"Jack McKinney - Robotech 03 - Homecoming" - читать интересную книгу автора (McKinney Jack)

they couldn't possibly remain at the primitive social and psychological level of
these aliens!"
"Now, granted, we're seeing a great deal of military display here," the
Intel man, a portly fellow in his early thirties, added. "But how many of those
ships have actually proved themselves to be combat-ready? A comparative handful!
No, Captain; I think what we're seeing is just a bluff. And I think your people
here have been taken in by it. My analysis is that Commander Hayes and her party
were permitted to escape so that they could bring us this...hysterical report
and demoralize us."
"Permitted?" Ben Dixon was halfway out of his chair, the big hands
clenched into fists, about to leap across the table and pummel the intel
officer. "D' you know how many times we almost got killed? How close we came to
not making it? When was the last time you saw any action, you-"
"Captain!" the intelligence officer burst out to Gloval by way of
complaint.
"That will do!" Gloval thundered, and there was sudden silence as Max
Sterling and Rick Hunter pulled Ben back.
Having shown his Jovian side for an instant, Gloval lapsed back into a
reasonable voice. "Gentlemen, let's hear the entire report before discussing
it." It wasn't a suggestion, and everybody understood that. The debriefing team
subsided.
Lisa had thought her words out carefully. "In the course of our captivity,
we observed that the aliens have absolutely no concept of human emotions.
They've been groomed entirely for war. And their society is organized along
purely military lines.
"It appears that they've increased their physical size and strength
artificially through genetic manipulation and that they also have the ability to
reverse the process."
The others present were studying the few video records she'd managed to
make surreptitiously during captivity, but Lisa's memory, with Rick's, Ben's,
and Max's, provided vivid and chilling recollections. They'd witnessed Zentraedi
trans-vid records of the destruction of an entire planet, seen the gigantic
protoculture sizing chambers the aliens used to manipulate their size and
structure, felt the deathly squeeze of Commander in Chief Dolza's fist around
them.
And something else had happened, something Lisa could only bring herself
to refer to obliquely. The enemy leaders had been repulsed, but fascinated, by
the human custom of kissing. At their demand, and to ascertain what effect it
would have on them, Lisa and Rick had kissed, long and deeply, on an enemy
conference table as big as a playing field.
None of the four escapees had mentioned the kiss. Lisa still wasn't sure
exactly what it was she'd felt afterward. She suspected that Rick was also a
little confused, in spite of his love affair with the girl called Minmei. Max
and Ben had kept silent, Rick's friends as well as his wingmates.
Lisa finished, "And I think this last part is very important: While they
examined and interrogated us, they constantly made reference to something they
called -'Protoculture.'"
The intel officer who had almost been attacked by Ben Dixon tilted his
chair back arrogantly. "That's pure fantasy."
His security buddy added, "And were there any little green men?"