[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
but not blackness. There was a huge sea in there, twice as large as the one in the other direction, looking as if bright moonlight was falling on it. it sparkled like a plain of diamond. "Isn't that the direction the wind came from?" Gaby asked. "Yeah, if we didn' t get turned around by a curve in the river." "I don't think we did. That loo ks like ice to me." Cirocco agreed. The ice sheet broke up as the sea narrowed to a neck, event ually becoming a river that ran in front of her and emptied into the other sea. The country over there was moun- tainous, rugged as a washboard. She d id not understand how the river could thread its way through the mountains to join the sea on the other side. She decided the perspective was fooling her. Water would not flow uphill, even in Themis. Beyond the ice was another daylight area, this one brighter and yellower than the others she could see, like desert sands. To reach it, she would have to travel across the frozen sea. "Three days and two nights," Gaby said. "That worked out pretty well from th e theory. I said we'd he able to see almost half the inside of Themis from a ny point. What I didn't figure on were those things." Cirocco followed Gaby's pointing fimer to a series of what looked like ropes that started on the land below and angled up- ward to the roof. There were three of them in a line almost directly in front of them, so that the neares t partially concealed the other two. Cirocco had seen them earlier, but had skipped over them because she could not understand it all at once. Now she l ooked closer, and frowned. Like a depressing number of things in Themis, the y were huge. The nearest one could serve as a model for all the rest. It was fifty kilome ters away, but she could see that it was made of perhaps one hundred strands wound together. Each strand was 200 or 300 meters thick. Further detail was lost at that distance. The three in the row all angled steeply over the frozen sea, rising 150 kilom eters or more until they joined the roof at a point she knew must be one of t he spokes, seen from the inside. It was a conical mouth, like the bell of a t rumpet that flared to become the roof and sides of the rim enclosure. At the far edge of the bell, some 500 kilometers away, she could make out more of th e ropes. There were more cables to her left, but these went straight up to the arched ceiling and disappeared through it. Beyond them were other ro ws that angled toward the spoke mouth she could not see from her vantage po int, the one over the sea in the mountains. Where the cables joined the ground, they pulled it up into broad-based moun tains. "They look like the cables on a suspension bridge," Cirocco said. "I agree. And I think that's what it is. There's no need for tow- ers to suppor t it. The cables can be fastened in the center. Themis is.a circular suspension bridge." Cirocco eased herself closer to the edge. She stuck her head over and looke d down two kilometers to the ground. The clifi was as near perpendicular as an irregular surface fea- ture can be. Page 34 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html Only near the bottom did it begin to flare out to meet the land below. "You aren't thinking of going down that, are you?" Gaby asked. "The thought had entered my mind, but I sure don't feel good about it. And what would be better down there than up here? We've got a pretty good idea we could survive up here." She stopped. Was that to he their only goal? Given the chance, she would take adventure to security, if se- curity meant building a but from sticks and settling down to a diet of raw meat and fruit . She would be crazy in a month. And the land below was beautiful. There were impossibly steep mountains with shining blue lakes set in them like gems. She could see waving grasslands, dense forests, and far to the east, the brooding midnight sea. There was no telling what dan- gers that land concealed, but it seemed to call to her. "We might shinny down those vines," Gaby said, reaching over the edge and p ointing out a possible line of descent. The cliff face was encrusted with plants. The jungle spilled over the edge l ike a frozen torrent of water. Massive trees grew from the bare rock face, c linging like bamacles. The rock itself could be seen only in patches, and ev en there the news was not all bad. it looked like a basaltic formation, a cl osely packed sheaf of crystal pillars with broad hexagonal platforms where c olumns had broken off. "It's do-able," Cirocco said, at last. lit wouldn't he easy or safe. We'd have to think of a pretty good reason for trying it." Something better than the form less urge she felt to be down there, she thought. "Hell, I don't want to be stuck up here, either," Gaby said, with a grin. "Then your troubles are over," said a quiet voice from behind them. Every muscle in Cirocco's body tensed. She bit her lip, forcing herself to m ove slowly until she was safely away from the edge. "Up here. I've been waiting for you." Sitting on a tree limb. three meters from the ground, his bare feet dangling was Calvin Greene. CHAPTER SEVEN Before Cirocco quite had a chance to settle down, they were all sitting in a c ircle and Calvin was talking. "I came out not far from the hole where the river disappears," he was sayin g. "That was seven days ago. I heard you on the second day." "So why didn't you call us?" Cirocco asked. Calvin held up the remains of hi s helmet. "The mike is missing," he said, extricating the broken end of wire. "I could l isten, but not transmit. I waited. I ate fruit. I just couldn't seem to kill a ny of the animals." He spread his broad bands, and shrugged. "How did you know this was the right place to wait?" Gaby asked. "I didn't know, for sure." "Well," Cirocco said. She slapped her palms on her legs, and then laughed. " Well. Fancy that. just when we'd about given up hope of finding anybody else , we stumble over you. It's too good to be true. Isn't it, Gaby? " "Huh? Oh, yeah, it's great." "It's good to see you folks, too. I've been listening to you for five days now. I t's nice to hear a familiar voice." [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] |