"Keith Laumer - Hybrid" - читать интересную книгу автора (Laumer Keith)

readjusted the functionmosaic, in preparation for spore generation.

Malpry stopped, shaded his eyes. A tall thin figure stood in the shade
of the uptilted root mass on the ridge.
"Looks like we headed back at the right time," Malpry said.
"Damn," Gault said. He hurried forward. Pantelle came to meet him.
"I told you to stay with the ship, Pantellel"
"I finished my job, Captain. You didn't say--"
"OK, OK. Is anything wrong?"
"No sir. But I've just remembered something--"
"Later, Pantelle. Let's get back to the ship. We've got work to do."
"Captain, do you know what this is?" Pantelle gestured toward the
gigantic fallen tree.
"Sure; it's a tree." He turned to Gault. "Let's-"
"Yes, but what kind?"
"Beats me. I'm no botanist."
"Captain, this is a rare species. In fact, it's supposed to be extinct.
Have you ever heard of the Yanda?"
"No. Yes." Gault looked at Pantelle. "Is that what this is?"
"I'm sure of it. Captain, this is a very valuable find--"
"You mean it's worth money?" Malpry was looking at Gault.
"I don't know. What's the story, Pantelle?"
"An intelligent race, with an early animal phase; later, they root,
become fixed, functioning as a plant. Nature's way of achieving the
active competition necessary for natural selection, then the advantage
of conscious selection of a rooting site."
"How do we make money on it?"
Pantelle looked up at the looming wall of the fallen trunk, curving
away among the jumble of shattered branches, a hundred feet, two
hundred, more, in diameter. The bark was smooth, almost black. The
foot-wide leaves were glossy, varicolored.
"This great tree-" Malpry stooped, picked up a fragment from a burst
root.
"This great club," he said, "to knock your lousy brains out with--"
"Shut up, Mal."
"It lived, roamed the planet perhaps ten thousand years ago, in the
young faunal stage. Then instinct drove it here, to fufill the cycle of
nature. Picture this ancient champion, looking for the first time out
across the valley, saying his farewells as metamorphosis begins."
"Nuts," Malpry said.
"His was the fate of all males of his kind who lived too long, to stand
forever on some height of land, to remember through unending ages the
brief glory of youth, himself his own heroic monument."
"Where do you get all that crud?" Malpry said.
"Here was the place," Pantelle said. "Here all his journeys ended."
"OK, Pantelle. Very moving. You said something about this thing being
valuable."
"Captain, this tree is still alive, for a while at least. Even after
the heart is dead, the appearance of life will persevere. A mantle of
new shoots will leaf out to shroud the cadaver, tiny atavistic