"Jack Vance - Tschai 1 - City of the Chasch" - читать интересную книгу автора (Vance Jack)

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CITY OF THE CHASCH

TO ONE SIDE of the Explorator IV flared a dim and aging star, Carina 4269; to the other hung a
single planet, gray-brown under a heavy blanket of atmosphere. The star was distinguished only by
a curious amber cast to its light. The planet was somewhat larger than Earth, attended by a pair
of small moons with rapid periods of orbit. An almost typical K2 star, an unremarkable planet, but
for the men aboard the Explorator IV the system was a source of wonder and fascination.

In the forward control pod stood Commander Marin, Chief Officer Deale, Second Officer Walgrave:
three men similarly trim, erect, brisk of movement, wearing the same neat white uniforms, and so
much in each other's company that the wry, offhand intonations in which they spoke, the half-
sarcastic, half-facetious manner in which they phrased their thoughts, were almost identical. With
scanscopes-hand-held binocular photomultiphers, capable of enormous magnification and
amplification-they looked across to the planet.

Walgrave commented, "At casual observation, a habitable planet. Those clouds are surely water-
vapor."

"If signals emanate from a world," said Chief Officer Deale, "we almost automatically assume it to
be inhabited. Habitability follows as a natural consequence of habitation."

Commander Marin gave a dry chuckle. "Your logic, usually irrefutable, is at fault. We are
presently two hundred and twelve light-years from Earth. We received the signals twelve light-
years out; hence they were broadcast two hundred years ago. If you recall, they halted abruptly.
This world may be habitable; it may be inhabited; it may be both. But not necessarily either."

Deale gave his head a doleful shake. "On this basis, we can't even be sure that Earth is
inhabited. The tenuous evidence available to us-"

Beep beep went the communicator. "Speak!" called Commander Marin.

The voice of Dant, the communications engineer, came into the pod: "I'm picking up a fluctuating
field; I think it's artificial but I can't tune it in. It just might be some sort of radar."

Marin frowned, rubbed his nose with his knuckle. "I'll send down the scouts, then we'll back away,
out of range."

Marin spoke a code-word, gave orders to the scouts Adam Reith and Paul Waunder. "Fast as possible;
we're being detected. Rendezvous at System axis, up, Point D as in Deneb."

"Right, sir. System axis, up, Point D as in Deneb. Give us three minutes."

Commander Marin went to the macroscope and began an anxious search of the planet's surface,
clicking through a dozen wavelengths. "There's a window at about 3000 angstroms, nothing good. The
scouts will have to do all of it."

"I'm glad I never trained as a scout," remarked Second Officer Walgrave. "Otherwise I also might
be sent down upon strange and quite possibly horrid planets."