"Tepper, Sheri S - A Plague Of Angels - plangel4" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tepper Sherri)

"Hunagor said yes, but even when men saw their own children dying, still they did not limit their numbers. And I told them what Oracle had taught me: that man believes what man wants to believe, and he always wants to believe the next time will be different.
"Then Hunagor asked why man, who claimed to be proud of his intelligence, preferred such easy belief to the hard choices intelligence requires. And I quoted Oracle again: The end is in the beginning. If children are taught to ignore their minds and merely believe, grown men will never do otherwise."
She fell silent, snuggling into his arms.
"That's only three questions," he said wonderingly.
"Those are the three Hunagor asked. Then Werra asked why man had not been warned b3, the wars he had created; why men did not change when Seoca first sent IDDIs among them; why it was necessary, finally, for the plague of man to be controlled by the plague of angels, in order to save the earth."
"And you gave the same three answers," said Abasio, sure of it.
"I gave the same three answers. Man believes what he wants to believe, and he chose to believe war was merely local or temporary or justifiable. Man could have made the hard choices that would have stopped the immune deficiency diseases in the same way Artemisia controls them now, but those afflicted demanded other choices, their friends demanded other choices, their


A PLAGUE OF ANGELS 421

kin./blk demanded other choices, no government would take a stand that might lose it support, ever), faction found some part of the solution unacceptable. And finally, man wottM not stop destroying the earth until he was forced to do so, for he was reared in the belief h~ was more important than
the earth itself, and the end is in the beginning." "What was the seventh question?" "It will be hard for you, Abasio.t" "Tell me.~" He shook her. Only gently.
Oily sighed, an echo of the sigh the old man Seoca had made when he sat down upon his mighty chair. "The last thing they asked me was this..
Since man was so intransigent, why was he allowed to go to the stars?" "What was your answer to that?" he demanded.
"I should have figured it out long ago, Abasio. So should you." "To save the earth? To conserve the earth? Why?" "Man never went to the stars." He merely stared, disbelieving.
She pursed her mouth, as though she tasted something bitter. ' 'Men never went anywhere but here." She stamped her foot, looking down at the ground beneath them. "His star journey was only a myth. Another in an endless series of man's heroic myths of his own past. Glorious stories to make man the hero, for man always has to be the hero. 'Cock-a-doodle. Crouch, you hens. Here comes the rooster.'"
He could not answer. He thrust her away in his mind, her and the knowledge she had brought him.
"You are of Gaddir kindred, too, Abasio, " she whispered. "Your children will be, and your many-times-great-grandchildren. You will live long. You will see many things--do many things." She leanedJbrward and kissed him. "There is an archetype we never had in any of our villages, Abasio. The Mysterious Stranger. The one who comes and goes, who sees everything,
learns everything. He is needed in this new worM."He could think of nothing to say.
"Farewell, Abasio," she whispered. "I'll be here if you need me." Abasio found the cap between his hands. He had taken it off himself. Bear said, "Poor man. So proud."
Abasio made a warding gesture. Bear merely grunted.
"You've both---experienced this?" Abasio snarled.
"Just me," Coyote whispered. "Oily promised me. She was my friend too. I know man never went to the stars."
"It's not true!" Abasio denied it. Men had gone. Men like himself had gone, taking possession of the universe for mankind!
Bear growled. "Little shuttle. Many men! But man believes what he wants
to believe."


422 Sheri S. Tepper

Coyote yawned. "She said you would see the size of the shuttle, when it went. And she said Tom talked all the time about how many men there had been once. She said reason alone should have told you."
"But there was a space station! There were moon settlements."
"But they were never finished. Oily said men could have gone to the stars if they hadn't been so prick-proud. But they were. So they didn't. They just stayed here and bred!"
"Then why didn't the thrones kill us all?"
"Because you belong here," said Bear.
"That's true," Coyote agreed. "Though some of our people think we'd be better off without you, you do belong here." His voice trailed off, and he put his head upon his paws. His leg hurt mightily. He was weary. Though he had never thought it would happen, he was tired of talk.
Abasio cried, "They ate us up! All our glory! They ate up our stars!" He heard echoes of his voice return from the rocks around them, the sound of
a child in tantrum, hating all the world. "They ate us all up." "That's the point. Someone had to," snarled Coyote. Bear whuffed with laughter.
"Now hush," said Coyote wearily. "It's over. They don't meddle until they must, and once they're done, they're done. They've gone."
"Tiring, this talk!" grumbled Bear, rearing up and sticking his hairy face in Abasio's to give him a close looking-over.
Big Blue stamped his foot, shaking the reins, whinnying a question that
Abasio heard clearly as, "Are we going to sit here all day?""Where?" asked Bear, staring into Abasio's eyes.
Abasio closed his eyes, not caring where they went. Big Blue heaved a sigh and pulled the wagon out onto the downward road, settled himself between the shafts, looked questioningly out over the canyon, farted loudly, and shook his head to make the harness jingle. Then he plodded down the road at an unhurried pace while Bear shambled purposefully along behind.
Abasio stared up at the star-pricked darkness, the shining vault of heaven that he had thought was his, if only by proxy, finding his own star. Abasio's star. His own private glory. His own Book of the Purples. His own legend of past marvels, making him more than he was.
"That's why they started the story," said her voice in his mind. "What man has already done, he need not plunder his worm to do again."
Which was true. He could be less... heroic. He could be more deliberate. Careful. Careful not only of himself...
Something within him shuddered and sat up straight, substituting one vision for another. Instead of glory and power, instead of a gleaming shuttle pushed by its tail of fire, this slow creaking wagon behind this flatulent horse. How