"C. L. Moore - Greater Than Gods" - читать интересную книгу автора (Moore C. L)

conquered; the atom had yielded up its incalculable power in the harness of
the machines, space itself was a highway for the vehicles of the U. W.
Under the blue-black skies of Mars, mankind's checkerboard cities patterned
the hot red soil; under the soft gray clouds of Venus, those
roofed and checkered cities spread from a common center through jungles
steaming in more than tropic heat. Many-mooned Jupiter was drawing the
covetous eyes of the Leaders in their sky-high cities of glass and steel.
And moving through these patterned cities upon three worlds, the followers of
the Leader went about their ways, resolute, unfaltering, their faces set in
one pattern of determination.
It was not a happy pattern. There was little laughter here; the only emotion
upon the serious faces, aside from the shadow of that same exaltation that
blazed in the Leader's eyes, was a subtle furtiveness, a sidelong quality that
by intuition seemed to distrust its neighbors. Bill recognized it. Every man's
duty was to sacrifice for the Cause not only his personal desires and
happiness, but his personal honor as well; he must keep relentlessly alert for
traitorous weakness in his friends, his associates, his own family.
Mistily the panorama of the centuries began to melt into itself, to fade,
while behind it a blue-eyed face, helmed in blue steel, took form to smile
straight into Bill's eyes. A tense, expectant smile, supremely confident.


Bill sat back and breathed deeply, avoiding for a moment the proudly smiling
face of his son. "I'm-there!" he was thinking. "That was me being born again
and again, working with all my heart to crush out human happiness- But there
was Sue, too, generations of her-yes, and of me-working just as sincerely
toward an opposite goal, a world without war. Either way they've got me. If I
don't finish my work, the world unbalances toward matriarchy; if I do, mankind
turns into a machine. It's bad. Either way it's bad-"
"The doctor is almost overwhelmed at the realization of his own greatness,"
Dunn's voice murmured from the window into the future. Bill recognized it for
a sort of apology, and sat up with an effort to meet the pride-bright eyes of
the boy who one day might be his son. There was nothing but happy expectancy
of praise on the boy's face, but Dunn must have read a little doubt in Bill's,
for he said heavily, as if to overwhelm that doubt:
"We build toward one common end, all of us-we have no thought for any smaller
purpose than the conquest of the Solar System for the mighty race of man! And
this great purpose is yours no less than ours, Dr. Cory."
"Manpower is what counts, you know, sir." Young Billy's voice took up the tale
as Dunn's died. "We've got tremendous reserves, and
we're piling up still more. Lots of room yet on Mars to fill up, and Venus is
almost untouched yet. And after that, we'll breed men and women adapted to
Jupiter's gravity, perhaps . . . oh, there'll be no end to our power, sir!
We'll go on and on- Who knows? There may come a day when we're a United
Universe!"
For an instant, hearing the young voice shake with eagerness, Bill doubted his
own doubtfulness. The mighty race of man! And he was part of it, living in
this far-off future no less than he lived now in the flesh, in the burning
ardor of this iron-faced boy. For a moment he forgot to be amazed and
incredulous that he stood in the Twenty-third Century and looked as if through