"Barry N. Malzberg - The Market In Aliens" - читать интересную книгу автора (Malzberg Barry N)

The Market in Aliens

by Barry N. Malzberg



The first thing I did when I brought the alien home from auction was to plop him right into the tub. No
sense in taking chances, even though they had assured me as usual that he was strong enough to exist out
of the aqueous environment for several days. These were the same boys who had learned only after a lot
of trial and error that they needed an aqueous environment in the first place, of course. The one thing I
couldn't take would be an alien dying on me right off, and thanks to the liars and cheats who run these
farces, there's a lot of precedent.

The next thing I did, after I established that he was going to lie there quietly, breathing slowly, turning the
water their characteristic black, was to make a strong drink and call Intercontinental. I didn't even want
to try making conversation with him; I had gone through that with the earlier ones, and it always came
down to the same frustration, backed by whistling. Some day they're going to establish communication
with them, and when they do, I'll be happy to talk. But until then, it's absolutely pointless. Besides, there
is absolutely nothing an alien could say that would interest me in the slightest, not at this stage of the
game.

I was lucky. I got Black, my contact, on only the fourth or fifth try at the switchboardтАФInter is in
administrative collapse like almost everything these daysтАФand after reminding him of all the favors I had
done for him, I laid it right on the line.

"I've got one in the bathtub," I said. "A clean healthy male, in the pink of maturity, I'd say. All reflexes in
order, highly responsive and probably as intelligent as hell; he's piping a blue streak. I just got him this
afternoon."

Black shrugged, a common business technique, and then cut off his viewscreen. "Don't need it," he said.
"We're already overstocked."

"You need this one. Prime of life and all that. Furthermore, I was able to get him reasonable, and I can
pass that saving right on to you."



┬╖┬╖┬╖┬╖┬╖



"Sorry," Black said. "We just don't need it right now. These things haven't been moving as well as we had
hoped in the last month. People are tired of them, and I think there's a lot of guilt building up too. What
the hell, they may be intelligent with these space machines and all. Speaking personally, I think the bottom
has fallen out of your craze."

"Never," I said. "You're talking about the whole appeal."

"You don't understand psychology. Not to get involved, though, and just because I'm curious, what
would you want for it?"