On the momentous day that man first walked on the moon, my brother Tom and I lay on the floor of the suite above my father's shop in Newark, watching the drama on the old black-and-white television while drinking. "One small step for man, one leap for mankind." Astronaut Armstrong's soul-stirring words are still in my memory.The strong smell of my father's Turkish tobacco and my mother's lavender talcum powder and other stale smells from the worn carpet are still in my mind.The moment Armstrong stepped on the moon, I choked with ecstasy and my throat throbbed. "Now they've found the money!" Tom's blatant jealousy almost ruined my mood at the time, "And I'm still stuck in Hot Renploz!"

Even though the Moon Children were born many years later, their story begins at that moment. This story seems too difficult for me to tell, so I hope to choose someone who is better than me—preferably a "story master" to tell it.Who can take on this responsibility?I think it must be Swift's Gulliver. Gulliver has always been my favorite literary figure.I have never been able to understand the profound theory of Swift, a theological satirist, but I always feel very close to Gulliver-a very simple, ordinary person, sensible and honest, who has no fault at all, but is involved Into all kinds of troubles beyond his ability to deal with.

The life of the Moon Children is more thrilling than Swift's Gulliver's Adventures, and it takes my personality and my intellect to tell it well.Maybe my brother Tom should be the narrator.In this story, he and I have the same weight, not to mention that he is a humorous and imaginative person.I recall my father saying that Tom was the natural poet in the family and I was just a bum. "Please, Gamo!" said the mother to the father.She defended me achingly, "You're breaking Kim's heart. You've taught Tom too much of your old tricks! Better to be stupid than a thief!"

"Your son is already a thief? Ha!" He winks at her like a wounded innocent, then tells a Jewish joke.Although Tom snickered knowingly, I couldn't understand.My mother stared back at them angrily, and suddenly told me to go to the deli to buy ham. Hearing the food, my father wailed for a while, but my mother said that ham was cheap. Despite the spat, Tom knew how to shake my hand and say goodbye.Normally, we are friends.I remember when a man landed on the moon and we learned that the Eagle (the space shuttle) had landed safely again: we stood up and made peace and we both decided to be astronauts.

"What chance do you have, children of Gamo Houdian?" the mother sighed impatiently, looking mournfully at the potatoes she was peeling. "What's wrong with Daddy?" Tom stared at his mother. "He's smarter than anyone. It's like on TV, 'Now, everything's going to change'. If Kim wants to, he can be your pet dumbass." Guy. But me, I'm going to put my talent to work on the planet." "Don't talk about Kim like that." "That's what Pa said," Tom reminded her. "I don't care what happens to Kim. I've made up my mind to go to the moon."

"Better finish high school first." "Better blow your little one's nose," Tom smirked at me. "I'm going to make it, Daddy says I'm going to be another capable guy, and I'll do it just as well." Mother's lips lost their color when she heard it, and she bent over and continued to peel potatoes.I grieved for my mother and myself, and my vision was blurred by tears. She was a tall, bony blond woman.She must have been an attractive girl in the past, although judging by her wedding photos, she was already beginning to age when she got married.

Once she found Tom and I rummaging through a black lacquered box with old photographs and trinkets of lavender scent that Tom had found in her closet.Her picture looked pretty to me, but Tom snickered that her breasts were as big as cows.She slapped Tom across the ear and snatched the box away.But then she showed me her memorabilia and how she had escaped from an unhappy family in the Arkansas mountains—and she was hoping for a chance to perform on stage. She couldn't help crying when she told this story.She said that her frame was too big and her timbre was too thin.She tried "Old Opry" in Nashville, Hollywood, and New York, but luck never came to her.She was working as a bartender in a third-rate bar when she met Gamo Houdian.

