"Colin Kapp - The Subways of Tazoo" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kapp Colin)

Abruptly the engine of the ground-cat coughed and died. Nevill held a rapid exchange over the
intercom with the driver.
"Engine's gone," he said finally. "Either the carburettor's etched away or the damn sand has got into the
cylindersтАФ or both. Anyway, the cat is a write-off for all practical pur-poses, so there's nothing for it but
to walkтАФand it's too near evening for that to be funny."
They descended from the cabin, Fritz and Jacko choking quietly in the acrid air which caught at
their noses and made their lungs feel raw. Nevill, acclimatized, was survey-ing the sky anxiously.
Above them the swirling cloudbanks, blood-red trailing into purple and black, plunged across the
darkening sky so low that Fritz had an almost compulsive desire to put up his hands to see if he could
touch them. There must have been a high wind above, for the cloudrace was certainly moving at better
than a hundred kilometres an hour, yet on the ground the warm humidity was deathly still, as though a
sheet of glass insulated them from the driving turbulence.
Nevill was worried. "Looks like a storm," he said.
"Is that bad?" asked Fritz.
"Only if you're unlucky enough to be out in it. Let's hope it's a wet storm. They're decidedly
uncomfortable, but not usually fatal if you can get to shelter quickly enough,"
 "Why, what happens?"
"Nothing spectacular if you can find shelter from a hun-dred kilometre per hour damp sandstorm and if
you hap-pen to have sufficient alkali available to neutralize the rain on your skin."
"Neutralize the rain?" said Fritz, his voice rising. "What the blazes is in it?"
"Oh, about five per cent sulphuric acid plus a trace of hydrogen chloride with a little free ionized
chlorine. Stings like hell, but it's better than a dry storm."
"I'll buy it," Fritz said helplessly. "If a wet sandstorm is equal to an accelerated metal descaling
process, what's a dry storm equal to?"
By now Nevill was deeply concerned, scanning the furious cloudrace with worried and experienced
eyes. They were still three hundred metres from the nearest part of the base, with Jacko and the driver
close behind.
"I think you're going to have a practical demonstration of a dry storm, Fritz. If the smell of
ozone becomes intoler-able or if you hear anything like a bee buzzing don't hesitate тАФjust drop to the
ground as fast as you are able. If you can find a hollow then roll into it, otherwise don't
bother тАФbut whatever you da, be quick."
"A bee buzzing?"
"Air ionization path, the prelude to a lightning bolt. There's a few mega-megavolt not many
metres up in the cloudrace, and it packs a current that can not only char a man but also fuse
him very neatly into the sand. The car-bon from the body reduces a great many metal
oxides in the ground so that the resultant slag forms a remarkable range of glasses."
"Forget the chemistry," said Fritz hastily. "I never could see myself making a very convincing
paperweight."
"Then drop!" said Nevill, suiting action to the words.
They all dropped to the ground. Fritz's nose didn't have time to detect the ozone,
virtually paralysed as it was by the existing acridity, but his ears did register the sudden
buzz which Nevill had anticipated by a half second. Then the lightning bolt, a blaze of
vivid energy a mere thirty metres distant, spat like a column of angry fire rising to the
heavens. The noise and the shock-wave of its passing stunned them momentarily. By the time they had
collected their wits only a generous patch of fused sand and a chok-ing concentration of
ozone marked the spot where the bolt had struck.
"Bad!" said Nevill, "Worst I've seen. It's striking low ground, which means we have no
possible cover out here. Best throw away any metal you may have on you and try to crawl back
nearer to the catтАФ-but for Pete's sake keep your heads low."
Another bolt of lightning, bigger and nearer than the first, stabbed into the sand behind