Dark Winter Read Online Free PDF

many of those he supposedly supervised. "How's it hanging?" the station manager asked.
    "Didn't freeze," Lewis said.
    "You ate?"
    "A little."
    Cameron looked dubiously at the toast. Fingies. They all had to learn. "All right, then. Looks like you're ready to see the homestead. Let's saddle up."
    "Yippie-ki-yay."
     
***
     
    Suiting up to go outdoors was as laborious as donning armor. Heavy long underwear and two pairs of socks. Sweater. Fleece vest, pants, and insulated nylon bib overalls. Neck gaiter, goggles, stocking hat, white plastic "bunny" boots, glove liners, mittens, ski gloves in case dexterity was required, and finally down parka with hood. Lewis felt as padded as the Michelin Man and awkward as an astronaut. He was roasting.
    "Up to a point, there's no such thing as cold," the station manager said. "Just inadequate clothing."
    "Up to a point?"
    "If you put too much on when you're working you can actually sweat," Cameron said. "That's dangerous when you cool down, or because of dehydration. At the other extreme, nothing will keep you warm when the wind comes up."
    "What do you do then?"
    "Tough it out. Up to a point."
    "I can't walk in these things." Lewis pointed to his boots, inflated with air for insulation. They looked like white melons.
    "You'd be walking on frostbitten stubs without them. Dorky, but they work."
    Lewis clumped along the floor. "Like wearing weights."
    "One year some pranksters started pouring sand into a guy's bunnies where the air goes. Little bit each day. By the end of the season they weighed about seventy pounds. Pretty funny."
    Lewis shook a boot, listening. "Ha."
    Stepping out of the berthing unit into the gray light of the dome was like stepping into a freezer. Lewis was jarred again at the nearness of such cold, just outside the door. The icicles hung overhead from the dome as before. And yet he was so hot from the dressing that the change felt good at first. Refreshing.
    The snow ramp from the dome exit led upward to the plateau surface and a bright cold that was more telling. This was a chill that wasn't confined to an enclosure but was the single salient fact of his new world. He stood a moment, letting himself adjust. The sky was overcast, the light flat. Even with a mild breeze he could feel the temperature sucking at him, trying to drain him of heat. The cold got into his lungs and palpated his heart.
    He pulled his gaiter over his nose and mouth, the moisture of his breath immediately starting a growth of frost. Goggles shielded his eyes and forehead. His hood kept a thin cocoon of slightly warmer air near his face. He took a moment to practice breathing, as if he were underwater.
    Okay. He wasn't going to die.
    Lewis looked around. The snow was flat and, beyond the cluster of human structures, utterly empty. Nothing moved. There was no natural feature to catch the eye.
    "First of all, stay close to the base," Cameron lectured, leaving his neck gaiter down so he could be heard clearly. "Even when it's not snowing the wind can kick up surface powder into a blizzard six or seven feet high. The blowing snow is just high enough to put any human who isn't in the NBA into whiteout conditions. So, if you do go somewhere, sign out, take a radio, and take some bearings. Pay attention to where you are, where we are. Start memorizing the layout. People have died in Antarctica a dozen feet from shelter. Temperatures can drop fifty degrees in ten minutes."
    Lewis nodded.
    "Second, we're marking the most frequently used routes with flags." He pointed to long poles with pennants on the end. "In the dark that's coming you just follow one flag to another to get back to a building. One route goes to astronomy, which the beakers call the Dark Sector because lights aren't allowed out there: It screws up their telescopes. Everyone else calls it the Dark Side. Another goes to Clean Air, where you'll work. It's away from the generators and any air pollution. A third goes to Summer Camp, which is shut