經典科幻文學:《銀河系漫遊指南》第20章1

Five figures wandered slowly over the blighted land. Bits of it were dullish grey, bits of it dullish brown, the rest of it rather less interesting to look at. It was like a dried-out marsh, now barren of all vegetation and covered with a layer of dust about an inch thick. It was very cold.
Zaphod was clearly rather depressed about it. He stalked off by himself and was soon lost to sight behind a slight rise in the ground.
The wind stung Arthur's eyes and ears, and the stale thin air clasped his throat. However, the thing stung most was his mind.
"It's fantastic ..." he said, and his own voice rattled his ears. Sound carried badly in this thin atmosphere.
"Desolate hole if you ask me," said Ford. "I could have more fun in a cat litter." He felt a mounting irritation. Of all the planets in all the star systems of all the Galaxy — didn't he just have to turn up at a dump like this after fifteen years of being a castaway? Not even a hot dog stand in evidence. He stooped down and Picked up a cold clot of earth, but there was nothing underneath it worth crossing thousands of light years to look at.
"No," insisted Arthur, "don't you understand, this is the first time I've actually stood on the surface of another planet ... a whole alien world ...! Pity it's such a dump though."
Trillian hugged herself, shivered and frowned. She could have sworn she saw a slight and unexpected movement out of the corner of her eye, but when she glanced in that direction all she could see was the ship, still and silent, a hundred yards or so behind them.
She was relieved when a second or so later they caught sight of Zaphod standing on top of the ridge of ground and waving to them to come and join him.
He seemed to be excited, but they couldn't clearly hear what he was saying because of the thinnish atmosphere and the wind.

一行五人緩慢地走在荒蕪的土地上。這一小片是單調的灰色，那一小片是單調的褐色，餘下的則根本沒法讓人提起興趣多看一眼。整片土地就像一塊乾涸的沼澤，寸草不生，上面覆蓋着足有一英寸厚的灰。氣溫很低。
贊福德顯然對這樣的景象感到很沮喪。他脫離了隊伍，獨自一人大步朝前走去，很快便消失在一個凸起的土丘背後。
迎面吹來的風刺痛了阿瑟的眼睛和耳朵，帶着腐臭味的稀薄空氣箍緊了他的喉嚨。然而，受刺激最深的卻是他的精神。
“真是不可思議……”他說，聲音傳進自己的耳朵，他自己都覺得有點兒彆扭。空氣太稀薄，聲音傳播效果很差。
“叫我說，真是個荒涼的洞窟。”福特說，“貓屎也比這兒有趣得多。”他滿腹怨氣。在整個銀河系的所有的星系裏的所有的行星中間——許多都狂野而奇異，沸騰着生命的喧囂——難道他只能待在這樣一個地方，而且還是在剛剛結束了15年被拋棄的生活之後？這裏甚至連個熱狗都沒有！他彎下腰，翻開一塊冰冷的泥土，但是下面卻沒有任何值得跨越幾千光年的遙遠路程來看一眼的東西。
“不對，”阿瑟堅持說，“你不明白。這畢竟是我第一次站在另一顆行星的表面上……另一個完全陌生的世界……雖然這裏狀況太糟糕了，讓人有點兒遺憾。”
崔莉恩縮緊身子，顫抖着，皺起眉頭。她可以發誓，自己的眼角瞟見了什麼東西在移動。但當她朝那個方向望去時，看見的卻只有靜靜停在那兒的飛船，離他們大約100碼。
幾秒鐘後，她才稍微安心了一點兒。因爲贊福德站在土丘的頂端向他們招手，要他們過去。
他看上去很興奮，但由於這裏稀薄的空氣和呼嘯的風，聽不清楚他在喊些什麼。