"Leinster, Murray - Plague" - читать интересную книгу автора (Leinster Murray)

УIТm killing them!Ф he said thickly. УIТll get all of them! IТll kill ev&y one! They made you suffer. TheyТd have killed you! IТll get every oneЧФ
Sally smiled tiredly at him. She was utterly exhausted, and she was very weak indeed.
УWeТll have to send word somehow, so theyТll know what. to do if the plague ever shows up anywhere elseЧФ
Ben remembered. Sally was thinking in terms of hope, but there was no hope. He was killing the Things because they had karmed Sally. But the orders heТd overheard a little while back made anything he could do a mere futility. And worse, the plague had already spread from Pharona. A newscast, hours sinceЧheТd hardly noticed it at the timeЧreported that a Galactic Commission cruiser had landed on Pharona with dispatches for the local sub-commissioner. He could not be cut off from his regular flow of documents to sign! It observed all sanitary precautions. But it did not think to prevent any possibility of bound electric charges entering its metal fabric. So when it went on to Galata it carried the plague, and women were now dying by thousands, and other women by more thou- sands glowed faintly with cosmic rays coming from their bodies.
Ben told her, his face savagely stern.
УWe must tell,Ф she insisted. УEven if we die, BenЧФ
УMy dear,Ф said Ben bitterly, Уyou know the brass hat mind. The instant we open communication, every ship thatТs hunting us will come bouncing here to blast us Out of space. And theyТll find us. If we can get our information to them and on their recorders before weТre killed
why . . . sooner or later, after maybe millions more lives have been lost, the information weТve given will be passed on as the result of brilliant investigation under the supervision of brass hat so-and-so. But weТll be dead and disreputable. And weТll stay disreputable after weТre dead, so that some pompous ass can claim credit for what weТve found out and get a few more decorations to hang on his fat tummy.Ф
УMaybe hers,Ф said Sally. She lay there in the bunk, looking up at Ben with soft eyes. УSome brass hats are women, and a woman brass hat is even worse than a man. You canТt blame them, Ben. TheyТre important people. They have important posts. So they get dignified and pompous and stupid. If they could only feel that its their work instead of them thatТs importantЧФ
УBut they never will,Ф said Ben grimly. УSo we die. I pulled down the
- GC phone to get rid of the Things. IТll kill off the rest and put the -phone back together. Then IТll broadcast my stuff, and weТll sit down and hold hands until weТre killed.Ф
УDarling!Ф said Sally wistfully. СWould you mind kissing me? You havenТt kissed me but twice since weТve been togetherЧФ
He bent down. He kissed her. And then they clung, suddenly. The little sports cruiser had reeled. Something had hold of it. With a tractorbeam. Ben fought against a savage acceleration, applied from without, and then- there was a violent impact. They had been drawn violently against the hull of a much larger vessel. Tools worked instantly on the air lock, and before Ben could do more than reach the door of the stateroom with his positron-pistol in his hand, he found himself looking into the muzzles of other positron-guns. Navy men faced him.
УYouТre under arrest, Sholto,Ф said a voice crisply. СWe were ordered to burn you down on sight, but since the plagueТs hit Calata, weТve got instructions to do it before a visiphone screen as a warning to anybody else who has the idea of breaking a planetary quarantine. Come along!Ф

Brass hat: an idiom accepted as Auxiliary Basic since Circa 2126 Earth Style. It originally referred to the headgear used to distinguish Уstaff officersФ in an army (See ARMY) who gave orders without responsibility for their result, and which they were required to justify only by precedent, Уpolitical necessityФ or Уstrategic reasons,ФЧterms which have no discoverable exact meaning. Costly blunders by officers of the mental pattern AF-IQ-R.37 and its derivativesЧ(to whom the career of a Уstaff officerФ was irresistibly attractive in time of war)Ч led to the use of the term Уbrass hatФ to indicate persons of those nowrecognized mental patterns. It is an interesting case of instinctive popular recognition of mental patterning before personality analysis emerged from charlatanry.
(Dictionary of Auxiliary Basic Words and Idioms. Cephus, Antres VII. 2215 Earth Style.)