Hodian must have been a pseudonym, but I never knew my father's real name.He was dark, stocky, and elusive.He speaks several languages, all of which are terrible, especially English. He is secretive about everything and keeps his mouth shut. My mother said he was of Egyptian origin, and he always looked mysterious.Tom thinks he is Jewish.I once heard him referred to as a "sneaky, sneaky Armenian thief" by his business friends.The father had said that he himself had no nationality.His passport was Turkish, but most likely a forgery. My father wanted to name my brother Tamar and Kemal, but my mother wanted him to call my brother Tom and me Kim.Hodian must have been the last name my father had adopted when he came to America—it was towards the end of World War II, and he had known my mother before that.He calls himself an importer.We have always lived on low rent, above or behind a grimy little shop.The home was sparsely furnished with cheap perfumes he had imported and tarnished brassware, and the carpet on the floor was in tatters.

There were other imports at home that my dad didn't know much about, and those strange customers always got on his nerves.He is not at home most of the time, and his mother always says that he has gone to stock up. Once he went out for nearly three years.Mother told us he had fallen ill in Ankara, but Tom snorted and said father was in prison somewhere. My father disappeared when I entered high school.Because he always hated Sicilians, his mother insisted that the Mafia murdered him.But much later, among my mother's things, I found a small packet of scented letters addressed to "Hooper and Monsieur" from Marseilles to the Staten Island post office box, apparently addressed to my father.They have a very feminine (French) touch.Begging him to come back to Qi Li and his and Qi Li's children.Maybe he (my father) did.

Although my father was never a big money earner, life became increasingly difficult without him.Mother closed the shop and started looking for a job.Some of her father's old friends had verbally promised to give her some relief, but none of them had been fulfilled.I think it's to keep her mouth shut and to keep things a secret between those "old friends". Once, one of these "old friends" took me to a bar to chat about my future.He was a dark, cautious, nervous little man who smelled of garlic and cheap wine.He asked questions in a low voice, absolutely skeptical that I knew nothing about the family connection to my father.My mother must have begged him to give me a job, but he stalked out of the bar angrily and proudly, leaving me to pay for the drinks.

Mother later tripped (or fell) in front of a truck that spring, when she graduated from high school.Two fat sisters and my baptized missionary brother came back from Little Rock for the funeral.I cleared all the gin bottles from the house.I didn't tell them that the coroner found a drug needle in my mother's arm. By then Tom was already working on going to the moon.He was older, stronger, darker and brighter than me, more like our father, and had a better eye for important opportunities than I did.He broke his habit of speaking with a Hindi (or Jewish) accent and earned himself a scholarship to college to study space science. I fared worse, Yuqian had no math brains, and I didn't earn a scholarship.The mother's insurance had $6,000 left after paying all the bills.I took my share of the inheritance to Las Vegas to try my luck.But I had bad luck and ran out of money after only three nights. It was from this disaster that I really started to learn to do things.I have been starving for a long time. I got caught by the police two or three times before I realized I hadn't inherited my father's talent.Then I managed a bar, drove a taxi, and sold second-hand goods.I bought a guitar, learned to hum folk songs and performed on the street, but my voice didn't sound better than my mother's.I wrote songs, but no one sang them; I wrote novels, but no one printed them.I've been a DJ, a TV reporter, and even a political party campaign manager for an unsuccessful candidate. Tom has been getting closer to our childhood dream year after year.He entered the Space Armed Forces from the university