When one encounters a town in the Outer Waste, it is not the town itself that you first see. Even from miles away in the sky you can see the water mine which, if the settlement has been there for any length of time, is far larger than the town itself. You see, rivers don't flow through this frigid wilderness but water is just about everywhere all frozen as ice. In order to use it the people have to cut up the ice in chunks and carry it back to the town where it can be melted and used for drinking, cooking and washing. On the other side of the town is big grayish brown patch where used water and sewage have been dumped.
The water mining is done with saws, explosives and shyships and goes on constantly, for Szojana is a busy port and not only uses water itself, but supplies the sky traffic which passes through. Most of the settlement is underground and cannot be easily seen from the air but the water mine is a large area of denuded rock where hundreds of people can be seen laboring as they load the cargo into small heavy lift skyships for return to town.
The town itself can be seen only as a series of docking masts at the crest of a hill. Our convoy was fast approaching one of those masts after a day and a half of travel and in spite of the luxury afforded us aboard Bontor Do'alina, we were all eager to get our first look at an entire population of these "People of the Sky"
We were informed that we would stay a short while at this small town and again rode the cable car toward what seemed like an impossibly small loading dock in the hillside. Size, it turns out is hard to judge in environment of unbroken white and the loading dock actually was able to accommodate six to ten of these cars at a time. There were in fact several unused ones just inside the doors behind the landing area.
The car was detached from the cables and we were moved inside with great speed to make room for the multitude of cars now descending. It seems just and fitting that in this strange land that the car felt much less steady on solid earth than it did in the air and so it was that we felt the most jostling of the entire trip at this point of our journey. As we looked behind we saw dozens of cars ascending and descending and in this way most of the crew and passengers were unloaded from the ships while supplies were sent aloft.
We were led out of the station area into a street which was roofed over with glass panels. All along either side were shops and apartment blocks which rose to the ceiling about fifty feet up. The temperature inside was a comfortable sixty or sixtyfive degrees compared with the profound cold just outside.
We were taken to a hotel, a barracks really, and were settled in for our stay.
It was the Antarctic summer and the sun remained in the sky almost twenty four hours a day at this latitude and season. The result was that I could not sleep and found myself full of energy in spite of the fact it was past my usual time for retirement. In another part of the barracks I found lieutenant Alprendauro and I asked him what he was doing, I thought he might like to talk. He said that he was off duty and was going for a drink, perhaps I would like to join him?
The little place he took me to, I don't know whether to call it a tavern or a coffee shop, was filled with people of all types and classes. Businessmen and skyship captains drank side by side with "ten malat men", that is men who made the minimum wage of ten "malat" a day.
Here I was introduced to what would become my favorite beverage on this or any continent, the famous "Molad Beer". In this remote land there is neither hops nor barley, the grain used being a oat-like plant called "lorva", the bittering agent an herb somewhere between dill and hops in flavor known as "taina". The result from the frementation of these ingredients is a wonderfully refreshing, effervescent potable of a light amber color.
It was in this place also that I caught my first glimpse of Bromfkidoran womanhood. The average Bromfkidoran woman is about the same height as the average American man and prone to have a hairstyle which further accentuates her height. Their garments are like those of the men in general style but with a tighter cut which accentuates the figure. Ankle length skirts are the standard, usually in bright colors. The necklines tend to be cut very low over the bosom, which on the typical woman displays a very generous cleavage indeed. It was only much later that I would learn that this had an economic as well as a social reason. The Bromfkidoran woman produces milk all her life and is the sole source of dairy products in this land with no mammals. The size of a woman's bosom is said to be of pecuniary importance to a potential mate and a symbol of status for her husband. All I can say was that there were many in this room to make their men rich.
I would also hear that evening my second sample of Bromfkidoran music, the first being the greeting fanfare of the Bontor Do'alina. Four men were seated in a corner of the room playing rather interesting, slightly syncopated strains of melody and harmony. While the scale was not quite like ours, the notes didn't sound sour to my ear. I was reminded a little of the so called "Jug Bands" I had heard in the southern U.S. and also a little of the wedding music of the Jewish people in Russia who I had encountered in my travels. In my later years I would become an eager student of these musical forms but on this day it was merely very foreign and slightly uncouth.
The lieutenant insisted that I call him Dzhidro which was his given name. I in turn told him that some of my closer friends called me Woody and invited him to do so as well. His story is of no small interest and I will relate as much of it as I can remember. I expect that I will be a little vague about the details because of the enormous quantity of beer that I consumed that night.
Dzhidro B. Alprendauro was born in 1879 in the city of Darmal which is now called Tippilina. That year the "Formation War" was in its final days. The separate nations of this region had surrendered before the dominance of the world government of Dzhidro Bogadnij, warlord of Darmal. The people of this city regarded this man as the most heroic figure of the age, within a year the whole of the Antarctic world would as well. This is the man who would become the first king of united Bromfkidor and every other male child born that year would be given some form of his name.
There were some startling similarities between our lives, the young lieutenant and I. He too, was born in the formative days of an emerging young nation. He too, had a wayward youth from which he was rescued by caring individuals to find a career as a skyship officer. He made it clear that to serve in the sky navy was one of the high honors afforded by this society, and he was proud as a man could be to have attained his present position. The city in which he was born, the new capital of Bromfkidor, was renamed Tippilina in honor of the men who served in the skyships. The name means "People of the Sky". During his service he had been on many missions of exploration in the outer waste. This last journey, the one which had picked up our party, was the farthest he had ever been. The shores of the ocean had only been visited by a few scientific missions in the short years since contact with the outside. Dzhidro told me that even the existence of the world outside the outer waste is regarded by the man on the street as nothing more than a crackpot rumor, but he himself is now convinced, having seen with his own eyes the great ocean, and even the tip of the neighboring continent.
For Dzhidro, life as a skyman gave all the pleasure and fulfillment that a man could desire. I ought to tell you that then, Bromfkidor was not nearly as cosmopolitan as it is today, and Dzhidro got real excitement out of visiting strange corners of the realm in the pursuit of his duties. He also noted to me in confidence that a sky officer was considered a real catch by the provincial girls and they would often make him feel very at home in the hopes of making him a husband. Further, he felt that he had a vital role to play in the unification of the world. Although Bromfkidor was united politically, there were still groups vieing for power and seeking to divide the people in all kinds of ways. There had even been local military uprisings which had to be put down. In one of these Dzhidro had been taken prisoner by the "Kozar's Republic Army" and held for four days before the tiny cadre was arrested. The man was philosophical, even gay, in his response to these experiences for he had been part of the history of his nation.
In the morning, I awoke with a headache that was the sure penalty of the previous night's drinking. Dzhidro met me at my room within an hour of my rising and seemed in somewhat worse shape than myself. Nonetheless he declared himself ready to guide me back to the ship and thence to continue our journey to Tippilina, the seat of government in this remote land
Now let me tell you that had I been at my best that morning the results of the events which followed would have been very different. In my slightly out of sorts condition my reflexes were not up to snuff, otherwise I would have been on the alert for the assailant who struck both me and the lieutenant on the head. As it was I like to think that I at least fell to the floor with a little grace and dignity.