"Barry Longyear - The Last Enemy" - читать интересную книгу автора (Longyear Barry)

still stalled. The music is that rapid effervescent confusion of human
and Drac folk music we call zidydrac and the humans call mancho. The
recording was made before the war. I scan for the Amadeen Front's
mobile station, or one of the others. Sometimes I can get the Black
October station, but not today. Nothing new supporting the rumors of
another attempt at a truce. Even if a truce should take place it would
be only a matter of days before The Rose, Black October, or some other
uncontrollable faction of the Front violates it, throwing us all back
into war. Still, there would be a day, possible more, without death.
Ki's hand makes signs to us. First the fist, one finger pointed down,
then all three fingers together followed by a fist. Chaki Anta is back.
There had been an explosion at the bunker. We all heard it, saw the
smoke and dust carried by the wind over the lake. Qat Juniki told us
about it before it died. A human had come out of the bunker, his hands
above his head, and Chaki Anta took the man's surrender. The human's
hands were held as fists. "I saw the wire," said Juniki. "I told the
man to open his hands before he came any closer. I told him in English.
I told him again. When he opened them, the world vanished." A walking
bomb with a dead man's switch. Such a human way of killing. Juniki
thought Chaki Anta had been killed, but now Anta is back. As I turn off
the receiver I am relieved. Anta is an old fighter, a survivor of many
raids and battles. It helps me to know that not everyone dies in this
war. My relief is mixed with dread, for when Anta comes back, our
killing and dying resume. We will soon move into a fight. No one says
any of this but it is in everyone's eyes. We swallow the last of our
ration bars. I see Pina take a touch of happy paste with its tongue.
Its eyes close as the drug spins Pina away on a transitory cloud of joy.
I look at my ration bar and wonder why food is so scarce but happy paste
is everywhere. In the end we will probably die of malnutrition within
the mist of a spittle dream. We looted the ration bars from the humans,
but they are good to eat. They are viyapi rations the humans looted
from us. Some of the human rations are good, too. I like the
containers of fruit and the candy bars, but they are rare. There is
something in plastic envelopes called scrambled eggs and ham that even
the humans refuse to eat. For that reason, of course, scrambled eggs
and ham are all that they have left. Their rations, like ours, are left
over from the war. Chaki Anta slides and stumbles down the dust of the
stream bank, followed by Ki. Anta's face is deep ochre, an old scar
along the left side of its forehead. Although our commander smiles with
its mouth, its deep yellow eyes betray all of the dead they have seen.
Anta nods as it points toward the east with its battered energy knife.
"Only a few left in that bunker at the foot of the bluff. I heard
firing coming from inside. They were not shooting at me or at anything
outside the bunker." Its brow climbs in an expression of hopeful
possibility. "I think they were fighting among themselves." His cold
smile becomes a cold grin. "We will get Taaka Liok a present and end
them this time." Chaki Anta's eyes narrow. "We are the Twelve."

"The
Front Twelve," we mutter back more out of habit than pride. Our