campus, and eventually joined the "Universe Organization", a non-governmental organization of human beings in interstellar space, whose purpose is "peaceful development and use of space."Tom used to make fun of their lofty slogan "The free world belongs to the free people."It didn't take long for him to enter the training base of the Space Organization on the moon as the first team member.He has even changed his name to Thomas Hood. He also joined the satellite survey team.Cosmos engineers are improving a Explorer-style survey rocket.It can carry complex instruments weighing tens of tons that are used to communicate and analyze alien surfaces while flying in low orbit.According to the plan, it will test fly around the moon, and then survey hundreds of satellites and large planets. "I don't think we'll find anything," sneered Tom, "but it's a comfortable little errand to get to the moon, because it's so close to home and Robin Hudson." Robin was the daughter of the hotel magnate Howard Hudson he had met before.She has the charm of a melancholy goddess and a large fortune from her father, so since Tom and his fellow astronauts have seen her, Tom is more interested in her than the moon. Tom took me to Antilles Hudson, one of her father's retreats, to spend the weekend with members of his three-person survey team.At this time, "Explorer 1" was already running in the orbit of the moon, and the members of "Explorer 2" such as Tom were waiting for engineers to analyze the recording data. I was flattered by this invitation, and since I refused to change my surname to his, he already treated me like a beggar relative.I was happy to go, however, because the party's defeat left me jobless and idle. We see his teammates debating the real purpose of this space survey from a bright balcony on the hot, milky Caribbean shore. "Safe!" said Eric Thorsen, a tall, red-haired Nordic man.Cosmic personnel must be civilians, and he had just resigned from his position as a major in the U.S. Space Armed Forces, but he still behaved and dressed like a soldier. "Military security!" he said, banging his empty beer glass on the table, "that's exactly what I wanted." "Then your efforts will always be in vain," retorted Yuri Marco, "and all you can get is failure and self-destruction. What I seek is something else..." He stopped when he saw us, so Tom introduced me to them.Marco is tall and gentle, wearing black-rimmed glasses with high prescription, and looks very serious.He politely asked us to sit down, and then continued his speech. "We shall seek life," he said to Thorsen, "and there is nothing like this..." "May God save us from extraterrestrial life!" Thorsen waved the empty wine glass like a bat. "There are so many people here, why go to other planets to find trouble and come back?" "Trouble?" Marco's black eyes looked anxiously at me and Tom, as if asking us for help, "Our neighbors in space have never harmed us, and never will. I hope to find a higher life than us , a kind of intelligent life that can shuttle in space and travel between stars." Thorsen let out a disdainful sneer. "That's our real purpose," Marco bent over to him and said, "I believe that life can grow on other planets. There must have been life before our life on Earth. If interstellar travel is indeed possible, those explorers in outer space Must have been in our world. We should be able to find their tracks." "On the moon?" "Any world without air should be visited," Marco nodded. "Wind and water can erase everything. But traces of the moon landing, such as broken tools or empty wine cans or even a single footprint, may remain for hundreds of years." Ten thousand years." "Pray to God that we don't meet aliens." Thorson strode on, staggering, Tom following him to comfort him.I stayed with Yuri Marko.I was initially put off by his brooding, serious coach-like demeanor, but we quickly found common ground. His parents, like my father, were immigrants, Ukrainian traitors.As a political idealist, Marco had voted for my hapless One World candidate.I found out that he had an extremely strong interest in the Explorer. At that time, life forms on Mercury, Venus, and Jupiter were still mysterious and deduced.Nobody ever