带上她的眼睛 2 中英故事版

Tall mountains, plains, meadows and forest all converged at this one spot. I was more than two thousand kilometers from the space center where I worked; the journey by ionospheric jet had taken all of fifteen minutes. The Taklamakan lay before me. Generations of hard graft had transformed the former desert into grassland. Now, after decades of vigorous population control, it was once again devoid of human habitation. 

The grassland stretched all the way to the horizon. Behind me, dark green forests covered the Tian Shan mountain range. The highest peaks were capped with silvery snow. I took out her eyes and put them on. 

These ‘eyes’ were, in reality, a pair of multi-sensory glasses. When worn, every image seen by the wearer is transmitted via an ultra-high-frequency radio signal. This transmission can be received by another person wearing an identical set of multi-sensory glasses, letting them view everything that the first individual sees. It’s as if the transmitter is wearing the recipient’s eyes. Millions of people worked year-round on the Moon and the Asteroid Belt. The cost of a vacation back on Earth was astronomical – pardon the pun – which is why the space bureau, in all their stinginess, designed this little gadget. Every astronaut living in space had a corresponding pair of glasses planet-side. Those on Earth lucky enough to go on a real-life vacation would wear these glasses, allowing a homesick space-worker to share the joy of their trip. 

People had originally scoffed at these devices. But as those willing to wear them received significant subsidies for their travels they actually became quite popular. These artificial eyes grew increasingly refined through the constant use of the most cutting-edge technology. The current models even transmitted their wearers’ senses of touch and smell by monitoring their brainwaves. Taking a pair of eyes on vacation became an act of public service among terrestrial workers in the space industry. Not everyone was willing take an extra pair of eyes with them on vacation, citing reasons such as invasion of privacy. As for me,  I had no problem with them.  

I sighed deeply at the vista before my eyes. From her eyes, however, came the gentle sound of sobs. ‘I have dreamed of this place ever since my last trip. Now I’m back in my dreams.’ came her soft voice, drifting out from her eyes. ‘I feel like I am rising from the depths of the ocean, like I’m taking my first breath of air. I can’t stand being closed in.’ I could actually hear her taking long, deep breaths. ‘But you aren’t closed in at all. Compared to the vastness of space around you, this grassland might as well be a closet.’ She fell silent. Even her breathing seemed to have stopped. I continued, if only to break the silence. ‘Of course, people in space are still closed in. It’s like when Chuck Yeager described the Mercury astronauts as being— ‘Spam in a can.’ She finished the thought for me. We both laughed. Suddenly she called out in surprise. ‘Oh! Flowers! I see flowers! They weren’t here last time!’ Indeed, the broad grassland was adorned with countless small blooms. ‘Can you look at the flowers next to you?’ I crouched and looked down. ‘Oh, how beautiful! Can you smell her? No, don’t pick her!’ Left with little choice, I had to lie almost flat on my belly to pick up the flower’s light fragrance ‘Ah, I can smell it too! It’s like she’s sending us a delicate sonata.’ 

I shook my head, laughing. In this age of ever-changing fads and wild pursuits, most young women were restless and impulsive. Girls as dainty as this particular specimen, who was practically moved to tears at the sight of a flower, were few and far between. 

‘Let’s give this little flower a name, shall we? Hmm... We’ll call her Dreamy. How about that one? What should we call him? Umm, Raindrop sounds good. Now go to that one over there. Thanks. Her petals are light blue – her name should be Moonbeam.’ We went from flower to flower in this way, first looking, then smelling and finally naming them. 

Utterly entranced, she kept at it with no end in sight, all else forgotten. I, however, soon grew bored to death of this silly game, but by the time I insisted that we stop, we had already named over a hundred flowers.  

Looking up, I realized we had wandered a good distance, so I went back to retrieve my backpack. As I bent down to pick it up, I heard a startled shout in my ear. ‘Oh no! You crushed Snowflake!’ I gingerly propped the pale little wildflower back up. The whole scene suddenly felt comical. Covering a flower with both hands, I asked her, ‘What are their names? What do they look like?’ ‘That one on the left is Crystal. She’s white, too, and has three leaves on her stem. To the right we have Flame. He’s pink, with four leaves. The top two leaves are separate, and the bottom two are joined.’ She got them all right. Actually, I felt somewhat moved. ‘See? We all know each other. I’ll think of them over and over again during the long days to come. It’ll be like retelling a beautiful fairy tale. This world of yours is absolutely wonderful!’ ‘This world of mine? It’s your world too! And if you keep acting like a temperamental child, those anal-retentive space psychologists will make sure you’re grounded on it for the rest of your life.’ 

