"Bruce Holland Rogers - Big Far Now" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rogers Bruce Holland)

looked around the room at us, from face to face, grinning so hard I thought its lips would split. Someone
-- Susan Suhl, I think -- had told me that Shies grinned when they were anxious.
Joanna looked at me as if to say, You still with me on this? My tongue felt like it was pasted to the
roof of my mouth. I avoided her gaze.
"Well," Meeker said. He waited for us to look at him. "Well. I don't mind telling you that this meeting is
largely a formality." He looked at Joanna. "But we are technically required to assemble and vote on an
economic plan for the colony, so here we are."
The Shy beside Joanna yawned and scratched and went right on grinning. The morning rain started to
patter on the roof.
"As far as I know," the governor continued, "there is only one verified source for paying off our charter
debt. If we fail to pay it off, I don't have to tell you what it will mean."
It meant Earth. It meant being dirty and hungry and crowded all the time. It meant eating synthmeals
when you could get them, breathing through catalyzers, and not going outside without a UV screen. It
meant living every day with the violence that an overcrowded, dying planet bred. Worst of all, for most of
us, it meant boredom.
"What about the planet's biota?" Joanna said. "This is an unusually rich planet, isn't it?"
Meeker said, "Dr. Suhl?"
Susan Suhl stood up. "Veloz is unusual, but hardly rich," she said. I wished the rain weren't so loud on
the roof. "The life-forms are chemically dissimilar from us. Bizarre, actually, compared to other planets.
Though the plants and animals here are made of elements in roughly the same proportion as life on Earth,
many of the basic chemical structures are not analogous. We may eventually isolate some useful
compounds, but on Veloz we will first have to relearn our basic biochemistry. It's going to take time, and
we may come up empty, especially since we don't have many species to work with. So far, it appears
there are only about five hundred different species on the planet. That may sound like a lot, but it includes
insect analogues and microorganisms."
Joanna's Shy started to sway from side to side now, and it was eyeing the door. Joanna put her hand
on its head. It clutched her fingers and stopped swaying.
"How long do you think it might take," she said, "to find something valuable?"
Suhl shook her head. "No way of knowing."
"No way of knowing. But you aren't up to the challenge, are you, Dr. Suhl?"
Suhl blinked. "Pardon?"
Joanna looked around the room. "Our first estimates were that this colony could pay its way through
biological discoveries. Now things look tough, and the chief biologist wants to bail out."
Meeker said, "Carpaccio, you're out of line!"
The Shy jumped at the sound of the man's voice. Joanna stroked the fuzzy head. "Sorry," she said.
She looked at Suhl. "I do apologize. I'm just trying to establish that the biological avenue of research
hasn't been exhausted yet. Has it, Susan?"
Suhl shook her head. "Not by any means."
"Thank you," Joanna said. "And I do apologize. I was out of line."
Suhl smiled a little warily and sat down.
"Well," said Meeker, "the point is that the biological approach is uncertain, whereas we have a proven
source of profit in the research Dr. Balas has done. Balas?"
My tongue was thick. I wasn't sure I could move it.
"Balas," said Meeker impatiently, "report."
"I think," I said, feeling the words fall like marbles from my mouth, "I think everyone knows what I
found."
"Yes," said Meeker, "but we haven't had it officially yet, have we? Report, mister!"
What an officious ass, I thought.
"All right." I cleared my throat, but it still felt like it was stuffed with cotton. "Based on my satellite
survey, Veloz is mostly unpromising for mining. The remote scan showed that for a depth of two