"Arcady And Boris Strugatsky. Prisoners of Power" - читать интересную книгу автораMac?"
"Mac, don't you want to say anything?" asked the General. "I already have. The new plan is better than the old one, but still poor. Let me do the job myself. Take the risk." "We won't go into that." The General was irritated. "And that ends the matter. Do you have anything practical to add?" "No," replied Maxim, regretting that he had reopened the discussion. "Where did you get these new pills?" Memo asked suddenly. "They are the same as the old ones," explained the General, "but Mac managed to make them a little more effective." "Ah, yes, Mac..." Memo's disparaging tone made everyone feel uneasy. It conveyed the notion that here was a greenhorn, not really one of them, an alien who might even be setting them up. "Yes, Mac," said the General sharply. "Enough talk. The order is from headquarters. Obey it, Hoofer!" "I am." Memo shrugged his shoulders. "I'm opposed to it, but I'm obeying it. What else can I do?" Maxim looked at them sadly. A completely heterogeneous group. Under normal circumstances it would probably never occur to them to associate with each other. Ex-farmer, ex-criminal, ex-teacher. What they were about to undertake seemed so senseless; in a few hours most of them would be dead and nothing in their world would have changed. Those who survived would have, at best, a brief respite from those excruciating pains. But they would be wounded or exhausted from the ordeal. They would be pursued like dogs and would have to hide out in stifling holes. And the cycle would begin again. unconscionable. He had to choose the former. Maybe that was the way you had to work here if you wanted to accomplish anything. You would have to endure folly, senseless bloodshed, even treachery. What miserable, stupid, evil people. But what could one expect from such a miserable, stupid, evil world? Folly springs from weakness, and weakness from ignorance, from ignorance of the correct path. It's impossible that the correct one can't be found. "I've tried one already, and it was wrong. It's evident that the one I'm about to take is wrong, too. Who knows, I might choose the wrong one again and again and find myself at a dead end. To whom am I trying to justify my actions? And why should I? I like these people and I can help them. For the present, that's all I need to know." "We'll split up now," said the General. "Hoofer, you go with Forester. Mac with Green. Ordi with me. At twenty-one hundred we meet at the boundary marker. Don't take the roads; go through the woods. Each of you is responsible for your partner, so stick together. Let's go now. Memo and Green first." He brushed the butts onto a sheet of paper, rolled it up, and put it in his pocket. Forester rubbed his knees. "My bones ache. It's going to rain. That means a fine night for us - good and dark." 11. They had to crawl from the edge of the woods to the barbed wire. Green crawled ahead, dragging a pole with a linear charge and swearing at the barbs pricking his hands. Behind him crawled Maxim with a sack of magnetic |
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