"Anderson, Poul - Fire Time" - читать интересную книгу автора (Anderson Poul)
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ANUBELEA B III (Bel HI)
ISHTAR
Elementary parameters
Earth (E) = 1.0
Mass: 1.53 E. Mean equatorial diameter: 1.14 E = 14,502 km.
Mean density: 1.03 E = 5.73 H20.
Mean surface gravity: 1.18 E = 1155 cm/sec2.
Sidereal year: 1,072 E = 392 Terrestrial days = 510 Ishtarian days.
Rotation period: 0.775 E = 18 h 36 m 10.3 s.
Axial inclination: 1.14 E = 28░ 3'.2.
Mean irradiation ifrom Bel only): 0.89 Sol/Earth.
Mean angular diameter of Bel: 1.03 Sol/Earth == 33░.
Mean sea-level atmospheric pressure: 1.12 E = 810 mm Hg.
Normal % atmospheric composition by volume: N3 76.90, Oi 21.02, HaO 0.35, A 1.01, CO; 0.03, + misc.
Water/land surface ratio: 1.20 E = 2.94:1.
Satellites
Note: Both moons being of irregular shape, especially I, diameters and angular diameters as seen from Ishtar are calculated for equivalent spheres. For fuller information and discussion, see Chapter III.
"What's there that I couldn't get better and quicker from the navigator's bible?" Dejerine said. "Oh, yes, sf, and, da, ja, also text, pictures, anecdotes. Not bad material for a tourist to study in advance, if anybody could afford to play tourist over such a distance. And I've gone through other stuff too, projected hours of 3V records, I know the shape of an Ishtarian-" He had been riffling pages as he talked, and for no logical reason halted at such an illustration.
A male and female were shown, plus a human who gave scale. The male was the larger of the pair, about the size of a small horse. "Centauroid" was a very loose description. The burly two-armed torso merged smoothly with the four-legged barrel, taurine hump above the forequarters leading from the horizontal to the almost vertical sections of the back. The body looked leonine rather than equine, with its robust build, long tail, padded feet whose three toes (more prehensile in front than behind) bore purplish nails. The arms resembled, somewhat, those of a Terrestrial weight lifter; but the hands each had four digits, the first three not unlike man's thumb and two of his fingers though spreading more widely, the last like a less-developed extra thumb with one more joint, all possessing nails too. The head was big and round, ears large and pointed (slightly movable), jaw showing a chin and near-anthropomorphous delicacy, teeth white and small except for a pair of upper fangs which barely protruded from the mouth. Instead of a nose, a short muzzle opened in a single broad nostril which curved downward and flared at the ends. Beneath, feline whiskers surrounded the upper lip. The eyes also suggested a cat's, whiteless, his blue, hers golden.
Face and arms were glabrous, the skin (in the race depicted, native to Beronnen) light brown. Most of the body bore a tawny-green mosslike pelt. The lion impression was heightened by a rufous mane which covered head, throat, and spine down to the hump: composed not of hair but of thickly leaved vines. A familiar growth formed a shelf of eyebrow.
Sexual dimorphism was considerable. The female stood fifteen centimeters shorter. She had a mere stub of tail. Her hump was large and softly rounded, unlike his blocky cluster of muscles; her rump was broad and her belly deep; two nipples on an udder which wasn't large, and the external genitalia, were brilliant red. Accompanying text noted that her odor was sweet and his acrid, and that she commanded a wider range of frequencies in both speech and hearing.
They were unclad aside from ornaments and a belt to support pouch and knife. He carried a spear and a stringed instrument slung across his shoulders; she, a longbow, quiver, and what might be a wooden flute.
"-I know the biochemistry is basically like ours, we can eat a good deal of each other's food though some essentials are lacking in either case-why, they get drunk on ethanol too." Dejerine snapped the volume shut. "Homelike, no? Except that men have spent a century on Ishtar, working hard to understand, and you can better tell than I how far off they are from their goal!" He sent the book spinning over to his bed.
"A long ways," his visitor admitted.
"And those humans. True, true, more than half the population of Primavera is floating: researchers who come for a while to carry out specific projects, technics on time contract, archeologists basing themselves there till they can go on to ... Tammuz, is that the dead planet's name? Nevertheless, they must all have a special devotion to Ishtar. And the core of them are the long-term residents, the careerists, a fair percentage second- or third-generation Ishtarians who have scarcely an atom from Earth in their cells." Dejerine spread his palms. "Do you see how badly I need a, a briefing? I need more than that, of course, but can't possibly get it. So ... my friend, will you kindly finish your drink and take another? Loosen your tongue. Free-associate. Tell me about your past life, your family, your comrades. In return, I can at least bring them your greetings, and whatever presents you wish to send,
"But help me." Dejerine knocked back his second glass. "Give me ideas. What shall I say to them, how reconcile them and get them to co-operate, I who come in as the agent of a policy that dashes their fondest hopes to the deck?"
Conway sat for a space, his vision lost in the overlook across Luna, before he said carefully: "You know, you might start by showing them that documentary of Olaya's which made the big splash last month."
"On the background of the war?" Dejerine was startled. "But it was generally critical."
"No, not quite. It tried hard to be objective. Oh, everybody knows Olaya is no enthusiast for this thing. Too aristocratic by temperament, I suppose. But he's a damn fine journalist, and he did a remarkable job of getting a variety of viewpoints."
Dejerine frowned. "He skimped the fundamental issue: the Eleutherians."
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