[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

structures of staggering dimensions extending as far as the eye could see in
one direction, while forming the shore of a distant ocean in the other. They
were looking over the entire city of Vranix. But it was all hanging over their
heads, upside down. They waited, seeing how long it would take Mildred to
figure it out.
"My God!" she said after a lengthy pause. "All that topsy-turvy wonderland we
came through inside. It turned us completely over somehow, and we didn't
realize it . . . at least, I didn't. But you said you'd been here before. This
has to be underneath. We've walked out like flies on a ceiling."
"Right on," Hunt complimented. The three spires "rising" around them
surmounted an enormous tower dominating the city, and supported a circular
platform that contained the place they were in actually a small amphitheater
used for various events and social gatherings. But the amphitheater was on the
underside of the platform, not on top.
"Is it . . . I mean, is it real?" Mildred asked, looking down and from side to
side as if checking her other senses. "Or something that VISAR is putting into
our heads?"
"Oh, it exists precisely as you perceive it," Danchekker assured her. "A whim
exercised by the Thurien architects of long ago, probably to show off their
dexterity with the new science of integral gravitic structural engineering,
which was developed at around that time. The Thuriens use it extensively, as
you will already have gathered."
"So is that why I feel normal? . . . No, wait a minute. VISAR can inject the
right stimuli to make you feel normal, anyway, can't it? What I'm trying to
say is, if we were really here physically . . . there, whatever . . . would we
still feel normal, with everything just looking wrong? Not upside down. The
local gravity is normal but inverted?"
"Precisely so," Danchekker confirmed.
A Thurien who had been pacing slowly out by the rim when they appeared from
one of the ramps from the interior, and who was now only a short distance
Page 42
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
away, changed direction toward them. The Terrans turned to face him as he drew
closer. His face was lined and seemed old, his furrowed crown a subdued mix of
streaky browns and grays that gave the impression of being faded.
"Forgive me if this is an intrusion," he said. "I am not familiar with the
ways of Terrans. But it's the first opportunity I've had to speak with people
from your world."
"Not at all," Hunt said cheerfully. "It would be a long way to come and not
want to talk to anyone." He introduced himself and the others and added, "All
in Thurios." When meeting in a virtual recreation of a setting, it was
customary to state where one was located physically. It was evident that the
Thurien was actually somewhere else also; had he been physically at the tower
in Vranix, and therefore not neurally coupled into the system, he wouldn't be
interacting with them. "Mildred is writing a book on your society. We're
giving her a quick introductory tour of Thurien."
"My name is Kolno Wyarel. On Nessara, a planet of Callantares, a star you've
probably never heard of." His manner became more relaxed. "But I was
Thurien-born originally . . . a long time ago, now."
"With a system like this, you're never really away," Mildred observed. "Has it
changed much?"
"Oh, Vranix never changes much."
"Is Vranix the part of Thurien that you're from?" Danchekker inquired, making
a heroic effort at being genial.
"I studied music and philosophy here." Wyarel looked around. A faint smile
touched his features. "It is where my wife, Asayi, and I met when we were
young. Our favorite memories are of these places. So every once in a while we
come back here to relive them a little."
"Will she . . ." Hunt wasn't sure if Wyarel meant that they came here
together, or that Wyarel came to be reminded. He broke of the question that he
had begun to frame, realizing that it might be indelicate.
The Thurien understood and gave a short laugh. "Yes, she's fine. She was
supposed to be here by now, but no doubt she got distracted by something.
VISAR says she isn't online yet. Don't worry about it. It happens all the
time. She's somewhere in the same house as me."
"A universal proclivity of the female, it would appear," Danchekker observed.
"Oh, don't pontificate so, Christian," Mildred chided. "What do you do now on
. . . where was it? . . . Nessara," she asked Wyarel.
"It's what I suppose you would call a tropical planet, teeming with forests
and life. Warm and humid by our standards, but you get used to it. We retired
there to be among the life, and to contemplate. There is an inner awareness
that learns to open out to these things."
"There used to be teachings like that on Earth, but we seem to have turned
away from them." Mildred glanced at the two scientists with her. "Such things
seem to be considered as gone out of style." Danchekker humphed and rocked
from one foot to the other, refusing to be goaded.
"That's only natural. But it will be temporary," Wyarel said. "A culture must
attend to its material needs before it can rise beyond them, just as we must
eat before we can create the works that are to be found in Vranix. Thuriens
have discovered and mastered the physical universe. Now we are discovering
ourselves."
"Christian, this is exactly what I wanted!" Mildred said. Then, to Wyarel,
"Could I feel free to get in touch again sometime, and talk more about this?"
"Of course. But there are times when we retreat from external affairs, you
understand."
"It wouldn't be an imposition?"
"We would be honored. . . . Excuse me for a moment." Wyarel stared distantly
for a few seconds, then returned to the present. "That was VISAR with a
Page 43
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
message. Asayi had something to attend to concerning one of the klorgs that's
a domestic animal. We have several that come and go around the house. Now
she's in the middle of a call from our daughter. Please, don't let me detain
you any further. She would love to meet you, I'm sure, but it can always be
another time. I am content enough here, alone with my thoughts."
"Females and cats," Danchekker murmured to himself, but not quite below his
breath.
"Christian!" Mildred admonished.
* * *
They added the planet Nessara to their tour list and visited it next out of
curiosity. The part that VISAR brought them to looked like the green
rain-forest hills of the upper Amazon with a snow-capped wall of the Himalayas
behind, but with greater richness of color and on an even grander scale. The
waterfalls tracing their way down from the heights looked like chains of
sparkling necklaces draped over the hills. VISAR supplied sensory inputs that
faithfully reproduced the heat and the sultriness of the air, the scents and
the sounds, even a realistic touch of clothing sliding clammily over moist
skin. Hunt was amused to note that Danchekker unconsciously removed his
virtual spectacles to wipe the lenses with his virtual handkerchief there was
no reason why VISAR should cause them to fog up. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
  • zanotowane.pl
  • doc.pisz.pl
  • pdf.pisz.pl
  • mons45.htw.pl
  • Wątki
    Powered by wordpress | Theme: simpletex | © (...) lepiej tracić niż nigdy nie spotkać.