said to make me feel wanted? Are there others she says that to when I'm away on trading flights?
His pride was hurt. He didn't like the feeling.
He decided not to stay. It was better for both of them if he left. That's what he told his conscience, but he could not totally eradicate the feeling that he was simply a coward, running away whenever he could rather than face an awkward situation.
He hoped Jack had been wrong about the scarcity of jobs. He didn't want to stay on Sellit any longer than absolutely necessary.
Chapter 11
Mayor Roger Lane was anxious, nervous in the car without his usual entourage of chauffeur and bodyguard, but it had long ago been agreed that he would come alone to the meeting.
The meeting.
It was so long since those first tentative approaches that he found it difficult to remember who had made the first move. Did it matter? It seemed to him that there had been a mutual convergence of ideas and desires. They had been lucky to find each other, if you chose to believe in luck. He believed in Larn and the power of the Larnian faith, the true Larnian faith, not that bastardised abomination practised by Earth. It was Larn who had brought them together, and it was Larn who would see him through his fear. This was jihad, holy war, and nothing could prevent the truth from ultimate victory.
The air car sped him through the skyways of the inner suburbs and out past Suburb 95, where the buildings began to thin and the surrounding desert's patient and inexorable invasion of the city limits became obvious. Sand crawled up the empty shells of buildings, fanning out in treacherous drifts that could bury a man in seconds.
The economic impact of the war was perhaps most blatant out here, where the money stopped and the poor and disadvantaged battled daily with the desert for survival. Many of these buildings, mere skeletons of structures that had once reached tall, had never been rebuilt since the early surface fighting. Others had simply been abandoned as their owners moved further into the city or were buried where they fell.
Sand clattered like gunfire against the car as the Mayor turned into the rising winds of the desert's regular afternoon sandstorm. He flew blind, unable to see as the drizzle of sand became a deluge and then a raging torrent, a river of airborne sand that, according to legend, could strip the flesh from a human in less time than it took to die from the wounds inflicted. Too many people lived out here on the edge of the city for the Mayor to believe that, but it still sent a shudder of cold fear through his body.
He tried to relax, letting the car’s drive computer navigate the storm, weaving past unseen obstacles as it carried him deeper into the desert on its pre-programmed route.
The first ruins of the ghost town faded into misty view as the car passed out of the worst of the storm, leaving the full ferocity driving towards the suburbs far behind him. Brick, concrete, steel and plastic jutted from the sand, jagged skeletons of what had once been the vibrant outskirts of a frontier town. Further down the main street, sand drifts reaching almost to the top of battered signposts and broken streetlamps, more substantial buildings had withstood the onslaught of the desert slightly better, empty husks and crooked, crumbling facades in equal measure on either side. The computer guided the car round one corner, then another, moving away from the remains of the centre of town to the sand-filled bowl of a grand plaza and, at the rear, his destination, a small but once fashionable hotel which, despite its brick and plasteel façade being pockmarked by sand, had stubbornly refused to be beaten by the desert.
The car came to rest in what had once been the foyer, rivulets of sand trickling off the surface as the door swung open and the Mayor stepped out. He was nervously aware of the tail-end of the storm that continued to clatter against the walls, but what little did find a way in
His pride was hurt. He didn't like the feeling.
He decided not to stay. It was better for both of them if he left. That's what he told his conscience, but he could not totally eradicate the feeling that he was simply a coward, running away whenever he could rather than face an awkward situation.
He hoped Jack had been wrong about the scarcity of jobs. He didn't want to stay on Sellit any longer than absolutely necessary.
Chapter 11
Mayor Roger Lane was anxious, nervous in the car without his usual entourage of chauffeur and bodyguard, but it had long ago been agreed that he would come alone to the meeting.
The meeting.
It was so long since those first tentative approaches that he found it difficult to remember who had made the first move. Did it matter? It seemed to him that there had been a mutual convergence of ideas and desires. They had been lucky to find each other, if you chose to believe in luck. He believed in Larn and the power of the Larnian faith, the true Larnian faith, not that bastardised abomination practised by Earth. It was Larn who had brought them together, and it was Larn who would see him through his fear. This was jihad, holy war, and nothing could prevent the truth from ultimate victory.
The air car sped him through the skyways of the inner suburbs and out past Suburb 95, where the buildings began to thin and the surrounding desert's patient and inexorable invasion of the city limits became obvious. Sand crawled up the empty shells of buildings, fanning out in treacherous drifts that could bury a man in seconds.
The economic impact of the war was perhaps most blatant out here, where the money stopped and the poor and disadvantaged battled daily with the desert for survival. Many of these buildings, mere skeletons of structures that had once reached tall, had never been rebuilt since the early surface fighting. Others had simply been abandoned as their owners moved further into the city or were buried where they fell.
Sand clattered like gunfire against the car as the Mayor turned into the rising winds of the desert's regular afternoon sandstorm. He flew blind, unable to see as the drizzle of sand became a deluge and then a raging torrent, a river of airborne sand that, according to legend, could strip the flesh from a human in less time than it took to die from the wounds inflicted. Too many people lived out here on the edge of the city for the Mayor to believe that, but it still sent a shudder of cold fear through his body.
He tried to relax, letting the car’s drive computer navigate the storm, weaving past unseen obstacles as it carried him deeper into the desert on its pre-programmed route.
The first ruins of the ghost town faded into misty view as the car passed out of the worst of the storm, leaving the full ferocity driving towards the suburbs far behind him. Brick, concrete, steel and plastic jutted from the sand, jagged skeletons of what had once been the vibrant outskirts of a frontier town. Further down the main street, sand drifts reaching almost to the top of battered signposts and broken streetlamps, more substantial buildings had withstood the onslaught of the desert slightly better, empty husks and crooked, crumbling facades in equal measure on either side. The computer guided the car round one corner, then another, moving away from the remains of the centre of town to the sand-filled bowl of a grand plaza and, at the rear, his destination, a small but once fashionable hotel which, despite its brick and plasteel façade being pockmarked by sand, had stubbornly refused to be beaten by the desert.
The car came to rest in what had once been the foyer, rivulets of sand trickling off the surface as the door swung open and the Mayor stepped out. He was nervously aware of the tail-end of the storm that continued to clatter against the walls, but what little did find a way in
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