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Speckle-Top had seen adult cheela do many strange things, but it was a new experience for her when the professor developed a long ridge just underneath her eyeflap bulges. The ridge became a sheet that slid up over her speckled topside. A strange feeling came over her. It wasn't the intense feeling she got when playing eye-ball games with Crumpled-Tread, but a relaxed, warm,safe feeling. She could finally relax the eternal vigilance that had kept her alive since her first terrifying days in the dump with the wild Slinks hunting her. Someone was now taking care of her. Someone was now watching out for her. She pulled all her eyes in under their eyeflaps, contracted her body into a small egg-shaped ball under the hatching mantle and rested. She liked the professor and the professor liked her. She liked the animals and they liked her. She wondered if this was what it was like being part of a clan. She decided she would stay if the professor wanted her to. 06:58:08 GMT TUESDAY 21 JUNE2050 The last place Qui-Qui checked was the Rejuvenation Center. As she expected, everyone was dead there, too, even the "dragon plants," snapped off at their roots. The large rods of dragon crystal that had supported the plants now lay glistening on the crust. She moved past a motionless robotic body on her way out and stopped as she felt an electronic tingle. "Emergency! Emergency!" a metallic voice whispered. She moved closer to the robot. The body of the robot didn't move, but the electronic tingle became stronger. "Emergency! Emergency!" "The emergency is over," Qui-Qui's tread vibrated through the crust. The robot continued its alarm as if it hadn't heard her. She switched to whispering herself. "The emergency is over," Qui-Qui whispered, using her body to set up oscillations in the sea of electrons around them. "Emergency! Crustquake! Activate Plan Two! Call Doctor!" said the robot. "Stop!" commanded Qui-Qui, who owned a dozen personal robots. "Emergency Over! Restart! Report Condition!" "Three-greths functional," said the robot. "I must report to a medical doctor. A failure has occurred." "Stop! Restart! Emergency over! Tell me how to activate communications links to Bright's Heaven." "I must report to a medical doctor," said the robot. "You are not a medical doctor." It fell silent. Qui-Qui was puzzled. The robot's eyes were useless. How did it know she wasn't a medical doctor? She went back to the main offices, found the remains of M.D. Sabin-Salk, pulled off his ornate badges, and replaced her glow-jewel decorations with badges. She went back to the robot, but didn't get too
close. She could have done a good imitation of M.D. Sabin-Salk's tread accent, but she had never heard him whisper. She did the best she could. "Tell me how to repair the communication links to Bright's Heaven!" she commanded. "Open box," said the robot. Qui-Qui was bewildered. She looked around, then saw a large metal box in one corner of the room. The room wall had suffered a large dent where the box had slid into it. She went over to the box and read the badly faded label. It was another robot! According to the label, it was a maintenance robot for the next bank of enzyme machines that were due to be sent to the rejuvenation center. She undid the latches and slid off the heavy lid. Twelve glassy eyes raised up from a Slink-sized dome and looked around. The top of the dome had the design of a cleft-wort plant. "Energy!" it said. The end of the box fell away and the robot glided out on its undulating underside. It paused by the damaged robot to exchange information, then moved into the enzyme machine room, where it found a partially full accumulator and reenergized itself. Qui-Qui followed it. The robot ignored her and started to lift an enzyme machine back onto its base. "Stop!" she said. "Repair the communication links to Bright's Heaven." "That is not my function," said the robot. "My function is to maintain the Rejuvenation Center in operational condition." "Reset!" she commanded. 'The Rejuvenation Center cannot operate without doctors. All the doctors are dead. You must get new doctors. The doctors must be called from Bright's Heaven. You must repair the communication links to Bright's Heaven so the doctors can be called." The robot paused in its repair of the damaged enzyme machine. It moved to the main offices, found one of the video link consoles, and opened it. It carried out a few tests, then moved to the next console. Since none of them were operational, it then took out a part from one console, other parts from another console, more from a third, and put them in a fourth. It left the room for a while and came back with a small energy source to power the console. It went through its testing routine again. "The communication link is repaired. Bright's Heaven does not respond." It returned to its work of fixing the enzyme machine. Qui-Qui tried the video-link console. She had made so many long-distance calls in her life that she knew all the screen blotches and tread murmurs that indicated the condition of the various portions of the links. The call probably made it to the central exchange at White Rock City, but the fibers were dead from there to Bright's Heaven. She tried to get the robot to go to White Rock City to fix the central exchange, but it refused to leave its assigned duty station and the enzyme machines. She finally gave up and set out for White Rock City herself to pick up her flyer. As soon as the flyer was activated, the acoustic coupler to the deck vibrated the floor with a recorded message. "Qui-Qui! Respond on channel 36. Qui-Qui! Respond...." The communications set was already on channel 36 so she activated the transmitter.
