"Jeff VanderMeer - A Heart For Lucretia" - читать интересную книгу автора (Vandermeer Jeff)

"Gems?" Whitey hissed. "Gems! For a human heart?"
Gerard shrank back into his chair.
"But I--"
"Do you mean to insult me?" His tail twitched and twitched.
"No! My sister Lucretia is dying! Her heart is bad. I have brought the
richest stones I could find..."
Flesh Dog rose onto his haunches, fur bristling, teeth bared.
Yellow patted Gerard's shoulder.
"There, there. No need to shock our guest. What else do you have?"
Here was a warm-hearted fellow, a generous fellow. Perhaps Yellow could
be
satisfied. Gerard scrabbled in his pack, pulled out an autodoc part.
"There. It is almost new."
Yellow's claws bit into his shoulder. Strangely, Gerard felt no pain,
though the shock made him bite back a scream.
"No," said Yellow, voice like ice. ""No, I'm sorry, but this won't
do...this won't do at all. You come here, down all fifteen levels, spy
on
us, and offer us used parts?"
Flesh Dog growled and Gerard shook off Yellow's grasp. Why did he feel
so
numb? He was a fool, he realized, to have come here. In his ignorance
he
might well have come into the clutches of villains.
Gerard felt Flesh Dog against his feet, a position from which to guard
him, and an unworthy thought crept into his head.
"What about Flesh Dog?" he asked Whitey. "I will trade Flesh Dog's
talents
for a heart..." An unfair trade considering the multitude of services
Flesh Dog performed, but it was after all a beast. Surely a human life
outweighed ownership of a talking beast? He tried to ignore the
animal's
whining.
Yellow nodded. "Very good. Very good indeed. However," and he pushed a
button, "not good enough."
One of the partitions slid back. Behind it: one hundred Flesh Dogs,
their
parts not yet assembled, so that the heads sat upon one shelf while the
bodies sagged in rows below. Two men, like the ones in the pit, lay
sprawled in a corner.
Gerard gaped at the sight. So many Flesh Dogs. Dead? Decapitated? It
made
no sense. But then, neither did the numbness spreading through his
body.
Flesh Dog shuddered, shook its head, and moaned.
One hundred heads, connected by one hundred wires to one hundred
nutrient
vats, turned to stare at him, with their globby folds of tissue
dangling.
"We are," said Yellow, pausing, "overstocked on Flesh Dogs at the