Читаем Footfall полностью

“All come,” Tashayamp directed in the fithp tongue.

“Where?” Wes Dawson demanded.

“Come.” Tashayamp turned to lead the way out. “Right,” Jeri said. She uncurled, and dove across the pens. “Come on, Melissa.”

The others followed, with Dawson bringing up the rear. Tashayamp led them through corridors toward We center of the ship.

They entered a large, nearly rectangular room, with huge steps around three sides. Machinery had been set up near the fourth wall. Four fithp watched them without comment.

Tashayamp followed them in. The eight fithp soldiers stayed in the corridor. Dawson moved up beside Jeri and said, “Theater. We’ve been here.”

“No seats,” Jeri said, then laughed at a mental picture of a fi’ collapsing a beach chair. “Of course, no seats. What’s… ah. That videotape machine must have come from Kansas.”

“The one in the fancy harness, he’s a priest or librarian or both. The one at the top of the stairs is the big boss. They call him the Herdmaster, something like that.” Dawson imitated the flthp sound. “The other two are teachers. At least I call them that, they’re supposed to teach us, but they don’t always, so I’m not sure. Every, time I think I understand them, something else happens, and—”

The door opened again, to let in three men in coveralls. One had no legs, but it didn’t seem to bother him.

Russians. That stocky one was on TV before the snouts came. I thought he was handsome — “Arvid Rogachev, Dmitri something or another, and the one with no legs is Nikolai. I never heard them call him anything else,” Dawson said.

Rogachev. He looks even better in person. Wes Dawson is a bit of a wimp compared to him.

And what does that mean? Am I looking for a big strong man to take care of me?

Would that be such a bad idea?

“You will watch,” Tashayamp said. She bellowed something infithpl

The scree’n lit up. Jeri caught a glimpse of the lead-in.

DEEP THROAT

“What is this?” Jeri asked.

Carrie Woodward had a puzzled look. “John, didn’t we hear something about that movie?”

The Russian Dawson had called Dmitri frowned. The other one seemed amused. “For this they have taken casualties?”

The screen raced past the titles to the sex scenes. Then it slowed to show Linda Lovelace doing her stuff in living color.

Carrie Wood ward watched just long enough to be sure of what she was seeing. “Gary! Melissa! Come here. You’re not to watch this. Come—”

Gary Capehart went to her at once. Melissa looked doubtful. “You come here, young lady. Now.” Carrie was insistent. Melissa looked to her mother for guidance.

O Lord. Now what? “Melissa, do as she says.”

“Aw, Mom—”

“Now.”

Carrie gathered the children to her ample bosom. “How dare you’?” she shouted. “Don’t you critters have any sense of decency at all? No shame?’

The Herdmaster trumpeted something. Tashayamp replied.

Now what kind of trouble has she got us into?

“What is your difficulty?” Tashayamp demanded. “Why have you done this?’

“You know perfectly well it’s not decent to show pictures like that.”

“Mrs. Woodward,” Dawson said. “They don’t think the way we do—”

“And of course you’ve seen worse,” Carrie said. She faced away from the screens, away from the Herdmaster. That left her facing the Russians. “I leave it to you, is this decent for children?” she demanded of them.

“Not at all,” Arvid agreed. Dmitri said something harsh in Russian.

“Bad-worse,” Tashayamp said. “What does it mean, ‘bad’? Why is this bad?”

“I think they really don’t know, Mother,” John Woodward said. His voice held wonder, “They really don’t.”

“I was trying to tell you,” Dawson said.

“You keep out of it. You don’t know either,” John Woodward said. “Your kind never did.”

All of the snouts were talking at once until the Herdmaster trumpeted. They fell silent instantly.

“I keep telling you they don’t see things as we do,” Dawson said. His voice rang loudly in the silence. “John, they didn’t make these movies. They found them in Kansas, Remember that.” John Woodward interrupted him, then Canie started to say something—

One of the teachers trumpeted.

“Raztupisp-minz commands that you speak one at a time,” Tashayamp said.

“There are many meanings of good and bad,” Dawson began. The teacher said something else.

“Not to begin with you,” Tashayamp said. She pointed to the Russians. “What is bad about this?”

“Filth. Typical capitalist garbage for the mind,” Dmitri said. “Why does this surprise anyone? The capitalist system caters to anyone with money, and inevitably produces decadence.”

“It’s freedom of speech!” Dawson shouted. “I don’t like it, but I don’t have to. If we start shutting people’s mouths, where—”

“Not we,” Carrie Woodward said. “We’d lock up the people that peddle that filth if it wasn’t for you federal people. We had a nice, decent town until your judges and your laws came.”

The two teachers were both speaking at once until the Herdmaster intervened. Tashayamp spoke at length, obviously trailslating since she used several human words. What can they make of this? What do 1 make of it? Jeri wondered.