Fall of the White Ship Avatar Read Online Free PDF Page A

earnest. The only light was from the occasional porthole or skylight, the harsh sunbeams cutting through the stale gloom.
    The boxtowners had been through like locusts, stripping away furnishings and anything else that wasn't welded down. There was more of the nitwit vandalizing: a mural marked with urine; elaborate wainscoting pried loose and pulverized. When the underclass got a chance to work off its frustration, savage emotions broke loose, and there were bloodstains to prove it.
    Alacrity wasn't surprised to find that all the air ducts in that section had been shut down to bolster circulation in the occupied areas. "The fights over air will be worse than the ones over plumbing?" Floyt file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/harry%20kruis...y%20-%20Fall%20of%20the%20White%20Ship%20Avatar.htm (15 of 242)23-2-2006 17:03:12
    [Fitzhugh 3]-FALL OF THE WHITE SHIP AVATAR
    inquired, and Alacrity nodded.
    "But why didn't the Sockwallets sell off all this property before they left?" Floyt asked. "All this material
    —the lashup itself?"
    "The real estate's public land, I guess." Alacrity was squinting at the walls as he went along. "Foragers can't just dismantle a lashup and drag it along with them, and people know that. So why pay for something that's going to be available for free when it's abandoned? When somebody with resources wants the buildings, they just come for them, and I wouldn't want to be living here then, pal."
    "But surely somebody could find some good use for the place."
    "The Lunies already did: they're letting all the trash pile up in one place. You heard Inspector Grissom; Luna's booming and that means a shortage of space. A big new boxtown eases the strain. You evict the riffraff, they come here, and you rerent your property for three times what you were getting. Yeah, I bet New Upsie's a real popular idea."
    "Not around here. Listen, what are you hunting for?"
    Alacrity had stopped by a hatchway. "Forager cues."
    With the light spill from a nearby viewbleb to search by, Alacrity scanned the bulkhead by Sim's door, past pathetic scrawlings and retarded vileness left there by the looters. He went past something, then came back, bending close. There were simple code-runes, hidden in among the other clutter.
    "What do they say, Alacrity?"
    Alacrity chuckled, reaching out to pat Floyt's shoulder. "Everything's fine. They heard !"
    "Heard what? Come, come now! I don't hold out on you, do I?"
    Alacrity turned to him with a sober look. "No, that's true, you don't. Sorry, Ho."
    Floyt suddenly wanted to bite his own tongue. He fought the impulse to make a clean breast of the White Ship matter; boxtown was no place for it and, more importantly, he couldn't face the idea of devastating his friend.
    "The Sockwallets heard about us, and the Camarilla, and how the conspirators are being sniffed out,"
    Alacrity was saying. "Sim says they're satisfied with the revenge."
    "To be honest with you, I'd almost forgotten about that."
    Two Camarilla assassins had made their way into the lashup to get Floyt and Alacrity, only to be killed themselves. But the sanctity of the lashup was violated and a number of Sockwallets injured. Gunny Readyknob and the other Foragers stressed that Alacrity and Floyt were obligated to let the Sockwallets file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/harry%20kruis...y%20-%20Fall%20of%20the%20White%20Ship%20Avatar.htm (16 of 242)23-2-2006 17:03:12
    [Fitzhugh 3]-FALL OF THE WHITE SHIP AVATAR
    know to whom they owed revenge.
    "I'm glad they saw it that way," Floyt admitted. One less thing to worry about. "Do the cues say anything else?"
    Alacrity was bent to them again. "They're headed for Gaeltacht to start a new lashup. We're welcome anytime, as adopted Sockwallets, for an hour or forever."
    "That makes me feel good," Floyt began as they started back the way they'd come. "But I'm not sure staying here is such a good idea, even if you do know your way around boxtowns."
    "I'll go along with that," Alacrity