"Herbert, Frank - The Green Brain" - читать интересную книгу автора (Herbert Brian & Frank)

There was. no mistaking the gesture. The thing was a weapon.
Slowly, Joao stepped up into the truck, crossed to the bench, lowered his father gently on to the padded surface.
The Indian with the flute motioned him to step back and he obeyed.
The other Indian bent over the elder Martinho's head, raised an eyelid. There was a professional directness about the gesture that startled Joao. The Indian pushed gently on the dying man's diaphragm, removed the Prefect's belt, loosened his collar. A stubby brown finger was placed against the artery in the old man's neck.
'Very weak,' the Indian rasped.
Joao took another look at the Indian, wondering at a sertao backwoodsman who behaved like a doctor.
'Hospital,' the Indian agreed.
'Hospital?' asked the one with the flute.
A low, stridulant hissing came from the other Indian.
'Hospital,' said the one with the flute.
That stridulant hissing! Joao stared at the Indian beside the Prefect. That sound had been reminiscent of the call that had echoed across the lawn.
The one with the flute poked him, said, 'You. Go into front and maneuver this ... '
'Vehicle,' said the one beside Joao's father.
'Vehicle,' said the one with the flute.
'Hospital?' Joao pleaded.
'Hospital,' agreed the one with the flute.
Once more, Joao looked at his father. The old man was so still. The other Indian already was strapping the elder Martinho to the bench in preparation for flight. How competent the man appeared in spite of his backwoods look.
'Obey,' said the one with the flute.
Joao opened the hatch into the front compartment, slipped through, felt the armed Indian follow. A few drops of rain spattered darkly against the curved windshield. Joao squeezed into the operator's seat. The compartment went dark as the hatch was closed. Solenoids threw the automatic hatch dogs with a dull thump. Joao turned on the dash standby lights, noted how the Indian crouched behind him, flute pointed and ready.
A dart gun of some kind, Joao guessed. Probably poison.
He punched the igniter button on the dash, strapped himself in while waiting for the turbines to build up speed. The Indian still crouched behind him without safety harness - vulnerable now if the airtruck were spun sharply.
Joao flicked the communications switch on the lower left corner of the dash, looked into the tiny screen there giving him a view of the lab compartment. The rear doors were open. He closed them by hydraulic remote. His father lay securely strapped to the bench, the other Indian seated at his head.
The turbines reached their whining peak.
Joao switched on the lights, engaged hydrostatic drive. The truck lifted about ten centimeters, angled upward as Joao increased pump displacement. He turned left on to the street, lifted another two meters to increase speed, headed toward the lights of a boulevard.
The Indian spoke beside his ear: 'Turn toward the mountain over there.' A hand came forward, pointed to the right.
The Alejandro Clinic is in the foothills, Joao thought. Yes, that's the correct direction.
Joao made the indicated turn down a cross street that angled toward the boulevard.
Casually, he gave pump displacement another boost, lifted another meter and increased speed once more. In the same motion, he switched on the intercom to the rear compartment, keyed it for the amplifier and pickup beneath the bench where his father lay.
The pickup, capable of making a dropped pin sound like a cannon, emitted only a distant hissing and rasping. Joao increased amplification. The instrument should have been transmitting the old man's heartbeats now, sending a noticeable drum-thump into the forward cabin.
There was no sound but that hissing, rasping.
Tears blurred Joao's eyes. He shook his head to clear them.
My father's dead, he thought. Killed by these crazy backwoodsmen.
He noted in the dash screen that the Indian back there had a hand under the elder Martinho's back. The Indian appeared to be massaging the dead man's back. The rhythmic rasping matched the motion.
Anger filled Joao. He felt like diving the airtruck into an abutment, dying himself to kill these crazy men.
The truck was approaching the city's outskirts. Ring-girders circled off to the left, giving access to the boulevard. This was an area of small gardens and cottages protected by overfly canopies.
Joao lifted the airtruck over the canopies, headed toward the boulevard. To the clinic, yes, he thought. But it's too late.
In that instant, he realised there were no heartbeats at all coming from the rear compartment - only that slow, rhythmic grating plus, now that his ears searched for it, a cicada-like hum up and down the scale.
'To the mountains, there,' said the Indian behind him. Again that hand came forward to point off to the right.
Joao, with the hand close to his eyes illuminated by the dash lights, saw the scale-like parts of a finger shift position. In that shift, he recognised the scale shapes by their claw fringes.
The beetles!
The finger was composed of linked beetles working in unison!
Joao turned, stared into the Indian's eyes, saw then why they glistened so brightly: they were composed of thousands of tiny facets.
'Hospital, there,' the creature beside him said, pointing.
Joao turned back to the controls, fought to keep from losing composure. They weren't Indians ... they weren't even humans. They were insects - some kind of hive-cluster shaped and organised to mimic a man.
The implications of this discovery raced through his mind. How did they support their weight? How did they feed and breathe?
How did they speak?
Every personal concern had to be subordinated to the urgent need for getting this information and proof of it back to one of the big government labs where the facts could be explored.
Even the death of his father could not be considered now. Joao knew he had to capture one of these things, get out with it. He reached overhead, flicked on the command transmitter, set its beacon for a homing call. Let some of my Irmaos be awake and monitoring their sets, he prayed.
'More to the right,' rasped the creature behind him.
Again Joao corrected course.