"Kristine Kathryn Rusch - Dancers Like Children" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rusch Kristine Kathryn)

"But there is no agreement."
"You can't negotiate with the Dancers," she said. "They have an
instinctual memory, and a memory for patterns that allows them to learn
language and establish routines. Past events have no meaning for them, only
future events that they hold in their minds. It poses an interesting problem:
if we negotiate a treaty with them, the treaty will not exist, because they
will have forgotten it. If we plan to negotiate a treaty in the future, as
their language and customs allow, the treaty will not exist because the
negotiations haven't started yet."
"Their language has no past tense?"
"Not even a subtle past. They speak only in present and future tenses.
They also have a very active subjunctive. Their lives are very fluid and very
emotional."
"And when one of them dies?"
"He ceases to be." She glanced at me, her lips set in a thin line. "And
then they skin the body, eat the flesh, throw the bones to the children, and
cure the skin. They stretch it and mount it until it becomes firm. And then
they use it to form their tents."
I knew then what was glowing at me through the jars in the tents.
Silver eyes. Wide silver eyes that had absorbed the light from the planet's
powerful sun. "Where did the jars come from?"
"The miners made them. The Dancers used to live closer to the salt
cliffs."
My mind felt cold and information-heavy. Heat rose in waves from the
sand. "What did the children think of the Dancer children?"
Latona shrugged. She took out the cream and reapplied it. "They seemed
fascinated. Who knows what would have happened? Netta banned any child contact
with the Dancers."
"Before the murders?"
"Yes." Latona handed me the cream. "I am not supposed to bring them
back."
I nodded, done asking questions. I drank the water Latona gave me, then
looked across the desert. The dome looked small and far away. I wrapped my
scarf around my face and followed Latona, too tired to do anything other than
walk.
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VII
Latona promised to show me a time-lapse holo of the Dancers' puberty
rite. I eased my way out of the apartment the next morning, unable to comb my
hair because some of the bumps had burst, leaking pus on my scalp. My skin,
which had been a light red the night before, had eased into an even lighter
tan. It would take many hours wearing reflective cream under the sun before my
skin color even approached that of Netta or Latona.
I had barely missed the morning work rush. I walked along the pathway,
staring at yards and the windowless plastic homes. These people made the most
euphoric drug in the galaxy, and they were humorless stay-at-homes who created
beautiful yards, but refused to look at their handiwork from inside the house.
The yards had different flowering plants from different climates and
different seasons. Roses seemed to be predominant, but some blocks preferred
rhododendrons, while others had hyacinths. All of the flowers bloomed, too,