The Mystery of the Abandoned Planet read online. Builder of emerald cities
INTRODUCTION
ALIENSa magical country and its capital Emerald City inhabited by tribes of little people - Munches, Migunovs, Chatterboxes, who had a very good memory for everything that surprised them.
What was surprising for them was the appearance of the girl Ellie, when her house crushed the evil sorceress Gingema like an empty eggshell. No wonder Ellie was named after this the fairy of the Killing House.
Residents were no less surprised Fairyland when they saw Ellie's sister Annie. She also appeared to them as a fairy fairy. She rode on an extraordinary mule that fed on sunlight, and on her head was a silver hoop that made everyone who put it on and touched the ruby star invisible.
And many, many more wonderful events happened in the Magic Land, which its inhabitants could tell about. There was only one miracle they knew almost nothing about - how their country became Magic. After all, she was not always fenced off from the rest of the Great World sandy desert and is surrounded by the inaccessible Circumnavigation Mountains. The eternal sun did not always shine above her, and the birds and animals began to speak like humans.
She became magical at the request of the great sorcerer Gurricap.
Gurricup was already old in those days, he was thinking about rest, he wanted peace and solitude. Therefore, the mighty sorcerer built himself a castle at a distance from the Magic Land, near the mountains, and strictly forbade its inhabitants to approach their home, even forbade them to remember the name Gurricap itself.
The residents, although surprised, believed that Gur-ricap really didn’t need anyone. Centuries and millennia passed. Quiet little people, fulfilling the sorcerer’s order, tried not to remember him, and never saw him again. And so it happened that the wonders of Gurricap gradually began to be forgotten.
But the good inhabitants of the country of Gurricap did not know how to be surprised by any evil and therefore did not remember it for long. How many troubles Oorfene Deuce brought them, trying to conquer the Magic Land, first with his wooden soldiers, and then with a large army of Marrans. And what?
As soon as Oorfene thought about his fate and refused to help the evil giantess Arachne, the good people immediately forgave him all his insults and began to consider him a good person. They believed that someone who has done good at least once will no longer want to return to evil deeds.
The most interesting thing is that this is what happened later.
Well, after friends from Big world Annie, Tim and the sailor Charlie helped them defeat the sorceress Arachne, they again looked cheerfully at the sky, bright bright blue, where there was no trace of the yellow fog sent by Arachne.
The glorious inhabitants of the Magic Land again lived calmly and happily, and did not expect danger from anywhere. And she was approaching and - who would have thought? - precisely from a clear sky.
A formidable spaceship from the planet Rameria was already approaching Earth. He was rushing through space at an unheard-of speed - one hundred and fifty thousand kilometers per second. And, as the alien star navigator Kau-Ruk wrote in the logbook, “he plied the interstellar desert for seventeen years.” During this time, the spacecraft covered a huge distance that light - the fastest messenger in the Universe (capable of traveling at a speed of three hundred thousand kilometers per second) - would have covered in nine years. So great was the distance from Rameria to Earth.
But the foreign astronauts did not even notice the flight. For them, time stood still from the moment when almost the entire crew of the ship was put into a state of suspended animation - the so-called long sleep during deep hypothermia - and immersed in special flight sleep compartments. There the astronauts slept peacefully for a good seventeen years.
Time lost its power over people - it was a real miracle. If the astronauts were awakened even after a thousand years, then they would wake up exactly as they fell into sleep.
To the uninitiated, the compartments looked like giant refrigerators with many cells, each of which contained a crew member. The polished surfaces of the cells sparkled with a mirror-like shine, and if you look closely, here and there red, blue, and green control valves appeared on them, and multi-colored lights were also blinking - these were the lamps of the control equipment.
