"Tuning, William - Terro-Human - Fuzzy 04 - Fuzzy Bones 1.0" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tuning William)

Jack asked, "Do we know anything definite yet about how they use hokfusine-more than that they metabolize it into something that inhibits NFMp production?"

"We think it's like a vitamin to them," Lynne said. ' "They prefer eating land-prawns over anything else, because of the titanium in its middle intestine. But the molecule isn't the same as the hokfusine molecule. They can't convert it into anti-NFMp, even though they're very fond of the taste it gives the land-prawn. We're making a series of endocrine comparisons now to determine what's involved with the titanium in hokfusine that allows its conversion into anti-NFMp and doesn't allow the titanium in land-prawns to be converted." She gave a short laugh. "You have to understand, though, that when I say endocrine system for Fuzzies, that's only the vaguest kind of label; we have precious little information on the subject at this point."

Land-prawns were very important to Fuzzies and a great nuisance to Terrans. They got into gardens; they got into machinery; they got into campsites; they got into bedding- painfully pinching the owner of the bedding when he tried to get into it. They got into wiring and ate the insulation; they got into dirty laundry and ate holes in your socks.

What the Terrans called a land-prawn the Fuzzies called a zatku; a big pseudo-crustacean, about a foot long, twelve-legged and possessed of two pairs of clawed mandibles. Fuzzies hunted zatku avidly and preferred them to any other food-until they tasted EMERGENCY FIELD RATION, EXTRATERRESTRIAL SERVICE TYPE THREE. Fuzzies liked zatku, but they loved Extee-Three. If it hadn't been for the land-prawns starting to move south into the big woods to get away from a drought, the Fuzzies would have stayed in the unexplored country of northern Beta Continent and it would have been years longer before any Terran made contact with them.

At first, it was a mystery why Fuzzies were crazy about Extee-Three, until the greater mystery developed of why they loved some Extee-Three and spit out other Extee-Three when both had been prepared identically.

Actually, almost identically.

A Company Science Center chemist named Charlotte Tresca had proceeded along completely unscientific lines and found that Fuzzies were nuts about only Extee-Three that had been prepared in titanium cookers. It contained a molecule, mostly carbon-oxygen-hydrogen, with five atoms of titanium hooked onto it. Sixty-four atoms in the long-chain organic molecule; five of them titanium. The molecule amounted to about one part per ten million of the Extee-Three.

Fuzzies could tell the difference by taste.

Pretty keen tasting.

Ms. Tresca had named the molecule hokfusine, from the name for Extee-Three in Lingua Fuzzy-hoksu-fusso, wonderful food. That had annoyed the lab chief no end; Dr. Jan Christiaan Hoenveld had planned to name the substance hoenveldine, thus assuring his niche in scientific history, but the term hokfusine was already in widespread usage before he could make up his mind that Charlotte Tresca's research was valid.

Outside Jack Holloway's bungalow, the Zarathustran sunset was blazing orange and red in the western sky. The slanting, ferruginous sunlight cast a coppery glow on the stocky man with a square face who was walking across the footbridge over the creek toward Holloway's house; and silhouetted the five little figures who followed behind him, tinting the soft, golden fur which covered their bodies to a russet red in the falling twilight.

They were erect bipeds, about two feet tall, with round, humanoid faces, little snub noses, big ears, and wide eyes that were very large and appealing. They all wore green canvas pouches made of TFMC ammunition pouches- "'shodda-bags"-on a shoulder-strap, two-inch silver I.D. discs on a chain about their necks, and nothing else. Each of them had a weapon in one hand-a six-inch, leaf-shaped blade on a foot-long steel shaft, with a steel ball welded to the butt end for balance. They were the Fuzzies adopted by George and his men at Constabulary Station Beta Fifteen. The silver discs around their necks were each engraved with the name of the bearer: Dillinger, Dr. Crippen, Ned Kelley, Lizzie Borden, and Calamity Jane.

Just like a bunch of cops, to hang names like that on innocent Fuzzies. But Fuzzies didn't care much what names the Terrans gave them. Fuzzies were glad to be with the Big Ones-the Hagga-and have fun with them, and be protected, and be loved, and to love the Hagga and make them happy. Plenty of time later to find out what all those names meant. There was still a lot for Fuzzies to learn-so many things to learn from the Big Ones.

Jack's Fuzzies heard George Lunt and his family of Fuzzies approaching the house before the Terran humans did, as always. They all jumped up and ran out through the little spring-loaded doorway Jack had built for them.

The Fuzzies went pelting across the open space in front of the house to greet the visitors. They lapsed into their own ultrasonic speaking range, which was inaudible to Terrans except as an occasional "Yeek." There were a lot of "yeeks," with different inflections, as all eleven adult Fuzzies frolicked and pushed and rolled on the ground with their friends.

After the Fuzzy-romp had spent itself, the whole spectacle was repeated, at a lesser intensity, as the Fuzzies greeted their Terran friends : "Heyo Unka Jack. Heyo, Unka Gerd, Auntie Woof, Auntie Win," all garbled together in a brief, delightful jumble of controlled bedlam.

When that was all over, George Lunt said anticlimactically, "I thought the kids might like to have a visit." He took off his pistol and beret and hung them on a peg near the door, signifying that he considered himself off duty. He laid a slender sheaf of papers on Jack's desk-table.

George's Fuzzies were looking over the complex multiple design on the floor, walking respectfully around it, squatting down to view it from different angles, and asking questions of Jack's Fuzzies about the composition.

That had been one of the first things to tip off Jack Holloway and Ben Rainsford that Fuzzies might be sapient; they had color perception and artistic sense, and made useless things just because they were pretty to look at.

Jack bent down and spoke to the group. "Ati-josso-so t'heet? How about esteefee?" Yes, they would love a treat, especially Extee-Three.

"What about you, George?" Jack asked. "Aki-josso-so whiskey?"

"Hokay," George said. "Hoksu. Do-bizzo." He flopped down in a chair and exchanged greetings with the others in the room, all of whom he knew quite well by now.

Jack went into the kitchen and got two of the blue labeled tins down from a cabinet. He divided the Extee-Three into twelve equal portions, cutting up the moist, gingerbread-colored cake with a knife, then laid out the pieces on a plate. With the plate in one hand and George's drink in the other, he returned to the living room, handed the glass to George, and set the plate down on the floor among the Fuzzies.

Each Fuzzy picked up a piece and began to munch on it appreciatively-although Baby Fuzzy was making rather more crumbs than was necessary as he maneuvered his small mouth around a chunk. Mamma Fuzzy gave him a smack and reminded him of good manners.

"What I still can't figure out," George was saying, "is, if Fuzzies are so smart-maybe smarter than we are, like Gerd says-why is it they never discovered fire?"