Born of Sand (Tales of a Dying Star Book 5) by David Kristoph Read Free Book Online Page A

spoke so cheerfully that Mira couldn't help but smile back. "I thought you were the doctor," she said.
    "That too. I'm really helpful. Come on, then. The sooner we finish the sooner we can eat."
    Binny led her through the facility while chattering away. Three dozen occupants lived in the base, though that was just the current number. It fluctuated almost daily as they recruited more from the city or lost some to the Melisao. Mira pictured the line of shadows she'd seen crossing the dunes. Maybe it hadn't been a mirage after all.
    She stuck her head in the kitchen as they passed. Ten people, men and women, occupied two tables inside. They laughed and joked, passing around a bottle of what looked like sweetwater. The large woman who had fed Mira while she was in her cell stood in the cooking area, bent over a pot of something steamy. "That's Maggy, the cook," Binny explained. "I like her."
    They passed the holding cells and entered the power plant. There wasn't much to it: a small room whose only light came from the array of computer screens. A glass window gave a view of a larger room with three turbines, round like sugar cakes. The sound of machinery filled Mira's ears, vibrated against her skin.
    Binny set down the buckets and turned to Mira. "The inside of the turbines get awful rusty, on account of all the moisture put out by the humidifiers. Normally, we would shut down one turbine at a time to clean the inside, leaving the other two operational, but since this one's broken we can't really do that. The base can't get by on just one turbine, not even for an hour."
    "Are they going to fix it?" Mira asked.
    "Nobody here knows how. Farrow's worried something awful. Anyway, since one's broken we might as well clean it up real nice while we can." She stepped up to a computer screen--so high she barely reached it--and a door next to the glass window slid open. The mechanical noise abruptly magnified. "Come on. Grab your bucket."
    Mira followed her down a metal grate stairway into the room. It was tough to get a good sense of size from up in the control room, but the turbines stood at least twenty feet tall. A thin layer of sand covered the floor, making each step precarious and uncertain around so much machinery.
    "I'll open the maintenance hatch and climb inside," Binny said when they reached the broken turbine. She stuck out her chin stubbornly. "When Spider's bored he likes to close the door and trap me inside, threatening to turn the turbine back on. He never does, though, so I'm not scared anymore. He won't do that with Akonai around, but once he's gone... it'll be good to have you here to watch out."
    "Who is Akonai?" Mira asked. "Is he in charge?"
    "Sort of. He's someone important. Gives a lot of orders, talks about plans. Farrow doesn't like him. He doesn't say that, but I can see the way he acts around him. I can tell." A long tube connected into the base of the turbine. Binny knocked on it with her knuckles, sending a hollow sound through the air. Then she opened a metal hatch in the side. A puff of hot air billowed out, and sand trickled to the floor.
    "Doesn't it burn you?" Mira asked, eying the hatch. "It looks hot."
    "You get used to it,' Binny said cheerfully. "Farrow says I have tough skin. Okay, while I'm in there take your rag and bucket and scour the outside of the pipe. Once you finish that, you can start on the outside of the turbine itself."
    She started to climb into the pipe. It was barely wide enough for her to squeeze through. "Won't the water make it rust even worse?" Mira asked, staring at her bucket.
    "It's not water. It's chemicals . It scours the rust and keeps it from coming back for a while. Be careful not to inhale too much. And don't get any in your eyes , or you'll go blind." And with that dire warning Binny shimmied inside the tube, pulling her own bucket behind her.
    Mira reached into the bucket, smelling the liquid for the first time. As she pulled out the rag from the liquid's depths the