Get Off My World by Eando Binder

Author:Eando Binder
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: science fiction, dystopia, revolution, sci-fi, pulp fiction
ISBN: 9781479403493
Publisher: Wildside Press
Published: 2014-08-21T16:00:00+00:00

Sparky winced. Then he said, “Hey, that means you came down before the Martian invas…” The rest was unsaid as Paige squeezed his arm tightly. Paige’s look plainly told Sparky not to shock the man with that horrifying revelation. Not yet, anyway.

“How did you get down here?” Evans now asked. “How did you get down through the jelly zone?”

Sparky’s eyes flew open. “Come again? Jelly zone?”

“Yes,” said Evans, a bit impatiently. “You know, it comes before the Fire Zone. Where the rock turns to quivering jelly and you have to dive down, holding your breath.” A gleam came into his eye. “But even that isn’t as bad as the syrup zone where the caverns are flooded with sticky goo and wading through it is a nightmare.”

Paige, Aronson, and Sparky exchanged stricken glances. “We…uh…didn’t come through any jelly zone or syrup zone, sir…”

Instant suspicion leaped into the man’s face. “You didn’t? Then you’re impostors. You didn’t come from the upper world. Impostors!” His voice was a shout now and guards came running to hustle him away.

Sparky looked half-sick. “And to think we were taken in by that screwball for a moment. Next we’ll meet Napoleon.”

“That name, Evans,” mused Paige. “Evidently he saw my first name ‘Evan’ in the files and made his last name ‘Evans’—with the cunning of the mad. But what a letdown. I thought we had an ally.”

They subsided into a depressed silence.

* * * *

Back in their cell a few days later, Paige spoke tersely. “We’ve got to escape from this snakepit. I’ve been looking over the place. Malmind Ward is a smaller version of Centropolis with the same concentric layers of living spaces. The outer shell is our only hope but all the windows are barred. However, the big thing is that people have to come in and out, and supplies have to be brought in.”

“That’s done,” nodded Aronson, “through one big hatchway in the hull. A jet-ship comes once a week to bring new inmates or carry away discharged patients, and to unload supplies.”

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