"James Rollins - Subterranean" - читать интересную книгу автора (Romeyn Henry)

water, clear as a window, teemed with small fish and other marine life. A luncheon basket, prepared by
the mess hall cook, was open beside her. Two half-eaten sandwiches sat on a paper plate. Bologna and
cheese.

"They look like little monsters," Jason said.

Smiling, Linda glanced over to the boy crouched over her portable Nikon microscope, viewing a water
sample taken from the lake. "Those cone-shaped ones are called tintinnids," she said. "The squarish ones
are diatoms."

"What are they? Some sort of bugs?"

"Not really. More like plants. They're in a family of organisms called phytoplankton. They take sunlight
and convert it to energy the way a plant does."

"But if they need sunlight, like a plant"тАФJason swiveled to face her, his face scrunched up with
concentrationтАФ"how do they survive down here in the dark?"

She tousled his hair. "That's a very good question. I'm not really sure. But I believe there must be an
underground current carrying the plankton from the surface waters to this underground lake. The water is
very salty. Like diluted seawater."

"What's so important about . . . these . . ." He pointed at the microscope. "Bugs?"

As Linda considered the implication herself, she allowed her gaze to drift across the camp. She noticed a
flurry of activity among the military personnel by the gorge that split the base. Probably some sort of
training exercise.

"Well?" Jason asked, recalling her attention.

She turned back to the boy. "Do you want a science lesson?"

"Sure!" he replied enthusiastically.

"All right, you asked for it." She smiled at him, appreciating his inquisitiveness. "Theseplankton are the
building blocks of life. On solid ground, grass turns sunlight into energy. Then a cow eats the grass. Then
we eat the cow. This is the way the sun's energy is passed on to us. In the sea, it is the phytoplankton that
turns sunlight into energy. The phytoplankton is then eaten by small creatures, such as jellyfish"тАФshe
pointed to the small fish just offshoreтАФ"which in turn get eaten by those tiny fish. Then even bigger fish
eat the little fish. And so on. So even in the sea, sunlight's energy is passed along. Do you understand?"

"So these plankton thingies are like our grass."

"Exactly. They are the grassy fields from which this ecosystem sprouts."

He nodded. "Neat."

"So we've done step one and determined that the water is alive. Next, after we finish our sandwiches,
we have to collect some of the creatures that live in the water. I saw some starfish close to the shore over
there and some sponges. Wanna help me get a few?"