"Donald Westlake - SH6 - Here's Looking At You" - читать интересную книгу автора (Westlake Donald E)

тАЬKybee, itтАЩs me! ItтАЩs Pam!тАЭ But it was the other one who said that.
Pam hurried toward Kybee, crying, тАЬDonтАЩt listen to her! SheтАЩs---SheтАЩs-- I
donтАЩt know what she is!тАЭ
тАЬThe ship,тАЭ Kybee muttered, dazed. тАЬSave the ship.тАЭ
тАЬYes,тАЭ Pam said, reaching for his arm, her terror deepening when he pulled
away. тАЬWeтАЩll go into the ship,тАЭ she said. тАЬWeтАЩll figure out---тАЬ
But he was backing away, staring from her to the impostor, his eyes terrified.
тАЬHow do I--- How can I-- You donтАЩt get inside the ship!тАЭ And he turned and ran.
 The Billys and the Hesters and the Ensign Bensons were building sheds and
lean-tos. The Councilman Luthgusters were sorting through the food supplies
Kybee had pushed out of the ship the day before so that the real crew members
wouldnтАЩt starve to death. The Pams were cooking on the makeshift stoves the
Hesters had constructed. Most of the Captain Standforths had quit banging on the
HopefulтАЩs door and yelling on the monitor cameras and had wandered off across the
landscape, presumably in search of birds suitable for taxidermy.
In a horrible way, it was fascinating to see how the creatures worked it. The
fear and disbelief and repugnance that were the natural reaction of the real crew
members were perfectly mirrored in all the imitations. Then, as time went by without
any change in the situation, with no further events, no escalation of threat, as horror
became dulled, that, too, was echoed, the real and the fakes all calming together,
getting used to this madness together.
If he were out there with the rest of them, would he behave any differently from the
headshaking wide-eyed Ensign Bensons he watched on the viewscreens? No, he
would not.
It was two days since Kybee had run back into the ship and sealed the entrance
behind him, and he had not yet slept. What was he going to do? What were any of
them going to do? They were doomed here, just like the original colonists. He
couldnтАЩt fly the ship alone, and even if he could, what about the others? He couldnтАЩt
just abandon them here, in this hell on Earth. Or hell on Matrix. тАЬIn this case,тАЭ
Kybee muttered to himself, watching the mobs on the viewscreens, тАЬhell really is
other people.тАЭ
It was strange how circumstances changed attitudes. Kybee had always felt
impatient loathing toward his shipmates, knowing himself to be the only truly sharp тАУ
and sharp-edged тАУ person on the ship. He had thought it miserably unfair that he
should be assigned to this team of losers on this mission into oblivion; what did he
have in common with them?
It was only now, in this extremity, that he found himself drawing parallels, that
he saw his own social prickliness as much of a liability as HesterтАЩs bluntness or
PamтАЩs unworldliness or the councilmanтАЩs pomposity. Damn it, somehow, damn it,
in the course of their voyage, damn it, they had become a team, damn it, a unit, while
his back was turned, damn it, some kind of stupid tribe. His shipmates were in
trouble out there, damn it, and he was the only one in the universe who could help.
Except, of course, that he couldnтАЩt. What was there to do? Forty colonists
had spent four years trying to solve this problem, without success. How could he
hope to do anything but keep the interior of the ship free of impostors by banning
everything?
ThereтАЩs something comforting about despair. When Kybee realized that there
truly was no way out, that they were all stuck on Matrix for the rest of their lives,
himself inside the ship and the rest of the crew outside amid the crowds of ersatz, A
kind of peace descended on him. ThereтАЩs nothing to be done; doom is at hand; no