[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
screen. From a pouch on her bodysuit, Brigid withdrew the symbol of her
for-mer office as a Cobaltville archivist. She slipped on the pair of
rectangular-lensed, wire-framed spectacles and gazed steadily at the screen.
Although the eye-glasses were something of a reminder of her past life, they
also served as a means to correct an astigmatism.
Still, she squinted at the flashes of color, first lean-ing very close to the
screen, then sitting back. Kane briefly wondered if her vision hadn't been
further im-paired by the head injury she suffered several months before. The
only visible sign of the wound that had laid her scalp open to the bone and
put her in a coma for several days was a faintly red horizontal line on her
right temple that disappeared into the roots of her hair. Her recovery time
had been little short of un-canny. Kane was always impressed by the woman's
tensile-spring resiliency.
However, he couldn't help but notice how she needed her glasses more and more
in the weeks and months following her release from the redoubt's in-firmary.
Pixels flickered over the screen. And slowly images began to form, overlaid by
a distracting white glow that strobed like the sputter of dying neon. The
flut-tering pattern coalesced into a scene that at first they could make
little sense of, dimly illuminated and shot through with jagged pixels. They
could barely make out a wide chamber filled with dark, unmoving shapes.
Brigid manipulated the mouse and tapped a few keys. The image shuddered and
jerked, presumably as the remote probe rolled forward a few feet on its
treaded tracks. With a colorful shimmer, the interfer-
ence faded and the screen showed what at first ap-peared to be a collection of
black statues, all of hu-
man beings. She instinctively cringed in her chair, muttering grimly, "Another
Hall of the Judged Sin-
ners."
Grant and Kane knew instantly she referred to the chamber in Redoubt Yankee
that Megaera and her
Furies had filled with the carbonized husks of Farers unfortunate enough to be
struck by the Oubolus.
The statues on the screen were as immobile and as jet-black as the victims
they had seen in Chicago.
Every fold of cloth, every strand of hair was visible. Scattered here and
there with no regard for order, they were all distorted in different
postures shielding their heads with up-flung arms, on their knees with their
hands clasped together as if they were still plead-ing for their lives when
the calcification process be-gan, others in crouching postures as if they had
Page 64
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
turned to run. The one common feature was the expression of unendurable terror
on the face of each figure.
"'What's the light source?" Grant asked.
Brigid shook her head. "I don't know. Whatever it is, it's not direct."
file:///J|/sci-fi/Nieuwe%20map/James%20Axler%20-%2...20Moon%20-%20The%20Dragon
%20Kings,%20Book%201.html (80 of 174)17-2-2006 3:18:22
James Axler - Outlanders - Devil in the Moon
The camera of the remote panned slowly to the left, and for an instant before
the view dissolved in a bliz-
zard of pixels, they saw a set of circular metal stairs spiraling up into a
square opening. A light-colored, indistinct shape bulked in the shadowy space
between the staircase and the wall.
"What's that under the stairs?" Kane wanted to know.
Brigid replayed the short sequence, and when the staircase appeared again Kane
directed, "Freeze it there. Can you augment and enhance it?"
"I'll try." By manipulating the mouse and stroking the appropriate sequence of
keys, Brigid enlarged the area. Not much could be done about the poor
illu-mination, but the computer program highlighted fea-
tures and reduced interference. She tapped the keys until, by degrees, the
image of a large metal cube swelled on the screen.
"It's a box," Grant stated. "A shipping crate."
"Yeah," Kane agreed, "but there's writing on it. A couple of words."
Brigid leaned forward. Carefully, she spelled it out aloud. "N-A-S-A."
Lakesh's sudden startled intake of breath sounded like steel sliding across
wet leather. "It's not just a word it's the logo of NASA, the National
Aeronau-tics Space Administration."
"That's one issue settled, then," declared Brigid. ' 'The interphaser opened a
vortex node on the Moon, apparently inside an old base. It's probably
under-ground."
"There's something else written under it," Grant said, pointing to it.
"D-E-V-I. What's Devi?"
"A title held by Indian royalty," Lakesh replied dryly. "I doubt NASA was
shipping devis to the Moon."
