No courses were offered in the normal scholastic subjects. Presumably these were studied after the child graduated survival school and could face the world alone. Which was a logical and cold-hearted way of looking at things. In fact, logical and cold-hearted could describe any Pyrran activity.
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Most of the morning was spent on the operation of one of the medikits that strapped around the waist. This was a poison analyzer that was pressed over a puncture wound. If any toxins were present, the antidote was automatically injected on the site. Simple in operation but incredibly complex in construction. Since all Pyrrans serviced their own equipment--you could then only blame yourself if it failed--they had to learn the construction and repair of all the devices. Jason did much better than the child students, though the effort exhausted him.
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In the afternoon he had his first experience with a training machine. His instructor was a twelve-year-old boy, whose cold voice didn't conceal his contempt for the soft off-worlder. "All the training machines are physical duplicates of the real surface of the planet, corrected constantly as the life forms change. The only difference between them is the varying degree of deadliness. This first machine you will use is of course the one infants are put into--" "You're too kind," Jason murmured. "Your flattery overwhelms me." The instructor continued, taking no notice of the interruption. "... Infants are put into as soon as they can crawl. It is real in substance, though completely deactivated."
2012年2月9日星期四
Eat quickly
In the morning Jason awoke with a bad headache and the feeling he had never been to sleep. As he took some of the carefully portioned stimulants that Brucco had given him, he wondered again about the combination of factors that filled his sleep with such horror. "Eat quickly," Brucco told him when they met in the dining room. "I can no longer spare you time for individual instruction.
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You will join the regular classes and take the prescribed courses.
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Only come to me if there is some special problem that the instructors or trainers can't handle." The classes--as Jason should have expected--were composed of stern-faced little children. With their compact bodies and no-nonsense mannerisms they were recognizably Pyrran. But they were still children enough to consider it very funny to have an adult in their classes. Jammed behind one of the tiny desks, the red-faced Jason did not think it was much of a joke. All resemblance to a normal school ended with the physical form of the classroom. For one thing, every child--no matter how small--packed a gun. And the courses were all involved with survival. The only possible grade in a curriculum like this was one hundred per cent and students stayed with a lesson until they mastered it perfectly.
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You will join the regular classes and take the prescribed courses.
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Only come to me if there is some special problem that the instructors or trainers can't handle." The classes--as Jason should have expected--were composed of stern-faced little children. With their compact bodies and no-nonsense mannerisms they were recognizably Pyrran. But they were still children enough to consider it very funny to have an adult in their classes. Jammed behind one of the tiny desks, the red-faced Jason did not think it was much of a joke. All resemblance to a normal school ended with the physical form of the classroom. For one thing, every child--no matter how small--packed a gun. And the courses were all involved with survival. The only possible grade in a curriculum like this was one hundred per cent and students stayed with a lesson until they mastered it perfectly.
2012年2月8日星期三
I don't think you want to
There have been at least thirteen super-novas in the immediate stellar neighborhood. Heavy elements can be found on most of their planets of course--as well as completely unbreathable atmospheres. Long-term mining and exploitation can't be done by anything but a self-sustaining colony. Which meant Pyrrus. Where the radioactive elements are locked in the planetary core, surrounded by a shell of lighter ones. While this allows for the atmosphere men need, it also provides unceasing volcanic activity as the molten plasma forces its way to the surface." For the first time Jason was silent. strapless wedding dresses Trying to imagine what life could be like on a planet constantly at war with itself. "I've saved the best for last," Kerk said with grim humor. "Now that you have an idea of what the environment is like--think of the kind of life forms that would populate it. I doubt if there is one off-world species that would live a minute. Plants and animals on Pyrrus are tough. one shoulder wedding dresses They fight the world and they fight each other. Hundreds of thousands of years of genetic weeding-out have produced things that would give even an electronic brain nightmares. Armor-plated, poisonous, claw-tipped and fanged-mouthed. That describes everything that walks, flaps or just sits and grows. Ever see a plant with teeth--that bite? I don't think you want to. You'd have to be on Pyrrus and that means you would be dead within seconds of leaving the ship. Even I'll have to take a refresher course before I'll be able to go outside the landing buildings.
