"Arcady And Boris Strugatsky. Prisoners of Power" - читать интересную книгу автора

their ancient rifles, flung them down, dropped to the ground, and covered
their eyes with their hands so they wouldn't see themselves mauled to
pieces. And Maxim, too, lost his head. Well, not exactly, but he didn't want
to fight the vampires. I had to do their dirty work for them. Clips were all
gone, so I used my gun butt. Luckily, there weren't many of them. Six, in
all. Two were killed, one escaped, and three were knocked unconscious. We
bound them and planned to take them to the village in the morning and
execute them. Well, that night I took a look and what did I see? Maxim had
gotten up quietly and gone to them. He sat with them, nursed them, applied
hand massage, then untied them. They weren't fools. Naturally, they took to
their heels. I said to him: 'Mac, why the hell did you do that?' 'I don't
know myself,' he said, 'but I feel that it's wrong to execute them. Wrong to
kill people, or even these things. They are neither dogs nor vampires.'
"If they aren't vampires, what are they? Flying mice? The hell they
are: they're flying horrors. What else could be roaming through the village
at night, stealing children? And they don't even enter the house, but the
children, still asleep, go out to them. Suppose it is a pack of lies - but
I've seen a thing or two myself. I still remember the day the duke took us
to see the closest entrance to the Fortress. We saw this beautiful, peaceful
green meadow. And a knoll. In the knoll was a cave. We looked and saw the
entire meadow in front of the cave's entrance strewn with dead vampires.
About two dozen of them, at least, and they weren't crippled or wounded. Not
a drop of blood on the grass. But most surprising was Maxim's diagnosis
after he had examined them. Not dead, he said, but in a trance, as if they
had been hypnotized. The question is how did it happen. It's certainly an
uncanny place. You can go there only in the daytime, and even then you have
to be careful. If it weren't for Maxim, I'd have taken off like a streak of
lightning. But where could I have gone? It's all forest, and the forest is
full of evil spirits. No tank - our tank sank in a swamp. Could I have run
back to my own country? That would have seemed the natural thing to do - to
run back to my own people. But are they mine now? They, too, are freaks,
puppets. Maxim is right. What kind of people are they, that they can be
controlled by machines? No, I've no use for them."

Maxim and Guy entered the square, a wasteland; in its center stood the
fused metal remains of a monument. They turned toward the one surviving
cottage where the city's representatives gathered to exchange rumors and
advice on sowing or hunting, or simply to sit, doze, or listen to the duke's
stories of bygone days.
The people had already assembled in a large, clean room. How repulsive
it was to look at them. Even at the duke. Although apparently not a mutant,
he too was disfigured. Bums and scars covered his face. They entered,
exchanged greetings, and sat down in a circle on the floor. Boshku, who was
sitting beside the stove, removed a teapot from the coals, and served each
of them a cup of good strong tea. Without sugar. Guy accepted his cup - a
cup of unusual beauty, priceless, made of royal porcelain. He set it down in
front of him, leaned the butt of his gun on the floor between his knees,
pressed his forehead against its ribbed barrel, and closed his eyes to avoid
seeing them.
The duke opened the meeting. He had been the Fortress' chief surgeon.