Tuesday, January 10, 2012

The Tower of Trials Chapter 2 Page 3

After a dozen tries, Mabel found a breastplate that she was satisfied with. Then she picked a pair of elbow and knee pads.

"In case someone decides to shoot me?" George asked dryly.

Mabel laughed. "No. In case you trip and fall."

George stared at her. "What? You expect me not to be able to stand on my own two feet?"

"If you can do that," Mabel said, "while bullets are flying and explosions go off all around you, good for you. You may want to dive for cover instead, though."

Okay, so George had not considered the dangers of the wasteland seriously enough. There was going to be flying ammunition and explosives and possibly other material hazardous to health that he had not heard of. It was going to be difficult to revel in the glory and spend his earnings if he was stuck in hospital, or worse, dead.

"Relax." Tricia clapped him lightly on the back. Well, it was a light clap for someone in a power armor. It was a pretty heavy clap for someone who was not in power armor.

George stumbled forward from the blow.

"We'll keep you out of any firefights," Tricia said, "We may not even have one."

That was not very reassuring for George. But the women were experienced explorers of the wasteland.

"How confident are you in that, based on your experience?" George asked.

Tricia paused for a moment. "You know, I'm sure we've had a fight each time we're out there. Sometimes three or five."

Definitely not very reassuring.

After that, Mabel looked for armored boots and gloves for George. Again, the teenager suffered countless tries to find a set that matched the rest of his gear. When Mabel was finally done playing dress-up, the Vixens took him to the transport waiting outside. Or rather, Tricia carried him there. He really was feeling like a mannequin.

The dark-brown transport outside looked different from the cargo vans George had seen in the upper levels of the city. It had the general boxy body shape, but it had pieces of armor attached all over. A gun turret had been installed in the middle of the roof. The vehicle stood on four large wheels, supported by heavy suspension. The logo of a red grinning fox's head on a gray cloud had been stenciled onto a flat piece of armor on each side.

George sat with Mabel at the front. Tricia sat in one of the seats at the back, one that was specially modified to fit a power armor. Some of the space in the back storage was taken up by a small selection of weapons and other equipment.

Mabel rolled the transport out of the garage. The exits to the city were not very far down, so there was no need to wait for the megalift, not that there was any scheduled for such a short distance. They went down the highway that stretched across tens of levels.

Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy, George was about to go on an adventure! What excitement awaited him? What new sights would he see? What sort of hazards and difficulties would he have to overcome? What would be the first challenge they would face?

Answer: Paperwork. The authorities required everyone leaving the city to fill up lots of forms. The loveliness of bureaucracy.

"If Laura were here, we'd be done by now." Mabel sighed. She turned to George. "This is why we wanted to leave early!"

Behind them, Tricia was typing away on a datapad. Mabel knew better than to distract her so she passed her time by pinning the blame on the only other person around.

"If you'd been here early, we'd have left early," Mabel continued nagging.

She reminded George of his Mama. She had nagged a lot too.

"And then we had to fit those armor on you."

Actually, that had been Mabel's fault mainly. She had wanted to try each and every piece of armor and had made certain that it matched each other piece right.

"Hey, have we any fruits or vegs to declare?" Tricia interrupted.

"No, of course not!" Mabel answered, "It's not like we'd bring any out of the city. I mean, who'd... Trish, are you filling the form for entry into Covenant?"

"I... Oops," the other Vixen uttered.

Mabel groaned. "You've been filling the wrong form!?" She turned to George and repeated, "This is why we wanted to leave early!"

Eventually, Tricia was done with the paperwork and mercifully, Mabel's nagging did end. Once the authorities were satisfied, they allowed the transport to continue.

Mabel had the transport crawl under the speed limit down the road to the main ground-level gates of the city. Once they were through the gates, the Vixen accelerated down the ramp onto the level sandy ground.

Outside the transport, George saw the ruins of the old city on which Covenant had been built. Tricia told him that ages ago, the old city had been scavenged for raw material to build the tower city Covenant. Buildings, bridges, even the roads had been taken apart. Only the base supports and foundations of buildings had remained. What had once been highways were sand-covered land.

Free from the restrictions of the city's traffic laws, Mabel sped off towards the old city limits, towards the wasteland beyond.

***


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