The Day After Doomsday by Poul Anderson

Author:Poul Anderson [Anderson, Poul]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Jerry eBooks
Published: 2020-05-18T21:00:00+00:00

A MOMENT she lingered, savoring the fresh air that blew across her skin. Zatlokopa was not only terrestroid, but midway through an interglacial period. Climatically it was a paradise for humans. The women had quickly adopted a version of native dress, little more than shorts and sandals, with the former only for the sake of pockets. The sun slanted long rays across the towers, a goldenness that seemed to fill the atmosphere. How quiet it was!

Too quiet, she thought. I winged snake cruised above the many-steepled skyline, but nothing else moved. No groundcars. No fliers. Not a walker in the grassy lanes between buildings, or a boat on the sunset-yellow canals. The city had subways, elevated tunnel-streets that looped like vines from tower to tower, halls and shaftways in the houses themselves. This was not Earth, she knew. It never had been, never could be.

Nothing could ever again be Earth.

A spaceship lifted silent on paragravity, kilometers distant and yet so big that she saw sunlight burn along its flanks. The Holdar liner, she thought; we have a consignment aboard. That reminded her. She had no time for self-pity. Closing the window, she hurried into the kitchen and checked the autochef. Everything seemed under control. Thank God for the high development of robotics in this cluster. No human cook had the sense of taste and smell to prepare a meal that an Eyzka would think fit to eat.

Sigrid returned to the living room, where Earth-type furniture looked homely and lost amidst intricate vaulting and miniature fountains. The perfume cabinet slid open for her. She consulted a chart. Formality on Zatlokopa paid no attention to clothes, but made a ritual of odors. For entertaining a guest of Taltla’s rank, you used a blend of Class Five aerosols . . . She wrinkled her nose. Everything in Class Five smelled alike to her—rather like ripe silage. Well, she could drench herself with . . . let’s see, the sha-Eyzka usually enjoyed cologne, and there was some left from the ship . . . Her hand closed on the little cut-glass bottle.

The door said: “Two desire admittance.”

Had Alexandra brought the fellow here early? She’d been told not to. “Let them in,” Sigrid said without looking at the scanner. The door opened.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.