Meanwhile, the navigator Kau-Ruk, sitting in the space observatory, calculated the position of the ship in space and marked the course on the star map. In addition to Kau-Ruk, three more people were awake: the commander of the starship, General Baan-Ku - he checked the instrument readings in the ship's control room; doctor Lon Gor - he monitored the condition of the sleeping crew, monitored the temperature, humidity, regulated the oxygen content, and the supply of coolant - liquid helium; and also the pilot Mon-So, the general’s faithful assistant, the most accurate executor of his orders, who never allowed any objections or reservations.
Alexander Melentyevich Volkov
The Mystery of the Abandoned Castle
Introduction
Aliens
The magical land and its capital, the Emerald City, were inhabited by tribes of little people - Munchkins, Winks, Chatterboxes, who had a very good memory for everything that surprised them.
What was surprising for them was the appearance of the girl Ellie, when her house crushed the evil sorceress Gingema like an empty eggshell. No wonder Ellie was named after this the fairy of the Killing House.
The residents of the Magic Land were no less surprised when they saw Ellie’s sister, Annie. She also appeared to them as a fairy fairy. She rode on an extraordinary mule that fed on sunlight, and on her head was a silver hoop that made everyone who put it on and touched the ruby star invisible.
And many, many more wonderful events happened in the Magic Land, which its inhabitants could tell about. There was only one miracle they knew almost nothing about - how their country became Magic. After all, it was not always fenced off from the rest of the world by the Great Sandy Desert and surrounded by the inaccessible Circumnavigation Mountains. The eternal sun did not always shine above her and the birds and animals spoke humanly.
She became magical at the request of the great sorcerer Gurricap.
Gurricup was already old in those days, he was thinking about rest, he wanted peace and solitude. Therefore, the mighty sorcerer built himself a castle at a distance from the Magic Land, near the mountains, and strictly forbade its inhabitants to approach their home, even forbade them to remember the name Gurricap itself.
Although the residents were surprised, they believed that Gurricap really didn’t need anyone. Centuries and millennia passed. Quiet little people, fulfilling the sorcerer’s order, tried not to remember him, and never saw him again. And so it happened that the wonders of Gurricap gradually began to be forgotten.
But the good inhabitants of the country of Gurricap did not know how to be surprised by any evil and therefore did not remember it for long. How much trouble Oorfene Deuce brought them, trying to conquer the Magic Land, first with his wooden soldiers, and then with a large army of Marrans. And what?
As soon as Oorfene thought about his fate and refused to help the evil giantess Arachne, the good people immediately forgave him all his insults and began to consider him a good person. They believed that someone who has done good at least once will no longer want to return to evil deeds.
The most interesting thing is that this is what happened later.
Well, after friends from the Big World Annie, Tim and sailor Charlie helped them defeat the sorceress Arachne, they again looked cheerfully at the sky, brightly bright blue, where there was no trace of the Yellow Fog sent by Arachne.
The glorious inhabitants of the Magic Land again lived calmly and happily, and did not expect danger from anywhere. And she was approaching and - who would have thought? - precisely from a clear sky.
A formidable spaceship from the planet Rameria was already approaching Earth. He was rushing through space at an unheard-of speed - one hundred and fifty thousand kilometers per second. And, as the stellar navigator alien Kau-Ruk wrote in the logbook, “he plied the interstellar desert for seventeen years.” During this time, the spacecraft covered a huge distance that light, the fastest messenger in the Universe (capable of traveling at a speed of three hundred thousand kilometers per second), would have covered in nine years. So great was the distance from Rameria to Earth.
But the foreign astronauts did not even notice the flight. For them, time stopped from the moment when almost the entire crew of the ship was put into a state of suspended animation - the so-called long sleep during deep hypothermia - and immersed in special flight sleep compartments. There the astronauts slept peacefully for a good seventeen years.
Time lost its power over people - it was a real miracle. If the astronauts were awakened even after a thousand years, then they would wake up exactly as they fell into sleep.
To the uninitiated, the compartments looked like giant refrigerators with many cells, each of which contained a crew member. The polished surfaces of the cells sparkled with a mirror-like shine, and if you look closely, here and there red, blue, and green control valves appeared on them, and multi-colored lights were also blinking - these were the lamps of the control equipment.
