Hellworld (Deathstalker Prelude) Read Online Free PDF

fanatically pro-life. Investigators weren’t.
    “Right, esper,” said Hunter briskly. “I want a full scan of the immediate area, twenty-mile radius. Never mind plant or animal life; I’m interested in intelligent life forms.”
    DeChance raised an eyebrow but said nothing. She sat cross-legged on the deck between the two webbings, arranged herself comfortably, and closed her eyes. She sent her thoughts up and out, and her mind spread across the world like ripples on a pond. The Hell Squad were bright sparks in and around the pinnace. Everywhere else was dark. She spread out further, and the world blossomed before her. Lives shone in the darkness like flaring torches and guttering candles, but none of them burned with the steady intensity of the intelligent mind.
    And yet there was something strange, right on the edge of her perception. Its light was strong but muted, and curiously indistinct. DeChance studied it warily. In a slow, creeping way it seemed to be aware of her. The esper started to back away, but even as she broke the contact, the light suddenly flared up into an awful brilliance. It burned in hideous colours, and it knew where she was. DeChance pulled the darkness around her like a cloak. Something new was abroad in the night, something huge and powerful. There were other things in the darkness too, and one by one they were waking up. Their lights grew bright and awful, and DeChance pulled back her esp, folding it in upon itself, and locking it safely away inside her mind again. She opened her eyes, and looked shakily at Captain Hunter.
    “There’s something out there, Captain. It’s not like anything I’ve ever encountered before. It’s big, very old, and very powerful.”
    “Dangerous?” said the Investigator.
    “I don’t know,” said DeChance. “Probably. And it’s not alone.”
    For a long moment, nobody said anything. Hunter felt a chill run up his spine as he realised just how shaken the esper was.
    “All right,” he said finally. “Thank you, esper; that will be all. Please join the others outside. We’ll be out shortly. Dismissed.”
    DeChance nodded and left. Hunter and Krystel looked at each other.
    “It has to be the city,” said Krystel. “We’ve got to go there, Captain.”
    “Yes. You’ve more … experience with aliens than I have, Investigator. Assuming we do find something there, what’s the best procedure?”
    Krystel grinned around her cigar. “Find it. Trap it. Kill it. And burn the body afterwards, just to be sure.”
    Dr. Williams sat quietly in the shadow of the pinnace, hugging his knees to his chest and staring out at his new world. All in all it looked decidedly bleak and barren, and the endless quiet was getting on his nerves. Still, he was lucky to be in the Hell Squad, and he knew it. If the Empire had been able to prove half the charges they’d made against him … but they hadn’t. His money and influence had seen to that. For a time.
    He thought he’d get away with a few years’ confinement in some comfortable open prison, or perhaps just a fine and a public admonition. But in the end, too many people decided they couldn’t risk the truth coming out at a trial. So they pulled a few strings, and Dr. Williams found himself heading out towards the edge of the Empire and some nice anonymous Hell Squad planet, where his secrets could be buried with him.
    It had all been very neatly done. Men he’d trusted for years had betrayed him, under the pressure of massive bribes and death threats, and suddenly he’d stood alone. He could either go with the Hell Squad or be shot in the back while trying to escape. Williams had screamed and raged and threatened, but little good it had done him. He hugged his knees tightly and glared out over the open plain.
    Graham Williams was a tall, slender, handsome man in his late fifties, who looked thirty years younger. His skin was fresh and glowing, and his thick curly hair was jet-black. He had a doctor’s warm,