I began to roam aimlessly about the plains. It wasn’t long before I came across a small brook concealed in the thick grass. I decided to forge ahead, but her voice called me back. ‘I want to reach into that stream so much.’ Crouching, I put my hands into the water. A cool wave of refreshment flowed through my body. I knew she would feel it too, as the ultra-high-frequency waves carried the sensation into the far reaches of space. Again I heard her sigh. ‘Is it hot where you are?’ I was thinking of that cramped cockpit and her spacesuit’s oddly advanced insulation system. ‘Hot,’ she replied. ‘As hot as hell.’ Her tone changed. ‘Hey, what’s that? The prairie wind?’ I had taken my hands from the water, and the gentle wind was cool against my damp skin. ‘No, don’t move. This wind is heavenly!’ I raised both hands to the breeze and held them there until they were dry. At her request, I dipped my hands back into the brook and then lifted them into the wind. Again it felt divine, and again we shared the experience. 

We idled away a long while like this. I set out again, silently wandering for a while. I heard her murmur, ‘This world of yours is truly magnificent.’  

‘I really wouldn’t know. The grayness of my life has dulled it all.’ 

‘How could you say that? This world has so many experiences and feelings to offer! Trying to describe them all would be like trying to count the drops of rain in a thunderstorm. Look at those clouds on the horizon, all silvery-white. Right now they look solid to me, like towering mountains of gleaming jade. The meadow below, on the other hand, looks wispy, as if all the grass decided to fly away from the earth and become a green sea of clouds. Look! Look at the clouds floating past the sun! Watch how majestically the light and shadows shift and twist over the grass! Do you honestly feel nothing when you see this?’ 

Wearing her eyes, I roamed the grassland for an entire day. I could hear the yearning in her voice as she looked at each and every flower, at every blade of grass, at every beam of sunlight leaping through the prairie and as she listened to all the different voices of the grassy plains. The sudden appearance of a stream, and of the tiny fish swimming within it, would send her into fits of excitement. An unexpected breeze, carrying with it the sweet fragrance of fresh grass, would bring her to tears... Her feelings for this world were so rich that I wondered whether something was wrong with her state of mind. 

Before sunset, I made my way to a lonely white cabin standing forlornly on the grassland. It had been set up as an inn for travelers, although I seemed to be its first guest in quite some time. Besides myself, the cabin’s only other resident was the glitchy, obsolete android that looked after the entire inn. I was as hungry as I was tired, but before I had a chance to finish my dinner, my companion suggested that we go outside right away to watch the sun set. ‘Watching the evening sky gradually lose its glow as night falls over the forest – it’s like listening to the most beautiful symphony in the universe.’ Her voice swelled with rapture. I dragged my leaden feet outside, silently cursing my misfortune. 

‘You really do cherish these common things,’ I told her on our way back to the cabin. Night had already fallen, and stars shone in the sky. ‘Why don’t you?’ she asked. ‘That’s what it means to truly be alive.’ ‘I can’t really find any satisfaction in those things. Nor can most other people. It’s too easy to get what you want these days. I’m not just talking about material things. You can surround yourself with blue skies and crystal-clear waters just like that. If you want the peace and tranquility of the countryside or a remote island, you barely even need to snap your fingers. Even love. Think of how elusive that was for previous generations and how desperately they chased it, and now it can be experienced through virtual reality, at least for a few moments at a time. ‘People don’t cherish anything now. They see a platter of fruit an arm’s length away, only to take a bite out of each piece before throwing the rest away.’ ‘But not everyone has such fruits within reach,’ she said quietly. 

I felt my words had caused her pain, but I wasn’t sure why. The rest of the way back, we said nothing more. I saw her in my dreams that night. She was in her spacesuit, confined to that tiny cockpit. There were tears in her eyes. She reached out to me, calling out, ‘Take me outside! I don’t want to be closed in!’ I awoke with a start and realized that she really was calling me. I was looking up at the ceiling, still wearing her eyes. ‘Please, will you take me outside? Let’s go see the Moon. It should be up by now!’ My head seemed to be filled with sand as I reluctantly pulled myself out of bed. 

Once outside, I discovered the Moon had indeed just risen; the night mist lent it a reddish tinge. The vast wilderness below was sound asleep. Pinprick glows from countless fireflies floated through the hazy ocean of grass, as though Taklamakan’s dreams were bleeding into reality. Stretching, I spoke to the night sky. ‘Hey, can you see where the Moon is shining from your position in orbit? What’s your ship’s position? Tell me, and I might even be able to see you. I’m positive your ship’s in LEO.’ Instead of answering me, she began humming a song. She stopped after a few bars and said, ‘That was Debussy’s “Clair de Lune”.’ She continued humming, seemingly forgetting that I was still listening on the other end – or that I even existed. From orbit, melody and moonlight descended upon the prairie in unison. I pictured that delicate girl in outer space: the silvery Moon shining from above, the blue Earth below. She flew between the two, smaller than a pinpoint, her song dissolving into moonlight...