"Larry Niven - Building Harlequin's Moon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Niven Larry)

factory by the Hammered Sea. Erika stayed warm for a year, giving Gabriel good advice, making a few
mistakes they laughed at together, fretting about how long everything took. The plan was already
foreshortened-Gabriel would never have forced so many processes if Selene wasn't really just a way to
escape to the stars again.

He held Erika's attention for a year before she insisted on going cold again.

Gabriel and Ali finished the little town of Aldrin. They laid pipes to carry water to a cistern, more pipes to
make a rudimentary sewer and reclamation system, planted a grove of trees on a hill outside town, and
filled greenhouses with seedlings. The night before they planned to wake High Council again, Gabriel and
Ali made love, alone on the surface of the moon they'd transformed. Their lovemaking started soft and
slow, growing to a deep intimate conclusion. They stayed still for a long time, wrapped in each other's
arms, warm in that close place that follows on the heels of lovemaking. When she stopped trembling, Ali
looked at Gabriel and said, "We've consecrated the ground here. Selene has been blessed. We blessed it
together."
Gabriel simply thought they'd enjoyed great sex, but it was a celebration, and so he didn't contradict her.
Rather, he held her tightly and began to work out hydrologic engineering problems in his head.




Part 1: Selene




60,268 John Glenn shiptime




Chapter 1: Teaching Grove




Rachel reached for the seedling. Her long fingers found the pliant trunk, thin as her pinkie, buried inside
the furled branches. She unwrapped gauzy material from the root ball with her free hand, separating the
roots by spreading them down and out in the air. Bits of soil fell through her hands as she settled roots
and tree onto a mound of nutrient-enriched dirt. Still steadying the gangly cecropia, she swept anchor soil
to cover the roots, tamped it down, and then tied the trunk very loosely to a long thin stake. Rachel sat
back on her heels and admired the little tree. A warm breeze rustled its leaves and the smell of damp dirt
filled the air.

A banana palm went in next, then a set of three heliconias near the path. Rachel's crate stood empty. The
distant sun, Apollo, hung low in the sky, illuminating beads of sweat as she stretched.

The other students had all finished more than twenty minutes ago. Rachel nodded to herself, checking to
be sure the plot matched the picture in her head. Harry's plot was well designed, and cleaner since he
had gone back and raked the soil after watering. But she could do that too. Water first. She sighed and