"Bruce Holland Rogers - In the Matter of the Ukdena" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rogers Bruce Holland)

***


Hank, this is going to come down to you through channels, but before it does I wanted you to have
some advance notice of the new policy regarding Navy fighter jets for use in vision quests. NAFCOM
acknowledges the right of pilots and their RIOs to use any means at their disposal to seek a vision, but
loss of an Ukdena in the Sixth Fleet's carrier group has lead us to formulate what you might call Rules of
Engagement with the Great Mystery.
***


The F-4 Ukdena is rated at a service ceiling of 43,000 at power, but the crew of the Sixth Fleet
mishap had throttled up hard and gone to 56,000.
***


Hank, you and I both know how imminent the Great Mystery must be at ten miles above the earth, but
we also know that this was a thousand feet above the fleet-configured F-4's maximum rating. A pilot in
combat won't make a mistake like that, but a pilot who's flying into the sun can get a little lost up there.
***


From now on, each crew is allowed one official quest flight per deployment, and they aren't to climb
above the military-power service ceiling. I know that there will be some grumbling about this, and I know
that there will be covert questing beyond what we're officially sanctioning, but this will at least make it
clear that the pain of the sundance is meant for the body, not the airframe of a fighter plane.
***


The red tribes
on this Turtle Island
were as varied as any people,
but most of them tried to discover
right relation to one another
and to the earth.

* * *

The red tribes believed in
the spiral,
the circle,
and everything
was alive.

* * *

Don't get the idea
that these people were flames of enlightenment.
Any human being drags a shadow.