"James White - SG 04 - Ambulance Ship" - читать интересную книгу автора (White James)

Ambulance Ship
James White
1979


Scanned by lzmini Feb 03

PART 1


SPACEBIRD


The Monitor Corps scoutship Torrance was engaged on a mission which was both
highly important and deadly dull. Like the other units of its flotilla it had
been assigned a relatively tiny volume of space in Sector Nine—one of the many
threedimensional blanks which still appeared in the Federation’s charts— to fill
in the types and positions of the stars which it contained and the numbers of
planets circling them.
Because a ten-man scoutship did not have the facilities for handling a
first contact situation, they were forbidden to land or even make a close
approach to these planets. They would identify the technologically advanced
worlds, if any, by analyzing the radio frequency and other forms of radiation
emanating from them. As Major Madden, the vessel’s captain, had told them at the
start of the mission, they were simply going to count lights in the sky and that
was all.
Naturally, Fate could not resist a temptation like that...
“Radar, sir,” said a voice from the controlroom speaker. “We have a blip
on the close-approach screen. Distance six miles, closing slowly, non-collision
course.”
“Lock on the telescope,” said the Captain, “and let’s see it.”
“Yes, sir. Repeater screen Two.”
On Corps scoutships discipline was strict only when circumstances
warranted it, and normally those circumstances did not arise during a mapping
mission. As a result the noises coming from the speaker resembled a debate
rather than a series of station reports.
“It looks like a ... a bird, sir, with its wings spread.”
“A plucked bird.”
“Has anyone calculated the chances against materializing this close to an
object in interstellar space?”
“I think it’s an asteroid, or molten material which congealed by accident
into that shape.”
“Two lights years from the nearest sun?”
“Quiet, please,” said the Captain. “Lock on an analyzer and report.”
There was a short pause, then: “Estimated size, roughly onethird that of
this ship. It’s non-reflective, non-metallic, non-mineral and—”
“You’re doing a fine job of telling me what it isn’t,” said the Captain
dryly.
“It is organic, sir, and .
“Yes?”