"Devil, maybe?" Kane ventured. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
zanotowane.pl doc.pisz.pl pdf.pisz.pl fopke.keep.pl
screen. From a pouch on her bodysuit, Brigid withdrew the symbol of her
for-mer office as a Cobaltville archivist. She slipped on the pair of
rectangular-lensed, wire-framed spectacles and gazed steadily at the screen.
Although the eye-glasses were something of a reminder of her past life, they
also served as a means to correct an astigmatism.
Still, she squinted at the flashes of color, first lean-ing very close to the
screen, then sitting back. Kane briefly wondered if her vision hadn't been
further im-paired by the head injury she suffered several months before. The
only visible sign of the wound that had laid her scalp open to the bone and
put her in a coma for several days was a faintly red horizontal line on her
right temple that disappeared into the roots of her hair. Her recovery time
had been little short of un-canny. Kane was always impressed by the woman's
tensile-spring resiliency.
However, he couldn't help but notice how she needed her glasses more and more
in the weeks and months following her release from the redoubt's in-firmary.
Pixels flickered over the screen. And slowly images began to form, overlaid by
a distracting white glow that strobed like the sputter of dying neon. The
flut-tering pattern coalesced into a scene that at first they could make
little sense of, dimly illuminated and shot through with jagged pixels. They
could barely make out a wide chamber filled with dark, unmoving shapes.
Brigid manipulated the mouse and tapped a few keys. The image shuddered and
jerked, presumably as the remote probe rolled forward a few feet on its
treaded tracks. With a colorful shimmer, the interfer-
ence faded and the screen showed what at first ap-peared to be a collection of
black statues, all of hu-
man beings. She instinctively cringed in her chair, muttering grimly, "Another
Hall of the Judged Sin-
ners."
Grant and Kane knew instantly she referred to the chamber in Redoubt Yankee
that Megaera and her
Furies had filled with the carbonized husks of Farers unfortunate enough to be
struck by the Oubolus.
The statues on the screen were as immobile and as jet-black as the victims
they had seen in Chicago.
Every fold of cloth, every strand of hair was visible. Scattered here and
there with no regard for order, they were all distorted in different
postures shielding their heads with up-flung arms, on their knees with their
hands clasped together as if they were still plead-ing for their lives when
the calcification process be-gan, others in crouching postures as if they had
Page 64
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
turned to run. The one common feature was the expression of unendurable terror
on the face of each figure.
"'What's the light source?" Grant asked.
Brigid shook her head. "I don't know. Whatever it is, it's not direct."
file:///J|/sci-fi/Nieuwe%20map/James%20Axler%20-%2...20Moon%20-%20The%20Dragon
%20Kings,%20Book%201.html (80 of 174)17-2-2006 3:18:22
James Axler - Outlanders - Devil in the Moon
The camera of the remote panned slowly to the left, and for an instant before
the view dissolved in a bliz-
zard of pixels, they saw a set of circular metal stairs spiraling up into a
square opening. A light-colored, indistinct shape bulked in the shadowy space
between the staircase and the wall.
"What's that under the stairs?" Kane wanted to know.
Brigid replayed the short sequence, and when the staircase appeared again Kane
directed, "Freeze it there. Can you augment and enhance it?"
"I'll try." By manipulating the mouse and stroking the appropriate sequence of
keys, Brigid enlarged the area. Not much could be done about the poor
illu-mination, but the computer program highlighted fea-
tures and reduced interference. She tapped the keys until, by degrees, the
image of a large metal cube swelled on the screen.
"It's a box," Grant stated. "A shipping crate."
"Yeah," Kane agreed, "but there's writing on it. A couple of words."
Brigid leaned forward. Carefully, she spelled it out aloud. "N-A-S-A."
Lakesh's sudden startled intake of breath sounded like steel sliding across
wet leather. "It's not just a word it's the logo of NASA, the National
Aeronau-tics Space Administration."
"That's one issue settled, then," declared Brigid. ' 'The interphaser opened a
vortex node on the Moon, apparently inside an old base. It's probably
under-ground."
"There's something else written under it," Grant said, pointing to it.
"D-E-V-I. What's Devi?"
"A title held by Indian royalty," Lakesh replied dryly. "I doubt NASA was
shipping devis to the Moon."
"Devil, maybe?" Kane ventured. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]