[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
whole species will be exterminated before anybody can get out from Terra to
check on Rainsford s story.
I hadn t heard that last detail before.
Well, we can prove it, Aelborg assured him.
Page 36
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
It sounded like a Victor Grego idea. He lit his pipe slowly. Damnit, he
didn t want to have to intervene. No Space Navy C.O. did. Justifying
intervention on a Colonial planet was too much bother always a board of
inquiry, often a courtmartial. And supersession of civil authority was
completely against Service Doctrine. Of course, there were other and more
important tenets of Service Doctrine.The sovereignty of the Terran Federation
for one, and the inviolability of the Federation Constitution.And the rights
of extraterrestrials, too. Conrad Greibenfeld, too, seemed to have been
thinking about that.
If those Fuzzies are sapient beings, that whole setup down there is illegal.
Company, Colonial administration and all, he said. Zarathustra s a Class-IV
planet, and that s all you can make out of it.
We won t intervene unless we re forced to. Pancho, I think the decision will
be largely up to you.
Pancho Ybarra was horrified.
Good God, Alex! You can t mean that. Who am I?A nobody . All I have is an
ordinary M.D., and a Psych.D. Why, the best psychological brains in the
Federation
Aren t on Zarathustra, Pancho.They re on Terra, five hundred light-years,
six months ship voyage each way. Intervention, of course, is my
responsibility, but the sapience question is yours. I don t envy you, but I
can t relieve you of it.
Gerd van Riebeek s suggestion that all three of the visitors sleep aboard the
airboat hadn t been treated seriously at all. Gerd himself was accommodated in
the spare room of the living hut. Juan Jimenez went with Ben Rainsford to his
camp for the night. Ruth Ortheris had the cabin of the boat to herself.
Rainsford was on the screen the next morning, while Jack and Gerd and Ruth and
the Fuzzies were having breakfast; he and Jimenez had decided to take his
airjeep and work down from the head of Cold Creek in the belief that there
must be more Fuzzies around in the woods.
Both Gerd and Ruth decided to spend the morning at the camp and get
acquainted with the Fuzzies on hand. The family had had enough breakfast to
leave them neutral on the subject of land-prawns, and they were given another
of the new toys, a big colored ball. They rolled it around in the grass for a
while, decided to save it for their evening romp and took it into the house.
Then they began playing aimlessly among some junk in the shed outside the
workshop. Once in a while one of them would drift away to look for a prawn,
more for sport than food.
Ruth and Gerd and Jack were sitting at the breakfast table on the grass,
talking idly and trying to think of excuses for not washing the dishes. Mamma
Fuzzy and Baby were poking about in the tall grass. Suddenly Mamma gave a
shrill cry and started back for the shed, chasing Baby ahead of her and
slapping him on the bottom with the flat of her chopper-digger to hurry him
along.
Jack started for the house at a run. Gerd grabbed his camera and jumped up on
the table. It was Ruth who saw the cause of the disturbance.
Jack! Look, over there! She pointed to the edge of the clearing. Two
strange Fuzzies!
Page 37
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
He kept on running, but instead of the rifle he had been goingfor, he
collected his movie camera, two of the spare chopper-diggers and some Extee
Three. When he emerged again, the two Fuzzies had come into the clearing and
stood side by side, looking around. Both were females, and they both carried
wooden prawn-killers.
You have plenty of film? he asked Gerd. Here, Ruth; take this. He handed
her his own camera. Keep far enough away from me to get what I m doing and
what they re doing. I m going to try to trade with them.
He went forward, the steel weapons in his hip pocket and the Extee Three in
his hand, talking softly and soothingly to the newcomers. When he was as close
to them as he could get without stampeding them, he stopped.
Our gang s coming up behind you, Gerd told him. Regular skirmish line;
choppers at high port. Now they ve stopped, about thirty feet behind you.
He broke off a piece of Extee Three, put it in his mouth and ate it. Then he
broke off two more pieces and held them out. The two Fuzzies were tempted, but
not to the point of rashness. He threw both pieces within a few feet of them.
One darted forward, threw a piece to her companion and then snatched the other
piece and ran back with it. They stood together, nibbling and making soft
delighted noises.
His own family seemed to disapprove strenuously of this lavishing of
delicacies upon outsiders. However, the two strangers decided that it would be [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
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whole species will be exterminated before anybody can get out from Terra to
check on Rainsford s story.