Meanwhile, the navigator Kau-Ruk, sitting in the space observatory, calculated the position of the ship in space and marked the course on the star map. In addition to Kau-Ruk, three more people were awake: the spaceship commander, General Baan-Nu, he was checking the instrument readings in the ship’s control room; doctor Lon Gor - he monitored the condition of the sleeping crew, monitored the temperature, humidity, regulated the oxygen content, and the supply of coolant - liquid helium; and also the pilot Mon-So, the general’s faithful assistant, the most accurate executor of his orders, who never allowed any objections or reservations.
The silence in the flight sleep compartments seemed eternal. Only occasionally would a demanding siren sound be heard in the doctor’s cabin, then Lon-Gor, with a hasty but silent gait, would slip to the compartments, turn the required green, red or blue tap, and silence would fall again.
Mon-So had nothing to do, his pilots slept in the compartments; He didn’t like to read books, so he played tic-tac-toe with himself in the cabin. Sometimes Mon-So wandered the corridors of the ship or kicked a ball there, but only when everyone was already asleep. He was the goalkeeper of the football team and simply could not do without training. On Rameria, everyone was accustomed to sports.
The four astronauts on space watch did special flight exercises every morning here on the ship. Occasionally he was late for Kau-Ruk's sports activities when he was reading some interesting book. Not necessarily a story about the history of a people, about some unusual character of a person or about adventures, Kau-Ruk read books on technology with no less enthusiasm.
“Kau-Ruk is the most capable person of your crew,” the Supreme Ruler of Rameria Gwan-Lo told the general before departure. – I don’t appoint him commander of the spaceship for one reason: he lacks diligence.
But nevertheless, navigator Kau-Ruk was appointed deputy commander.
Awakening of Ilsor
For commander Baan-Nu, pilot Mon-So, star navigator and flight doctor, time did not pass unnoticed: during the flight they aged exactly seventeen years. True, age on Rameria was calculated differently: people lived there three times as old as on Earth. Therefore, the four astronauts keeping watch on the ship remained young and full of strength according to the Ramerian reckoning.
Aliens arrive in the Magic Land with the aim of conquest. People from the outside world come to help.
Introduction
The spaceship "Diavona" from the planet Rameria is heading towards Earth. The crew consists of the ship's captain, general, navigator, doctor, pilot and general's servant Ilsor.
On the planet Rameria live the Arzaks, a talented but trusting people like children, and the Menvits, who have a supreme ruler. He casts a spell on a person by looking into his eyes. So he convinced the Menvits that they were the chosen race of the Universe, and forced the Arzaks to obey the Menvits. The Arzaks invented, worked, and the Menvits used their discoveries. The Menvits planned to conquer planet Earth. They landed in a secluded area, not knowing that they were in a magical land.
First days on Earth
Oorfene Deuce, who lives in the Magic Land as a hermit, receives a telescope as a gift from the Tin Woodman. One day, looking into it, he sees “Diavona,” but does not attach any importance to it. Urfin is engaged in gardening. He grows unprecedented vegetables and fruits and gives them to the residents of the Emerald City so that they can organize holidays. Preparing for the holiday, the Munchkins see a red ball in the sky and, frightened, run to the Scarecrow.
The aliens land at night, hoping that everyone is asleep. Going on reconnaissance, they find the castle of the wizard Gurricap and turn it into their camp. The birds, seeing strangers, report this to the Scarecrow. The Scarecrow urgently gathers council and looks into the magic box. Tilly-Willy goes to the gnomes to take them to an abandoned castle. The dwarves must find out everything. Now the Scarecrow receives reports all the time about what the aliens are doing.
The Menvits kidnap one of the former underground kings, now the weaver Mentaho, and his wife, in order to use them to study the language of the earthlings. Mentaho, like the Arzaks, is frightened by the gaze of the Menvits. But the ubiquitous gnomes tell Mentaho that the Scarecrow will not leave him.
