"James Tiptree Jr. -10000 Light Years From Home" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tiptree James Jr)

“Could you tell me what races are coming in, sir? If I could even get a view—”
He waved me to the port. Greedily I angled my lenses up at the long blue hull blocking out the
starfield. Beyond her I could see the bulge of a black and gold ship.
“That’s a Foramen,” he said. “There’s a freighter from Belye on the other side, you’d call it
Arcturus. Not much traffic right now.”
“You’re the first person who’s said two sentences to me since I’ve been here, sir. What are those
colorful little craft?”
“Procya,” he shrugged. “They’re always around. Like us.”
I squashed my face on the vitrite, peering. The walls clanked. Somewhere overhead aliens were
off-loading into their private sector of Big Junction. The man glanced at his wrist.
“Are you waiting to go out, sir?”
His grunt could have meant anything.
“Where are you from on Earth?” he asked me in his hard tone.
I started to tell him and suddenly saw that he had forgotten my existence. His eyes were on
nowhere, and his head was slowly bowing forward onto the port frame.
“Go home,” he said thickly. I caught a strong smell of tallow.
“Hey, sir!” I grabbed his arm; he was in rigid tremor. “Steady, mark.”
“I’m waiting... waiting for my wife. My loving wife.” He gave a short ugly laugh. “Where are you
from?”
I told him again.
“Go home,” he mumbled. “Go home and make babies. While you still can.”
One of the early GR casualties, I thought.
“Is that all you know?” His voice rose stridently. “Fools. Dressing in their styles. Gnivo suits,
Aoleelee music. Oh, I see your newscasts,” he sneered. “Nixi parties. A year’s salary for a floater.
Gamma radiation? Go home, read history. Ballpoint pens and bicycles—”
He started a slow slide downward in the half gee. My only informant. We struggled confusedly; he
wouldn’t take one of my sobertabs but I finally got him along the service corridor to a bench in an empty
loading bay. He fumbled out a little vacuum cartridge. As I was helping him unscrew it, a figure in
starched whites put his head in the bay.
“I can be of assistance, yes?” His eyes popped, his face was covered with brindled fur. An alien, a
Procya! I started to thank him but the red-haired man cut me off.
“Get lost. Out.”
The creature withdrew, its big eyes moist. The man stuck his pinky in the cartridge and then put it up
his nose, gasping deep in his diaphragm. He looked toward his wrist.
“What time is it?”
I told him.
“News,” he said. “A message for the eager, hopeful human race. A word about those lovely, lovable
aliens we all love so much.” He looked at me. “Shocked, aren’t you, newsboy?”
I had him figured now. A xenophobe. Aliens plot to take over Earth.
“Ah Christ, they couldn’t care less.” He took another deep gasp, shuddered and straightened. “The
hell with generalities. What time d’you say it was? All right, I’ll tell you how I learned it. The hard way.
While we wait for my loving wife. You can bring that little recorder out of your sleeve, too. Play it over to
yourself some time ... when it’s too late.” He chuckled. His tone had become chatty—an educated voice.
“You ever hear of supernormal stimuli?”
“No,” I said. “Wait a minute. White sugar?”
“Near enough. Y’know Little Junction bar in D.C.? No, you’re an Aussie, you said. Well, I’m from
Burned Barn, Nebraska.”
He took a breath, consulting some vast disarray of the soul.
“I accidentally drifted into Little Junction Bar when I was eighteen. No. Correct that. You don’t go
into Little Junction by accident, any more than you first shoot skag by accident.