2 Chasm City by Alastair Reynolds

Author:Alastair Reynolds [Reynolds, Alastair]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: General, Fiction, Science Fiction, Life on other planets, Space colonies
ISBN: 9780575073654
Publisher: Gollancz
Published: 2008-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

I fired, straight into the mouth.

The head smashed into the dirt next to me, its lunge confused by the laser pulses. Angered, the snake reared up, its mouth wide, emitting a terrible roar and a smell like a field of butchered corpses. I had squeezed off ten rapid pulses, a stroboscopic volley which had punched ten black craters into the roof of the mouth. I could see the exit wounds peppering the back of the head, each finger-wide. I'd blinded it.

But it had enough memory to remember roughly where I was. I stumbled back as the head daggered down again -- and then there was a glint of bright metal cleaving the air, and the thunk of Cahuella's crossbow.

His dart had buried itself in the neck of the snake, instantly discharging its payload of tranquilliser.

'Tanner! Get the fuck away!'

He reached into his bandolier and extracted another dart, then cranked back the bow and slipped the second dart into place. A moment later it joined the other in the snake's neck. That was, if he had done his sums correctly, and the darts were both coded for large adults, something like sixteen times the dose necessary to put this specimen to sleep.

I was out of harm's way now, but I kept firing. And now I realised that we had another problem...

'Cahuella...' I said.

He must have seen that I was looking beyond rather than at him, for he stopped and looked over his shoulder, frozen in the action of reaching for another dart.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.