Lord of Janissaries Read Online Free PDF

harmed.”
    “Maybe a couple of us ought to come anyway,” Sergeant Elliot said.
    “Thanks, Sarge, but I guess not,” Rick said. “If they really want us dead, they’ll let the air out of this compartment. And don’t forget that. Elliot, for God’s sake, don’t let the troops do anything stupid while I’m gone.”
    “No, sir. But when will you be back?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “Cap’n, if you’re not back in four hours, we can blow that door open—”
    “No. Wake up Lieutenant Parsons and tell him he’s in charge. I’ll be back.” Rick sounded a lot more confident than he felt as he went through the doorway. It closed behind him before the airtight in front of him dilated.
    There was another corridor, and no one in sight. Rick followed that for a hundred meters until it bent sharply left, then led through two more rubberized pressure doors. He emerged in another cavern, one much smaller than the one he had left. It was well lighted, and there were at least a dozen of the TV screens of the kind he had seen in the ship and in the cavern.
    There were both people and aliens in the cavern, perhaps a dozen of each. Several were studying the TV-like screens. An alien in grey coveralls, possibly the one who had spoken to him in the ship, came over to him.
    The alien was six inches taller than Rick, but the extra height seemed to be all in the legs. The torso was not much longer than Rick’s. The arms were longer than a human’s, but not so much longer as were the legs. “There,” the alien said. He indicated a door. “You would—do well—to be—careful—of what you say.”
    Rick nodded. “I understand.” If this were the same alien, and Rick thought it was, it no longer spoke as easily and confidently as it had aboard the ship. Why? he wondered.
    The door opened into an office. A desk faced the door. There were papers on the desk, along with two keyboards that Rick thought must connect to a computer. The desk held two of the flat TV screens, and there were other screens higher up. All were blank. The office had metallic square walls and floor and ceiling; a room built into the cavern. There was a rug on the floor which Rick thought was Persian; it had that pattern and look to it. There were other art objects that appeared to be from Earth: seascape paintings, a color photograph of the Golden Gate bridge, a Kalliroscope with its swirling shock-wave patterns.
    The man he had seen on the TV screen sat behind the desk. The desk itself looked Danish modern and was probably from Earth. The man stood as Rick entered, but he did not offer to shake hands.
    He was perhaps five feet ten, two inches shorter than Rick, and looked thoroughly human. He was a bit darker than Rick, face rounder, but he would not have attracted attention on any street in the United States or Europe. His expression was not unfriendly, but he looked harried, very busy and preoccupied.
    The man spoke. It sounded to Rick more like the twittering of a bird than any human speech. “A parrot in a cageful of cats,” Rick told André Parsons later. The alien answered in the same language, and the human nodded.
    “Excuse me, Captain,” he said. “Please be seated.” He indicated chairs, both of aluminum and plastic, one a normal-height chair, the other like a highchair for an adult. “Doubtless you have many questions.”
    Now there’s an understatement, Rick thought. “Yes. Beginning with, who are you?”
    The man nodded, tight-lipped, again his expression more of impatience and mild annoyance than anything else. “You would find my name hard to pronounce. Try ‘Agzaral,’ which is close enough not to offend me. I am—you do not have the occupation. Think of me as a police inspector. It is close enough for our purposes. And do be seated.”
    Rick took the normal chair. The alien went to the highchair. It fitted perfectly. “And my—rescuer?” Rick asked. It was difficult to know how to speak. There were no referents, and Rick had