Delta Pavonis Read Online Free

Delta Pavonis
Book: Delta Pavonis Read Online Free
Author: John Maddox Roberts, Eric Kotani
Tags: Fiction, General, Science-Fiction
Pages:
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harangued him for years, but he never listens. He has a romantic image of himself as a rebel, a maverick. He just never grew up. Did I mention that he's my husband? I guess I didn't." She made an airy gesture with a beringed hand. "We love one another dearly, but we prefer to keep a certain distance most of the time. Half a planet is about right. With luck, you won't be seeing much of him. He'll be at his headquarters on the mainland, mostly." Abruptly, the older woman stood and held out her hand. "Good luck out there. Be careful and you'll make out all right. Send me word of how you're doing from time to time." She sounded as if she had meant it.
    "I will," Dierdre said, deciding that she meant it, too.
    An hour later, she stood on the airfield, her gear piled next to her as she shuffled forward in line to board her scoutcraft. It was a racy name for a clumsy-looking cargo vehicle. Its body was a barely-streamlined rectangle twenty meters in length and five meters high. At each corner was a rotating rotor pad, held clear of the ground by landing struts. A man wearing flyer's wings checked off the passengers as they boarded.
    "Dierdre Jamail?" She nodded. "Southeast peninsula, Atropos?" She nodded again. "That's the last stop. If I was you, I'd stay aboard and ride back."
    She was getting tired of this. "I asked for the assignment. I'm looking forward to it."
    He looked as if he doubted her sanity. "You're sure welcome to it. Hop aboard, you'll be there in a little under seventeen hours."
    She hoisted her duffel bag and climbed the steps into the scoutcraft.

TWO

    She was sure she would go insane long before she reached her destination. She had pictured an aircraft ride as being not greatly different from a voyage in a small spacecraft. She was wrong. First of all, the noise was unbelievable. The interior was designed for cargo, with the only concession to passenger comfort being fold-down scats along the sides of the hold. There was no insulation to dim the noise from the engines, and the fumes from fuel and lubrication were almost as bad. She had wanted to talk with her fellow passengers, but the noise precluded even that small pleasure.
    The motion of the craft was violent, jerking up, down, or to any side with every atmospheric disturbance. The thing had been designed for efficient cargo hauling, not for smooth flight. She was glad that the pilot had passed out anti-nausea pills before takeoff. Even the view from the tiny ports was disappointing, being mostly the tops of fluffy white clouds or monotonous seascape.
    Every couple of hours they landed and discharged cargo or passengers. These brief respites allowed her to get out of the craft and stretch, breathe clean air and talk a little, but there wasn't much to learn. Most of the other passengers were newcomers like herself and had little to tell her.
    The terrain changed from one stop to the next, but it was dark after the third one. The last stop before the fall of night had been at the base of an immense mountain range, and she was deeply impressed. Holos could be incredibly realistic, but they were no substitute for knowing the mountains were actually there. They made her feel dwarfed in a way that a big chunk of rock floating in space never could.
    Somehow, toward the early morning hours, she managed to sleep a little. All too soon, something shook her shoulder.
    "Wake up, Sleeping Beauty, we're here. Come on out and see your new abode."
    She snarled something sleepily and rubbed her eyes. A brief struggle freed her from her straps, and she collected her belongings and made her way to the hatch. The sky was growing dimly blue, so there was little to see, but there was plenty to feel and smell.
    The heat struck her like a rubber hammer as soon as she left her transportation. The humidity matched the temperature. It was like breathing under water. If this was early morning, what would it be like at midday?
    Even without a trace of breeze, the air bore distilled
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