A World out of Time by Larry Niven

Author:Larry Niven
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2014-12-10T16:00:00+00:00

II

He was trying to remember something. It was urgent.

…See now, I hit an intercom button, then the door button, then kick out. Or the other way around? Intercom, door, kick out. Didn’t wait—couldn’t wait—never thought so fast in my life.

Pressure on his ankles. He thrashed a bit, got his elbows under him to lift his head. The door of the “phone booth” was trying to lift under his ankles. Beyond, the great red sun was almost whole again, a chunk still missing behind black Jupiter. Closer: A desk floated above cloud-rug.

He smiled and closed his eyes.

It was seconds or minutes before he stirred himself. The sun was still cut by Jupiter. He stood on the edge of the door while he looked for something to wedge it.

He’d got out by the skin of his teeth. With the silver cane pushing him down into unconsciousness, he’d hit the intercom button to take him to the office, the button to open the door, then got his legs across the door to wedge it. So far so good, but—

Assume the Norn was still guarding her zero-time device and her drug supply. He hadn’t seen the marvelous machine, he couldn’t even guess what it looked like, but what else could the cables be for? It must be there, and now Mirelly-Lyra knew he was after her drugs. By now she would know that the intercom to the office wasn’t working. She would assume Corbell had blocked the door open.

He couldn’t let the door close. She’d be out of it an instant later, right on his heels.

Corbell began to panic. He’d barred her from the general “phone-booth” system by barring her from the office. She couldn’t use that. She couldn’t come after him in the car; they’d left it here, just outside the entrance. So…yeah. Her fastest route to him was by intercom to the beach. Jog down to someone else’s intercom booth, thence to someone else’s office, dial for this building. By now she could be trotting down from the roof. And he still hadn’t found anything to block the door!

He stripped off his undersuit and wedged it in the door. It was cool for a moment, until the sweat dried on him. Now he was naked—and ashamed; what he saw when he looked down was not a self to be proud of. But who would see him but Mirelly-Lyra? The old woman was probably in no better shape.

His personal possessions had dwindled to an ancient, withered body (stolen) and a single plastic credit card disk (also stolen). He took them down three flights of stairs and out.

The car was where they had left it.

It wouldn’t start. He looked for a key or a key slot. If the Norn had taken the key he would have to walk. He found a slot, empty, and said a bad word before he noticed its size…

The plastic disk fit it perfectly.

The cars must be public taxis. That was convenient. Now, if the cars’ destination codes resembled the booths’, all he had to do was punch for the police station.

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.