cities or grew the sea crops or flew between the
stars.
The god was following his thoughts. Yes. You see the way
of it, LKN 8737938. This transformation is but a first step toward the total
freedom of form that you shall inherit as one of the immortal gods.
"I . . . I'm not worthy of this honor, Lord."
You are worthy if a god says you are worthy. And you will prove that
worthiness soon, by defending the World of the Gods from the invading
demons.
"Y-yes."
It was payment, of a sort. He helped defend the world, he received
godhood as his pay. He just wished someone had seen fit to warn him
about this ahead of time. He'd found out he could tap into camera feeds
from various locations and actually see his own huge, gray-black form, a
hulking, brooding mass of duralloy and lethal-looking weaponry,
squatting on the ferrocrete pavement of the cavern. There were scars
along his flank, like plow furrows, and there were incrustations of rust
and dried vent discharge at odd angles and corners of his suspension
housing. The machine that was now his body was old, and it had seen
combat in the distant past.
"Just one thing," he said. "I'm a monk. A student monk, in the
Dyi'jikr, the Way of the Gods. I don't know about war. I've never fought
anyone, or anything. I've never fought a demon. I . . . I . . . wasn't even
sure the sky demons were real!"
Did you believe, then, that the Histories were mere
fantasy? Mythology without form or substance?
"The idea had crossed my mind. I mean, we of the Brotherhood serve
the living gods . . . but stories of vast empires spanning the night sky, of
other worlds circling the lights in the sky we call stars . . . it's all a bit
fantastic. Many of us believe the Histories to be . . . allegory. Metaphor."
The histories are accurate, or as accurate as such records can be,
given the passage of millennia and the erosion of social order by time.
"I've never even seen a weapon." Mentally, he indicated the hulking
presence of his own body. "I certainly don't know how to operate this . . .
thing."
We will be feeding you a great deal of information within the next few
periods, his god said. This information will help you learn how to operate
your new body efficiently and what to do when the time comes to fight. All
you need do is perform the tasks I or others of the gods set before you.
"I . . . I'll try my best."