Orion Shall Rise, CHAPTER NINETEEN.
The nucleus was "...natural caves and extinct fumaroles..." (p. 327);
more than four years of dynamite, power equipment and effort added corridors, rooms and vaults containing rails, pipes, cables and machines and also living quarters (see the next post) at enormous cost in concrete, metal, labor and fuel;
electricity generators power fluorescents, ventilators, furnaces and pumps;
construction workers temporarily hired from down south were told that they were building an industrial site;
in a pause between excavation and furbishment, a faked volcanic eruption was said to have ruined the site beyond affordable repair;
the Wolf Lodge, some of its members already leading the project, bought the site "...for a wildlife refuge and scientific base..." (ibid.);
the Maurai Inspectorate, new and overextended in the South, heard nothing suspicious;
(Anderson has successfully explained how a large facility can be built, then its existence kept secret);
the few above-ground buildings are not on the mountain where ten shafts contain the spacecraft;
staff and their families permanently live inside the project.
4 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
However much I sympathize with some of its GOALS, I don't approve of the Wolf Lodge. They had no business committing the Northwest Union to such a dangerous plan without the consent of he other lodges.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean: but if they sought that consent, the enemy would find out and suppress it before it got started.
"To desire the end is to desire the means", as the saying goes.
It's also a cool mad-scientist secret underground lair in a volcano! Cool!
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
Your first comment: I could more easily accept what the Wolf Lodge had done if they had been legitimately the leaders of the entire Northwest Union.
Your right, Anderson did set Project Orion in a way cool mad scientist style secret underground lair masquerading as a volcano! (Smiles)
Ad astra! Sean
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