Undying World

Jantor said, «And now what?»

«We must remain in the basements and hack our way through the walls, heading for the Government Building. The walls are thin and no match for our bars. Begin.»

«But the direction? I ca

«I can. Follow me.» During his last moments above ground level, Blade had oriented himself. By bearing straight ahead and keeping the fronting street always to his right, they would reach the square surrounding the Government Building. How to cross the square was another matter. But he would leave that bridge until time to cross it. In a matter of seconds, Blade battered a hole through the thin plastic and stepped into the next basement. He told Jantor, «You take the next wall, and the man after you the next, and so on. Just enough so we can pass single file. Always a fresh man at work. Hurry now. Come on, come on!»

He fell to the rear of the line with Jantor and Norn. Jantor's spirits were sinking again. «We are fools. What if we do reach Government Building? That is the first place the patrols will go after they realize what has happened.»

Blade put an arm around Norn. «I am counting a great deal on that. It will take them time to realize just what has happened. I thought you wrong to destroy the council of elders, but now it may save us. The Morphi will be confused and leaderless. They have just come awake without knowing they have been asleep. Most of them will have no idea of what is happening. Some will know that there are Gnomen above-ground and they will leave it to someone else to handle. Has there ever been a Gnomen rebellion before?»

With some pride Jantor said, «I am the first who ever dared.»

«Good. Chaos and confusion will work for us. The patrols are sure to go after the decoys. Will you other Gnomen, those scattered about the city, put up a fight?»

Jantor nodded gloomily. «They will die fighting, as best they can. Most of them are drunk, though, and will be no match for the patrols.»

«They will still buy us time,» said Blade. «Now you, Jantor, go to the fore and keep your men at it. Push them. Kill whoever slackens, as an example. Let no Morphi escape to tell the patrols where we are.»

When the big Gnomen king had gone, Norn looked at Blade and whispered, «Is not this all a lie, man Blade? You do not really think we can escape and live?»

Blade met her glance. «You are right. We have no chance-unless we can find masks to guard against the powder. That would change everything.»

«I know where there are masks,» said Norn. «Great crates of them. Thousands of them.»

Blade kissed her. «Where?»

«In the basement of a building on the square across from the Government Building. I followed Sybelline one time and saw them. I thought nothing-«

Blade did not hear her. He seized her arm and ran to the head of the line where another wall was being pierced. Jantor plunged through the opening with a great shout. Five Morphi, surprised at a game of chance, tried to scurry off in terror. Jantor speared one and his men two more. Blade, on Jantor's heels, hurled his spear bar at the fourth. But it was the fifth and last Morphi who nearly did them in. He did not flee.

Instead he snatched a canister from a wall rack and directed a fine spray of compressed powder at Jantor. One of the king's subchiefs leaped in time to take the spray squarely in the face.

A dozen spear bars tore the Morphi to pieces. The subchief collapsed, laughing, agony in his brown eyes. Jantor knelt, and for a moment stroked the man's head. Then he rose and lifted his bar.

«It was a gallant thing he did for me. I ca

Blade picked up the canister and examined it. It was small, with no straps for carrying on the back. Instead it could be carried in one hand and operated by pressing a button. There was no hose.

He held it up for all to see. «Keep on the lookout for these. And for the larger cylinders. Maybe we can turn their own weapons against them.»

«They will have masks,» said Jantor.

«So will we if our luck holds,» Blade answered, and explained what Norn had told him.

Blade had reckoned very near. Four more walls down and he ordered a halt. He whispered to Jantor. «Absolute silence. I will go ahead with Norn and seek the masks.»

With Norn slipping along behind him, Blade ascended to the first basement, then up more stairs to a door that opened on a lobby. He cracked it open and peered out. The lobby was strewn with a mix of Morphi and Gnomen corpses. «Stay here,» he told Norn. «I must pretend to be a corpse.»

Blade slid out the door on his belly. He moved like a snake among the real dead to the entrance where, lying between bloody and depowered Morphi males, he could see out into the square and across to the circular Government Building. One glance was enough. There were cars and foot patrols all about the entrance and scattered about the square. Near the plastic portico was a slim barreled ca

He heard a high wailing scream and something came plummeting down to splash in the square. Then another and another. Blade felt sick and wondered if he had gone mad? He stared at the oozing red bodies of Morphi women. They had jumped?

Another high scream and a body splashed just outside the entrance. Blade thought he could hear similar screams from all directions now. What the hell was going on? He crawled back to where Norn waited. She had heard the screams and when he told her what he had seen she smiled.

«It is nothing you can prevent, man Blade, nor is it important to us. The Morphi women have discovered that they have been raped by Gnomen. So they kill themselves. Some will jump, some use the little knives, some the death powder. It is their custom. Those who do not commit suicide-and there will be some-will be sent down to the sewers.»

Blade knew he was hard, coarsened by his many lives in Dimension X, but this dented him. He fought back his revulsion. «Jantor knew of this custom?»

«Of course. It is why he insisted that every Morphi woman be raped. It saves the trouble of killing them and gives pleasure to the troops. It aids in decimating the Morphi as they would decimate the Gnomen. Of course he knew. Jantor pla

Blade listened to the screams, imagined those he could not hear, coming from far out over the endless city, and spoke harshly to Norn. «Crawl to the door, feigning death, be very careful. Spot the building where the masks are stored and point it out to me. Hurry!»

CHAPTER 17

As soon as she pressed the power button, Sybelline took the lift and was whisked upward at breathtaking speed. Six miles in fifteen seconds. The lift car was stabo-energized, had its own gravity, and she felt no ill effects.

Sybelline wore a mask and carried the powder cyclinder. She was risking everything. Time was short and the line thin. She must contact Onta, Chief of Brain Secrets on the Moon, to ask for instructions. Only with the aid of the Selenes could she survive; could she realize her ambition to rule. She held one high card, though. The orbfolk wanted Blade.

She rode the lift to the vestibule of the high council room. The narthex was circular, high-domed and littered with bodies of male and female Morphi. One Morphi was just cutting her own throat with a short-bladed knife as Sybelline entered the chamber. The white-haired woman knelt and asked, «Why?»

The woman mistook Sybelline for a full-blooded Morphi and laughed blood as she died. «I have been raped by the Gnomen. What else is there? How is it that you escaped?»