"Tuf Voyaging - 06 - Call Him Moses" - читать интересную книгу автора (Martin George R R)

УI will eat your frogs,Ф Moses yelled. УThey will be fine and delicious.Ф
УThese frogs will come from the river,Ф said the pillar of fire, Уand they shall be more terrible than you can imagine.Ф
УNothing lives in that poisoned gutter,Ф Moses said. УYou have seen to that.Ф Then he slammed the door, and would listen no more to the pillar of fire.
The guards that Moses sent to the river at dawn came back bloody and hysterical with fear.
УThere are things there,Ф one of them testified, Уmoving around in the pools of blood. Little crimson wrigglers, 'bout as big as your finger, but their legs was twice as long. Looked like red frogs, except when we got closer we saw that they had teeth, and they was ripping up the dead fish. Hardly any fish was left at all, and them that were had these frog things crawling all over them. Then Danel tried to pick up one of these frogs, and it snapped at him, right into his hand, and he screamed and all of a sudden the air was full of the damn things, jumping around like they was flying, biting people, tearing at you when they got hold. It was terrible. How are you going to fight a frog? Stab it? Shoot it? How?Ф He was shaking.
Moses sent another party down to the river, armed with sacks and poison and torches. They came back in total disarray, carrying two of their number. One man died that morning, his throat torn out by a frog. Another went a few hours later, from the fever that many of those bitten had developed.
By dusk, all the fish were gone. The frogs began to move up from the river, into the villages. The Altruists dug trenches and filled them with water and flame. The frogs leaped over the trenches. The Altruists fought with knives and clubs and fire, some even with the modern weapons they had taken from the cityfolk. Six more people were dead by dawn. Moses and his followers retreated behind closed doors.

УOur people are out in the open,Ф Jaime Kreen said fearfully. УThe frogs will come into the camps and kill them.Ф
УNo,Ф said Haviland Tuf. УIf your Rej Laithor can keep her charges calm and quiet, they have nothing to fear. Scarnish bloodfrogs are carrion eaters chiefly. They attack living creatures larger than themselves only when attacked or frightened.Ф
Kreen looked incredulous, then slowly smiled. УAnd Moses hides in fear! ThatТs rich, Tuf.Ф
УRich,Ф said Haviland Tuf. There was nothing in his tone to indicate either agreement or mockery. But Dax was in his arms, and Kreen noticed suddenly that the cat was still and stiff, his fur slowly bristling.
That night the pillar of fire came not to the man called Moses, but to the refugees from the City of Hope, huddled in fear in their ramshackle camp, watching the frogs prowl beyond the fences that kept them apart from the Altruists.
УRej Laithor,Ф the pillar of fire said, Уyour enemies have imprisoned themselves behind barred doors. You are free-Go. Take your people in hand and lead them back to your arcology. Walk slowly, watch where you set your feet, make no sudden moves. Do these things without fail, and the frogs will leave you unharmed. Clean and repair your City of Hope, and ready my forty thousand standards.Ф
Rej Laithor, surrounded by her junior administrators, stared up at the writhing flames. УMoses will attack us again as soon as you depart, Tuf,Ф she shouted. УFinish him. Unleash your other plagues.Ф
The pillar of fire said nothing. It turned and crackled for long minutes, and then it was gone entirely.
Wearily, the people of the City of Hope began to file out of camp, being very careful where they set their feet.
УThe generators are working again,Ф Jaime Kreen reported two weeks later. УThe City will soon function as before. But that is only half our bargain, Tuf. Moses and his followers still sulk in their villages. The bloodfrogs are nearly all dead now, for want of any carrion to eat except each other. And the river shows signs of clearing. When are you going to unleash the lice on them? And the flies? They deserve to scratch, Tuf.Ф
УTake the Griffin,Ф Haviland Tuf ordered. УBring Moses to me, willing or no. Do this and one hundred standards of your CityТs funds will be yours.Ф
Jaime Kreen looked astonished. УMoses? Why? Moses is our enemy. If you think you can turn around and make a deal with him now, sell us back into slavery for a better priceа.а.а.Ф
УContain your suspicions,Ф Tuf replied. He stroked Dax. УAlways people think the worst of us, Dax. Perhaps it is our sad fate to be ever suspect.Ф He addressed Kreen again. УI wish only a conference with Moses. Do as I have told you.Ф
УI am not in your debt any more, Tuf,Ф Kreen said sharply. УI assist you only as a patriotic Charitan. Tell me your motives, and I may do your bidding. Otherwise, do it yourself. I refuse.Ф He crossed his arms.
