"Philip Jose Farmer - Jesus on Mars" - читать интересную книгу автора (Farmer Phillip Jose)

When they landed, they would find the temperature to be +20┬░ C.
Orme turned the lander to face west as the thin but still strong wind began
to carry them east. He adjusted the pulses to counter the push of the
atmosphere. The Barsoom sank, and he noted that the air, though it was
becoming thicker, was not moving as swiftly as the higher altitude wind. He
decreased the pulses; the raser indicator showed that the Barsoom was
maintaining its angle of descent. A straight line drawn from the lander would end
dead on the point of contact, the floor of the Tithonius Chasma.
Time passed as he poured data into the transceiver. The transmitter would
also be sending photographs of the approaching surface of Mars and of the two
Marsnauts in this womb of irradiated plastic.
Like a mouth, the rift opened beneath him. The vast mounds of the
volcanoes outside dropped, and presently the ship was below the edges of the
awesomely towering cliffs. They were still in the thin but bright sunlight of the red
planet. Not until the sun was low would the shadow of the western wall fall on
them.
Orme, glancing now and then out of the port, could see the metallic curve
of the other vessel buried beneath the landslide. Reddish rocks and a finer
material, dust, were mixed in this collapse from the weathered material of the
canyon wall. There was little wind here, which made Orme's task easier.
Bronski, overcome by emotion, forgot his English and spoke in Polish.
This had been his native language; he had not learned French until the age of
ten, when his parents had fled to Sweden and thence to Paris. He corrected
himself a moment later, saying, 'It is an artefact! A ship!'
Orme thought that it remained to be proved that it was a spacecraft but he
had no time to comment. Besides, he felt that Bronski was right.
The lander settled firmly on its six pads, and it sank a trifle as its
telescoping legs absorbed the shock, then recoiled to lift the vessel. Orme cut off
the power and sat for a moment feeling the weak pull of Mars and hearing the
silence. Then he said jubilantly, 'Martians, we're here!'
He'd planned a number of short speeches, some quite poetic, but he had
finally decided to hell with it. He'd say whatever came spontaneously.
Danton's voice broke the silence. 'Congratulations, commander.'
Orme was startled when Bronski's arms enfolded him from behind and his
voice bellowed in Orme's ears.
'By God, we've done it!'
'He's here, too,' Orme said, and he meant it. 'Even if this place does look
like the devil's workshop.'



2
Orme unstrapped himself and rose slowly, remembering that though there was
gravity it was not Earth's. He looked through the port and quickly described what
he saw. The lander was 300 feet from the edge of the landslide, resting on an
area detected from the Aries. It was comparatively free of the rocks that littered
the floor of the canyon; the pads had missed all of them and sat on rock swept
smooth of dust by the recent winds. Through the top port he could see the sky, a
light blue crossed by a few wisps of whiteness. Coming towards them was the
robot explorer, RED II, which had first seen the two Greek characters on the