or the fact that Travertine was utterly and irrevocably sincere in vis convictions.
Perhaps a little of both.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Chiku returned to Kappa later that day. Putting on her suit, she deliberately found fault with as many components as she could without arousing suspicion. Fortunately, this was hardly a challenge since many of the suits were coming back with all sorts of minor ailments. By the time she cycled through into Kappa, Chiku’s assigned search party was far ahead and not making any effort to slow down. That suited her perfectly. She told them she would rendezvous with them after they had completed a sweep of one grid, at a junction a couple of blocks astern of the breach. They agreed; it was clear from their indifferent tones that Representative Chiku Akinya could do whatever the hell she liked as far as they were concerned.
Her ruse allowed her perhaps thirty minutes to make the rendezvous, which was just enough time to return to the laboratory and the collapsed basement. If she was late meeting up with the other search party, her actions might start to attract attention.
She found her way back into the damaged structure. From its ruined heart, Chiku looked up at the chamber’s distant ceiling, defined now by random constellations – the lights of repair teams lashed high above, trying to prevent more cladding from breaking loose. She turned her attention to the improvised ramp, the shard of fallen sky, which was still in place. Chiku vaulted the gap with more confidence than on her first attempt.
She started descending.
Chiku had been trepidatious before, but there was no time for that now, even with the knowledge that the floor might not be as secure as it looked. She reached the basement and moved through the rubble until she found the sheet of walling material she had placed over the hole in an effort to disguise it. It had not been disturbed. Chiku heaved the piece aside, taking care not to shatter it.
Then she stood on the edge of the hole and directed her helmet lightdownwards. It was just as she remembered, except that it appeared to plunge deeper than she had originally thought. At the very limit of the lamp’s reach, the shaft began to curve around to a less steep angle, perhaps even to the horizontal. The recessed hand- and footholds looked intact. She could climb down them, no problem, but the real difficulty was getting to them in the first place – the aperture was only half as wide as the shaft under it.
Chiku checked the time. Twenty minutes, give or take.
She cast around for a chunk of debris and found a chest-sized boulder that would have taxed her without the suit’s ampliation. She walked to the edge of the hole, raised the boulder to her sternum and thrust it down and away as hard as she could, stepping back in the same instant so that there was no risk of the boulder crushing her feet on its way down.
Her aim was true. The boulder crunched through the lip of overhanging floor, pulverising it. Chiku watched the debris rain down the shaft in perfect soundlessness. Now the hole was more or less the same diameter as the shaft. All she had to do was lower herself over the lip and start climbing.
Chiku crushed her misgivings. She knelt down with her back to the hole and began to drop her right foot into the void, maintaining balance so that the weight of her suit’s life-support hump did not tip her over the edge. It did not work. Why had she ever thought it was going to? If there had been a shaft like this in a normal part of Zanzibar, there would have been railings, or something to hold onto, to help the transition into a climbing position. Here there was nothing, just a hole in the ground . . . and nothing to stop her toppling into it. She could sit with feet over the edge and somehow try and wriggle around . . .
Chiku spotted something that might work. It was a length of pipe or spar as thick as her wrist, one end still embedded in a chunk of debris. The pipe was perhaps
Perhaps a little of both.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Chiku returned to Kappa later that day. Putting on her suit, she deliberately found fault with as many components as she could without arousing suspicion. Fortunately, this was hardly a challenge since many of the suits were coming back with all sorts of minor ailments. By the time she cycled through into Kappa, Chiku’s assigned search party was far ahead and not making any effort to slow down. That suited her perfectly. She told them she would rendezvous with them after they had completed a sweep of one grid, at a junction a couple of blocks astern of the breach. They agreed; it was clear from their indifferent tones that Representative Chiku Akinya could do whatever the hell she liked as far as they were concerned.
Her ruse allowed her perhaps thirty minutes to make the rendezvous, which was just enough time to return to the laboratory and the collapsed basement. If she was late meeting up with the other search party, her actions might start to attract attention.
She found her way back into the damaged structure. From its ruined heart, Chiku looked up at the chamber’s distant ceiling, defined now by random constellations – the lights of repair teams lashed high above, trying to prevent more cladding from breaking loose. She turned her attention to the improvised ramp, the shard of fallen sky, which was still in place. Chiku vaulted the gap with more confidence than on her first attempt.
She started descending.
Chiku had been trepidatious before, but there was no time for that now, even with the knowledge that the floor might not be as secure as it looked. She reached the basement and moved through the rubble until she found the sheet of walling material she had placed over the hole in an effort to disguise it. It had not been disturbed. Chiku heaved the piece aside, taking care not to shatter it.
Then she stood on the edge of the hole and directed her helmet lightdownwards. It was just as she remembered, except that it appeared to plunge deeper than she had originally thought. At the very limit of the lamp’s reach, the shaft began to curve around to a less steep angle, perhaps even to the horizontal. The recessed hand- and footholds looked intact. She could climb down them, no problem, but the real difficulty was getting to them in the first place – the aperture was only half as wide as the shaft under it.
Chiku checked the time. Twenty minutes, give or take.
She cast around for a chunk of debris and found a chest-sized boulder that would have taxed her without the suit’s ampliation. She walked to the edge of the hole, raised the boulder to her sternum and thrust it down and away as hard as she could, stepping back in the same instant so that there was no risk of the boulder crushing her feet on its way down.
Her aim was true. The boulder crunched through the lip of overhanging floor, pulverising it. Chiku watched the debris rain down the shaft in perfect soundlessness. Now the hole was more or less the same diameter as the shaft. All she had to do was lower herself over the lip and start climbing.
Chiku crushed her misgivings. She knelt down with her back to the hole and began to drop her right foot into the void, maintaining balance so that the weight of her suit’s life-support hump did not tip her over the edge. It did not work. Why had she ever thought it was going to? If there had been a shaft like this in a normal part of Zanzibar, there would have been railings, or something to hold onto, to help the transition into a climbing position. Here there was nothing, just a hole in the ground . . . and nothing to stop her toppling into it. She could sit with feet over the edge and somehow try and wriggle around . . .
Chiku spotted something that might work. It was a length of pipe or spar as thick as her wrist, one end still embedded in a chunk of debris. The pipe was perhaps
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