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.You couldn't have done anything about it inonly one minute.""I suppose not," Blake agreed, "but I can't help feeling I should have beenmore careful.But that's all water under the bridge; here we are among ourdiamonds with no way of getting home not for a long time at best, I'm afraid.So let's see just how long that may be, just how great the damage to the shipis.""From here," Cooke observed as they walked toward the ship, "the situationlooks hopeless.Our ship looks exactly like an overripe watermelon that's hada bad fall.It's not only broken in two, with a few girders holding the brokenhalves together, it's also sort of flattened now, rather than round like itonce was.""And gaping open at every seam," Wilfred added.* * *They passed the stern of the ship, where the rim of the ragged hole stillglowed redly with half-molten metal, and Blake motioned toward the deep furrowblasted in the ground where the ship had stood."The blast was directional,"he said."If it hadn't been, it would have destroyed the lower half of theship.""It didn't make such a big hole in the stern," Cooke remarked with a return ofhis characteristic optimism.We could patch it.""Of course," he added bleakly, "we'd only have half a ship to drive, and noconverter to power our drive if we have a drive left."They entered the ship by the gap where it had broken apart, climbing throughthe bent and broken steel.The elevator shaft, now a horizontal passageway,was accessible by climbing up the ragged, torn sheet metal and girders.Blakemade a suggestion to the older Taylor before they climbed up into the elevatorshaft."I'd like to look at the drive room and the repair shop.So, suppose Cooke andPage 104 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlI do that while you and the others see what the damage is in the forward halfof the ship?""Anything you say, Red," Taylor answered."I have an idea we'll find nothingbut wreckage either way.""First, I'll get some lights for you," Blake said.He climbed up into the elevator shaft and made his way to the supply level ofthe ship.The door to the room he entered opened with considerable difficultyand the scene inside, as revealed by his pocket lighter, was utter confusionand chaos.He found the locker that held the emergency lights under a mass ofmiscellaneous supplies, equipment and broken containers and took five lightsfrom it.He went back to the gap in the ship and tossed three of the lights to theothers.They began to climb up into their own section of the ship and Cookescrambled up to where he stood."How did it look where you were?" Cooke asked."Just a little untidy," he answered, leading the way to the drive room.They forced the now-horizontal drive room door open and a gush of warm airstruck them.The drive room was fairly well lighted by the hole theconverter's explosion had produced and they appraised the damage, not caringto drop the ten feet to the new floor."That shapeless gob over there by the hole that's all that remains of ourconverter," Blake said."The explosion was directional, all right, and the converter was working atminimum output if it had been up to as much as quarter output, it couldn'thave remained directional and at a quarter output the entire ship would havevanished in a blaze of glory."He flashed his light down into the shadowy corners of the room and found whathe sought."Look see that square metal thing?" he asked."That's the fuel inlet cover.Sure enough, it wasn't in place they must have forgotten to tighten down theclamps.""And we paid them to do that?" Cooke asked bitterly, flashing his own lightover the cover.* * *Blake moved his light slowly over the drive assembly.Originally equipped withthe old Harding atomic drive, the transformation to the hyperspace drivehad for financial reasons been confined to the installation of the space-shiftunits and the installation of the nuclear converter to supply the enormousenergy required by the hyperspace units to wrench the ship from normal spaceinto hyperspace.Although a modern drive would have been preferred, theirlimited capital had forced them to compromise by leaving the atomic rocketdrive intact and modifying its fuel chambers to accept the tailor-made fuelprepared for it by the converter."How does it look?" Cooke asked." can't see where the blast did any damageto it.Am I right?"I"I think you are the directional blast missed it and its construction wasrugged enough that the fall didn't affect it.This is more than I had daredhope for we can alter those fuel chambers back to the way they were and wehave a rocket drive again."If," he added, "we can find uranium
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Tematy
Index3.Longin Jan Okoń Longin Jan Okoń Trylogia Indiańska. Tom III ladami Tecumseha
O. CZESŁAW KANIAK ZA PRZYCZYNĽ MARYI PRZYKŁADY OPIEKI KRÓLOWEJ RÓŻAŃCA WIĘTEGO (Przykłady na maj) Tom I
Erikson Steven Malazańska Księga Poległych Tom 5.2 Przypływy Nocy. Siódme Zamknięcie
Clancy Tom Jack Ryan 04 Polowanie na Czerwony Padziernik
Encyklopedia spraw międzynarodowych i ONZ (tom III) Edmund Mańczyk
Margaret Way Rycerz z Maramby
Sandra Brown Mistyfikacja
Christine Lynxwiler Reluctant Cowgirl (epub)
Gary Dorrien Imperial Designs, Neoconservatism and the New Pax Americana (2004)
Chris Simms Pecking Order (epub)