"E. C. Tubb - Dumarest 22 - The Terra Data" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tubb E. C)

me? Answer if you can. Answer!"

The sobbing continued.

"Itel?" A waste of time and energy; the intelligence had reverted to before the
name had been given. A fact Icelus would have known but he had remained
silent, content to watch, to gauge the other's ability. Elge said, "You have his
dossier?"

He waited as it was fed into a machine; a minute chip which held the sum total
of a man's active existence. The details flashed on the screen were what he'd
expected; a child of the slums spotted by a shrewd agent and placed in a Cyclan
school for elementary training. Proving worthy he had become first an acolyte
then, later, had won the scarlet robe of a cyber. A man trained and tested and
dedicated to serving the organization; one as efficient as a living machine. Itel
had served well in that he had never failed and had earned his final reward. A
reward he had enjoyed for centuries—why should he now be crying?
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"As I told you," said Icelus when Elge asked the question. "Catatonia."

"The condition but not the cause."

"True—that is, as yet, unknown." He added, as Elge remained silent, "All
possible causes have been eliminated by a series of exhaustive tests. The nutrient
fluids have been analyzed and found innocuous. No trace of radiation was found
in the casing or attendant structures. No chemical alterations of any kind could
be discerned in any part of the essential apparatus. There is no apparent
protoplasmic degeneration."

"But there is a correlation with previous breakdowns." Elge studied the
addendum on the dossier. "This unit was removed from its original position and
placed in isolation."

"To minimize the risk of contamination," explained Icelus. "It was previously in
close proximity to a bank of failed units."

Brains which had taken to uttering nothing but gibberish—the entire unit of
which they were a part totally destroyed by orders of the Cyber Prime. A
decision which, obviously, had failed to achieve the desired result. Elge listened
again to the thin, frightened wailing of a lost and lonely child. What was it
seeking? How did it feel? A brain, taken from its skull, fitted with life-support
apparatus, placed in a vat of nutrient fluids there to rest, alive, awake and aware.
Once it had been a part of Central Intelligence; incorporated in the massed brains
which, linked together, formed the tremendous cybernetic computer able to
handle an incredible input of data. Able also to eliminate time and space in direct