"Robert Reed - Decency" - читать интересную книгу автора (Reed Robert)

"It's in pain," Caleb muttered afterward.

The doctor looked at him, then away. "Are you sure?"

What a strange response. Of course it was in pain. He searched for the
usual trappings of hospitals and illness. Where were the dangling bags of
medicine and food? "Are you giving it morphine?" he asked, fully
expecting to be told, "Of course."

But instead Hilton said, "Why? Why morphine?"

As if speaking to an idiot, Caleb said each word with care. "In order to
stop the pain, naturally."

"Except morphine is an intricate, highly specific compound. It kills the
hurt in Marines, but probably not in aliens." She waited a moment, then
gestured. "You've got more in commonтАФbiochemically speaking тАФwith
these birch trees. Or a flu virus, for that matter."

He didn't understand, and he said so.

"This creature has DNA," she explained, "but its genetic codes are all
different. It makes different kinds of amino acids, and very unusual
proteins. Enzymes nothing like ours. And who knows what kinds of
neurotransmitters."

The alien's mouth opened, and Caleb braced himself.

It closed, and he sighed.

"We've found organs," said Hilton, sipping her coffee. "Some we know,
some we don't. Three hearts, but two are punctured. Dead. The scar tissue
shows radiation tracks. Count them, and we get an estimate of the tissue's
age. A thousand years, maybe. Which means it was injured when it flew
through a dust storm, probably on its way out of the last solar system."

The alien was about the size of a good riding horse. It seemed larger
only because of its peculiar flattened shape. The wounds were surgically
precise holes, wisps of dust having pierced diamond as well as flesh.
Knowing what ballistic wounds meant, he asked, "How is it even alive?"

"Implanted machinery, in part. Most of the machinery isn't working,
but what does is repairing some tissues, some organs." She took a big
swallow of coffee. "But its wounds may not have been the worst news.
Marvin and my other esteemed colleagues think that the cosmic buckshot
crippled most of the sail's subsystems. The reactors, for instance. There
were three of them, a city block square each, thick as a playing card.
Without power, the creature had no choice but to turn everything off,
including itself. A desperation cryogenic freeze, probably for most of the