Martian Deathtrap by Lawrence Watt-Evans

Author:Lawrence Watt-Evans [Watt-Evans, Lawrence]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 0345409531
Publisher: Del Rey
Published: 1996-05-15T05:00:00+00:00

21

THE POLAR BEAR

STRIKES!

“I appear to have destroyed a musical instrument,” Bindar admitted as he looked at the tangle of wires and broken wood that had been a piano.

In the snack bar, Hadrak sighed. Bindar hadn’t given any details about what sort of musical instrument had startled him. “Could that instrument have been what made the sounds you heard earlier?” Hadrak asked.

Bindar snatched at the idea. “I believe it could, sir,” he said.

“Then there are no indications of live Terrans in your vicinity?”

“None that I can see, sir.”

“You might as well come back down here and rejoin us, then,” Hadrak said.

Bindar was about to agree when he heard the now-familiar buzz of an approaching wasp outside. He glanced out the window and saw the insect bumbling about over the kitchen garden, working its way closer.

Bindar suddenly had no interest at all in climbing back down the purple rope, exposed to that lumbering monstrosity. “Sir, shall I attempt to find a route back there through the building?” he asked. “Perhaps I’ll encounter a few Terrans along the way.”

He hoped not, but Terrans were better than wasps. The lunatic with the long axe had gone down a lot more easily than the wasp that had killed Aif.

“Good,” Hadrak said. “Do that.”

“Your will,” Bindar replied.

He looked around the ruined music room. He had done a lot of damage here, he realized — not that it mattered. He doubted anyone would care what had happened to a Terran asylum once the planet was conquered.

In getting here he had come out a door and then around to the side, and then up through the window. He needed to descend one level, and to move back to the northern side of the building, perhaps twenty or thirty feet in from the corner — that should put him back in the little refectory where the others were gathered.

Getting down a level would be the hard part. He could just blast a hole in the floor, he supposed, but shooting out anything he was standing on did not appeal to him. He was unsure just how good the structural integrity of this Terran architecture might be. He would take a look around first, he decided, and see if he could find a stairway or lift.

The north end of the room opened onto a sort of porch, open to the outside air — he looked out at the wasp and decided he didn’t want to try that route, or for that matter any route that led past a lot of big windows. An inside route was definitely preferable.

He poked his head carefully through the nearest door and found a small antechamber. He could proceed in three different directions from here — north, south, or straight ahead.

South would take him farther from his goal; straight ahead might work, but he chose north, and turned the corner into a good-sized room — a dim chamber lit entirely by stained-glass transoms over several doors, and lined with cabinets.

One door at the far end stood open, and that was the direction he wanted to go in any case; he marched on through.

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.