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."I look forward to working with you."She averted her eyes as he stood up to look at her."Follow me.We will be on our way in a few minutes."She turned and walked off toward port clearance, not looking back to see if he was following.Mike trailed along five paces behind.He felt very much alone.Kristen Waldemar had looked annoyed and said just enough to make him feel unwelcome.Chill negotiation technique? Too soon to tell.The whole Chill group was standing, ready to leave.Whether or not Mike was welcome, there was one formality of greeting that would not be neglected.He was prepared for it."To fruitful discussions!" Kristen Waldemar said curtly.She handed everyone a small metal cup and lifted her own in salutation.Mike drained his along with the rest of them and managed to smack his lips in the required gesture of appreciation.It was liquid seal fat, warmed to a few degrees short of blood heat.That would give his gall bladder a workout.He handed back the cup and prayed there would be no more toasts.Three minutes later they were airborne.The Chill aircraft never rose above three thousand feet in its slow flight from F'waygo to Cap City.The southern continent ahead of them was a long time appearing.The first signs came far out to sea, when Mike saw beneath him the wandering icebergs, like glittering castles in the pale afternoon light of an Antarctic April.Soon after that they reached the island chain and finally began to cruise south along the curving spine of the long Antarctic Peninsula.The gigantic krill farms were offshore to the left in the Weddell Sea.Their retaining barriers lay like patterns of golden lacework on the black surface of the water.The plane flew steadily on, overland into cold and darkness, threading its way between tall mountain peaks in its progress to the deep southern spur of the Ross ice shelf.Following formal introductions the Chill party showed no interest at all in Mike.When his own polite shot at conversation was rebuffed he did not persist.He watched the stark scenery drifting past below them, until by four o'clock in the afternoon it was too dark for any sight but the flashing white light on the tip of the wing.Then he stared at that and thought about the mission, wondering how he would handle what came next; wondering, for the first time ever, if he was cut out to be a Trader at all.Finally, lulled by the soft whine of the engines, he fell asleep.Food, drink, sleep—take them whenever you have a chance.A change in the engine sound woke him.Mike looked sleepily out of the cabin window on the left, then jerked to full attention.The pulsing wing light had become a fuzzy bright point in a dancing cloud of white.They were flying through a snowstorm, a blizzard so intense that visibility did not go beyond the wingtips.Kristen Waldemar had noticed that he was awake.She nodded coldly from her seat on the other side of the cabin, "In the middle of the descent.Landing in a couple of minutes.""It's an absolute ice storm out there.How can the pilot see?""She can see as much as she is allowed to." Kristen Waldemar gave him another chilly stare."Don't worry.Even without snow, no one has been permitted to land at Cap City on visual flight rules for more than twenty years.Our descent is all on instruments.There will be nothing to see, and it is time you were ready to go outside.Let me show you how it is done."As the engines were throttled back further, she handed Mike a compact parcel.He hefted it on his palm; it weighed less than a pound.She picked up a second package by one corner and cracked it like a whip.The whole fabric unfolded to become a glittering quicksilver mantle.Chillsuit!He'd heard of them but never seen one.They were not exported from the Cap Federation territories.According to Trader rumor the suit was the most precious possession any Chill could ever own.He looked at it curiously.It seemed little more than a piece of shiny plastic.Kristen Waldemar lifted her suit in both hands, the head of the unit hanging down, and held it up above her."Watch now.It looks hard, but it is very easy." She lowered the head unit of the suit to touch the top of her dark curls.As soon as the unit made contact, it rippled.Turning inside out, the unfolding suit flowed down over her body to her ankles.She lifted her feet, one after the other.As she did so the chillsuit made closure there.Kristen Waldemar had vanished, replaced by a shimmering figure of distorting mirror surfaces.The transformation shocked Mike.As a Chill negotiator she had been no more than a rather unfriendly-looking woman, a little taller and thinner than most.Now she was a spectral, menacing figure, with bulging face and spidery limbs.The main chillsuit material was less than a millimeter thick.It covered the body completely, head to toe, including mouth, nose, and eyes.The chillsuit contoured Kristen Waldemar's slim body to skintight perfection, vacuum tight everywhere except at the face.There the suit bulged grotesquely outward.Optic fiber bundles protruded as silver-green disks.Two inches across, they allowed perfect vision in all directions and protected the wearer's eyes totally from wind and cold.Below the green protruding disks the suit's mouth and nose formed a swollen muzzle.A network of tubes curved out and down under the chin, allowing the chillsuit wearer to breathe air warmed by circulation near the body.The glittering shape in front of Mike raised a fragile-looking arm and nodded."You now.Get a move on.We'll be landing in another minute."He hesitated.What Kristen Waldemar had done looked like an impossible trick—a chillsuit donned and in full working order in less than ten seconds.He lifted the parcel and shook it loose.Then he held it high and gingerly began to lower it toward his head.Even before it made contact he felt the movement.It pulled out of his hands and writhed down to enfold him.There was one unbearable moment when nose and mouth were covered, then he realized that his breathing was unimpaired.And he could see perfectly—better with the suit than without it! There must be enhancement hardware in the optic bundle image reconstruction.He lifted one gloved hand and stared at the dazzling surface of the back of his forearm.He could see tiny sensors there, no more than a few micrometers across.Inside that total opacity, his fingertip recorder must be totally blind and useless."You're not finished yet," Kristen Waldemar said, and he realized that he could hear her perfectly, too, even though his ears were covered."If you went out on the ice cap like that you'd freeze in two minutes.Lift your feet."Mike did so, and felt the closure around each leg as the chillsuit completed its seals.Just as that happened he also felt a slight shake of the aircar.The dazzling silver figure in front of him nodded."Just in time.We're down.Follow me.For your information, it's thirty below zero outside.But see how you feel when you get there.Stay close behind me."She turned the handle.The cabin door opened as though someone had jerked it violently outward.There was a great scream of wind past its edges, and a flurry of snowflakes.Mike was supposed to go out into that—without any more protection against the cold than the skimpy suit? Kristen left without another word.He paused for a moment on the step down
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