Archiwum
- Index
- Cykl Pan Samochodzik (19) Złoto Inków (2) Jerzy Szumski
- Hodgson Burnett Frances Mały lord
- Dunsany Lord CĂłrka krĂłla ElfĂłw
- fr 19
- Julia Latham League of the Blade 01 Thrill of The Knight
- Brittainy C. Cherry Kochajć…c pana Danielsa
- Smith Crissy Were Chronicles 01 PACK ALPHA
- JosĂŠSaramago Ensaio sobre a luc
- Reymont WśÂ‚adysśÂ‚aw Wampir
- hmc444lp4
- zanotowane.pl
- doc.pisz.pl
- pdf.pisz.pl
- aeie.pev.pl
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Blade picked up the grenade launcher and was loading it again when several of
the people got in their blows first. Trailing smoke, their grenades sailed
through the air, two of them straight into the command machine's door. Smoke
and flame erupted half a dozen times in as many seconds and bodies and pieces
of bodies fell smoking out of the murk. Then people and
Peace Lords together were running frantically toward the command machine.
Blade leaped from the chariot and joined them in time to be only a few seconds
behind the leaders in reaching the machine.
The battle in the dark, smoke-filled corridors of the command machine was
still another butchery. Blade remembered guns roaring in his ears, strangling
one mercenary with his bare hands, stamping on the chest of another until the
ribs caved in, being grazed by pellets in half a dozen places. But that was
all he remembered between the moment he entered the machine and the moment he
stood looking, down at an open locker. In that locker lay another atomic bomb.
Calculations dashed through Blade's mind like the people's charging cavalry.
Here was a weapon to destroy the dimension door and perhaps even destroy the
mercenaries on the other side of it, in Konis.
Blade had given up hope of doing that for a while. Now he felt his heart leap
up at this new chance.
Silora was beyond help, but not beyond vengeance, and this was the best
vengeance he could offer to her valiant memory.
He grabbed one of the people and shouted in his ear. "Run outside, take the
signal baton from my chariot, and signal one of our war machines to come here.
Run!"
He would have to move fast, before the door opened completely and more
mercenaries perhaps came streaming into Tharn through it, or the people in the
door machine realized what he was doing. He knelt to inspect the bomb, then
ran outside, shouting for a dozen strong men. As fighters crowded around him,
he noticed three of the captured Looter machines floating in above the
chariots. The fourth was just landing almost beside the command machine. The
hatch opened and Chara scrambled out. Good, sensible Chara. The four machines
should keep the mercenaries at a safe distance while he finished the job.
There were crushed feet and broken arms as they hustled the bomb outside, but
in five minutes it was safely inside Chara's machine. Again Blade knelt beside
it, working furiously but carefully to arm it. He set the fuse for ten minutes
from the moment the timer began counting, then ran a length of teksin cord
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from the fuse to the inside handle of the hatch. Now if anyone opened the
hatch all the way, the cord would pull tight, setting off the bomb instantly.
That was his insurance against curious mercenaries in
Konis.
After setting the booby-trap he stuck his head out through the hatch for a
moment. Good. The other three machines had already lifted out, Peace Lords
jammed shoulder to shoulder on the platforms and
clinging to the turrets as well. Others were scrambling into chariots and some
of the more athletic were climbing up behind the cavalrymen on their horses.
As fast as each chariot or horse was loaded, the driver or rider turned it
about and headed away across the plain as fast as it would go. Chara stood on
the machine's platform, urging everybody on with shouts and yells. In one hand
she waved the Principal
Technician of War's jeweled belt, in the other she waved a Looter rifle. She
waved it so wildly that Blade ducked back inside in case she accidentally
fired it off. As he did, he saw two men loading Silora's body into a chariot.
Chara sprang down to the ground at a word from Blade. He lifted the machine
into the air and turned it until the shimmering milky sphere that was the
dimension door was centered in the forward screen. Then he gave it a small
amount of forward speed, ducked through the half-open hatch, then closed it
solidly behind him. He took a final careful look at the dimension door. At
least he would be able to tell Lord
Leighton what the damned thing looked like. The machine was perfectly on
course. Then he took a quick look at the ground slipping past ten feet below,
swung himself over the railing, and dropped.
He landed harder than one ankle could really take. But he closed his mind to
the stab of pain and sprinted toward the chariots. His own was there, one of
only half a dozen left. All the cavalry was gone, and so were all the Peace
Lords. He leaped in just as his ankle gave up the struggle, sprawling on his
face on the floor of the chariot. The driver needed no orders, but whipped up
the horses. The chariot swung about and began to roll.
As Blade pulled himself to his feet he saw a Looter war machine sail low
overhead. It was heading for the dimension door. As Blade watched, the door
ceased to be shimmering and milky, and showed a clear view of rocks and grass
and buildings rising beyond the grass. The door was open and through it he was
looking into Konis. Among the buildings Blade saw a polished metal oval
gleaming-the machine that kept open the door from the other end.
The first Looter war machine plunged through the door while Blade's
bomb-carrier was still a hundred yards away. Blade's wobbled in the disturbed
air behind the other and swung off course. For a moment it looked as if it
would slide past the door. Then some force flowing from the door itself caught
it, steadied it, guided it smoothly and surely through the door. Blade
mentally uncrossed his fingers. Now his work was done, and there was nothing
left but to wish for good luck and fast horses to get clear in a hurry. The
bomb could be no more than five minutes from going off, less if the
mercenaries in Konis got curious.
It was less. The chariots had gone no more than another two hundred yards when
the heat and the light of the sun itself seemed to burst into Tharn. For one
split second white incandescence gushed through the dimension door. Then the
door died, leaving only a fire that now had no beginning and seemingly no end.
The flame licked out and caught the dimension door machine. The metal
blackened and buckled and peeled. Something exploded inside and the vast
machine heaved itself into the air. It rose high enough to turn end over end
before it came down, trailing smoke and flame. It came down squarely on the
cargo machine, crumpling it inward. How much ammunition was left in that
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