seriously suggested that these space neighbors might be more advanced than our own, but Marco fired my imagination. "Assuming we're not alone, and alien life exists," he says hoarsely, in a Slavic voice, about the universe. How big is the space.I've never felt that big before, so get excited.He went on to say: "Imagine a more advanced alien species, a society that spans the stars, and our earth may only be regarded as a small village worth mentioning in this interstellar space. Maybe you can't fully understand our space creature partners. Visualization, but the effort at least gives you a more realistic impression." Robin threw a party for us at her apartment last night at Antiris Hudson.It was dimly lit, so we could see the waves reflecting off the glass seal white.Robin's father was present, and the rich man's eyes were as cold as ice.Later, I guessed why Tom invited me. It turns out that Mr. Howard Hudson, who controls the maritime hotel industry, has set his sights on space, and the Hudson orbit and the Hudson crater are about to open.All he wanted from us was quick secret information, anything economical that this moon landing might reveal.The message will be taken by me through Tom and translated into some kind of private message code. Eric Thorson flushed with anger when he understood.He smashed champagne flutes against the shiny glass seawall and threatened to blow up the place.Tom hinted that Thorson had secret military ties to the Space Armed Forces, which the Cosmos didn't like.Thorson turned pale when he heard this, and agreed to remain silent on the matter. I saw Marco's disdain for me. "Listen, sir," I pleaded with him, "Tom takes too much for granted. He's never mentioned it to me. I won't interfere. Believe me, sir!" I don't think he's convinced yet. I. The purpose of the invitation made our party a mess.Tom said rudely to me that I was no longer his guest.But it turned out that after his team left, I stayed in that resort.I was left there with no money to pay my unexpected bills.I went to the public office and, after all, I got a job writing for people. Exploring the moon, it turned out, wasn't the comfortable missionary activity Tom had hoped it would be. When Explorer 1 crashed behind the moon, there were no survivors, and of course no one came to report what had gone wrong.Tom and his teammates were summoned to sit on "Explorer 2" and continue to survey the moon. My brother wasn't the only one dumbfounded by Explorer's discovery.The moon hides its secrets well, it has enough space, bigger than all of Africa.Early astronauts saw many empty craters of various sizes and expected to find many more.Tom and the others also hope to discover more exciting things. While the Moon is lifeless, worlds such as these have shown us the lingering threats and temptations of unknown life.Robots began to collect samples on Mars for analysis, and from the telemetry data we saw complex biomolecules.The first people exposed to this dust sample contracted a painful strange disease, and they stayed in the quarantine facility of the Cosmic Organization base in Fuopos until they died. The first men to orbit the Moon failed to solve old mysteries and discovered new ones. They saw many dark spots in the upper layers of the cloud, which they speculated might be larger biological forms in an ecological pyramid based on lesser life.They found wisps of tan popping up across the empty planet.Just when they reported seeing an unexplained loss of energy, their signal disappeared. The dark clouds on Venus conceal secrets that are also incomprehensible to humans.While unmanned probes have brought back simple, inferior life forms from its uppermost atmosphere, no probes (manned or unmanned) have yet returned from the unseen lower surface. Only one of the first three people to Mercury returned, and he saw no signs of life.He spent a year in a quarantine station on the moon and brought back some pictures.The photo shows a tunnel surrounded by a strange crater, surrounded by iron walls.And his two companions, once gone, never to return. Although no probes have yet returned from Jupiter's atmosphere, cosmic organizations have made preliminary detections of its large moons.According