A Crack in the Sky Read Online Free PDF Page B

By the time the virus hit North America, InfiniCorp was ready. Soon after, the domed cities were completed, andInfiniCorp’s employees were able to live in a protected space where climate-bred illnesses couldn’t reach them.
    So of course Eli was proud.
    Each and every person living in the domed cities owed his life to Grandfather!
    Today InfiniCorp was still a family-owned business. After the Great Sickness, Grandfather was hailed as a hero; the petty complaints about one company holding so much power disappeared virtually overnight. Now everyone understood that the Papadopouloses were
leaders
. They ran things. They managed the domes that shielded everybody from the storms and heat. They cleaned up messes and did what they could about the Outsiders. And most important, they protected their employees when it mattered most. Not only had Eli’s family turned the whole disorganized nation into one ideal society, the most advanced and productive in human history, but they kept everybody safe and comfortable while they awaited the completion of the Great Cooldown. If it hadn’t been for Grandfather, the employees of InfiniCorp would have suffered the same fate as the rest of the world: if they’d survived the Great Sickness at all, they’d still be scrounging in the desert wilderness, trying to survive in the scorching heat. Grandfather said even if there were still any Outsiders alive on other continents, all the other nations of the world had been virtually destroyed.
    Grandfather was the greatest hero ever. Everyone knew that.
    *   *   *
    Eli and Grandfather stood in Grandfather’s office gazing at the magnificent music box the old man kept on a block of carved marble at the center of the room. The size of a grand piano, the musical contraption was in the shape of a domed city, with little wooden houses and shopping centers, shiny towers, and jeweled streets, all under a protective dome of glass. It was one of a kind, an astonishing work of art. Eli had been drawn to it since he was a small boy.
    Beside him, Grandfather leaned into the glass and spoke the code words that switched the machine on: “Good morning, folks. Time to wake up.” He winked at Eli. At once the model began to hum, and little lights came on in the houses and buildings.
    Next Grandfather produced a wooden box containing hundreds of tiny metal keys in velvet casings. He waited for Eli to choose one. This was part of their ritual. Each key triggered the mechanism to play a different melody, but since the keys all looked pretty much the same, Eli was never sure which music his chosen key would unlock. He picked one at random and slipped it into the keyhole. The city came to life. Little people walked the sidewalks. Tiny transport pods moved along the streets and flew in circles in the sky. Eli pressed his face closer to the glass. The music was Bach’s Minuet in G. Its restrained, measured notes gave a stately feel to the mechanical movement.
    “How’s that mongoose?” Grandfather asked. “Any unusual behavior yet?”
    “I’m not sure. I think she’s smart—for an animal, I mean. But it’s hard to tell. Yesterday she ripped up one of my socks.”
    He grunted thoughtfully. Eli could see the old man’sreflection in the glass. Short and stocky with a wide nose, his sky blue eyes still maintained the good humor and vitality of his youth. Now, though, he was almost completely bald, with only a thin line of white hair over his ears. His face was etched with pockmarks, barely visible, which he shared with Eli’s parents and uncles and aunts, and all those old enough to have survived the Great Sickness. But it was Grandfather’s deep wrinkles that had always fascinated Eli. At seventy-nine, Grandfather was the oldest person he’d ever known. For the past few months Eli had been observing him, taking note of the slow, shuffling way he sometimes moved and how he occasionally wheezed when he breathed. It worried him a little. Despite his age,