УSir,Ф said Haviland Tuf, Уare you aware of how many meals and mugs of ale you have taken aboard the Ark since our balance was adjudged even? Are you aware of the quantity of my air you have breathed, and how many times you have used my sanitary facilities? I am abundantly aware of all of these things. Are you further aware that the usual charge for a voyage from KТtheddion to Charity is some three hundred seventy-nine standards? All of these amounts could easily be added to your account. I have foregone this, to my great financial disadvantage, only because you have afforded me certain minor conveniences. I can see now that my forbearance was an error. I will rectify the mistakes in my bookkeeping.Ф
УDonТt bluff me, Tuf,Ф Kreen said stubbornly. УWeТre even, and weТre a long way from Kytheddene Prison, and any claims you have to me under their absurd laws are null and void on Charity.Ф
УThe laws of KТtheddion and Charity are alike to me, except when they serve my purposes,Ф Haviland Tuf said very quietly. УI am my own law, Jaime Kreen. And if I should determine to make you my slave until the last days of your life, neither Rej Laithor nor Moses nor your own bravado could help you in the least.Ф Tuf delivered the words as always, evenly, calmly, in his bass voice, with hardly a hint of emotion in his flat inflection.
But Jaime Kreen suddenly felt very cold. And he did as he was bid.

Moses was a tall, strong man, but Tuf had told Jaime Kreen of his nightly reflections, and it was an easy enough thing to wait one evening in the hills beyond the village, in the brush with three others, and overcome Moses as he passed. One of KreenТs assistants suggested killing the Altruistic leader then and there, but Kreen forbade it. They carried the unconscious Moses back to the waiting Griffin, where Kreen dismissed the others.
Shortly after, Kreen delivered Moses to Haviland Tuf, and turned to take his leave.
УStay,Ф Tuf said. They were in a room that Kreen had never seen before, a vast echoing chamber where the walls and ceiling were of the purest white. Tuf was seated in the center of the chamber, at a horseshoe-shaped instrument panel. Dax sat atop the console, looking quite alert.
Moses was still groggy. УWhere am I?Ф he demanded.
УYou are aboard the seedship Ark, the last functioning biowar ship of the Ecological Engineering Corps. I am Haviland Tuf.Ф
УYour voice,Ф Moses said.
УI am the Lord God,Ф Haviland Tuf said.
УYes,Ф Moses said. He stood up suddenly. Jaime Kreen, standing behind him, grabbed him by the shoulders and shoved him roughly back into his seat. Moses protested, but did not try to rise again. УYou were the one who brought the plagues, the voice from the pillar of fire, the devil who impersonated God.Ф
УIndeed,Ф said Haviland Tuf. УYet you misunderstand. You are the impersonator in this company, Moses. You sought to impersonate a prophet, to pretend to vast supernatural powers you do not have. You employed tricks, and waged a primitive form of ecological warfare. I, in contrast, am no pretender. I am the Lord God.Ф
Moses spat. УYou are a man with a starship, and a host of machines. You played the plague game well. But two plagues do not make a man a god.Ф
УTwo,Ф said Haviland Tuf. УDo you doubt the other eight?Ф His large hands moved over the instruments before him, the room darkened, the dome ran with light, and it seemed they were out in space, looking down on Charity. Then Haviland Tuf did something else to his instruments. The holograms shifted and they were moving, sinking, soaring, until the blurs resolved themselves. They floated above the settlements of the Holy Altruists, in the Hills of Honest Labor. УWatch,Ф commanded Haviland Tuf. УThis is a computer simulation. These things were not, yet could have been. I am confident that you will find this enlightening.Ф
In the domed room, all about them, they saw the villages, and shadow-faced people moving among them, shoveling the carcasses of dead frogs into pits for burning. They saw within the cabins, too, where weaker people burned with fevers. УIt is after the second plague,Ф Haviland Tuf announced, Уeven as now. The bloodfrogs have spent themselves.Ф His hands moved. УLice,Ф he said.