Alien geologists find emerald deposits. While studying the language, the general tries to bribe Mentaho with emeralds and extract the secrets of the country from him. But Mentaho says only what the Scarecrow allowed. Ilsor goes over to Mentaho's side. He proposes to release Tilly-Willy on the roads in different guises, so that the aliens will think that the Magic Land is inhabited by giants. When asked by General Mentaho, he replies that it was these giants who helped Goodwin conquer the country.
During a hunt, Carfax's chick Goriek hits an alien radar and cannon installed in the mountains and throws them into a gorge. Then the aliens decide to take the radars outside the country, but the black stones of Gingema prevent this from happening, and the aliens are left without contact with Rameria.
Annie, Tim and the Aliens
The dragon Oyhho brings Kaggi-Karr and Faramant to Kansas. They ask Annie for help. Summoning Alfred Canning, Annie and Tim arrive in Fairyland. This time Artoshka stays at home.
The Arzaks, mining emeralds for the general, notice that the stones protect against the hypnosis of the Menvits. An uprising is brewing among the Arzaks.
Oorfene Deuce begins to supply the aliens with his extraordinary fruits, receiving emeralds for it.
The birds, led by Kaggi-Karr, attack the alien base, fenced with barbed wire, and the general orders the alarm to be turned off.
Sleeping water
At a council convened by the Scarecrow, a plan is developed to destroy the aliens. Annie, walking around the Emerald City, is kidnapped by an alien pilot. During interrogation by the general, Annie says the same thing as Mentaho, taught by the Scarecrow. The mice, led by Ramina, enter the general’s room and gnaw everything that was there. Tim, wearing a silver hoop that makes him invisible, sneaks into the base. The mice break through a tunnel and flood the base with Sleeping Water. Taking advantage of the general turmoil, Tim kidnaps Annie.
The general convenes a council and decides to take a campaign against the Emerald City. Ilsor warns Mentaho about this, and he warns the gnomes. The Scarecrow orders the blockheads to be painted with a special paint that reflects the beam blasts of alien weapons, and to send them to the base.
The aliens attack the Emerald City, but with the help of the eagles led by Carfax, their army is defeated.
Oorfene Deuce comes up with the idea of setting fire to the stones of Gingema. One of the stones bursts, he collects the fragments and brings them home. Hiding the debris under the fruits, Oorfene delivers them to the alien base. Saying that these are treasures, Oorfene sets a trap for the general and takes the emeralds while the stones hold the general captive.
Having prepared a mine and a stream of Sleeping Water, the Scarecrow and his army attack the aliens. After complete victory, the Menvits are put to sleep.
Under the leadership of Ilsor, the aliens return home, and Annie, Tim and Alfred return to Kansas.
Aliens
The magical land and its capital, the Emerald City, were inhabited by tribes of little people - Munchkins, Winks, Chatterboxes, who had a very good memory for everything that surprised them.
What was surprising for them was the appearance of the girl Ellie, when her house crushed the evil sorceress Gingema like an empty eggshell. No wonder Ellie was named after this the fairy of the Killing House.
The residents of the Magic Land were no less surprised when they saw Ellie’s sister, Annie. She also appeared to them as a fairy fairy. She rode on an extraordinary mule that fed on sunlight, and on her head was a silver hoop that made everyone who put it on and touched the ruby star invisible.
And many, many more wonderful events happened in the Magic Land, which its inhabitants could tell about. There was only one miracle they knew almost nothing about - how their country became Magic. After all, it was not always fenced off from the rest of the world by the Great Sandy Desert and surrounded by the inaccessible Circumnavigation Mountains. The eternal sun did not always shine above her and the birds and animals spoke humanly.
She became magical at the request of the great sorcerer Gurricap.
Gurricup was already old in those days, he was thinking about rest, he wanted peace and solitude. Therefore, the mighty sorcerer built himself a castle at a distance from the Magic Land, near the mountains, and strictly forbade its inhabitants to approach their home, even forbade them to remember the name Gurricap itself.
