Fred Saberhagen Final Conflic The Arrival

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.Frustrated, Doors hurried back to the dead militiaman and searched the body, looking for some other weapon, maybe a holstered pistol, even a hunting knife, anything in the way of armament.He had one brief joyful moment when he came up with a pistol, but when he pulled out the magazine he found that it was empty.Not even a single round remained in the chamber.Cursing, Jonathan realized that the attackers were probably all in the same boat with the defenders, on the verge of running out of ammunition—given the amount the invaders had expended in the early minutes of the battle, it could hardly be otherwise.The global on Jonathan's belt was buzzing.This time the face on the little screen was Jubal's, and he was jubilant at having got through at last."Got the Highway Patrol on for you, Johnny!"Moments later, Doors was talking to a uniform."This is Jonathan Doors, at the Castle.We are under heavy attack here, and at least half a dozen people have been killed.Some of my people and I are still holding out in Casa Grande.""We read you, sir.People have seen the fireworks, and we've had troopers trying to get to you for an hour now.They're being held up en route."Page 175ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlJonathan went back to visit his wife in the nearby room where he had left her, and eagerly reported to Amanda his recent success in communication.Having locked themselves in, they cautiously approached a window and looked out together.Amanda clutched his arm."Look! Down there on the road!"No doubt about it, there was a string of approaching headlights on the distant coastal road, and another, closer, on the long, winding drive ascending from the highway.They were coming closer at high speed.Then, even as Doors watched, the distant flickering and flaring of small-arms fire.Headlights went out, or slewed sideways and stopped.It seemed the enemy had not yet used up all their ammunition.And meanwhile, all this time, like background music of a particularly ugly style, running through his mind, Jonathan could still intermittently sense the struggling Urod.His perception of it became somewhat clearer the more the contact was repeated and prolonged.A monstrous being trapped in the snares of its enemies, surrounded now by layers and meshes of metal, strange composite materials, and pure force, who even after being loaded on the ship, kept fighting to escape.But the energies that gave the Urod its strange life were fading and failing, and Doors got the distinct impression that the creature's chances of breaking loose again were, at the moment, pitifully small.But it was still giving the Taelons as much as they could handle, distracting them, preventing them from watching the humans as closely as they might have otherwise.The lanky security agent, Carson, called in again.No sir, he wasn't hit, nor was Shorty as far as he knew.But he, Carson, had a problem and needed some kind of help.Doors went to see what was the matter.He found Carson crouching in a closet, wondering if he was going mad.The combat veteran had put down his weapon and was clutching his head with both hands."God, Mr.Doors, what have they done, shot the house full of some kind of gas? I'm—I'm having visions—hearing things—""I doubt poison gas has anything to do with it.Probably not the militia at all, just some of the bad dreams that we were promised earlier.I can feel it too, if that's any comfort."And how I can feel it."I guess the difference is, I've worked into it gradually, sort of, and I know what it is."Carson looked marginally relieved."But what can we do?""Hang in there and it'll go away." Doors tried to sound much more confident than he felt."I close my eyes—just for a moment—and think of something else.Most of the time it works.""Whatis the damned thing, Boss?"Page 176ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html"See me later and I'll tell you all I know, which isn't much."And you will be a rich man, and so will all my other workers who have made it through this night with me.But we won't even talk about that now.The Urod's ongoing struggle was invisible to human eyes, but it was not without profound effect on human minds.Doors was sufficiently familiar with it that he thought he could chart the creature's progress toward oblivion.No doubt some of the other humans in the vicinity could do the same.By now all the survivors of Casa Grande must know that staying awake was not always protection against bad dreams.If the defenders were partially disabled by the mental effects produced, the attackers were no better off, also suffering the mental strains and delusions inflicted by the Urod.Doors saw a man run wildly across the plaza, spraying bullets into the air at nothing.The Urod effect was probably the reason no coherent effort to occupy and search the building had yet begun.Jonathan rejoined his wife.The room they were in contained some heavy furniture, a bureau and two massive chairs, and he began to tug and shift these pieces, creating a hiding place for Mandy, what he could hope would be a sanctuary.The fear and suspicion engendered by his father's story had gradually hardened into a practical certainty: What the dear Companions meant to do with his wife would mean her death, or possibly some fate that was genuinely worse than death—and now, at a time when anything that might happen to her could probably be blamed on the militia attack, it would be easier than ever for them to get away with it.Jonathan had already torn her loose from their damned machine, and when a chance came he was going to get her away from here somehow, no matter what the risk…Danger loomed, worse than that from some fanatic's bullets.Two Taelons, Amanda's would-be kidnappers, were back in the building—if they had ever left it.Doors could hear their familiar, tireless, patient footsteps on the stairs.The image of their approach came from the Urod—and Jonathan feared that he could expect no further help from his peculiar sometime ally—the Urod was now in the last stages of being finally, permanently, squelched.Jonathan decided not to lock the door.If he left it open, maybe they could hide.Putting his lips against his wife's ear, he drew her back behind the heavy furniture, and whispered, "Not a sound.This time we won't be able to talk them out of it [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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