"Murray Leinster - The Mutant Weapon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Leinster Murray)

file:///D|/Documents%20and%20Settings/harry/Desktop/Murray%20Leinster%20-%20The%20Mutant%20Weapon%20.txt

CHAPTER I
"The probability of unfavorable consequences cannot be zero in any action of common life, but the
probability increases by a very high power as a series of actions iti lengthened. The effect of
moral considerations, in conduct, may be stated to be a mathematically verifiable reduction in the
number of unfavorable possible chance happenings. Of course, whether this process is called the
intelligent use of probability, or ethics, or piety, makes no difference in the facts. It is the
method by which unfavorable chance happenings are made least probable. Arbitrary actions such as
we call criminal cannot ever be justified by mathematics. For example ..."
Probability and Human Conduct--Fitzgerald
CALHOUN lay in his bunk and read Fitzgerald on Probability jtmd Human Conduct as the little Med
Ship floated in overdrive. In overdrive travel there is nothing to do but pass the time away.
Murgatroyd, the tormal, slept curled up in a ball in one corner of the small ship's cabin. His
tail was meticulously curled about his nose. The ship's lights burned steadily. There were those
small random noises which have to be provided to keep a man sane in the dead stillness of a ship
traveling at very many times the speed of light. Calhoun turned a page and yawned.
Something stirred somewhere. There was a click, and a taped voice said:
"When the tone sounds, breakout will be five seconds off."
A metronomic clicking, grave and deliberate, resounded in the stillness. Calhoun heaved himself up
from the bunk and marked his place in the book. He moved to and seated himself in the control
chair and fastened the safety belt. He said:
"Murgatroyd. Hark, hark the lark in Heaven's something-or-other doth sing. Wake up and comb your
whiskers. We're getting there."
Murgatroyd opened one eye and saw Calhoun in the pilot's chair. He uncurled himself and padded to
a place where there was something to grab hold of. He regarded Calhoun with bright eyes.
"Bong!" said the tape. It counted down. "Five . . . four . . . three . . . two . . one . . ."
It stopped. The ship popped out of overdrive. The sensation was unmistakable. Calhoun's stomach
seemed to turn over twice, and he had a sickish feeling of spiraling dizzily in what was somehow a
cone. He swallowed. Murgatroyd made gulping noises. Outside, everything changed.
The sun Maris blazed silently in emptiness off to port. The Cetis star-cluster was astern,, and
the light by which it could be seen had traveled for many years to reach here, though Calhoun
had left Med Headquarters only three weeks before. The third planet of Maris swung
splendidly in its orbit. Calhoun checked, and nodded in satisfaction. He spoke over his shoulder
to Murgatroyd. "We're here, all right." "Chee!" shrilled Murgatroyd.
He uncoiled his tail from about a cabinet handle and hopped up to look at the vision screen. What
he saw, of course, meant nothing to him. But all tormals imitate the actions of human beings, as
parrots imitate their speech. He blinked wisely at the screen and turned his eyes to Calhoun.
"It's Maris HI," Calhoun told him, "and pretty close. It's a colony of Dettra Two. One city
was reported started two Earth-years ago. It should just about be colonized now." "Chee-chee!"
shrilled Murgatroyd.
"So get out of the way," commanded Calhoun. "We'll make our approach and I'll tell 'em we're
here."
He made a standard approach on interplanetary drive. Naturally, it was a long process: But after
some hours he flipped over the call switch and made the usual identification and landing request.
"Med Ship Aesclipus Twenty to ground," he said into the transmitter. "Requesting co-ordinates for
landing. Our mass
is fifty tons. Repeat, five-oh tons. Purpose of landing: planetary health inspection."
He relaxed. This job ought to be purest routine. There was a landing grid in the spaceport city on
Maris III. From its control room instructions should be sent, indicating a position some five