精华区文章阅读

发信人: by (春天的小懒虫), 信区: SFworld
标  题: 2010 (29)
发信站: 哈工大紫丁香 (Wed Oct  6 14:53:35 1999), 转信

                                  29
                            Emergence

Sasha's latest edict read:
                   RUSSLISH BULLETIN #8
                 Subject: Tovarishch (tovarish)
To our American guests:
  Frankly.  pals.  I can't  remember when I was last addressed by this term.
To any twenty-first century Russian, it's way back there with the battle-
ship  Potemkin  -  a  reminder  of cloth caps and red flags and Vladimir
Ilich haranguing the workers from the steps of railway carriages.
  Ever  since  I was a kid it's been bratets or druzhok-take your choice.
  You're welcome.
                                                   Comrade       Kovalev

  Floyd    was   still   chuckling   over   this   notice   when   Vasili
Orlov joined    him   as   he   floated   through   the   lounge/observa-
tion deck on his way to the bridge.
  `What   amazes   me,   tovarishch,   is  that  Sasha  ever  found  time
to    study    anything    besides   engineering   physics.   Yet   he's
always   quoting   poems   and   plays   I   don't  even  know,  and  he
speaks better English than - well, Walter.'
  `Because   he   switched   to   science,   Sasha   is   -  what  do  you
say   -   the   black   sheep   of   the   family.   His  father  was  a
professor    of    English    at    Novosibirsk.    Russian   was   only
allowed    in    the    house   Monday   to   Wednesday,   Thursday   to
Saturday it was English.'
  `And Sundays?'
  `Oh, French or German, alternate weeks.'
  'Now    I   know   exactly   what   you   mean   by   nekulturny;   fits
me  like  a  glove.  Does  Sasha  feel  guilty  about  his  ... defec-
tion? And with such a background, why did he ever become
an engineer,'
  `At Novosibirsk, you soon learn who are the serfs and
who are the aristocrats. Sasha was an ambitious young man,
as well as a brilliant one.'
  `Just like you, Vasili.'
  `Et tu, Brute! You see, I can quote Shakespeare as well -
Bozhe moi! - what was that?'
  Floyd was unlucky; he was floating with his back to the
observation window, and saw nothing at all. When he
twisted around, seconds later, there was only the familiar
view of Big Brother, bisecting the giant disk of Jupiter, just
as it had done ever since their arrival.
  But to Vasili, for a moment that would be imprinted on
his memory forever, that sharp-edged outline held a comp-
letely different, and wholly impossible, scene. It was as if a
window had suddenly been opened onto another universe.
  The vision lasted for less than a second, before his in-
voluntary blink reflex cut it off. He was looking into a field
not of stars, but of suns, as if into the crowded heart of a
galaxy, or the core of a globular cluster. In that moment,
Vasili Orlov lost forever the skies of Earth. From now on
they would seem intolerably empty; even mighty Orion
and glorious Scorpio would be scarcely noticeable patterns
of feeble sparks, not worthy of a second glance.
  When he dared to open his eyes again, it was all gone. No
- not completely. At the very centre of the now-restored
ebon rectangle, a faint star was still shining.
  But a star did not move as one watched. Orlov blinked
again, to clear his watering eyes. Yes, the movement was
real; he was not imagining it.
  A meteor? It was some indication of Chief Scientist Vasili
Orlov's state of shock that several seconds passed before he;
remembered that meteors were impossible in airless space.
  Then it blurred suddenly into a streak of light, and within
a  few  heartbeats  had vanished beyond the edge of Jupiter.
By  this  time,  Vasili  had recovered his wits and was once
more the cool, dispassionate observer.
  Already he had a good estimate of the object's trajectory.
There  could  be  no  doubt;  it was aimed directly at Earth.

--
           KK   KK    KK    KK     KK    KK
          KK  KK      KK  KK        KK  KK
         KKKK         KKKK           KKKK
        KK  KK        KK  KK          KK  KK
       KK    KK       KK    KK         KK    KK

※ 来源:·BBS 水木清华站 bbs.net.tsinghua.edu.cn·[FROM: 166.111.10.176]

--
:-) Helix@163.NET                                                    85958F57
:-( Helix@KALI.COM.CN                                                208CE12C
                                        简  爱                       CB384F06
                                                                     CC60E9F4
                           你-为-什-么-把-心-给-挖-走-了~~~ ?        54319BC9
                                                                     7EA2D22F

※ 来源:·饮水思源站 bbs.sjtu.edu.cn·[FROM: 202.120.5.220]

--
☆ 来源:．哈工大紫丁香 bbs.hit.edu.cn．[FROM: bingyang.bbs@bbs.sjt]

SFworld 版 (精华区)