"Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle - Reflex UC" - читать интересную книгу автора (Niven Larry)

All through Defiant nonessential systems died. It took power to maintain the Langston Field, and the more energy the Field had to contain the more internal power was needed to keep the Field from radiating inward. Local overloads produced burnthroughs, pai-tial col
lapses sending busts of energetic photons to punch holes through the hull. The Pield moved toward full collapse, and when that happened, the energies it contained would vaporize Defiant. Total defeat in space is a clean death. -
The screens were indigo and Defiant couldn't spare power to fire her guns or use her engines. Every erg was needed simply to survive.
"We'll have to surrender," Colvin said. "Get the message out."
"I forbid it!"
For a moment Colvin had forgotten the political officer.
"I forbid it!" Gerry shouted again. "Captain, you are relieved from command. Commander Halleck, engage the enemy! We cannot allow him to penetrate to our homeland!"
"Can't do that, sir," Halleck said carefully. The recorded conversation made the executive officer a traitor, as Colvin was the instant he'd given the surrender order.
"Engage the enemy, Captain." Gerry spoke quietly. "Look at~me~Colvjn." -
Herb Colvin turned to see a pistol in Gerry's hands. It wasn't a sonic gun, not even a chemical dart weapon as used by prison guards. Combat armor would stop those. This was a slugthrower-no. A small rocket launcher, but it looked like a slugthrower. Just the
weapon to take to space. - -
"Surrender the ship," Colvin repeated. He motioned with one hand. Gerry looked around, too late, as the quartermaster pinned his arms to his sides. A captain's bridge runner-launched himself across the cabin to seize the pistol.
"I'll have you shot for this!" Gerry shouted. "You've betrayed everything. Our homes, our families-" -
"I'd as soon be shot as surrender," Colvin said. "Besides, the Imperials will probably do for both of us. Treason, you know. Still, I've a right to save the crew."
Gerry said nothing.
"We're dead, Mister. The only reason they haven't finished us off is we're so bloody helpless the Imperial commander's held off firing the last wave of torpedoes
to give us a chance to quit. He can finish us off any time."
"You might damage him. Take him with us, or make it easier for the fleet to deal with him-"
"If I could, I'd do that. I already launched all our torpedoes. They either got through or they didn't. Either way, they didn't kill him, since he's still pouring it on us. He has all the time in the world-look, damn it! We can't shoot at him, we don't have power for the engines, and look at the screens! Violet! Don't you understand, you blithering fool, there's no further place for it to go! A little more, a miscalculation by the Imperial, some little failure here, and that field collapses."
Gerry stared in rage. "Maybe you're right."
"I know I'm right. Any progress, Susack?"
"Message went out," the communications officer said. "And they haven't finished us."
"Right." There was nothing else to say.

A ship in Defiant's situation, her screens overloaded, bombarded by torpedoes and fired on by an enemy she cannot locate, is utterly helpless; but she has been damaged hardly at all. Given time she can radiate the screen energies to space. She can erect antennas to find her enemy. When the screens cool, she can move and she can shoot. Even when she has been damaged by partial collapses, her enemy cannot know that.
Thus, surrender is difficult and requires a precise ritual. Like all of mankind's surrender signals it is artificial, for man has no surrender reflex, no unambiguous species-wide signal to save him from death after defeat is inevitable. Of the higher animals, man is alone in this.
Stags do not fight to the-death. When one is beaten, he submits, and the other allows him to leave the field. The three spine stickleback, a fish of the carp family, fights for its mates but recognizes the surrender of its enemies. Siamese fighting fish will not pursue an enemy after he ceases to spread his gills.
But man has evolved as a weapon using animal. Unlike other animals, man's evolution is intimately bound with weapons and tools; and weapons can kill farther than man can reach. Weapons in the hand of a
defeated enemy are still dangerous. Indeed, the Scottish skean dhu is said to be carried in the stocking so that it may be reached as its owner kneels in supplication.
Defiant erected a simple antenna suitable only for radio signals. Any other form of sensor would have been a hostile act and would earn instant destruction. The Imperial captain observed and sent instructions. -
Meanwhile, torpedoes were being maneuvered alongside Defiant. Colvin couldn't see them. He knew they must be in place when the next signal came through. The Imperial ship was sending an officer to take command.
Colvin felt some of the tension go out of him. If no one had volunteered for the job, Defiant would have been destroyed.
Something massive thumped against the hull. A port had already been opened for the Imperial. He entered carrying a bulky object: a bomb.
"Midshipman Horst Staley, Imperial Battlecruiser MacArthur," the officer announced as he was conducted to the bridge. Colvin could see blue eyes and blonde hair, a young face frozen into a mask of calm because its owner did not trust himself to show any expression a~t aji. "I am to take command of this ship, sir."
Captain Colvin nodded. "I give her to you. You'll want this," he added, handing the boy the microphone. "Thank you for coming."

"Yes, sir." Staley gulped noticeably, then stood at attention as if his captain could see him. "Midshipman Staley reporting, sir. I am on the bridge and the enemy has surrendered." He listened for a few seconds, then turned to Colvin. "I am to ask you to leave me alone on the bridge except for yourself, sir. And to tell you that if anyone else comes on the bridge before our Marines have secured this ship, I will detonate the bomb I carry. Will you comply?"
Colvin nodded again. "Take Mr. Gerry out, quartermaster. You others can go, too. Clear the bridge."
The quartermaster led Gerry toward the door. Suddenly - the political officer broke free and sprang at Staley. He wrapped the midshipman's arms against his body and shouted, "Quick, grab the bomb! Move! Captain, fight your ship, I've got him!"
Staley struggled with the policial officer. His hand groped for the trigger, but he -couldn't reach it. The mike had also been ripped from his hands. He shouted at the dead microphone.
Colvin gently took the bomb from Horst's imprisoned hands. "You won't need this, son," he said. "Quartermaster, you can take your prisoner off this bridge." His smile was fixed, frozen in place, in sharp contrast to the midshipman's shocked rage and Gerry's look of
triumph. -
The spacers reached out and Horst Staley tried to escape, but there was no place to go as he floated in free space. Suddenly he realized that the spacers had seized his attacker, and Gerry was screaming.
"We've surrendered, Mister Staley," Colvin said carefully. "Now we'll leave you in command here. You can have your bomb, but you won't be needing it."