After the Collapse Read Online Free PDF Page B

Overclockers would react to the arrival of the wardens, how the wardens would dissuade the humans from tampering with the planetary mind, what they would do if they met resistance—all this remained obscure.
    Remounting Flossy, Pertinax easily put the uncertainty from his mind. Neither he nor his kind were prone to angst. So, once on his way, he reveled instead in the glorious day and the unfolding spectacle of a nature reigning supreme over an untarnished globe.
    Herds of bisons thundered past at a safe distance during various intervals along Pertinax’s journey. Around noon a nearly interminable flock of passenger pigeons darkened the skies. A colony of prairie dogs stretching across hectares mounted a noisy and stern defense of their town.
    That night replicated the simple pleasures of the previous one. Before bedding down, Pertinax enjoyed a fine display of icy micrometeorites flashing into the atmosphere. The Upflowered had arranged a regular replenishment of Earth’s water budget via this cosmic source before they left.
    Around noon on the second full day of travel, with the landscape subtly changing as they departed one bioregion for another, Pertinax felt a sudden quivering alertness thrill through Flossy. She had plainly pinged the must of Sylvanus’s steed (a stallion named Bix) on the wind, and needed no help from her rider to zero in on her fellow Kodiak Kangemu. Minutes later, Pertinax himself espied Sylvanus and his mount, a tiny conjoined dot in the distance.
    Before long, the two wardens were afoot and clasping each other warmly, while their hoppers boxed affectionately at each other.
    “Pertinax, you’re looking glossy as a foal! How I wish I was your age again!”
    “Nonsense, Sylvanus, you look splendid yourself. After all, you’re far from old. A hundred and twenty-nine last year, wasn’t it?”
    “Yes, yes, but the weary bones still creak more than they did when I was a young buck like you, a mere sixty-eight. Some days I just want to drop my duties and retire. But I need to groom a successor first. If only you and Chellapilla—”
    Pertinax interrupted his elder friend. “Perhaps Chellapilla and I have been selfish. I confess to feeling guilty about this matter from time to time. But the demands on our energies seemed always to preclude parentage. I’ll discuss it with her tomorrow. And don’t forget, there’s always Cimabue and Tanselle.”
    Sylvanus clapped a hearty paw-hand on Pertinax’s shoulder. “They’re fine stewards, my boy, but I had always dreamed of your child stepping into my shoes.”
    Pertinax lowered his eyes. “I’m honored, Sylvanus. Let me speak of this with Chell.”
    “That’s all I ask. Now I suppose we should be on our way again.”
    It took some sharp admonishments and a few coercive treats to convince Bix and Flossy to abandon their play for the moment and resume travel, but eventually the two wardens again raced northeast, toward their unannounced appointment with the Overclockers.
    That night before turning in, Sylvanus suggested some entertainment.
    “I have not viewed any historical videos for some time now. Would you care to see one?”
    “Certainly. Do you have a suggestion?”
    “What about The Godfather ?”
    “ Part One ?”
    “Yes.”
    “An excellent choice. Perhaps it will help to refresh our understanding of Overclocker psychology. I’ll send up a pigeon.”
    The sleepy bird responded sharply to the directorial seed and verbal instructions, then zoomed upward. While the wardens waited for the tropospheric mind to respond, they arranged their packs and saddles in a comfortable couch that allowed them to lay back and observe the nighted skies.
    In minutes a small audio cloud had formed low down near them, to provide the soundtrack. Then the high skies lit with colored cold fires.
    The new intelligent meteorology allowed for auroral displays at any latitude of the globe, as cosmic rays were channeled by virgula and sublimula, then bent and