to the crew of the first spacecraft that came to the nearest satellite to Jupiter, they were tracked by an intermittent short wave of radiation when the spacecraft took off. It seemed that something on the planet was using radar to observe them. Leaving aside those uncertain omens, the crash of "Explorer 1" is enough to shock the world. People's first reaction is anxiety, which can also be said to be fear, fearing that unfriendly life has developed on the far side of the moon.Howard Hudson makes the most of this panic. I was still working at Antiris Hudson, and what I saw taught me what business is.A public announcement of the incident was delayed for several hours due to confusion by COSMO Moon officials and delays by Earth inspectors.During this period, Hudson's private spy system made him a lot of money. News of the crash reached our ranks in secret, disguised like a weather report sent from orbit over the Hudson.After a colleague deciphered the message, he couldn't help but speak out immediately, because the aviation incident was hitting the stock market at this time. Hudson had his broker short the space industry.The next day, when the news of the crash spread, he used his public office to disseminate frightening rumors that the missile launched by the Venusian creature had passed through the clouds of Venus, and the Venusian creature had learned about space conditions from the missile and was currently on the moon Build a military base on Earth to prevent our astronauts from polluting their Venusian air. The news that the Cosmic Organization has now sent a message from the moon gives more support to the rumor.Hudson's brokers made little money on space stocks after the closing bell.But rumors from the public office said Hudson netted $3 billion in three days. Cosmos tried to cool the rumors with a deadpan official document: "The responsible space authorities have detected no signs of hostility towards the crashed Explorer 1. Neither the observers of the Celestial Orbital Lunar Observatory nor the None of the crew members of 'Explorer 1' reported any abnormalities before the crash. The rescue team found no signs of any attack or conspiracy to sabotage the Explorer at the crash site. It is estimated that a mechanical failure may have caused the The survey ship drifted out of its own very low orbit. Any new developments were an immediate warning sign to the media, but in any case gave no reason for public fear. "'Explorer 2' is in full swing. Once its crew reaches the moon, it immediately resumes regular flight. " This is how the announcement ends.So far, the reconnaissance operation has made no reportable findings.In fact, nothing is to be expected, since the moon is completely dead.But the test flight has established a pattern for Explorer to map the resources of other airless worlds. Five minutes after the authorities' stern statement ended, our office was buzzing with a message from the Moon on the transmission network. News was sent in laser form from the managers of the new Hudson Crater.Our laser crew replayed the tape for us after relaying the news to Hudson's office. "...Listen, Mr. Hudson. Don't trust the Cosmos lightly. They're covering something up. I don't know what, maybe it's the one thing that will reveal the fact that they're dumb. But they're pressuring something, I think you should find out., "It is true that Explorer 1 de-orbited for no apparent reason.It flies in reconnaissance mode, up to 10 kilometers high, and sends a regular report to the console every time it moves.No trouble was ever mentioned. "But the observatory did notice something unusual. There was a strange light hitting the surface of the moon. It ignited just before Explorer 1 passed there, and Explorer 1's brake rocket caught fire seconds later.A laser crew on the observatory was tracking Explorer with a telescope, so he saw what happened.He also thought that the Explorer was trying to land in that light.Of course, the Explorer flew over the designated spot when it was preparing to land, maybe 400 kilometers away from the destination.At half its orbital speed, it landed near the lunar south pole.The rescue boat found nothing worth taking back.At the same time, that