After Earth Read Online Free PDF Page B

peak. He was on a six-centimeter ledge just below with a face that tilted out by more than ninety degrees into space. That should have caused some hesitation on Kitai’s part. He was, after all, facing every climber’s greatest fear: commitment to the void. Usually such a move required one to take long moments to prepare oneself.
    Not Kitai. Without the slightest hesitation, he swung himself out, dangling almost two hundred meters above the canyon below. Having insufficient speed for his first arc, he swung back and forth again and then a third time. The third one did the job, providing enough momentum for him to throw himself up and over and land atop the ridge upside down.
    Quickly he scrambled up and around so that he was standing properly on the top of the ridge. He stood there with his arms spread wide, and Bo could distantly hear something. It took him a few moments to realize what it was. Kitai was making
aaaahhhhh
sounds as if a vast audience were watching him and cheering his achievements.
    Oh, that little punk
, Bo thought as he clambered the rest of the way.
    Kitai was still making the noises of a thrilled crowd when Bo finally joined him atop the ledge. “That was stupid,” Bo informed him, although he was certain that Kitai wouldn’t give a damn what he had to say.
    He turned out to be quite correct. “They don’t give statues for being scared.”
    “Yeah, but they do give plenty of headstones for being dead!”
    Kitai simply grinned as he clipped himself into a futuristic zip line. Bo morbidly wondered whether Kitai might, upon reconsideration, simply toss aside the zip line and just throw himself off the top of the ridge on the assumption that somehow he would float down on waves of his own greatness.
    He was destined to be disappointed, because Kitai finished clipping himself in before leaping off the ridge. The zip line drew taut, and Kitai was off on his buzz toward the ground far below. Bo clipped onto the line and leaped off as well.
    As they descended toward the ground, Bo couldn’t help noticing all the sights of Nova Prime spread out before him: undulating structures in the canyon, windmill towers and waterwheels making use of the environmentally sound energies that Nova Prime provided them. In the distance there were ships ready to take off, heading toward any number of destinations within the solar system and beyond.
    Not bad. Considering we arrived here centuries ago with the contents of the arks and that was all, this is definitely not bad. An appreciable testimony to the cleverness of humanity
.
    From below him, he heard Kitai giving out a loud war whoop that celebrated nothing else but the speed with which he was heading toward the ground.
    Kid never pays attention to anything around him, and he doesn’t even realize it. That’s going to cost him. Cost him a lot
.
    Over the remaining twenty minutes, the rest of the Ranger cadets, one by one, came sliding down the zip line. It was the last endeavor of the day, and Bo knew that the next day, the results would be delivered. He was feeling fairly confident that he would score high enough to move on. And he had faith in 80 percent of the other cadets.
    He just couldn’t make his mind up about Kitai.
    As the remaining Rangers gathered, Kitai made no effort to approach any of them. He stayed off to the side, stretching and then doing push-ups. Bo simply shook his head. He couldn’t recall seeing anyone quite like Kitai Raige before. It made him wonder if Kitai’s father had been anything like this when he was Kitai’s age. He almost asked but then remembered that Kitai wasn’t much for talking about his father except in the most reverent terms, and so an honest discussion about what his father was like seemed to be out of the question.
    Kitai finished his push-ups and then, without sitting up, flopped back against a small rocky projection. His breathing was completely under control. Then, with a wry smile, he tossed off a salute toward Bo.