經典科幻文學:《 基本上無害 Mostly Harmless》 第10章2

Vann Harl was in his swivel chair, looking alarmed, pale and shaken. Had probably had some bad news as well as a nasty bang to the back of his head. Ford leapt to his feet and made a running grab for him.

範.哈爾驚慌地坐在他的轉椅裏，臉色發白，直打哆嗦。看來除了後腦勺那一下之外多半還聽到了什麼壞消息。福特一躍而起朝他衝了過去。

Under the pretext of getting him into a good solid double underpinned elbow-lock, Ford managed surreptitiously to slip the Ident-i-Eeze back into Harl’s inner pocket.

他以一個漂亮的加強版雙鎖肘作掩護，神不知鬼不覺地把“我-真是-我”塞回了他的內包裏。

Bingo!

大功告成！

He’d done what he came to do. Now he just had to talk his way out of here.

要乾的事已經完成了。現在他只需要幾句甜言蜜語哄他們給自己開路。

‘OK,’ he said. ‘I…’ He paused.

“OK”他說，“我……”他停下來。

The big guy with the rocket launcher was turning towards Ford Prefect and pointing it at him, which Ford couldn’t help feeling was wildly irresponsible behaviour.

扛導彈發射器的大塊頭向福特轉過身來，開始瞄準，福特不由感到這是一種極端不負責任的舉動。

‘I…’ he started again, and then on a sudden impulse decided to duck.

“我……”他又張開嘴，然後在一陣衝動之下決定先閃了再說。

There was a deafening roar as flames leapt from the back of the rocket launcher and a rocket leapt from its front.

導彈發射器的屁股後頭竄出火苗，導彈伴隨着震耳欲聾的咆哮從前端飛了出去。

The rocket hurtled past Ford and hit the large plate-glass window, which billowed outwards in a shower of a million shards under the force of the explosion. Huge shock waves of noise and air pressure reverberated around the room, sweeping a couple of chairs, a filing cabinet and Colin the security robot out of the window.

導彈與福特擦肩而過，擊中了又大又厚的玻璃窗，窗戶在爆炸的衝擊下化作百萬碎片向外砰灑。噪音和氣壓形成的強烈衝擊波在屋裏迴盪，把兩把椅子，一個文件櫃和保安機器人科林掀出了窗外。

Ah! So they’re not totally rocket-proof after all, thought Ford Prefect to himself. Someone should have a word with somebody about that. He disentangled himself from Harl and tried to work out which way to run.

啊！這麼說它們其實不是真能防導彈嘛，福特暗想。真得有人跟負責的傢伙說說。他同哈爾脫離了接觸，開始策劃逃跑路線。

He was surrounded.

他被包圍了。

The big guy with the rocket launcher was moving it up into position for another shot.

扛導彈發射器的大塊頭正在調整位置準備再來一發。

Ford was completely at a loss for what to do next.

福特完全不曉得接下來該怎麼辦纔好。

‘Look,’ he said in a stern voice. But he wasn’t certain how far saying things like ‘Look’ in a stern voice was necessarily going to get him, and time was not on his side. What the hell, he thought, you’re only young once, and threw himself out of the window. That would at least keep the element of surprise on his side.

“聽着。”他嚴厲地說。可他不大確定嚴厲地說“聽着”這種話究竟能產生什麼效果，再說時間也不等人。管他呢，他想，你難道還能年輕兩回麼？然後就飛身躍出了窗外。這樣一來，再不濟也能殺對方個措手不及不是。