Under the Eye of God Read Online Free PDF Page B

does not fit my concept of a good time,” gasped Finn.
    â€œYou knew the dangers when we accepted the warrant—” Sawyer lost his footing then, caught himself and slipped anyway, tumbling headlong forward across the laser-slicked rocks, rolling and sliding ever downward. Finn hurried after. “Soy—!”
    Sawyer bounced off a wall and came to a sudden stop. For a moment, he lay motionless.
    â€œSawyer!”
    â€œNo problem—” Sawyer gasped; he rolled back up onto his feet. “Keep going. I can handle it. Life gets harder every year—”
    â€œâ€”And then you die.”
    â€œRight. And then they throw dirt in your face.”
    â€œAnd then the worms eat you,” added Finn.
    Sawyer finished the catechism. “Thank Ghu it happens in that order.”
    â€œUh—” Finn voiced his fear. “It might not always work that way.”
    Sawyer glanced backward. “I can’t see it—”
    â€œDon’t worry. It’ll keep up.”
    â€œUh-oh—” Sawyer skidded to a halt—tried to halt, but slipped instead, his feet sliding wildly out from under him. He came down heavily on his rump and kept on sliding downward, his speed increasing as he tumbled. He shot ahead into the darkness, his screams echoing up and down the tunnel, his hand torch marking his descent until both it and Sawyer disappeared abruptly in the distance. The last frantic echoes faded into silence.
    Finn tried to hurry after his brother. The descent grew steeper here, the stones slicker. Finn found it harder and harder to gain purchase. Then he lost control too, his arms flailed, his legs shot out; like his brother before him, he coasted wildly downward into darkness. Suddenly, the slide beneath him disappeared and he hurtled down and out into empty space.
    Finn Markham screamed throughout the entire long terrifying moment of free fall; his torch tumbled with him, revealing the quickest glimpse of a wall of shining night, and then he smashed painfully into its cold wet surface—

Dread Planet
    The Lady MacBeth did not often carry passengers of Lady Zillabar’s exalted rank; partly because neither the Captain nor the First Officer enjoyed ferrying warm cargo, and partly because the cruiser’s accommodations did not lend themselves to the level of comfort one might expect on a more opulent vessel.
    The starship’s furnishings, while otherwise acceptable to travelers concerned more with destination than with luxury, possessed a less-than-charming Spartan quality when judged by the standards of the nobility. The Lady MacBeth lacked the elegant proportions and spacious design that individuals of wealth and power expected as a matter of daily convenience. The starship lacked too many of the luxurious services that broke up the tedium of long interstellar voyages; therefore, that class of passenger most likely to reserve the services of a starship for personal transportation remained those least likely to desire this one—a state of affairs which exactly suited Star-Captain Campbell and First Officer Ota. The real profit lay in cargo, not in passengers.
    Unfortunately, the wisdom of these arguments had failed to convince the Lady Zillabar, leader of one of the Regency’s oldest families of immortals. Star-Captain Campbell had tried to reject the Lady’s charter, but Zillabar had chosen The Lady MacBeth for obscure reasons of her own and once having made her decision, she would not accept refusal. She wanted transport for herself, her personal retinue of servants and Dragons, and no small quantity of cargo, from the nexus world of Burihatin to the dark red planet, Thoska-Roole.
    Captain Campbell had tried a second time to refuse the Lady’s charter, but Zillabar did not understand the word no. She made complaints to the local Registry administrators, pointedly not making reference to the unfortunate fates of their predecessors; the validity of her