Although the residents were surprised, they believed that Gurricap really didn’t need anyone. Centuries and millennia passed. Quiet little people, fulfilling the sorcerer’s order, tried not to remember him, and never saw him again. And so it happened that the wonders of Gurricap gradually began to be forgotten.
But the good inhabitants of the country of Gurricap did not know how to be surprised by any evil and therefore did not remember it for long. How much trouble Oorfene Deuce brought them, trying to conquer the Magic Land, first with his wooden soldiers, and then with a large army of Marrans. And what?
As soon as Oorfene thought about his fate and refused to help the evil giantess Arachne, the good people immediately forgave him all his insults and began to consider him a good person. They believed that someone who has done good at least once will no longer want to return to evil deeds.
The most interesting thing is that this is what happened later.
Well, after friends from the Big World Annie, Tim and sailor Charlie helped them defeat the sorceress Arachne, they again looked cheerfully at the sky, brightly bright blue, where there was no trace of the Yellow Fog sent by Arachne.
The glorious inhabitants of the Magic Land again lived calmly and happily, and did not expect danger from anywhere. And she was approaching and - who would have thought? - precisely from a clear sky.
A formidable spaceship from the planet Rameria was already approaching Earth. He was rushing through space at an unheard-of speed - one hundred and fifty thousand kilometers per second. And, as the stellar navigator alien Kau-Ruk wrote in the logbook, “he plied the interstellar desert for seventeen years.” During this time, the spacecraft covered a huge distance that light, the fastest messenger in the Universe (capable of traveling at a speed of three hundred thousand kilometers per second), would have covered in nine years. So great was the distance from Rameria to Earth.
But the foreign astronauts did not even notice the flight. For them, time stopped from the moment when almost the entire crew of the ship was put into a state of suspended animation - the so-called long sleep during deep hypothermia - and immersed in special flight sleep compartments. There the astronauts slept peacefully for a good seventeen years.
Time lost its power over people - it was a real miracle. If the astronauts were awakened even after a thousand years, then they would wake up exactly as they fell into sleep.
To the uninitiated, the compartments looked like giant refrigerators with many cells, each of which contained a crew member. The polished surfaces of the cells sparkled with a mirror-like shine, and if you look closely, here and there red, blue, and green control valves appeared on them, and multi-colored lights were also blinking - these were the lamps of the control equipment.
Meanwhile, the navigator Kau-Ruk, sitting in the space observatory, calculated the position of the ship in space and marked the course on the star map. In addition to Kau-Ruk, three more people were awake: the spaceship commander, General Baan-Nu, he was checking the instrument readings in the ship’s control room; doctor Lon Gor - he monitored the condition of the sleeping crew, monitored the temperature, humidity, regulated the oxygen content, and the supply of coolant - liquid helium; and also the pilot Mon-So, the general’s faithful assistant, the most accurate executor of his orders, who never allowed any objections or reservations.
The silence in the flight sleep compartments seemed eternal. Only occasionally would a demanding siren sound be heard in the doctor’s cabin, then Lon-Gor, with a hasty but silent gait, would slip to the compartments, turn the required green, red or blue tap, and silence would fall again.
The Mystery of the Abandoned Castle
Alexander Melentyevich Volkov
Emerald City #6
Alexander Volkov
The Mystery of the Abandoned Castle
INTRODUCTION
ALIENS
The magical land and its capital, the Emerald City, were inhabited by tribes of little people - Munchkins, Winks, Chatterboxes, who had a very good memory for everything that surprised them.
What was surprising for them was the appearance of the girl Ellie, when her house crushed the evil sorceress Gingema like an empty eggshell. No wonder Ellie was named after this the fairy of the Killing House.
The residents of the Magic Land were no less surprised when they saw Ellie’s sister, Annie. She also appeared to them as a fairy fairy. She rode on an extraordinary mule that fed on sunlight, and on her head was a silver hoop that made everyone who put it on and touched the ruby star invisible.