That's preposterous
"Laboratory reactions!" he growled. "They look great on a bench--but what happens when you have a world filled with those compounds? In an eye-wink of galactic time all the violence is locked up in nice, stable compounds. The atmosphere may be poisonous for an oxygen breather, but taken by itself it's as harmless as weak beer. "There is only one setup that is pure poison as a planetary atmosphere. pink bridesmaid dresses Plenty of H{2}O, the most universal solvent you can find, plus free oxygen to work on--" "Water and oxygen!" Jason broke in. "You mean Earth--or a planet like Cassylia here? That's preposterous." "Not at all. Because you were born in this kind of environment you accept it as right and natural. You take it for granted that metals corrode, coastlines change, and storms interfere with communication. These are normal occurrences on oxygen-water worlds. On Pyrrus these conditions are carried to the nth degree. "The planet has an axial tilt of almost forty-two degrees, so there is a tremendous change in temperature from season to season. This is one of the prime causes of a constantly changing icecap. The weather generated by this is spectacular to say the least." "If that's all," Jason said, "I don't see why--" "That's not all--it's barely the beginning. The open seas perform the dual destructive function of supplying water vapor to keep the weather going, and building up gigantic tides. halter wedding dresses Pyrrus' two satellites, Samas and Bessos, combine at times to pull the oceans up into thirty meter tides. And until you've seen one of these tides lap over into an active volcano you've seen nothing. "Heavy elements are what brought us to Pyrrus--and these same elements keep the planet at a volcanic boil.
It has meaning enough
That cargo means the survival of a world. Guns, ammunition, mines, explosives and such." Jason choked over a mouthful of food. "Gun-running! What are you doing, financing a private war? And how can you talk about survival with a lethal cargo like that? Don't try and tell me they have a peaceful use. Who are you killing?" Most of the big man's humor had vanished, he had that grim look Jason knew well. "Yes, peaceful would be the right word. Because that is basically all we want. yellow bridesmaid dresses .Just to live in peace. And it is not who are we killing--it is what we are killing." Jason pushed his plate away with an angry gesture. "You're talking in riddles," he said. "What you say has no meaning." "It has meaning enough," Kerk told him, "but only on one planet in the universe. Just how much do you know about Pyrrus?" "Absolutely nothing." For a moment Kerk sat wrapped in memory, scowling distantly. Then he went on. "Mankind doesn't belong on Pyrrus--yet has been there for almost three hundred years now. The age expectancy of my people is sixteen years. bridesmaid dresses under 100 .Of course most adults live beyond that, but the high child mortality brings the average down. "It is everything that a humanoid world should not be. The gravity is nearly twice Earth normal. The temperature can vary daily from arctic to tropic. The climate--well you have to experience it to believe it. Like nothing you've seen anywhere else in the galaxy." "I'm frightened," Jason said dryly. "What do you have--methane or chlorine reactions? I've been down on planets like that--" Kerk slammed his hand down hard on the table. The dishes bounced and the table legs creaked.
2012年2月7日星期二
I would have introduced you
From where he sat, the painter could see the tall, uncouth figure of the famous novelist standing beside the automobile, while the occupants of the car were, apparently, absorbingly interested in what he was saying. The beautiful face of the woman was brightly animated as she evidently took the lead in the conversation.
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The artist could see her laughing and shaking her head. Once, he even heard her speak the writer's name; whereupon, every lounger upon the veranda, within hearing, turned to observe the party with curious interest. Several times, the young man noted that she glanced in his direction, half inquiringly, with a suggestion of being pleased, as though she were glad to have seen him in company with her celebrated friend. Then the man who held so large a place in the eyes of the world drew back, lifting his hat; the automobile started forward; the party called, "Good night." The woman's voice rose clear--so that the spectators might easily understand--"Remember, Mr. Lagrange--I shall expect you Thursday--day after to-morrow."
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As Conrad Lagrange came up the hotel steps, the eyes of all were upon him; but he--apparently unconscious of the company--went straight to the artist; where, without a word, he dropped into the vacant chair by the young man's side, and began thoughtfully refilling his brier pipe. Flipping the match over the veranda railing, and expelling a prodigious cloud of smoke, the novelist said grimly, "And there--my fellow artist--go your masters. I trust you observed them with proper reverence. I would have introduced you, but I do not like to take the initiative in such outrages. That will come soon enough. The young should be permitted to enjoy their freedom while they may."