light has gradually faded. "That's the whole story, sir. We thought you wanted to know about the bright light, even though we couldn't say what it was. The laser crew said it looked like a fluorescent effect from the surveyor's radar set. Space engineers say radar pulses don't cause fluorescent effects. Cosmic folks think informally that laser crew is drunk. They're not making a public statement. "That's it, Boss. " Whether Hudson made another fortune on that report, I don't know.My brother and his teammates are already on their way to Skygate, the Cosmic Organization Center in High Mesa, New Mexico, and their route is: Spaceship to Earth Control Station - Space Shuttle to Lunar Control Station - Lead Ship to Armstrong · Pointer - It takes a day and a half to fly to the moon. At the end of the day, it's easy for me to retell the story of Explorer 2.I continued to read the official papers that Cosmos deemed appropriate for publication and adopted the private advice we had gathered for Hudson.Later, I talked to Tom and his partner.I even used tapes and copies of official censorship.These things are still there. Explorer 2 lifts off from Armstrong Point.It is again operating in reconnaissance mode, in a circumpolar orbit, stable at an average altitude of 10 km.With gravimeters, electromagnetic gauges, radiation computers, and more than a hundred other sophisticated research instruments, it is charting a 5-kilometer journey across the Moon, recording every significant surface and subsurface feature of the crater in every possible detail. In a wider orbit 4 kilometers away, the Lunar Observatory monitors its flight reports and monitors for any possible obstruction.Its first delivery is routine. "All systems are functioning normally and there are no abnormalities." As it neared the flames of Explorer 1's brake rockets, watchers on the observatory made a terse report to Armstrong Pointer's Cosmic Organization Center: "Observatory calls Lunar Control Center , we found the situation. Obviously due to the approach of 'Explorer 2', a beam of light about 20 kilometers long appeared, in the shape of an arrow, with a brighter end, and its position was estimated to be 600 kilometers away from the south pole of the moon." The Lunar Control Center urgently asked what Explorer 2 had observed. "The moon's surface is on fire below us," Marco's voice sounded cool on record, "from a small crater directly ahead that looks like a point of impact, and the radiation from it is spreading due north. On the radiation we have spectrometers, and they look like north-scattered fluorescent material emanating from that crater. The spectroscopic analysis is incomplete." "Continue to operate in orbit," the people in the lunar control center seemed to be more vigilant than Marco, "monitor everything but don't change your flight mode..." "'Explorer 2' calling the Lunar Control Center," Marco's voice sounded faster on the tape, but still surprisingly calm, "Reporting the visual situation of the unknown building ahead. There is something in that At the point of impact, the location is estimated to be at 69° south latitude. At Circumpolar Exploration Track 88, there is a light tower..." Marco's voice dropped, out of hearing. "Explorer 2! Explorer 2!" the lunar control center called loudly, "Go ahead and tell us everything." "A gigantic device!" Even Marco's voice sounded breathless now, "I can't imagine it wasn't seen before. The top of the tower was miles above our flight path. There was dead silence ahead. It looked like Some kind of signal light. Changing colours. Red, yellow, orange. Crossing spectral bands..." "Observation Tower calling Explorer!" a harsh voice cut in. "We're tracking you with our telescopes. We see it—the light is now converging on the impact crater directly in front of you. But we don't see any towers either. No obstacles. Your path looks clear." For several seconds, there was no sound on the tape. "Explorer 2!" The people in the lunar control center were hoarse with tension, "Explorer 2! Explorer 2! " "'Explorer 2' calls Lunar Control," Marco's voice finally "comes back" Yes, it's darker.Marco said lightly: 'We made a sound connection and figured out the building ahead.It is a