[翻译]守望者/THE SENTINEL by Arthur C. Clarke(...
2006-11-30 19:02:31 来自: 恶魔的步调
| 标题：[翻译]守望者/THE SENTINEL by Arthur C. Clarke(试开第一个坑＾＾) | ||
守望者
阿瑟·C.·克拉克
下次你再看到高悬在南方夜空上的满月的时候，如果你沿着它右边缘月轮的弧线缓缓往上移动你的视线的话，你会在两点钟左右方向的地方，看见一块椭圆形的斑块，它小小的，暗暗的，但任何视力正常的人都不难发现它。那是月球上最平坦的地带之一——一片被“圈”起来的大平原，它被人们称之为“梅雅·克里斯姆”，或者危海。这片直径达300英里，四周被宏伟的环形山脉围的固若金汤的广阔平原，在1996年的夏天我们进入那儿之前，从来都没有被人打扰过。
我们的探险规模很大，用了两艘重型运输飞船才把我们全部的补给和设备从月球澄海的主基地运到危海，而两地相距有500英里之遥。另外，我们准备了三架微型的火箭推进器，以帮助我们在某些我们的月球车不能通过的月面进行短距离传送。幸运的是，它们几乎派不上用场，因为危海大部分的地带都非常的平坦，没有其它地方随处可见的危险的大裂缝，也很少有坑坑洼洼和丘陵这些复杂的地势。至少据目前我们所知，我们的强悍的月球车可以毫不费力地把我们带往任何我们想去的地方。
我是个地质学家，或者说是个月球学家，如果你非得那么认真的话。我们的队伍在梅雅的南部地区进行探险，我们得在一个星期内穿行100英里，绕过山脉的山麓丘陵通过这儿。那些山脉就横亘在亿万年前曾经存在过的古海洋的海岸线上。当生命在地球上刚刚诞生的时候，这里的海洋就已经开始消亡了，它们从高高的宏伟悬崖上败下阵来，全都撤退到了空荡荡的月球之心中去了。我们现在正在行走着的这块地面，不在涨潮的海洋曾经把它深藏在半英里的水面之下，而如今，唯一关于水的印记，就只剩下了那些你偶尔才能在不见天日的洞穴中找到的白色冰霜。
我们在月亮缓慢的晨晓中早早地起程，按照地球时间计算，我们要等到一周后才能等到太阳落下去。一天中大部分的时间，囚禁在太空服里的我们离开月球车，到处寻找我们可能感兴趣的矿物，或者为将来的那些旅者放置一些防止他们迷路的标牌。总之，都是些平淡无奇的例行程序。就是这样，月球探险没有任何的危险性，甚至不会让人觉得特别的刺激。我们可以在月球车中舒舒服服地过上一个月，即便真的出了什么状况，我们只要靠紧坐好，等着电波那头的人派飞船来接我们走就行了。
我刚刚是不是说了，月球探险一点都不刺激？好吧，我说谎了。这儿宏伟的山脉从来都不会让人感觉到厌倦，这儿的山那才叫真正的山，地球上的跟这儿比起起来就只能算是小土墩了。而且我们从来都不知道，等我们绕过这些消失海洋留下的巨大石岬，又有什么样的惊奇什么样宏伟的奇观展现在我们面前。危海南部的整个拐弯处是一片辽阔的三角洲，曾经大大小小的河流就是由此进入大海的。可能原来耸立在这儿的会是一座高大的山脉，在月球最初的那段短暂的火山活动时期，它们经过持续不断的倾盆大雨的侵蚀才变成了如今的样子。雨水冲刷出来的古老峡谷像是封邀请函，纵勇着我们去攀爬它们两边不知名的高地。但我们还有自己百来英里的行程，能做的只有抬头用渴望的眼神不时地瞥一眼那些后人可能到达的高地顶上。
tbc...
＝＝＝＝＝＝＝语言的分割线＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝
THE SENTINEL
Arthur C. Clarke
1951 Avon Periodicals Inc.
The next time you see the full moon high in the south, look carefully at its right-hand edge and let your eye travel upward along the curve of the disk. Round about two o’clock you will notice a small, dark oval: anyone with normal eyesight can find it quite easily. It is the great walled plain, one of the finest on the Moon, known as the Mare Crisium-the Sea of Crises. Three hundred miles in diameter, and almost completely surrounded by a ring of magnificent mountains, it had never been explored until we entered it in the late summer of 1996.
Our expedition was a large one. We had two heavy freighters which had flown our supplies and equipment from the main lunar base in the Mare Serenitatis, five hundred miles away. There were also three small rockets which were intended for short-range transport over regions which our surface vehicles couldn’t cross. Luckily, most of the Mare Crisiurn is very flat. There are none of the great crevasses so common and so dangerous elsewhere, and very few craters or mountains of any size. As far as we could tell, our powerful caterpillar tractors would have no difficulty in taking us wherever we wished to go.
I was geologist-or selenologist, if you want to be pedantic in charge of. the group exploring the southern region of the Mare. We had crossed a hundred miles of it in a week, skirting the foothills of the mountains along the shore of what was once the ancient sea, some thousand million years before. When life was beginning on Earth, it was already dying here. The waters were retreating down the flanks of those stupendous cliff s, retreating into the empty heart of the Moon. Over the land which we were crossing, the tideless ocean had once been half a mile deep, and now the only trace of moisture was the hoarfrost one could sometimes find in caves which the searing sunlight never penetrated.
We had begun our journey early in the slow lunar dawn, and still had almost a week of Earth-time before nightfall. Half a dozen times a day we would leave our vehicle and go outside in the spacesuits to hunt for interesting minerals, or to place markers for the guidance of future travelers. It was an uneventful routine. There is nothing hazardous or even particularly exciting about lunar exploration. We could live comfortably for a month in our pressurized tractors, and if we ran into trouble we could always radio for help and sit tight until one of the spaceships came to our rescue.
I said just now that there was nothing exciting about lunar exploration, but of course that isn’t true. One could never grow tired of those incredible mountains, so much more rugged than the gentle hills of Earth. We never knew, as we rounded the capes and promontories of that vanished sea, what new splendors would be revealed to us. The whole southern curve of the Mare Crisiurn is a vast delta where a score of rivers once found their way into the ocean, fed perhaps by the torrential rains that must have lashed the mountains in the brief volcanic age when the Moon was young. Each of these ancient valleys was an invitation, challenging us to climb into the unknown uplands beyond. But we had a hundred miles still to cover, and could only look longingly at the heights which others must scale.
tbc...
＝＝＝＝＝＝再一次分割线＝＝＝＝＝＝＝
第一次搞翻译，此乃SK鼎鼎大名的2001的小说原著，原文提供者阿尔法
2006-11-30 20:04:20: 呱啦啦 (武汉)
纠正
原始提供者是BY叔叔
阿尔法小姐是我家姑娘之一，这篇被她放鸽子了
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