"Dafydd ab Hugh, Brad Linaweawer DOOM: Endgame (english)" - читать интересную книгу автора

The Newbie sat rigidly still on the operating table,
arms hanging limply at its sides, almost as if they were
barely usable. Probably the result of being dead and
imperfectly revivified, I guessed. "Do you attempt to
fix all races that don't, um, grow to meet the circum-
stances?"
"We have never encountered other races before.
Until we grew, we did not realize we were a planet; we
thought we were the world."
"Why did the Newbies leave you behind?"
"We are the Newbies. We don't understand the
question. We require further growth or fixing."
"Why are you, you personally, still here on Fred-
world? Why aren't you with the Newbies?"
"Your syntax is confusing us. We are here and we
are there."
Oh criminey! Another freaking hive culture. The
Klave were bad enough, being able only to see pairs
and powers of two (pairs of pairs of pairs)... now
these Newbies didn't even understand the concept of
an individual member of a species.
"We must withdraw to consider your information,"
I said. "Newbies, please wait on this table and else-
where."
"Newbies will wait." The Newbie closed its eyes
. . . and all life signs ceased! The machines giving
their steady thuds with every beat of each heart
(threeЧone in the groin area, one in the stomach,
and a smaller one circulating blood through the head)
fell silent, and a rasping buzz sounded as respiration
and body temperature plunged.
I stared. Had something inside the Newbie's stom-
ach moved? I leaned close, staring, then I thought
about that grotesque movie from the late 1900s and
the thing popping out of the chest, so I stepped back
warily. But something inside the Newbie was defi-
nitely on the move; it rippled across the alien's belly
from east to west, slithering around. "Sears and
Roebuck," I called, "did you pick up any large
parasites or symbiotes that might be using the Newbie
as a host?"
Sears and Roebuck looked at each other, hands on
heads in agitation. "No," they said, "definitely noth-
ing there was that produces such a motion could
produce."
"Jesus, Fly, what's happening to it? It looks like it's
being eaten alive! Is it dying?" Arlene and I split,
stepping to either side of the Newbie, weapons at the
ready. The snake or worm or whatever it was pressed
up against the Newbie's stomach, bulging out the