Earth Flight. Janet Edwards
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on either.
Rono glanced at the image on the wall vid. ‘I see Lecturer Playdon’s already talked about the island structure of the Land Raft. The giant supporting legs of these islands are made out of diamene, and the island platforms are formed of connected diamene strips.’
There was some furtive whispering behind me, as a couple of the class puzzled over the scar tissue that marred Rono’s dark forehead, making him look like someone in a history vid of the days before fluid patch treatments. The scar was the result of the solemn Keren losing his temper and punching Rono on newly regrown skin, and Rono was deliberately keeping it to tease him. I didn’t understand how two such contrasting personalities had ever got into a relationship with each other.
‘The strips are designed to move independently during earthquakes, so buildings are laid out in wide blocks along each strip.’ Rono tapped his lookup to show a new image on the wall vid. ‘The islands all have identical layouts. This is an aerial view of one of them, showing the central park surrounded by regimented blocks of buildings with wide gaps between them where the strips meet. Guess what we call the gaps between the buildings.’
‘The gaps?’ asked Krath.
‘Correct,’ said Rono. ‘I’m glad someone’s awake out there. As you can see, there are twenty gaps running the length of each island from north to south. They’re connected by one gap running east to west through the centre of the island. Like the bridges, that gap was used for emergency access when the portal network had to be shut down during solar storms.’
He paused. ‘The buildings on the islands have structural frames bonded to the diamene platform, so they’re held firmly in place when the platform angle tilts during an earthquake. All the walls have imbedded reinforcement mesh running through them, but they’re still riddled with cracks and liable to drop lumps of concraz on your head. Every gap has twin red safety lines painted on it. Between those two lines is safe, but you never put a foot across a red line without your impact suit hoods up and sealed. Understand?’
We all nodded.
‘Understand?’ repeated Rono. ‘I want to hear you say it.’
‘We understand.’ We chorused the words like a bunch of little kids in Nursery.
‘Due to the small size of Land Raft islands, there are no emergency evac portals on the dig site,’ said Rono, ‘but there are twin accommodation domes on each island. Teams are assigned in pairs, and co-ordinate their excavation work so they can help each other in case of accidents.’
He grinned. ‘Less experienced teams are always paired with research teams. Cassandra 2 were supposed to be nursemaiding Cassandra 11 pre-history degree course, but we were fool enough to agree to them trading dig site allocations with you lot. I’m sure we’ll regret it.’
There was a nervous ripple of laughter from the class. After months of Playdon’s formal teaching style, we found Rono a bit of a shock.
He waited for everyone to quieten down before turning serious again. ‘The main danger here is earthquakes. If the quake warning sirens shriek, then you evacuate as fast as possible. We’re working on red risk islands, and even a minor quake may push one of the supporting legs past its limit or break the strip connections, so you get the chaos out of here. Understand?’
We responded in ritual chorus. ‘We understand.’
‘One final thing,’ said Rono. ‘Four years ago, Dannel Playdon’s wife was killed at the California Rift. This is the first time he’s been back here since then. You don’t mention that to him, you pretend you don’t notice if he looks upset, and you call me at once if you think he needs help. I warn you that if anybody causes him any trouble, I’ll personally take them to the edge of this island and throw them off. It’s a very, very long way down, so even if they’re wearing an impact suit they won’t repeat the mistake. Understand?’
We all stared at him in shock. I hadn’t even known Playdon had been married, let alone that his wife … No wonder Playdon was so paranoid about dig site safety.
‘Understand?’ repeated Rono.
‘We understand,’ we said.
‘Good.’ He turned off the wall vid. ‘Our domes are in the central park, and that’s perfectly safe without impact suits. Let’s go outside and escape the sickly smell of Osiris lilies.’
He led the way towards the dome exit, and everyone pulled frantic faces at each other before trailing after him. This was the first time the class had ever left a dome without wearing protective impact suits. We’d started the year in bleak winter at New York Main Dig Site, where wolves were roaming outside our dome. We’d moved to Eden, in the heart of a rainforest holding scimitar cats and a whole range of nasty insects. Now we found ourselves in bright sunshine in …
Well, this might once have been a park, but now there were no flowers, only patchy grass and a scattering of stunted trees. Next to our accommodation dome was the usual sled storage dome, and facing us were two matching domes that must belong to Cassandra 2. A pathway ran off into the trees to the right, and over to the left was a curved blue shape.
‘We’ve got a swimming pool!’ Krath shouted joyously.
Rono laughed. ‘The park swimming pools are the best thing about the Land Raft islands. They only needed re-lining with flexiplas to make them functional again. Now pay attention to three safety rules.’
He raised one finger. ‘Number one is obvious. Don’t wander out of the park into the ruins. If you aren’t wearing an impact suit, they’re utterly lethal.’
He raised a second finger. ‘Number two. Birds of prey nest on these islands. Don’t disturb them, because they’ll attack you to defend their young.’
He raised a third finger. ‘Number three. The sun here is stronger than most of you will have experienced on your home worlds. If your skin is liable to sunburn badly, there’s protective sun block in the store room.’ He glanced pointedly at a couple of the class, including Fian. ‘Don’t come crying to me if you forget to use it. Understand?’
He’d got us trained now, so we chanted the words in unison. ‘We understand.’
‘Good.’ He clapped his hands. ‘That’s it. Take a break.’
Everyone else sprinted back into the dome, but I went over to Rono. ‘I’m causing far too much trouble staying with the class. I’ll call my commanding officer and ask to go somewhere else.’
Rono looked apologetic. ‘I was joking about the Osiris lily smell, Jarra. I really wanted to get outside because I love the sunshine at the California Rift. It’s just like back home on Cassandra.’
‘I didn’t mean the joke.’ I struggled to keep my voice under control. ‘Lecturer Playdon shouldn’t be forced to come here and face painful memories to keep me safe.’
Rono shook his head. ‘Playdon wasn’t forced to do this. He had plenty of teams offering to trade dig site assignments, and he deliberately chose this one so he could try facing the past in the company of his friends.’
‘Oh.’ I felt a total nardle.
Rono grinned and patted my shoulder. ‘I’m very glad Dannel Playdon’s students appreciate him.’
The rest of the class started reappearing and heading for the pool. Most people, including Fian, were wearing the skintights they normally wore under impact suits, but a few had proper swimming costumes. Rono ran to the pool himself, pulled off his clothes to show a swimming costume that barely covered the legally private areas, and dived into the water.
Fian came over to join me, and I gave an envious sigh. ‘I can’t go in the water until the skunk juice wears off, but you enjoy a swim.’
He shook his head. ‘I’ll wait until we can both go swimming.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ I said. ‘You will go swimming, Major Eklund, that’s an order.’