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STARQUAKE Acknowledgments
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Prelude Burrowing through the dark
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science instruments and consoles, w
Page 7 and 8:
Please take a rest." "Doctor Wong,
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about half a day we will be in prop
Page 11 and 12:
Amalita floated over to the table a
Page 13 and 14:
One of her near eyes caught him loo
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"All you need to do is shrink the h
Page 17 and 18:
Pierre spoke quickly to the robotic
Page 19 and 20:
slid open. He entered the security
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Slinklings, and Cold, Chilly's mate
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page and didn't like what he saw. "
Page 25 and 26:
He activated a conference link and
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egg-tending fever. Every time I see
Page 29 and 30:
A glowing speck swung around the to
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"If only Dragon Slayer had some mea
Page 33 and 34:
"That gives us four greats of turns
Page 35 and 36: "I see someone in the back." "Brigh
Page 37 and 38: with spots of different emittance t
Page 39 and 40: Web Construction is the biggest con
Page 41 and 42: activated. "There are 144 connector
Page 43 and 44: With the X-ray illuminators in plac
Page 45 and 46: up and wait. Then there would begin
Page 47 and 48: 06:55:16 TUESDAY 21 JUNE2050 Quiet
Page 49 and 50: There was a loud clang from nearby.
Page 51 and 52: Hearing the decimal number for the
Page 53 and 54: walls made out of high quality supe
Page 55 and 56: It was turnfeast, and Time-Circle s
Page 57 and 58: "After the success with the three m
Page 59 and 60: "Renegotiate them," she replied. "J
Page 61 and 62: "Those machines produce both the an
Page 63 and 64: millimeters away it fades into the
Page 65 and 66: She started with the animals. Three
Page 67 and 68: idly to the surrounding crust. She
Page 69 and 70: 06:58:07 GMT TUESDAY 21 JUNE2050 Qu
Page 71 and 72: kilohertz gravitational radiation t
Page 73 and 74: "We're losing it!" Heavy-Egg shoute
Page 75 and 76: y the errant streams. Treads grippi
Page 77 and 78: "Less than a turn," said the Comm O
Page 79 and 80: "Our total space force consists of
Page 81 and 82: "Bright has cursed us all!" Hohmann
Page 83 and 84: straight toward her, moving rapidly
Page 85: You should be able to find more cag
Page 89 and 90: "My plan is to use the robots on Eg
Page 91 and 92: were mixed to produce an ultra-hot
Page 93 and 94: and gravitational waves. Status 82%
Page 95 and 96: "There is someone muttering nearby.
Page 97 and 98: farming class how to tell ripe nut-
Page 99 and 100: of engineers who can fix the damage
Page 101 and 102: Eighty turns later, Qui-Qui returne
Page 103 and 104: They worked their way through the m
Page 105 and 106: other two read zero. Must be breaks
Page 107 and 108: Qui-Qui would arrive at each clan c
Page 109 and 110: satiated, however, for he would nev
Page 111 and 112: They charged, the mounted warriors
Page 113 and 114: out that what was needed was a spec
Page 115 and 116: "You must be Qui-Qui," Ferocious-Ey
Page 117 and 118: stage' for our lander. We can store
Page 119 and 120: "We are aware of that," said Plasma
Page 121 and 122: "One," said Cliff-Web. "And an infi
Page 123 and 124: field. Cliff-Web had returned to no
Page 125 and 126: "There are flying animals on the hu
Page 127 and 128: nothing, tor the forces were gravit
Page 129 and 130: "We will need to have a new power g
Page 131 and 132: "Good. Let's cut it up and haul it
Page 133 and 134: The trade was made, with the captai
Page 135 and 136: operation," said Power-Pack. "My se
Page 137 and 138:
"We would rather wait to taste the
Page 139 and 140:
"But she only has eight eyes now!"
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her whip-sword and urged her Swift
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for the Taker to come again." "The
Page 145 and 146:
As if to punctuate his offer, there
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As he flowed up over the crumbled b
Page 149 and 150:
"Focus the laser on the landing bas
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"It has been a long time since the
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their quirrls sparred with each oth
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"The humans take forever to do anyt
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"That's the last of the HoloMem sto
Page 159 and 160:
to the Science Deck. Pierre looked
Page 161 and 162:
"Hey! Look at the sightseers," Abdu
Page 163 and 164:
choose will be a better name, anobl
Page 165 and 166:
The screen on the communications co
Page 167 and 168:
This was the first time there had b
Page 169 and 170:
"Coupling experiments successful,"
Page 171 and 172:
Manager-Director/5 set up a confere
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"The cheela are bringing them now."
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"Mine," replied Abdul. "She's right
Page 177 and 178:
Amalita and Abdul in two segments o
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15 min 31 g cheela generation 29 se
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and behaves much like a young cheel
Page 183 and 184:
Ngw* 5. CI»ft-Wort Plant Upon reve
Page 185 and 186:
We wanted Dragon Slayer at a 406-ki
Page 187 and 188:
Figure 10. Gravity Catapult The wor
Page 189:
6. F. J. Tipler, "Rotating Cylinder
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