首页 刘慈欣中英双语科幻经典:青少版2.赡养人类

Emissary Fangs

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Just as the debate over the crystal’s credibility began to rage in earnest, the first small Devourer ship entered the solar system. It was heading straight toward Earth.

The first contact was again initiated by the space patrol led by the Captain. The mood of this contact could not have been more different than the last, and the mood was, by far, not the only contrast. The exquisitely wrought structure of the Eridanus Crystal bore all the hallmarks of the ethereal technology of a refined civilization. The Devourer’s ship represented the polar opposite. Its exterior appeared exceedingly crude and ungainly, somewhat like a frying pan that had spent the better part of a century forgotten in the wilderness. It immediately reminded onlookers of a giant steampunk machine.

The envoy of the Devourer Empire matched his vehicle in appearance: a massive, awkward lizard covered in huge slabs of scales.Erect, he stood nearly thirty feet tall. He introduced himself as ‘Faingsh’,but his appearance and later behaviour quickly led to him being called‘Fangs’ instead.

When Fangs landed at the feet of the United Nations Building, his craft’s engines blasted a large crater, the splattering concrete leaving the surrounding buildings scarred and battered. Since the alien emissary’s massive size prevented him from entering the Assembly Hall, the world’s heads of state gathered on the United Nations Plaza in front of the UN Building to meet him. Some among them now covered their faces with bloody handkerchiefs, staunching foreheads gashed open by flying glass and concrete.

The ground shook with every step Fangs took toward them, and when the alien spoke, he roared. It was a sound like the screaming horns of a dozen train engines, and it made the hair stand on end of all who heard it. Although he had learned English in transit, Fangs spoke through an unwieldy translator hanging around his neck, the device repeating his words back in English. The rough male voice his translator produced,despite being much quieter than Fangs’ real voice, nonetheless made his listeners’ flesh crawl.