《Seeding Program 》作者：- James Blish【EPUB】

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BOOK ONE. SEEDING PROGRAM. The spaceship resumed humming around Sweeney without hisnoticing the change. When Capt.Meikiejons voice finallycame again from the wall speaker Sweeney was still lyingbuckled tohis bunk in a curious state of .tranquility he hadnever known before and couldnt possiblyhave describedeven to himself. Though he had a pulse he might otherwisehave concluded that hewas dead. It took him several minutesto respond. quotSweeney do you hear me Are you all right” The brief hesitation in the pilots breathing made Sweeneygrin. From Meikiejons point of viewand that of most of therest of humanity Sweeney was all wrong. He was in factdead. The heavily insulated cabin with its own airlock to the outside and no access for Sweeney atall to the rest of the shipwas a testimonial to his wrongness. So was Meikiejons tone: the voice of a man addressing not another human being butsomething that had to be kept in avault. A vault designed to protect the universe outside it not toprotect its contents from theuniverse. . ‘ quotSure Im all rightquot Sweeney said snapping the buckle andsitting up. He checked thethermometer which still registeredits undeviating minus 194 F.the mean surface temperatureofGanymede moon number III of Jupiter. quotI was- dozingsort of. Whats up” quotIm putting the ship into her orbit were about a thousandmiles up from the satellite now. Ithought you might want totake a look.” quotSure enough. Thanks Mickey.” The wall speaker said quotYeah. Talk to you later.quot Sweeneygrappled for the guide rail and pulledhimself over to thecabins single bull’s-eye port maneuvering with considerableprecision. Fora man to whom 1/6 Earth gravity is normal freefall -a situation of no gravity at all-is onlyan extreme case. Which was what Sweeney was too. A human being butan extreme case. He looked out. He knew exactly what he would sec he hadstudied it exhaustively from photosfrom teletapes frommaps and through telescopes both at home on the Moon andon Mars. When youapproach Ganymede at inferior conjunction as Meikiejon was doing the first thing that hitsyou inthe eye is the huge oval blot called Neptunes Trident sonamed by the earliest Jovianexplorers because it was markedwith the Greek letter psi on the old Howe composite map. Thename had turned out to have been