《Earth of Hours》作者： - James Blish【EPUB】

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This Earth of Hours. THE ADVANCE squadron was coming into line as MasterSergeant Oberholzer came onto the bridge ofthe NovaeWashingtongrad saluted and stood stiffly to the left of Lieu-tenant Campion theexec to wait for orders. The bridgewas crowded and crackling with tension but after twentyyears in the Marines it was all old stuff to Oberholzer. TheHobo as most of the enlisted mencalled her out of earshotof the brass was at the point of the formation as befittedavirtually indestructible battleship already surfeited withthese petty conquests. The rest ofthe cone was sweepingon ahead in the swift enveloping maneuver which hadreduced so manyprevious planets before they had been ableto understand what was happening to them. This time the planet at the focus of all those shiftingconic sections of raw naval power was aplace called Calle. It was showing now on a screen that Oberholzer could seeturning as placidly as any planetturned when you were too faraway from it to see what guns it might be pointing at you. Lieutenant Campion was watching it too though he had tolook out of the very corners of hiseyes to see it at all. If the exec were caught watching the screen instead ofthe meter board assigned to him CaptainHammer wouldprobably reduce him to an ensign. Nevertheless Campionnever took his eyes off theimage of Calle. This one wasgoing to be rough. Captain Hammer was watching too. After a moment hesaid quotSoundquot in a voice like sandpaper. quotBy the pulse six sirquot Lieutenant Springs voice murmuredfrom the direction of the scope.His junior a very rawyoungster named Rover passed him a chit from the plottingtable. quotForthat read: By the birefs five eight nine sir” the invisible navigator corrected. Oberholzer listened without moving while Captain Ham-mer muttered under his breath to Flo-Mar12-Upjohn theonly civilian allowed on the bridgeand small wondersince he was the Consort ofState of the Matriarchy itself. Hammer had long ago become accustomed enough to hisown bridge to be able to control whooverheard him but12-Upjohns answering whisper must have been audible toevery man there. The briefing said nothing about a second inhabitedplanetquot the Consort said a littlepeevishly. quotBut thentheres very little we do know about this systemthatspart of ourtrouble. What