I hadn t heard that last detail before.
Well, we can prove it, Aelborg assured him.
Page 36
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
It sounded like a Victor Grego idea. He lit his pipe slowly. Damnit, he
didn t want to have to intervene. No Space Navy C.O. did. Justifying
intervention on a Colonial planet was too much bother always a board of
inquiry, often a courtmartial. And supersession of civil authority was
completely against Service Doctrine. Of course, there were other and more
important tenets of Service Doctrine.The sovereignty of the Terran Federation
for one, and the inviolability of the Federation Constitution.And the rights
of extraterrestrials, too. Conrad Greibenfeld, too, seemed to have been
thinking about that.
If those Fuzzies are sapient beings, that whole setup down there is illegal.
Company, Colonial administration and all, he said. Zarathustra s a Class-IV
planet, and that s all you can make out of it.
We won t intervene unless we re forced to. Pancho, I think the decision will
be largely up to you.
Pancho Ybarra was horrified.
Good God, Alex! You can t mean that. Who am I?A nobody . All I have is an
ordinary M.D., and a Psych.D. Why, the best psychological brains in the
Federation
Aren t on Zarathustra, Pancho.They re on Terra, five hundred light-years,
six months ship voyage each way. Intervention, of course, is my
responsibility, but the sapience question is yours. I don t envy you, but I
can t relieve you of it.
Gerd van Riebeek s suggestion that all three of the visitors sleep aboard the
airboat hadn t been treated seriously at all. Gerd himself was accommodated in
the spare room of the living hut. Juan Jimenez went with Ben Rainsford to his
camp for the night. Ruth Ortheris had the cabin of the boat to herself.
Rainsford was on the screen the next morning, while Jack and Gerd and Ruth and
the Fuzzies were having breakfast; he and Jimenez had decided to take his
airjeep and work down from the head of Cold Creek in the belief that there
must be more Fuzzies around in the woods.
Both Gerd and Ruth decided to spend the morning at the camp and get
acquainted with the Fuzzies on hand. The family had had enough breakfast to
leave them neutral on the subject of land-prawns, and they were given another
of the new toys, a big colored ball. They rolled it around in the grass for a
while, decided to save it for their evening romp and took it into the house.
Then they began playing aimlessly among some junk in the shed outside the
workshop. Once in a while one of them would drift away to look for a prawn,
more for sport than food.
Ruth and Gerd and Jack were sitting at the breakfast table on the grass,
talking idly and trying to think of excuses for not washing the dishes. Mamma
Fuzzy and Baby were poking about in the tall grass. Suddenly Mamma gave a
shrill cry and started back for the shed, chasing Baby ahead of her and
slapping him on the bottom with the flat of her chopper-digger to hurry him
along.
Jack started for the house at a run. Gerd grabbed his camera and jumped up on
the table. It was Ruth who saw the cause of the disturbance.
Jack! Look, over there! She pointed to the edge of the clearing. Two
strange Fuzzies!
Page 37
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
He kept on running, but instead of the rifle he had been goingfor, he
collected his movie camera, two of the spare chopper-diggers and some Extee
Three. When he emerged again, the two Fuzzies had come into the clearing and
stood side by side, looking around. Both were females, and they both carried
wooden prawn-killers.
You have plenty of film? he asked Gerd. Here, Ruth; take this. He handed
her his own camera. Keep far enough away from me to get what I m doing and
what they re doing. I m going to try to trade with them.
He went forward, the steel weapons in his hip pocket and the Extee Three in
his hand, talking softly and soothingly to the newcomers. When he was as close
to them as he could get without stampeding them, he stopped.
Our gang s coming up behind you, Gerd told him. Regular skirmish line;
choppers at high port. Now they ve stopped, about thirty feet behind you.
He broke off a piece of Extee Three, put it in his mouth and ate it. Then he
broke off two more pieces and held them out. The two Fuzzies were tempted, but
not to the point of rashness. He threw both pieces within a few feet of them.
One darted forward, threw a piece to her companion and then snatched the other
piece and ran back with it. They stood together, nibbling and making soft
delighted noises.
His own family seemed to disapprove strenuously of this lavishing of
delicacies upon outsiders. However, the two strangers decided that it would be [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]