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eBook Category: Science Fiction
eBook Description: If you found yourself on a new world, surrounded by aliens and kicked out of the city for being an "otherworlder," how would you get through the harsh winter cold? Would you curl up and die, or would you look to your neighbors for inspiration? Tockle the otherworlder tries to survive his first winter outside the City of All-Worlds, in the slum known as Riverrun Alley.

eBook Publisher: Fictionwise.com, Published: MarsDust, 2003
Fictionwise Release Date: February 2004

15 Reader Ratings:

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Available eBook Formats [MultiFormat - What's this?]: eReader (PDB) [29 KB] , ePub (EPUB) [34 KB] , Rocket/REB1100 (RB) [14 KB] , Adobe Acrobat (PDF) [66 KB] , Palm Doc (PDB) [15 KB] , Microsoft Reader (LIT) [65 KB] , Franklin eBookMan (FUB) [86 KB] , hiebook (KML) [63 KB] , Sony Reader (LRF) [42 KB] , iSilo (PDB) [12 KB] , Mobipocket (PRC) [16 KB] , Kindle Compatible (MOBI) [44 KB] , OEBFF Format (IMP) [24 KB]
Words: 4561
Reading time: 13-18 min.
Microsoft Reader (LIT) Format: Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud ENABLED
Adobe Acrobat (PDF) Format:  Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud DISABLED
All Other formats: Printing DISABLED, Read-aloud DISABLED

In the ramshackle slum of Riverrun Alley, just east of the City of All-Worlds, winter started early and stayed longer than an uninvited guest, and Tockle the otherworlder was beginning to doubt he'd ever see spring. Perched on the edge of his sleeping mat, he tried to remember a day in his new world without bitter cold and searing wind. But the tall blue being from Quantock was cursed with a painfully short memory, and he couldn't remember what he had eaten last night, much less what life had been like before he entered the Portal that led to Subaridon.

Unfolding his body with a crackling like dead branches breaking, Tockle stepped outside of his hut and checked a wrinkled sheet of well-used paper with his day's tasks scribbled on them. He'd barely finished reading his first chore when one of the two Hagarupk brothers living in the shack next door ran into him.

"Tock!" Grex shouted. "What is doing today?"

"I have work to do on the Old Walls," Tockle said. He shivered and pulled his hood tight over his bald head. "Then I'm meeting a friend at Andros' Bar. If you help me, we can finish early." He gave Grex a weary smile, noticing the way the hairy boy was shaking--either hunger or withdrawal from the drugs he and his brother indulged in. "And lunch will be my treat."

"Deal," Grex said, slapping Tock on the back harder than was needed.

With snow falling around them, Tockle and Grex walked south through the twisting paths of Riverrun Alley, waving and nodding to the other slum dwellers they passed. South of the Zither River and east of the locked and guarded City walls, the Alley was a mish-mash of shacks, boxes, and lean-tos huddled together for warmth. Dirt paths trickled and shifted around the parasitic growths of discarded wood and synthetic brown boards. The only constants were the boundaries of the river and the City walls, and the lights of Andros' Bar on the northern riverbank.

With snow falling around them, they arrived at Tockle's work site after nearly a dozen references to his scribbled directions. For two weeks' worth of food, Tockle had agreed to break pieces of the Old Walls into gravel and haul the gravel the River. He picked up a rock and began smashing. There was always work to do, food money to be earned.

"Max has seller at West Gate," Grex began, watching Tockle work. "Seller put stuff under wagon, Max and buddies hit driver. I grab Blur when driver not looking. Funny stuff, huh?"

"I guess," Tockle said. Through the falling snow, he looked over at Grex's furry smile and had to laugh from his front-mouth. His side-mouths were inhaling deeply, helping him draw strength from the thin air as he laughed. The heat from his exertions had chased away the cold and most of the bad feelings that had been haunting him since the start of winter.