And many, many more wonderful events happened in the Magic Land, which its inhabitants could tell about. Only about one miracle they knew almost nothing - about how their country became Magic. After all, it was not always fenced off from the rest of the world by the Great Sandy Desert and surrounded by the inaccessible Circumnavigation Mountains. The eternal sun did not always shine above her, and the birds and animals began to speak like humans.
She became magical at the request of the great sorcerer Gurricap.
Gurricup was already old in those days, he was thinking about rest, he wanted peace and solitude. Therefore, the mighty sorcerer built himself a castle at a distance from the Magic Land, near the mountains, and strictly forbade its inhabitants to approach their home, even forbade them to remember the name Gurricap itself.
The residents, although surprised, believed that Gurricap really didn’t need anyone. Centuries and millennia passed. Quiet little people, fulfilling the sorcerer’s order, tried not to remember him, and never saw him again. And so it happened that the wonders of Gurricap gradually began to be forgotten.
But the good inhabitants of the country of Gurricap did not know how to be surprised by any evil and therefore did not remember it for long. How many troubles Oorfene Deuce brought them, trying to conquer the Magic Land, first with his wooden soldiers, and then with a large army of Marrans. And what?
As soon as Oorfene thought about his fate and refused to help the evil giantess Arachne, the good people immediately forgave him all his insults and began to consider him a good person. They believed that someone who has done good at least once will no longer want to return to evil deeds.
The most interesting thing is that this is what happened later.
Well, after their friends from the Big World Annie, Tim and the sailor Charlie helped them defeat the sorceress Arachne, they again looked cheerfully at the sky, brightly blue, where there was no trace of the yellow fog sent by Arachne.
The glorious inhabitants of the Magic Land again lived calmly and happily, and did not expect danger from anywhere. And she was getting closer - and who would have thought? - precisely from a clear sky.
A formidable spaceship from the planet Rameria was already approaching Earth. He was rushing through space at an unheard-of speed - one hundred and fifty thousand kilometers per second. And, as the alien star navigator Kau-Ruk wrote in the logbook, “he plied the interstellar desert for seventeen years.” During this time, the spacecraft covered a huge distance that light, the fastest messenger in the Universe (capable of traveling at a speed of three hundred thousand kilometers per second), would have covered in nine years. So great was the distance from Rameria to Earth.
But the foreign astronauts did not even notice the flight. For them, time stood still from the moment when almost the entire crew of the ship was put into a state of suspended animation - the so-called long sleep during deep hypothermia - and immersed in special flight sleep compartments. There the astronauts slept peacefully for a good seventeen years.
Time lost its power over people - it was a real miracle. If the astronauts were awakened even after a thousand years, then they would wake up exactly as they fell into sleep.
To the uninitiated, the compartments looked like giant refrigerators with many cells, each of which contained a crew member. The polished surfaces of the cells sparkled with a mirror-like shine, and if you look closely, here and there red, blue, and green control valves appeared on them, and multi-colored lights were also blinking - these were the lamps of the control equipment.
Meanwhile, the navigator Kau-Ruk, sitting in the space observatory, calculated the position of the ship in space and marked the course on the star map. In addition to Kau-Ruk, three more people were awake: the starship commander, General Baan-Nu, he was checking the instrument readings in the ship’s control room; doctor Lon Gor - he monitored the condition of the sleeping crew, monitored the temperature, humidity, regulated the oxygen content, and the supply of coolant - liquid helium; and also the pilot Mon-So, the general’s faithful assistant, the most accurate executor of his orders, who never allowed any objections or reservations.
The silence in the flight sleep compartments seemed eternal. Only occasionally would a demanding siren sound be heard in the doctor’s cabin, then Lon-Gor, with a hasty but silent gait, would slip to the compartments, turn the required tap, green, red or blue, and silence would fall again.
