Acid Sky Read Online Free PDF Page A

unlocked and folded slowly over until they lay above the wings, allowing the spaceplane to fit within the confines of the elevator.
    ‘One Four Seven, ready to lower.’
    A moment later, the section of deck on which they stood started to move downwards. The roar of air faded as they sank inside the carrier, but the din of the engines increased, bouncing off the walls of the hangar. Metal walls, dirty with old oil stains and covered with pipework and ducting rose up around them. The elevator slowed and stopped, and on the deck above them, a huge spoiler plate flipped up, deflecting the air over the open elevator pit. A deck handler wearing a facemask walked onto the elevator and signalled for them to lower the spoilers and set the parking brake, then made the sign to cut engines.
    ‘Good landing, lieutenant,’ Hartigan observed as he moved the four fuel control levers to CUTOFF . The noise of the engines faded, and the interior lights blinked as the ship went onto battery power. He went onto the intercom: ‘Okay, we’re down and safe. Can you keep your faceplates down and seat straps fastened until we’ve been pushed back into the hangar.’
    He released the intercom, and then pressed it again with a smile. ‘Sorry, I nearly forgot – welcome to Venus, and the USAC carrier Langley . We’re flying at sixty-one kilometres above the planet’s surface. Temperature outside is a balmy minus twelve degrees Celsius, and it’s a beautiful day.’



 
     
    CHAPTER TWO
     
    Clare dropped the bulky escape suit, her helmet and the rest of her equipment onto the floor, and collapsed onto the bed. She felt exhausted. After so long in space, the walk from the hangar to her assigned cabin, on the upper accommodation deck, had taken all her strength.
    She closed her eyes and just lay there, listening to the faint roar of the engines. It was wonderful to lie down on a real bed, in a real gravity field, instead of the centrifugal version of the space tug. Beneath her, the Langley moved slightly as it settled out on a new heading. The sensation was like being on board a large ship, she thought, but who could have ever envisaged such a ship, sailing through the skies of a distant world?
    She had brought the spaceplane in, and she swelled with pride at the thought. Apart from a couple of minor points, Hartigan had been happy with her performance, and he was going to clear her for carrier qualifications once she had acclimatised.
    How many times had she flown that in the simulator, she wondered. Hundreds? It felt like thousands, and none of them had been like the real thing. Now here she was, lying in her own cabin on board a flying aircraft carrier circling round Venus, and she had just landed a fully loaded spaceplane on it.
    If my parents could see me now …
    The lovely thought bounced round inside her head in lazy curves, and faded to a comfortable blackness. Her breathing steadied, and the sunlight moved across the room as the carrier changed course.
     
     
    She woke suddenly, over two hours later. For a moment, she thought she was in her room at home, on her parents’ farm, and then she realised where she was. She lifted herself up on one shoulder and looked around at her new surroundings.
    The room was much bigger than she had expected, and so was the bed; it was nearly a full single size, not the narrow bunks that were all you usually got in space. A small bedside table stood next to the bed, a desk for writing by the door, and a washbasin and mirror on the opposite wall.
    A washbasin . Suddenly the reality of being in an environment with real gravity hit home, and she grinned to herself. Down the corridor was a shower room, a real shower with decent water jets, and tonight she would eat dinner in the galley, and it would have been cooked in a real galley. She felt suddenly hungry at the prospect and sat up on the edge of the bed, moving carefully, but there was no dizziness and she felt stronger already after the sleep. She