"Howard Waldrop - The Lunchbox" - читать интересную книгу автора (Waldrop Howard)

THE LUNCHBOX
Howard Waldrop
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It came down on a flame toward the gray and red landscape, hissing through the thin air, lower and lower
as the dim sun rose up the edge of the planet. The ground below was turning from shadow to sunlight,
and the metal eye of the craft reflected the eye and heart of the sun.

It dropped more slowly still, and the pillar under it changed from bright orange to nothingness and
shimmer as the propellants burned away and the nitrogen pressure tanks were emptied in the last twenty
feet of the drop. It settled with a small thump, and the legs made the machine plumb level inside their
hydraulic casings.

The planet was quiet and still.

The sun beaded the horizon in the deathstill frosty calm of dawn.

ManтАЩs first claim to daybreak on Mars.

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The noise rose from stillness to roar to pandemonium inside the Mission Control Room. Cigars were
passed around, papers were thrown into the air, the unloosed tension went from desk to desk. Checklists
fell like snow in the cyclone of the room.

Then the men resettled at their consoles, ready for the Big Broadcast of 1977. Above them, television
commentators were telling the public that what they had just seen was a celebration by the men at the
consoles because the first of the Viking series had landed on the red planet, Mars.

Krvl, resting in their den, heard the scream of a ruined xr. Parts of Krvl roused, other parts remained
dormant, others were reproducing in a random manner, ready for the formation of a motherbud later in
the day.

Krvl shifted himself sluggishly, aware that something was amiss. Xrs roamed at night, and by the slight
pulsing in its head, Krvl knew it was dawnlightтАФwhen xrs should be dying. They did not scream when
they died. And what but an xr went about at night?

And what, except the Kind, destroyed xrs?

Krvl paused moved to the chute-tube of the den. It availed themself of an xr pouch and slid out, leaving
its reproducing self behind.

Outside, it was a wonderfully murky morning.

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The first photographs from Mars showed a hummocked landscape of powdered sand and clay grit sized
particles. The scanning lens mounted atop the module showed the hummocks. The close-up lens in the
bottom of the Viking showed the clay-sized particles.