《King of the Hill 》作者：- James Blish【EPUB】

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Kingofthe Hill. IT DID Col. Hal Gascoigne no good whatsoever to know thathe was the only man aboard SatelliteVehicle 1. No goodat all. He had stopped reminding himself of the fact sometime back. And now as he sat sweating in the perfectly balanced airin front of the bombardier board oneof the men spoke tohim again: quotColonel sir” Gascoigne swung around in the seat and the sergeantGascoigne could almost remember the mansnameUirewhim a snappy Air Force salute. quotWell” quotBomb one is primed sir. Your orders” quotMy ordersquot Gascoigne said wonderingly. But the manwas already gone. Gascoigne couldntactually see the ser-geant leave the control cabin but he was no longer in it. While he tried to remember another voice rang in thecabin as flat and razzy as all voicessound on an intercom. quotRadar room. On target.” A regular meaningless peeping. The timing circuit hadcut in. Or had it There was nobody in the radar room. Therewas nobody in the bomb hold either. Therehad never beenanybody on board SV-I but Gascoigne not since he hadrelieved GrinnellandGrinnell had flown the station uphere in the first place. Then who had that sergeant been His name was . . . It was . . . The hammering of the teletype blanked it out. The noisewas as loud as a pom-pom in the echoingmetal cave. He gotup and coasted across the deck to the machine gliding in thegravity-freecabin with the ease of a man to whom free fallis almost second nature. The teletype was silent by the time he reached it and atfirst the tape looked blank. He wipedthe sweat out of hiseyes. There was the message. MNBVCXZ LKJ HGFDS PYTR AOIU EUIO QPALZMHe got out his copy of TheWell-TemperedPogo andcheckedthe speeches of Grundoon the Beaver-Chile for thekey letter-sequence on which the code wasbased. Therewerent very many choices. He had the clear in ten minutes. BOMB ONE WASHINGTON 1700 HRS TAMMANANYThere it was. That was what he had been priming thebombfor. But there should have been earlier orders givinghim the go-ahead to prime. He began torewind the paper. It was all blank. AndWashington Why would the Joint Chiefs of Stafforder himquotColonel Gascoigne sir.” Gascoigne jerked around and returned the salute. quotWhatsyour namequot he snapped. quotSweeney sirquot the corporal said. Actually