[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

metal.
For the next two hundred yards, the wall was cold. Then, neutral. Then, very warm again. After
that, neutral. Then, cold. And so on.
"Parts of these walls," said Cull, "are the walls of hot or cold air shafts. They must be. It's only
logical. You know that many of the statues in the city contain ventilation shafts. Hot air goes into some.
Cold air comes out of others. I always knew that and also knew why. This is an enclosed world with light
furnished by a cold sun and heat provided by the radiation from billions of warm bodies. If there weren't
some means of cooling the air, we'd have all been cooked to death long ago from the accumulated heat
of our own bodies.
"Where does the cold air come from? Are there gigantic refrigeration devices buried deep below
the surface? Or are other means used?"
"There's only one thing wrong with your theory," said Fyodor. "When this world expands, and
the cities are dislodged from their places on the surface, the air shafts would snap off. However, this
doesn't, obviously, happen. The hot-cold balance is maintained. So. . .?"
"Sharp. Good point. Since the ventilation isn't cut off, the shafts don't break. If they do, they're
repaired or replaced. That doesn't seem likely when you consider the enormous labor and materials
involved. Not to mention the time. So. . ."
"So?"
"So I'd guess that. . ."
Cull stopped because the metal beneath his feet was quivering. Fyodor's eyes ballooned. Cull's
and Phyllis' were bulging with panic, too. His hand, placed against the wall to steady himself, to combat
the dizziness caused by the undulations of the floor, felt the wall also shake. And, looking down the tunnel
as far as their torchlight shone, he could see a swell passing along the floor, a wave of metal.
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
Moreover, the corner where the tunnel took an almost right-angle turn was going inward toward
the other side. Then, like a stretched rubber band released, it snapped back to its original position. A
second later, it again shot toward the other side. Or the other side was moving toward this side. Or both
actions were taking place.
He had a terrifying vision of the tunnel col-lapsing, burying them beneath the millions of tons of
dirt and rock above them. Perhaps, the whole city would slide into a chasm suddenly opened beneath it,
and they. . .
No place to run. Besides, they had enough trouble keeping their balance; they could not have
fled more than a few steps without falling down.
All three shrieked with horror as the floor rose and twisted, and they fell from the floor against
the side of the tunnel. The wall had suddenly become the floor.
They continued shrieking as the river water poured over them. They fought to claw a hold in the
metal to keep from being swept away in the current of the river.
The water rose over their heads. Willynilly, they began floating alongside the wall.
Just as abruptly as it had come, the water fell away from the wall, the three with it, and they were
on a wave roaring toward the other wall. Cull could see what was happening. Though Fyodor's torch had
been doused, Cull had managed to hold his above the water with one hand while he thrashed with the
other to keep him-self afloat. Fyodor was to Cull's right and a yard or so ahead of him so that Cull saw
the other wall rushing at him. He could not find Phyllis. He struggled to get his feet in front:of him to
enable them to take the impact.
Then, just as he was about to crash, the water ran away from him. His momentum brushed him
gently against the wall, he sank, and found him-self standing on the walk alongside the wall. He also
could, see by his torch that Fyodor (he was right beside him) was standing too and that the tunnel was
righting itself. Phyllis, minus her torch, was a few yards away.
They had quit shrieking; now, they were breathing harshly. Cull was, anyway. Fyodor's mouth
was open, and his chest was rapidly rising and falling. But Cull couldn't hear him, for the river water was
twisting and roiling too noisily.
Then the turbulence began to lessen and the water started to regain its former oily smoothness.
After a few minutes Cull could hear Fyodor gasping.
"That answers your question about why the tunnels and shafts don't snap," Cull said between
sobs. "This stuff stretches, bends, twists as no material ever built by man does. And it has a built-in
self-alignment. Or so it seems."
"But isn't there a limit to its ability to stretch?" Fyodor said. "I would think that. . ."
The floor began to shake again. Cull started to get seasick. Swellsick, rather.
It was like being inside a monster snake when the snake is going over the top of a steep
sharp-peaked hill. The tunnel -- their part of it -- slanted upward. Ahead of them, about two hundred
yards away, the tunnel straightened out for about forty yards. Then, it dipped out of sight, apparently
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
bending downward.
Immediately afterward, the tunnel slanted sideways. They yelled again as they slid across the
walk. Just as they could no longer cling to the sur-face and were about to slide into the river, the slanting
motion stopped. The tunnel straightened out. And the river, five feet higher than it had been before, a
racing wall, roared down the tunnel.
They were almost swept away. But they'd scrambled up to the wall as far away from the water
as possible, and, though the edge of the water struck them and almost knocked them loose, they
succeeded in not being carried off.
With the abruptness of an elevator dropping, the tunnel leveled out and began righting itself.
Fyodor screamed. Phyllis screamed.
Cull whirled, and he screamed.
The backward race of the river, caused by the leveling of the tunnel, had left behind a fearsome
jetsam. A river demon was clutching the edge of the walk with its paws. Its lower jaw rested on the
walk, and its tongue was curled around Phyllis' right leg.
Cull, shrieking with hate and hysterical fear, leaped at the huge head and kicked furiously at one
of the great eyes. One of? The eye. It was a Cyclops; a single eye glared in the middle of its low brow.
His toe drove into the eyeball. Again and again. The eyeball burst.
Wheezing, the demon uncoiled the tongue from around Phyllis' leg. The whale-like body rolled [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

  • zanotowane.pl
  • doc.pisz.pl
  • pdf.pisz.pl
  • szkla.opx.pl

    •