Mon-So had nothing to do, his pilots slept in the compartments; He didn’t like to read books, so he played tic-tac-toe with himself in the cabin. Sometimes Mon-So wandered the corridors of the ship or kicked a ball there, but only when everyone was already asleep. He was the goalkeeper of the football team and simply could not do without training. On Rameria, everyone was accustomed to sports.
The four astronauts on space watch did special flight exercises every morning here on the ship. Occasionally he was late for Kau-Ruk's sports activities when he was reading some interesting book. Not necessarily a story about the history of a people, about some unusual character of a person or about adventures, Kau-Ruk read books on technology with no less enthusiasm.
“Kau-Ruk is the most capable person of your crew,” the Supreme Ruler of Rameria Gwan-Lo told the general before leaving. “I don’t appoint him commander of the spaceship for one reason: he lacks diligence.
But nevertheless, navigator Kau-Ruk was appointed deputy commander.
AWAKENING ILSOR
For commander Baan-Nu, pilot Mon-So, star navigator and flight doctor, time did not pass unnoticed: during the flight they aged exactly seventeen years. True, age on Rameria was calculated differently: people lived there three times longer than on Earth. Therefore, the four astronauts keeping watch on the ship, according to the Ramerian account, remained young and full of strength.
The peace of the huge spaceship was not disturbed by anyone other than the awake astronauts; its cabins, service rooms, and engine room corridors were empty, which is why it seemed uninhabited.
In fact, one more person did not sleep on the starship, or rather, was in a state of awakening - Ilsor, the servant of General Baan-Nu. He was awakened by order of the general. Baan-Nu reached the point of final exhaustion, he was so tired of doing without a servant that he had long been dissatisfied with everything around him: the doors, in his opinion, slammed too loudly, pens and felt-tip pens wrote poorly, food taken from cans was tasteless, and the bed quite tough. The commander would sooner force the doctor Lon-Gor to serve him than agree to endure a few more weeks until the general awakening of the space crew. He was not used to dressing himself and taking care of his appearance, so his red, scraggly beard had grown to fantastic proportions; the jacket that he pulled over his overalls (obviously, it replaced a uniform) turned out to be without buttons; overalls - without a zipper and crumpled into an accordion; the general had rags hanging on his elbows because he was constantly clinging to some sharp corners and hooks; Moreover, Baan-Nu did not make it difficult for himself to recognize the left and right boots: his right boot invariably ended up on his left foot, and this was extremely inconvenient even for a general.
Lon Gore for a long time He turned first one faucet to failure, then the other, then waited again until all the multi-colored lights stopped flashing, indicating complete defrosting.
Finally, the shiny, polished cell opened, and Ilsor Mon-So and Kau-Ruk, walled up in it, were lifted and transferred from the compartment to the doctor’s cabin by order of the commander.
“Well, couch potato, get up,” the general said joyfully as Ilsor was carried out of the compartment under the supervision of Lon-Gor.
Ilsor woke up slowly, swaying slightly on a suspended inflatable mattress, similar to a hammock bunk, which sailors usually have in the cockpit.
Ilsor occupied a special position: he was not only a good servant under the general, but also an excellent inventor. According to his design, a starship was built on which the Menvits fly to Earth. It is called "Diavona", which in the language of the chosen ones means "Elusive".
Ilsor was sleeping. Suddenly he shuddered, but did not wake up and did not open his eyes. He only felt the commander of Baan-Nu leaning towards him.
– Awakening takes time, awakening takes time.
The general probably did not believe that the servant needed some time, because he made an impatient movement: he extended his hand to Ilsor and shook his shoulder with all his might. The servant had to jump up immediately at his first word. However, in the end, realizing that shaking was of little use, Baan-Nu retreated.
ARZAKS AND MENVITS
Ilsor had not yet realized that he was on a starship. He woke up, and it was as if life on Rameria was running through his eyes again. He saw his distant homeland. I saw my people - the Arzaks, their houses resembling fragments of rocks near the Silver Mountains. Not only the mountains are cast in silver, the whole of Rameria is covered with a soft flowing white light. The soil, grass, trees and shrubs are silvery, it seems that if you touch the leaves with your hand, they will ring.