base for intergalactic missions seeking peace with humanity.We will land on that base during the next orbital move. ""Don't do that! The voice from Lunar Control Center sounded almost manic, "Go over the obvious obstacles and don't try to land." The observation deck did not see any towers.We think you've fallen into a trap.Remembering the tragedy of 'Explorer 1', don't let your brake rockets get touched. " The tape rustled with solar static, but there was no echo. "Lunar Control Calling Explorer 2!" The voice rose incongruously. "Don't land! Repeat, don't land! Terminate contact with that thing. Change flight mode to bypass survey curve 88. Indicates signal received Just get out of the way." The tape continued to play, but Explorer 2 did not indicate that it had received the signal. The Lunar Control Center was run by Hillman Parkinson at this time.Like Eric Thorson, he recently resigned from the military to qualify himself for Civil Cosmos.By his own standards, he was undoubtedly a brave and well-trained officer.If he is not loyal to the ideal of universal organization and unification of mankind, he should at least be loyal to the "old" tradition of the United States Marine Corps. Two or three years later, I saw him back on Earth, locked up in an alcoholic ward of a veterans hospital.All kinds of things happened on the moon finally broke him.Habitually, like a dinosaur, he was unprepared for anything he hadn't experienced so far. He later developed alcoholism.It seemed that during that "crisis" he had already moderated his drinking.In fact, the special investigation team decided to commend him for his conscientious work. He was astute in spotting that Explorer 2 was flying into a trap, but he seemed to have been duped by Hudson's rumors of Venus attackers.When Marco ignored his orders, Parkinson asked Tianmen for military assistance. "The universe is international." Tianmen reminded him.As the administrator of the cosmic organization on the moon, he has certain commanding powers.But he cannot use any military force without the clear and unanimous approval of the leadership of the cosmic organization on Earth. Angry Parkinson's complaint to Explorer 2 A new order was issued to change the form of survey and return to Armstrong Point immediately.He pointed out that even under Cosmos' kids' picnic rules, Marco and his teammates could be disqualified from flying for violating orders from superiors, fined for misusing Cosmos property, and threatening public safety. was sentenced to 10 years in prison.When the above threats still failed to make Explorer 2 respond, Parkinson shouted again in a rustling voice: "Members, didn't you hear the report from the observation tower that the inter-galactic base does not exist? I don't know the nature of space that is very different from my own." The danger of life contact? Don't you want to think about your obligations to the organization of the universe and mankind?" Explorer 2 continued on its gentle course, and as it flew from the observatory to the far side of the moon, Boorman Parkinson broke laser contact and turned his attention to the observatory itself, from which the light streaks could be seen.The observatory reports that the light streaks are slowly fading behind the Explorer, the carp-splash-like scatter is now only visible, and the circle of the impact crater is still indistinct. The observatory picked up the signal as Explorer 2 was returning across the lunar north pole, and it reported that it had changed course to follow the rotating Moon, and that it was following survey curve 88 back toward that twilight. Parkinson asked her a series of questions, what kind of creatures built that intergalactic base?How did they hide it?In what language are they vocally connected?What data is recorded by the sensor?Explorer 2 continued flying without response. The observatory tracked it again to survey curve 88. As soon as it crossed the lunar equator, the arrow-shaped shock wave burned ahead again.At this moment, its brake rockets fired, and it flew on a long orbit towards the glowing crater. Watchers on the observation deck tracked the Explorer 2 jet's flash, which converged into a single point of light as it descended.Their