THE COSMIC COMPUTER

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through a big breach in the wall. Anse said: "I did that myself; 90-mm
tank gun. When we want a wall out of the way, we get it out of the way."
Inside were a lot of lifters and skids and power shovels and things;
laborers were assembling for work assignments. Most of them had been
with his father six years ago and he knew them. They hadn't done any
growing up in the meantime. They climbed into an airjeep and floated out
over the edge of the plateau, letting down past the sheer cliff to where
the lower lateral shaft had been opened. A great deal of rock had been
shoveled and bulldozed away to expose it; it was twenty feet high and
forty wide. Anse simply steered the jeep inside and up the tunnel.

There were occasional lights on at the ceiling. Anse said they were all
powered from their own nuclear-electric conversion units. "We don't have
the central power on here; there's a big mass-energy converter, but
we're tearing it down to ship out."[Pg 46]

That was something they could get a good price for. Maybe even one-tenth