"William Tenn - The Liberation of Earth" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tenn William)

suggested, that it became immediately vital for them to strike rapidly, and make the Troxxt position on
Proxima Centauri untenable—to establish a base inside their lines of communication. The most likely spot
for a such a base was Earth.


The Dendi apologized profusely for intruding on our development, an intrusion which might cost us
dear in our delicate developmental state. But, as they explained—in impeccable pre-Bengali—before
their arrival we had, in effect, become (all un-knowingly) a satrapy of the awful Troxxt. We could now
consider ourselves liberated.
We thanked them much for that.
Besides, their leader pointed out proudly, the Dendi were engaged in a war for the sake of
civilization itself, against an enemy so horrible, so obscene in its nature, and so utterly filthy in its
practices, that it was unworthy of the label of intelligent life. They were fighting, not only for themselves,
but for every loyal member of the galac-tic federation; for every small and helpless species; for every
obscure race too weak to defend itself against a ravaging conqueror. Would humanity stand aloof from
such a conflict?
There was just a slight bit of hesitation as the information was digested. Then—"No!" humanity
roared back through such mass-communication media as televi-sion, newspapers, reverberating jungle
drums, and mule-mounted backwoods mes-senger. "We will not stand aloof. We will help you
destroy this menace to the very fabric of civilization! Just tell us what you want us to do!"
Well, nothing in particular, the aliens replied with some embarrassment. Possibly in a little while there
might be something—several little things, in fact—which could be quite useful; but, for the moment, if we
would concentrate on not getting in their way when they serviced their gun-mounts, they would be very
grateful, really...
This reply tended to create a large amount of uncertainty among the two billion of Earth's human
population. For several days afterward, there was a planet-wide ten-dency—the legend has come down
to us—of people failing to meet each other's eyes.
But then Man rallied from this substantial blow to his pride. He would be useful, be it ever so
humbly, to the race which had liberated him from potential subjugation by the ineffably ugly Troxxt. For
this, let us remember well our ancestors! Let us hymn their sincere efforts amid their ignorance!
All standing armies, all air and sea fleets, were reorganized into guard-patrols around the Dendi
weapons; no human might approach within two miles of the murmuring machinery without a pass
countersigned by the Dendi. Since they were never known to sign such a pass during the entire period of
their stay on this planet, however, this loophole-provision was never exercised as far as is known; and
the immediate neighborhood of the extraterrestrial weapons became and remained henceforth
wholesomely free of two-legged creatures.


Cooperation with our liberators took precedence over all other human activities. The order of the day
was a slogan first given voice by a Harvard professor of government in a querulous radio round table on
"Man's Place in a Somewhat Overcivilized Universe."
"Let us forget our individual egos and collective conceits," the professor cried at one point. "Let us
subordinate everything—to the end that the freedom of the solar system in general, and Earth in
particular, must and shall be preserved!"
Despite its mouth-filling qualities, this slogan was repeated everywhere. Still, it was difficult
sometimes to know exactly what the Dendi wanted—partly because of the limited number of interpreters
available to the heads of the various sovereign states, and partly because of their leader's tendency to
vanish into his ship after ambiguous and equivocal statements—such as the curt admonition to "Evacuate
Washington!"
On that occasion, both the Secretary of State and the American President perspired fearfully