"William Tenn - The Liberation of Earth" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tenn William)

True, there was always the alien who would pause in his evidently supervisory la-bors to release the
set little speech; but not even the excellent manners he displayed, in listening to upward of fifty-six replies
in as many languages, helped dispel the panic caused whenever a human scientist, investigating the
shimmering machines, touched a projecting edge and promptly shrank into a disappearing pinpoint. This,
while not a frequent occurrence, happened often enough to cause chronic indiges-tion and insomnia
among human administrators.


Finally, having used up most of his nervous system as fuel, the professor collated enough of the
language to make conversation possible. HeтАФand, through him, the worldтАФwas thereupon told the
following:
The aliens were members of a highly advanced civilization which had spread its culture throughout
the entire galaxy. Cognizant of the limitations of the as-yet-un-derdeveloped animals who had latterly
become dominant upon Earth, they had placed us in a sort of benevolent ostracism. Until either we or our
institutions had evolved to a level permitting, say, at least associate membership in the galactic federation
(under the sponsoring tutelage, for the first few millennia, of one of the older, more wide-spread and
important species in that federation)тАФuntil that time, all invasions of our privacy and ignoranceтАФexcept
for a few scientific expeditions conducted un-der conditions of great secrecyтАФhad been strictly
forbidden by universal agreement.
Several individuals who had violated this rulingтАФat great cost to our racial sanity, and enormous
profit to our reigning religionsтАФhad been so promptly and severely punished that no known infringements
had occurred for some time. Our recent growth-curve had been satisfactory enough to cause hopes that
a bare thirty or forty centuries more would suffice to place us on applicant status with the federation.
Unfortunately, the peoples of this stellar community were many, and varied as greatly in their ethical
outlook as in their biological composition. Quite a few spe-cies lagged a considerable social distance
behind the Dendi, as our visitors called themselves. One of these, a race of horrible, worm-like organisms
known as the TroxxtтАФalmost as advanced technologically as they were retarded in moral
devel-opmentтАФhad suddenly volunteered for the position of sole and absolute ruler of the galaxy. They
had seized control of several key suns, with their attendant planetary systems, and, after a calculated
decimation of the races thus captured, had announced their intention of punishing with a merciless
extinction all species unable to appre-ciate from these object-lessons the value of unconditional
surrender.
In despair, the galactic federation had turned to the Dendi, one of the oldest, most selfless, and yet
most powerful of races in civilized space, and commissioned themтАФas the military arm of the
federationтАФto hunt down the Troxxt, defeat them wher-ever they had gained illegal suzerainty, and
destroy forever their power to wage war.
This order had come almost too late. Everywhere the Troxxt had gained so much the advantage of
attack that the Dendi were able to contain them only by enormous sacrifice. For centuries now, the
conflict had careened across our vast island uni-verse. In the course of it, densely populated planets had
been disintegrated; suns had been blasted into novae; and whole groups of stars ground into swirling
cosmic dust.
A temporary stalemate had been reached a short while ago, andтАФreeling and breathlessтАФboth
sides were using the lull to strengthen weak spots in their perimeter.
 Thus, the Troxxt had finally moved into the till-then peaceful section of space that contained our
solar systemтАФamong others. They were thoroughly uninterested in our tiny planet with its meager
resources, nor did they care much for such celestial neighbors as Mars or Jupiter. They established their
headquarters on a planet of Proxima CentauriтАФthe star nearest our own sunтАФand proceeded to
consolidate their offensive-defensive network between Rigel and Aldebaran. At this point in their
explanation, the Dendi pointed out, the exigencies of interstellar strategy tended to become too
complicated for anything but three-dimensional maps; let us here ac-cept the simple statement, they