The lice came. The dust itself seemed to burst with them, and suddenly they were everywhere. All the shadow-folk were scratching, and Jaime Kreen (who had scratched a good bit himself before departing for KТtheddion) chuckled. Then he stopped chuckling. The lice seemed more than lice. The people broke out in a scarlet rash, and many of them took to bed, screaming of the itches, the horrible itches. Some scratched themselves so badly that they drew blood, scratched deep gouges in their skin, and tore their fingernails loose in their fury.
УFlies,Ф said Haviland Tuf. And the flies swarmed, flies of all kinds-the swollen stinging flies of Dam Tullian, the flies of Old Earth with their ancient diseases, the black and grey fleshflies of Gulliver, the sluggish flies of Nightmare who plant their eggs in living tissue. They settled on the villages and the Hills of Honest Labor in immense clouds, and covered them as if they were but a particularly large dung heap, and left them black and thick and stinking.
УThe murrain,Ф said Haviland Tuf. They watched the herds die by the thousands. The gross immobile meatbeasts in the cellar of the City of Hope turned to rot and corruption. Burning could not check the pestilence. Soon, no meat was left, and those people who still lived grew gaunt and bitter-looking. Haviland Tuf said other wordsЧanthrax, RyersonТs Disease, roserot, calierosy.
УBoils,Ф said Haviland Tuf, and again disease raged, but this time among the people and not their animals. They sweated and screamed as the boils covered their faces and hands and chests, each swelling until it burst, so the blood and the pus ran free. Then new boils grew as fast as the old ones vanished. Men and women staggered through the streets of the simple villages, blind and pockmarked, bodies crusted and covered with open sores, the perspiration running like oil over their skin. When they fell in the dirt, among the dead flies and lice and cattle, they rotted there, with none to bury them.
УHail,Ф said Haviland Tuf, and it came, a great thundering pounding hail, the stones fists of ice, for a day and a night and a day and a night and a day and a night, and on and on, and fire mingled with the hail. Those who went outside died, the hailstones smashing them to the ground. And many of those who stayed within died, too. When the hail had stopped at last, there was hardly a cabin left standing.
УLocusts,Ф said Haviland Tuf. They covered the earth and the sky, clouds of them, worse than the flies. They landed everywhere, crawled over the living and the dead both, and ate what little food was left, until there was nothing at all.
УDarkness,Ф said Haviland Tuf. Darkness moved. It was a gas, a thick black gas, drifting with the wind. It was a liquid, flowing, moving like a sensuous stream of jet, gleaming, shining. It was silence. It was night. It was alive. Where it moved, no life remained behind it; the weeds and grasses were dry and dead, and the soil itself looked raw and ravaged and bruised. It was a cloud larger than the villages, or the Hills of Honest Labor, or the locusts. It settled over all of them, and nothing moved for a day or a night, and then the living darkness rolled on, and behind it was only dust, and dry decay.
Haviland Tuf touched his instruments, and the visions were gone from them. The lights came on again. The walls were very white.
УThe tenth plague,Ф Moses said slowly, in a voice that no longer seemed rich or large. УThe death of the firstborn.Ф
УI admit to my own failures,Ф said Haviland Tuf. УI cannot make such fine distinctions. I would point out, however, that all of the firstborn are dead, in these scenes that never were, even as the lastborn. I am a gross and clumsy god in that; in my awkwardness, I must need kill all.Ф
Moses was pale and broken, but within him was still a strong and stubborn man. УYou are only human,Ф he whispered.