"Alan E. Nourse - Rocket to Limbo" - читать интересную книгу автора (Nourse Alan E)

'<: Lars felt his heart pounding as he stepped across to the rolling strip bearing the
green and white cross of the Gany-mede. His ship! The assignment he had dreamed of
since his first day in the Academy-to ship aboard the Ganymede with Walter Fox, the man
who had opened more planets colonization than any man since the first Koenig-drive ship
had left Earth; the man whose seal of approval on a planet was fc virtual guarantee of a
successful and healthy colony. This *fip on the Ganymede would be no exploratory voyage,
to be Jure- a full week now before blastoff to bunk down the new members of the crew and
get the OfBcers-in-Training settled |a their duties; then a milk-run to Vega III to run a final
ftheck on a colony about to be opened to free colonization- felt it would be a good trip to
give an Officer-in-Training his
12 ROCKET TO LIMBO
space legs. There would be exploratories later, to unvisited stars, to unknown dangers.
Time enough for that, Lars thought. Now it was enough just to be assigned aboard the
Ganymede.
He glanced at the chrono on his wrist and stepped off the strip at a refresher booth. The
assignment orders in his pocket instructed him to join his ship at 1400 hours; it was now
only 1135. He had time to catch a shower and get himself into presentable uniform before
going aboard. He wanted his first impression to be a good one. He could see himself in his
mind's eye, stepping off the gantry into the entrance lock of the Ganymede, saluting the flag
first, then the officer of the deck. Walter Fox himself, perhaps? No, that would be too much to
hope for. But perhaps Mr, Lorry then, the second officer, returning his salute with casual
briskness and saying, "Name, Officerr
"Heldrigsson, sir. Officer-in-Training. Planetary ecology."
"Oh yes, one of the biology boys. You'll be working with Dr. Lambert, then."
"Yes, sir. That's what I'd hoped. Where will I find him, sirr
"Up in the lab, I suppose. Glad to have you aboard, Officer." And another salute.
In the refresher booth skillful robot fingers helped Lars ease off his travel-stained
uniform, picked through his pack for disposables and discarded them all with a whoosh
down the disposal chute. As new clothing popped out of the slot Lars stepped into the
shower stall, still glowing from his daydream. He relaxed as sheets of warm water and
detergent sponges enveloped him. Even five years of intensive study and preparation at the
Academy could never truly prepare a man for space-this was understood from the start-and
neither could they explain in advance the feeling of tension and excitement, the
indescribable fever of wonder and adventure that took possession of you the hour before
you
ROCKET TO LIMBO 13
stepped aboard a Star Ship for your first Officer-in-Training assignment.
He had tried to explain it to Dad during the two-week graduation furlough from which he
was just returning. It had been good to be home again for a few days, good to feel the warm
winds coming up from the south, • good to feel the bite of a pick once again in the rocky
north-central Greenland soil. The farm was the same as he had remembered it, the heavy
house built of glacial rock, the huge granite fireplace, the outbuildings, the fields of wheat
spreading forth for miles in every direction. Dad had seemed unchanged, too, his face
burned red and seamed by the wind, bis hands rough and brown. Mom looked older and
more tired, her eyes bright with worry as she greeted her son, but she had smiled through
the worry, refusing to say a word to dampen his enthusiasm for his new assignment. ". He
had spent the first days with old Black, the huge Labrador who guarded the farm against all
assailants, hiking the hills and valleys he remembered so well from his childhood. But he
knew the question would come, and presently ;ft did as he sat with Dad before the fire one
night after dinner.