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The artist could see her laughing and shaking her head. Once, he even heard her speak the writer's name; whereupon, every lounger upon the veranda, within hearing, turned to observe the party with curious interest. Several times, the young man noted that she glanced in his direction, half inquiringly, with a suggestion of being pleased, as though she were glad to have seen him in company with her celebrated friend. Then the man who held so large a place in the eyes of the world drew back, lifting his hat; the automobile started forward; the party called, "Good night." The woman's voice rose clear--so that the spectators might easily understand--"Remember, Mr. Lagrange--I shall expect you Thursday--day after to-morrow."
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As Conrad Lagrange came up the hotel steps, the eyes of all were upon him; but he--apparently unconscious of the company--went straight to the artist; where, without a word, he dropped into the vacant chair by the young man's side, and began thoughtfully refilling his brier pipe. Flipping the match over the veranda railing, and expelling a prodigious cloud of smoke, the novelist said grimly, "And there--my fellow artist--go your masters. I trust you observed them with proper reverence. I would have introduced you, but I do not like to take the initiative in such outrages. That will come soon enough. The young should be permitted to enjoy their freedom while they may."
The young man
The young man, quietly ignoring the humor of the novelist's words, said protestingly, "But, surely, to portray human nature is legitimate art, Mr. Lagrange. Your great artists that the West is to produce will not necessarily be landscape painters or write essays upon nature, will they?"
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"To portray human nature is legitimate work for an artist, yes"--agreed the novelist--"but he must portray human nature _plus_. The forces that _shape_ human nature are the forces that must be felt in the picture and in the story. That these determining forces are so seldom seen by the eyes of the world, is the reason _for_ pictures and stories. The artist who fails to realize for his world the character-creating elements in the life which he essays to paint or write, fails, to just that degree, in being an artist; or is self-branded by his work as criminally careless, a charlatan or a liar. That one who, for a price, presents a picture or a story without regard for the influence of his production upon the characters of those who receive it, commits a crime for which human law provides no adequate punishment. Being the famous Conrad Lagrange, you understand, I have the right to say this. You will probably believe it, some day--if you do not now. That is, you will believe it if you have the soul and the intelligence of an artist--if you have not--it will not matter--and you will be happy in your success."
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As the novelist finished speaking, the two men arrived at the hotel steps, where they halted, with that indecision of chance acquaintances who have no plans beyond the passing moment, yet who, in mutual interest, would extend the time of their brief companionship. While they stood there, each hesitating to make the advance, a big touring car rolled up the driveway, and stopped under the full light of the veranda. Aaron King recognized the lady of the observation car platform, with her two traveling companions and the heavy-faced man who had met them at the depot. As the party greeted the novelist and he returned their salutation, the artist turned away to find again the chair, where, an hour before, the strange character who was to play so large a part in his life and work had found him. The dog, Czar, as if preferring the companionship of the artist to the company of those who were engaging his master's attention, followed the young man.
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"To portray human nature is legitimate work for an artist, yes"--agreed the novelist--"but he must portray human nature _plus_. The forces that _shape_ human nature are the forces that must be felt in the picture and in the story. That these determining forces are so seldom seen by the eyes of the world, is the reason _for_ pictures and stories. The artist who fails to realize for his world the character-creating elements in the life which he essays to paint or write, fails, to just that degree, in being an artist; or is self-branded by his work as criminally careless, a charlatan or a liar. That one who, for a price, presents a picture or a story without regard for the influence of his production upon the characters of those who receive it, commits a crime for which human law provides no adequate punishment. Being the famous Conrad Lagrange, you understand, I have the right to say this. You will probably believe it, some day--if you do not now. That is, you will believe it if you have the soul and the intelligence of an artist--if you have not--it will not matter--and you will be happy in your success."
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As the novelist finished speaking, the two men arrived at the hotel steps, where they halted, with that indecision of chance acquaintances who have no plans beyond the passing moment, yet who, in mutual interest, would extend the time of their brief companionship. While they stood there, each hesitating to make the advance, a big touring car rolled up the driveway, and stopped under the full light of the veranda. Aaron King recognized the lady of the observation car platform, with her two traveling companions and the heavy-faced man who had met them at the depot. As the party greeted the novelist and he returned their salutation, the artist turned away to find again the chair, where, an hour before, the strange character who was to play so large a part in his life and work had found him. The dog, Czar, as if preferring the companionship of the artist to the company of those who were engaging his master's attention, followed the young man.
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