instruments recorded an irregular wave of radiation that peaked just moments after the jet departed. At that moment, it lost contact with the observation deck.At that time, the observatory was moved by its own orbit to the far side of the moon, which was outside the radiation range.Observers report that the crater still glows on the lunar horizon as far as they can see. Explorer 2 crashed. Hillman Parkinson calls on Skygate for help.He was told again that there was no actual evidence of being attacked, and that the cosmic organization could not break the principles of peace in space.Parkinson said foully that he would find evidence.Ignoring objections, he took a desperate flight to the crash site in an unarmed navigator. When he arrived, the sun was rising, and its blinding rays covered all traces of the darkness. His recorded report said that the beam hitting the crater and its north-facing beam appeared black, as if an ink-laden ship had run aground and had splashed ink.The navigator's calculator picked up no irregular radiation, nor any hint of a transgalactic base. Only Explorer 2 is wedged obliquely between boulders on the steep north crater rim. There was no sign that it was damaged after its rash landing, nor that it was "alive".Parkinson carefully landed a little far from the crater, and made a discovery that his "Ci Hai" could not explain. As he reported hoarsely to the Lunar Observatory, the three astronauts left Explorer 2, their feet roaming north among the boulders hundreds of meters away.Eventually they returned, and it was those returning footprints that sparked Parkinson's most vehement rhetoric.The mag-bolt flight boots left a footprint when they left the plane, but when they returned, they were three pairs of bare feet. "Report this situation to Tianmen," Parkinson paused the tape recording to sort out the clues and straighten out the language, "We have found 'Explorer 2', and some things can only be explained by a doctor! The footprints in the dust indicate three The team members disembarked barefoot and returned." "Better rub your eyes and re-look and see clearly," the Observatory advised him. "One cannot walk barefoot on the moon. At any rate, at least not very far. You must gather very reliable evidence, sir." .Otherwise you wouldn't be in Lunar Control Center long." Parkinson looked again.Before donning his spacesuit, he moved the navigator twice to take pictures of the footprints.Later, he went down with an astronaut to inspect Explorer 2. 空气锁再次被锁住，重击信号发出后没得到回应，帕金森不得不匆匆作一个紧急路径片来钩住锁然后上去。马可、胡德及梭森在月球死寂的夜里短暂出行，返回时摔倒在甲板上，然后一直趴在那儿。 三个人的靴子、手套和头盔都没在身上。脸上血迹斑斑，一定是在太空真空里从肺部喷出来的血。最初，帕金森确信他们死了。 无论如何，他们三人身体受到的损伤完全没有预料中的严重。在冰凉的尘埃上行走的脚并没有被冻伤。 他们更没被冻死。通过他加大氧氢压力以后的第二次检查，帕金森确定他们仍有呼吸。 “我认为他们外出是去收集这种黑色尘土，”他向观望台报告，“就是使火山口呈黑色的那种，实际上是一种粗砂粒，喷洒在火山口周围。但绝大多数在北边，好像被从南方来的一种冲击力分散了似的。” “奇特的东西！”磁带上帕金森的声音听起来沙声沙气，并且上气不接下气，“这微粒是尖角、黑色而且闪光的，所有的看起来一模一样，但和我所见过的任何东西都不一样。这三个人在收集这奇特的砂粒，他们的靴子里满是这东西，他们的工具袋也装满了砂粒，霍迪安嘴里都塞满了。” 从观望台转播到阿姆斯壮·坡因特又从那儿转播到天门，帕金森的报告既令人欢欣鼓舞又让人疑惑满腹。他得到了更换他的威士忌品牌（有人认为他喝醉了）、获取小绿人指印及在触摸东西前拍照的各种建议。 “我几乎希望我们已经发现了从金星来的入侵者，”他对在探索者号上与他同机的宇航员说，“我们知道怎么对付我们可以接近的敌人。” 通过宇宙组织的公告及哈德森的间谍泄露的报道，我几乎可以身临其境，亲眼目睹阿姆斯壮·坡因特下属医院里“探索者2号”队员所受的审问。磁带上出现了刺耳的支持者无聊的嗡嗡声，如同是空气对耳膜造成的刺痛。狭窄的地道、有钻印的月球石与玻璃样的密封层一起发着光。三个疲惫不堪的人被白纱布包裹着，散发出阵阵恶臭味，周围是医务人员和警卫。帕金森向他们刨根问底，一个个他无法接受的回答惹得他面红耳赤，扯大嗓门。 第一个被问的是尤里·马可。 “……一个秘密基地，” 磁带从这句话的中间部分开始录。自令人难以置信的月球之夜以来，马可喉咙疼痛肿大，他那沙沙的声音难以辨认，“那儿的生物不是从金星来的，先生。他们不是从我们太阳系中的任何一颗行星上来的。” 帕金森叫起来，咬牙切齿，满腹狐疑，“你怎么知道？” “我看见了基地，”马可回管道，“我与它的人员交谈过。他们属于一种高等文明社会。他们早已在月球上驻留以观察我们的进化。对于我们发展到足以与其进行联系的程度，他们表示高兴。” "what!" “先生，想想那意味着什么吧！“马可忍着痛，以他那沙哑的声音说着，他那令人畏惧的病态的自鸣得意劲儿清清楚楚地表现出来了。 “他们想要与我们分享他们博大精深的文明。我们的生活将不再是这样了——” “根本没有什么基地，”帕金森插进来，“观望台在监视现场。我刚好在那儿。那里，除了一种奇特的黑砂粒分散在一个冲击火山口周围外，什么都没有。如果你看见了什么，那一定是某种太空海市蜃楼。” 有几秒钟，磁带上没有声音。 “先生，我知道什么是真实的。”马可最终模糊不清地低语坚持，“我吸过毒，有过幻觉。那不一样。无论任何人看到其它什么，基地是直有的。” "tell me the story." “它是一个建筑物，”马可暂停，似乎在想，“但关于它的每一件事都反映出一种未知的文化，设计、材料、令人难以置信的规模。以我们的语言说不清楚，但我会设法告诉你我的印象。请想像：高低不一的白色圆柱紧挨着。六根较矮的，顶上有平台，由低到高呈螺旋状环绕中心塔，塔很高。塔在我们轨道上方，离我们轨道一定有10公里远，顶呈洋葱形，像信号灯那样变色，我认为在它下面的平台是着陆台，其中有些是空的，但我在两个平台上看见了巨球形的船，”马可提高嗓门，“先生，听起来像场梦吧？” “它现在不见了，”帕金森讥讽道，“你说你有过声音联系，与你自认为看见的东西。你用的什么语言？” “为什么问这个？”马可暂停下来，好像被自己的回忆震惊了，“乌克兰语！我听见的声音不是人的。它是一种调整好的电子嗡嗡声，像计算机里的声音。我记得怀疑过它是否是从某种翻译仪器中发出的。但它说着乌克兰农民的土语，就是我父母在家说的那种。那太异乎寻常了！”