Ben grinned. There was no particular mirth in it, but it was the only possible expression of the way he felt.
УAh-h-h!Ф he said softly. УThe brass-hat mind in action! The order undoubtedly ended, Сthis order is not to be questioned.Т But try and carry it out! You can kill me, of course. But IТve a pistol in my hand, too. Try and drag me to a visiphone! And youТve got a boarding-mike with you, havenТt you? Ah, yes! Everything I say will be recorded and goes through all the ranks of brass hats up to the Galactic Commission, if necessary. Very well! This is a plague ship. I have a girl here who has had the plague and has been cured of it. I know how to cure the plague. But the ship is infectedЧand so is yours, now! If there are as many as a dozen women on board it, youТve got a dozen cases of plague in your shipТs company, and youТve only to set a Geiger counter in front of any one of themЧor stand them in the darkЧto find it out! What IТve said is recorded! Now kill me and go and land on any planet in the universe!Ф
The boarding officer said uncertainly:
УI have orders to take you to a visiphone screen and blast you before it.Ф
УTry it!Ф said Ben savagely.
He shook - with fury. Because it seemed that every hope was gone, not only of his own life and SallyТs, but of being able to get past the wall of pompous stupidity brass-hattism had erected. The Space-Navy and all interstellar traffic suffered intolerably from a policy which assumed that infinite wisdom lay in any person with authority to issue an order, and that only blind obedience should be practiced by inferiors.
He raged at himself, too. It was his use of the positron pistol to kill
the Things which had led this Navy cruiser directly to him. Pulling Out the GC phone to get its condenser had left him unaware of demands for surrender. His screens had been off. And now he would be killed, and the plague would go all through the galaxy. Because, of - course, brass hats would refuse to believe anything they did not already know, and they would solemnly remove themselves from infected planets-with all sanitary precautions, of courseЧto exercise their authority elsewhere, and they would spread the plague themselves.
The boarding-officerТs helmet phone hummed. His uncertainty vanished. -
УVery good, sir,Ф he said to the air. To Ben be said, УYour first statements have been checked. Four cases of plague have been found already. You say you can cure them. They will be brought here. The order for your execution is suspended for the time being.Ф
УIТll do it,Ф said Ben curtly, Уin the control room.Ф -
People crowded through the air lock and into the control room. There were four women and a stout and pompous individual with the brass tabs of an under-commissioner. Of brass hat ratingЧand brass hat mentality.
УYou are incredibly insolent!Ф he puffed. УYou have defied the authority of the Galactic Commission! It is unheard of!Ф
УAlso,Ф said Ben grimly, УIТve found out how to cure the plague. If you canТt think of anything but my defiance -of authority, youТre a fool!Ф
The brass hat purpled and gasped. But Ben turned out the lights. The four women, in Space-Navy Auxiliary uniform, stood out starkly in the darkness. Their faces and throats and hands glowed with a pale white light. Ben picked up his condenser. He touched it to the cheek of the first woman, whose features were working convulsively. The glow vanished from her. The little knob glowed instead. Ben held it out and gave it a momentary positron blast. There was the feeling of a soundless scream. He touched the second woman. She no longer glowed. A second blast. A second unheard shriek. The third. When he had drawn the Thing from the fourth woman he did not use the blast upon it. Instead, he turned on the lights.
УThose four cases of plague are cured,Ф he said shortly.
The brass hat puffed.
УIn that case,Ф he said querulously, Уthere is nothing more to be done. Regulations have to be obeyed. You will carry out your orders, lieutenant?
The boarding-officerТs jaw dropped.
УYou mean, sirЧФ
УHeТs been ordered to be executed,Ф said the brass hat, indignantly. УHasnТt the Navy learned yet that orders are to be obeyed first and questions asked afterwards?Ф
Ben released the last Thing into the fabric of the ship.
УBut the plague isnТt finished,Ф he said, his eyes burning. УI inform youЧand all my words are recordedЧthat if you land on any planet with-
out my having cleaned your ship of the plague, you will start the plague again wherever you land.Ф
УButЧthatТs blackmail!Ф cried the brass hat.
There were sounds. Three more people came through the air lock.
-Two were the ranking officers of a Space-Navy cruiser. The third was a white-haired woman in a gray cloak. She had alert, intelligent eyes.
УMaТam,Ф bellowed the brass hat. УThis man has insulted and tried to blackmail the Galactic Commission! I have ordered him blasted!Ф
It would be unthinkable, of course, to carry out a death sentence in the presence of a member of the Galactic Commission itself. The whitehaired woman said gently:
УMore immediately important, I am afraid, is the fact that he called you a fool.Ф She looked at Ben. УI am Myra Thorn. I am one of the Galactic Commission. I was on my way to Galata, where the plague has broken out, to try to press its investigation. Within the past five minutes it appears that I have developed the plague myself. I feel that there is something within me, but separate from me, which gloats in triumphant hate. A Geiger counter verifies my diagnosis. And... I glow in darkness. The plague - is a form of life, is it not? An entity which is not quite matter?Ф
УYes, maТam,Ф said Ben. He regarded her from beneath frowning brows. УIt is an organized form of electron gas.Ф
УI wish,Ф said the white-haired woman, Уthat you would broadcastЧ through the cruiserТs CC phone, since your own is dismantledЧall the information you have on these entities, and the method you have devised for destroying them.Ф