Macrolife by Zebrowski George;

Author:Zebrowski, George; [Zebrowski, George;]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Open Road Media Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Published: 1979-10-21T23:00:00+00:00

16. The City

Clouds covered the suns as the flitter rushed into the southeast. He climbed higher to keep their warmth on his face. At midafternoon the brighter sun eclipsed its larger companion, reducing Lea’s illumination by slightly less than half. He caught a glimpse of the ocean just as the eclipse was ending. The water sparkled as if it were on fire.

A storm sat on the eastern horizon. As he flew lower over the plain, clouds obscured the suns again, turning the ocean dark blue. He turned the flitter eastward and dropped within a thousand meters of the beach, where powerful breakers crashed against the sand and rocks.

He was completely in control of the craft, sure of the freedom that it had given him. The afternoon’s sights had helped him forget himself. It was enough that the planet was strange, enough that he was curious about what he might find; nothing else existed.

The small display map indicated that he was now more than two thousand kilometers southeast of the mining site. He eased the craft away from the beach, slightly toward the northeast, hoping to glimpse the large city that Miklos had mentioned.

Storm clouds now took up half the sky in front of him, gray and black cumulus illuminated by silent flashes of lightning. The planet is alive, he thought, as much a system of living things as home.

He saw the city, a dark mass of towers sitting under the thunder-heads. The storm covered the whole sky as he flew closer and darted under the cloud ceiling. Rain began to hit the canopy. The lightning became more frequent, stabbing at the dark land below. The flitter cut through the rain without shaking, its gravitic field a vise holding it steady in relation to the planet’s surface.

The city was a ragged black outline against the leaden sky, receiving the torrent without protest. As the lightning flashed, he imagined the city to be a huge black spider crouching ahead. He could almost reach out and touch it, though he knew that it was still kilometers away.

He turned on the outside audio for a moment and heard the wind howling; thunder rumbled and cracked and died. The craft slowed to a drift over the city.

The towers held up more than one level. Huge holes gaped at him, black pits into the lower levels. The wind whistled through the city’s wounds. What suffering had been here? he wondered; the vast ruin was an external record of misery and decline.

He wafted toward a tower. A finger of lightning struck the top, hurling debris down into the ruin. He released the stick, leaving the flitter to hover while he cleared the map from the small screen to reveal the area directly below. In the moment of another flash, human figures ran across the wet surface.

He took the stick and landed the craft. For a moment he sat there, unsure of what to do next. Above him the clouds drove fast in the wind, covering the broken point of the tower.

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