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if file:///F|/rah/Jack%20L.%20Chalker/Chalker,%...01%20-%20When%20the%20Changewin ds%20Blow.txt (111 of 156) [1/19/03 4:09:40 PM] file:///F|/rah/Jack%20L.%20Chalker/Chalker,%20Jack%20L%20-%20Changewinds%201%2 0-%20When%20the%20Changewinds%20Blow.txt so, that was okay-she certainly enjoyed it. But there would certainly be differences with a man. Big ones. Hell, Charley had done it with her in the shack and Charley was a real man-lover. Charley's power was beauty, but she had power, too. She was through being a patsy. It was time for Sam to take a little. From Zenchur's cave to the city had been only forty miles or so; the trip to the border where the train would leave Tubikosa was maybe a hundred in the other direction, counting having to go around part of the big lake. The trip was already just starting to settle into a big and potentially boring routine when they reached that border. Tubikosa ended in a flat plain here, but it still gently sloped down into that glowing mist. It had been so long since they had seen it that it was almost like seeing it for the first time. Tubikosa was a mixture of the primitive and the modem but it was still a large, cosmopolitan city. It was easy to forget that it was such a small part of a new and very alien world rather than just a remote part of their home. Across the mists another land could be seen, one not very appetizing to look at. A mass of tall, green trees that seemed to cover virtually everything in sight. From their distance it looked just plain green, but with the aid of strong binoculars borrowed from one of the crew it looked like a pretty creepy and dark jungle. There was a large staging area at the border and a large building for officials, sort of like a customs and immigration station, although it was pretty large and included barracks in back and seemed to be run by the black-clad professional army troops. Sam didn't remember any such things where they'd come in and suspected that, like most borders, you could get in and out of this one secretly if you knew the territory and if you really had to. There wasn't much incoming traffic, but waiting at the border post was another wagon, this one guarded by four heavily armed men wearing uniforms of a different son. Private security. Mercenaries. Sam was startled by the sight of both the private and national troops; it was the first time she had seen guns here. They were sleek and oddly curved and shaped yet, oddly, they appeared to be single-shot short rifles, and even the pistols had no barrels-you put in one bullet and that was it. Charley, from the conservative southwest and no stranger to firearms, figured they had to be pretty good shots, since you might not have the time to reload, "I sure hope so," Sam responded worriedly. That jungle looked pretty mean, and on top of that it looted like it was raining buckets over there. The Weather here was cloudy, with the clouds in rapid motion in that somewhat circular pattern, but it wasn't really bad. That night they had a campfire meeting with Jahoort, this time around the new and still guarded wagon. "All right, we shook you down and we didn't lose nobody," the navigator Page 131 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html commented. "That's pretty good. Now the easy part's out of the way. Tomorrow it gets tough, and we'll have to go through that ground fog you see. Now, we'll all be sittin' high enough up that we'll be able to see each other, but fix cold sandwiches for tomorrow 'cause we won't be stoppin' in it unless we have to. The area extends about forty leegs"-that was a little under twenty miles, Sam knew-"and then we're out of the hub completely. The weather will likely take some real rums for the worse, too. Lots of overcast at least in the region closest to the hub and probably some nasty weather. Be prepared for it but don't let it get you down. It don't last a long ways in and then the weather gets more like normal-which means unpredictable. Normal weather we can handle, I think. Your first mud bath will try your strength and your patience but you'll soon take it in stride. The only kind of storm you really have to worry about you probably won't meet-and pray you don't. But you better know what to do just in case you meet one." He got up, walked over to the wagon, and pulled back the tarp, then pulled out what looked like a large blanket or rug made of woven wool the color of dull gold. "This is Mandan gold, and it's fairly heavy although not as heavy as regular gold. Some of you may have seen it before and know all this but listen anyway. file:///F|/rah/Jack%20L.%20Chalker/Chalker,%...01%20-%20When%20the%20Changewin ds%20Blow.txt (112 of 156) [1/19/03 4:09:40 PM] file:///F|/rah/Jack%20L.%20Chalker/Chalker,%20Jack%20L%20-%20Changewinds%201%2 0-%20When%20the%20Changewinds%20Blow.txt Self-confidence gets more folks killed or worse than any other cause. Each of you is gonna get one of these blankets about this size and we'll stow it for you. You don't own it-Mandan's worth more than all of us put together, particularly in this form-and we'll take it back when you leave us, but for the duration it's yours. If we get much changewind warning, we will stop, the crew will handle your things, and we'll all pitch in and dig a series of bunkers- holes in the ground, really-and get in, lying as flat as possible, with these blankets covering the entire hole. Don't worry-you won't suffocate, you'll just feel like you will. Air passes through the blanket, but Mandan is the only known substance that insulates against the effects of a changewind. You stay down and under it no matter how long it takes until I, personally, or one of my crew comes and tells you it's all clear. Understand. No peeking out, no feeling to see if it's still going, nothing like that. Any exposed area of your body will be permanently affected by the changewind." Sam shivered at the vision, remembering her own change-wind nightmare. So that was why all the villagers crowded into the underground bunker! And why that castle and even the big door looked golden. It was Mandan coated, inside and out. Inside, they were protected. All but that poor boy. . . . "Now, changewinds could blow any time-even here," Jahoort warned. "At least two hubs have been hit in the last five years. Both had a great deal of warning, although ones like Tubikosa with large cities simply like to play with the fates. But the odds of a changewind hitting here, or hitting us, are slim-but not as slim as they used to be. There's been a dramatic upsurge in the number of them, mostly very small and localized, in the past year and a half. The unique conditions of a hub prevent many of these small local ones from happening here, but they are not that uncommon in the sectors and can come without much real warning at all. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] |