Starquake.pdf

was using was bent and ragged toward the top.
He used both down-streams for another methturn, then just before Level 10 switched to the one good
stream. Rotating the platform around the good stream so it was out of the way of the ragged tail on the
second stream, he continued down to the surface. When the altitude indicator showed he had a meter to
go, he slowed down. He sacrificed another eye in a look over the side to see a glaring mountain of rings
piled up where Base Level had been. There wasn't much time left, so he dropped quickly down the last
few centimeters, hit the pile of rings, and slid down and away from the rest of the incoming stream. The
lift platform coasted to the bottom of the pile of rings and stopped.
He was alive! And nothing worse than a couple of seared eyeballs. For a long time he stayed on the
platform, his eyes tucked under their eye-flaps. After the crust movement had slowed down a little, he
peeked out to find that the atmosphere was still flickering with X-rays, but it wasn't too bad this high up
in the East Pole mountains. He made his way across the slippery rings until he had his tread once again on
firm crust.
He looked up and found the tiny spots that were the East Pole Space Station and the Topside Platform.
Topside, having lost its support from the fountain, had drifted off into its own elliptical orbit. Heavy-Egg
was wondering what was happening to the people on Topside now that they were in free fall with no
black holes to provide gravity. It must be horrible to go that way. He was glad he was on Egg where he
was safe.
A strong aftershock rumbled up from beneath the East Pole mountains. The shock became more
concentrated as it reached the peak of the mountain. Traveling with the shock was a sheet of X-ray
flame. Growing brighter every meter, the flame roared up the valley and burned Heavy-Egg's eyes off.
* * *
Both Cliff-Web and the chief engineer paused as their treads noticed the change in the everpresent hum
in the deck.
"Crustquake," said the chief engineer. "I thought I noticed an increase in the light reflected from the East
Pole Space Station a little while ago."
They continued their discussion while the hum slowly varied in pitch as the ring-streams compensated for
the motion of the crust below. The variations had almost faded from their attention when the pitch
changed again. The note dropped lower and lower and kept dropping. All their eye-stubs came to alert
as they felt the platform start to drop out from under them. A staccato of muffled bangs from an overload
of pushouts sent them both out the door and across the deck toward the elevator to the machine deck
below. Topside Platform wobbled as it lost the upward force that had been holding it in place. The noise
from below became louder. Then, through the deck in front of them shot a deadly stream of high-speed
metal rings.
"Get everyone to the launch area and on a shuttle!" Cliff-Web shouted. The chief engineer pulled out an
emergency communicator from a pouch, placed it on the deck and put his tread over it. His amplified
voice blasted its way throughout all three levels.
"Everyone to the launch area. Topside is going into free fall. Repeat. Everyone to the launch area and
onto a shuttlecraft."
"All three up-streams are out of control." Cliff-Web looked around as his creation was sliced into pieces