Arzaks are very friendly - they are trusting, like children. And their eyes are attentive, wide open.
The Arzaks are talented. Among them there are many artists, doctors, scientists, writers, designers and engineers, teachers. The Arzaks not only know how to do a lot, they simply cannot help but share what they achieve themselves with their Menvit neighbors and do it with great joy. But the Menvits are treacherous people.
The Menvits have a Supreme Ruler, Gwan-Lo, who is also a sorcerer. He has a hypnotic, commanding gaze and can command anyone to do whatever he wants. And as soon as the person begins to protest, Gwan-Lo looks him in the eyes - and he immediately falls silent. This witchcraft art was inherited by the Supreme Ruler terrible secret from his ancestors and taught it to the Menvits. He immediately drew attention to the fact that the Arzaks are talented people.
“It would be nice,” thought Gwan-Lo, “to make this talent work for us.”
Even earlier, the Supreme Ruler realized that the Arzaks are well-mannered people; when they talk, they look straight into their eyes. And there is nothing easier to use witchcraft when looking straight into your eyes.
“You will pay, my dears, for your upbringing,” Gwan-Lo even purred with pleasure, “you are all already slaves and, I believe, you will serve us faithfully.”
He began to persuade the Menvits that they were the chosen race of the Universe, that they could do anything. Other intelligent beings are created only to obey them. And he persuaded. The Menvits proclaimed themselves masters - the chosen ones, while the Arzaks - slaves.
This is a very sad page in the history of the Arzaks.
First of all, the chosen ones took away from the Arzaks their chanting expressive language.
That is, first they taught the Arzaks the Menvit language, not so that they could communicate from the fifth to the tenth, the Arzaks had long been able to communicate with the Menvits. But now the Menvits wanted the Arzaks to know their language perfectly, like their own. The main thing is that no effort was required. Naturally inquisitive, the Arzaks themselves showed great interest in the language of their neighbors. Not knowing the danger, they remembered everything well and very soon spoke equally fluently both in their own language and in the language of the chosen ones,
Then the Menvits forbade them to speak the Arzak language and closed Arzak schools.
And they did one more thing.
They pretended to invite the Arzaks to visit, held a feast in the park of the ruler's palace, and there, at this feast, they used their witchcraft commands on the Arzaks.
Ilsor remembers the first Menvit team well, it is always the same:
- Look into my eyes, look into my eyes, obey me, stranger!
With this command the imaginary feast began. The Arzaks, like well-mannered people, looked into the eyes and were all enchanted. They were ordered to completely forget their native language, and the Arzaks forgot. A more terrible disaster happened.
The chosen ones ordered to forget that the Arzaks were free people, and they forgot.
They were still inventors, scientists or artists. They carried out their plans themselves, because they were accustomed to working not only with their heads, but also with their hands.
And so it turned out that not only excellent field machines, machine tools, beautiful works of art, but also the technology of astronautics, the spaceships of the Menvits - everything was created by the hands of the Arzaks. However, strange thing! From now on, the Menvits used their discoveries and knowledge. They took significant positions in industry and agriculture throughout Rameria. They were called engineers, doctors, teachers, agronomists, although everywhere - in the fields, in factories, in institutions - they played the same role as overseers.
In fact, everything that the Menvits considered themselves to be, of course, were Arzaks, but, having discovered, invented, created something, they immediately forgot about it. It was as if they themselves admitted that they were no longer fit for anything other than to play the role of labor: they washed, weaved, scraped, herded cattle, raised grain, worked on machines, and were also servants and cooks. And they really believed that, apart from the work that the chosen ones call menial, they had no other business.
The sorcerer Gwan-Lo tried so hard.
Commander Baan-Nu is from the Menvits. He has something in him that is characteristic of the chosen race. He is a very tall, strong man, proudly carrying his large round head on his broad shoulders.
