Hull Zero Three Read Online Free PDF Page A

get cold soon,” she says.
The three don’t hesitate. They grab her up and run along the length of the tube, away from me and the dead tooth-snout, with its exposed radula. I watch their backs for a moment, the flapping of their rags, not sure whether I have any astonishment left in me.
Radula.Wheretheheldoesthatwordcomefrom?I’dlookitupifIwere you….
    “I guess this means you’re not worth eating,” I say to the tooth-snout. Then I get up. I can hear heavy slams. The bulkheads are going up. Best not to get left behind. Unless, of course, the three have snatched the little girl to make a meal of her. In any case, I have to follow, if only to save her—though I’m almost hungry enough to join in.
    This is where madness begins. No water, no food, skin snatched away by freezing cold from my back, feet, knees, elbows—heavy exertion—nonstop terror. Missing tip of toe. Everything hurts.
    I manage to run. I look back only once. Sure enough, the bulkheads aren’t far behind. The tooth-snout carcass is slammed to the top of the tube, split again, and hidden from view.
    I seem to run forever. Second wind is nothing to third and fourth wind. Eventually, I expect, I’ll just fall over and die and not even notice the difference, because my seeing, my hearing, all that’s left of me , is totally isolated from what my body is doing.
    It’s pretty monotonous. Makes being alive seem more of a boring burden than a promise of better things. Curved tube—hundreds of meters of it. Then more curved tube. And finally—still more curved tube!
    And no sign of the three and the little girl. I can see pretty far ahead— maybe another hundred meters.
I begin to notice other variations. Glim lights in the wall form brighter broken lines. Occasional circular patches twenty centimeters or so wide, hard to make out, radiate striped designs.
Maybe these are road signs: stop, go, turn, di . e
Behind me, the lights dim. Cold air is chapping my flying heels and pumping calves. Then, to my right, I see a door actually open—grow from a dark dot to a dimly lit oval. Smaller than the fistula but big enough to admit someone my size. There’s a room beyond, with corners and edges. I glimpse shapes inside, nothing moving….
My lungs let out a moan in the midst of the constant gasping.
No need to stop and investigate. Didn’t need to see that. Nothing but bodies scattered under a low ceiling. Maybe I’ve come full circle and this is where I started. Maybe this is all there is.
But I don’t think so.
This thing is bi . g
Meters, kilometers—length and measure are coming back to me. I’ve run at least three kilometers since being snatched out of my sleep sac. (I must have been sleeping, otherwise, why the Dreamtime?) Three kilometers, but I doubt I’ve made anything like a complete circuit, judging from the curvature of the tube. It could be a gigantic squirrel cage.
Something’s waiting for me to fall over, something that likes lean, tired, smelly meat—meat still scared shitless.
No shit. No pee.
No reason for either.
I see all four of them now. They’re far away—the length of a footbalfiel . d Small but clear. They’re standing just as they were before, the girl held between them, and all watch me run. Everything behind is painfully cold, scary dark. The tiny surface lights under my pounding feet are dimming to that dead umber that will no doubt be the end of me, and before I can even remember my name.
If I have a name.
Not much strength left. I stumble, fall, get up, try to run again, then just fall over and lie there. Bulkheads slam. My skin is freezing to the surface. I almost don’t care, but with the last of my energy, I roll, a futile gesture….
Then hands grab me and tug me the rest of the necessary distance. More food for everybody, I guess—but might as well let the food carry itself as far as possible.
My head bobs from my neck.
Then… it doesn’t hang anymore. I feel the odd forward and backward wobble, the upward