Читать книгу No Sanctuary - Helen R. Myers - Страница 2

Exhaling in relief, Bay threw a load on her own welder. She began the bottom weld on her spear and was immediately lost in her work.

How long was it before she picked up on the change, the smell? Two minutes, three? It couldn’t have been much longer. In any case, the strong odor, wholly unnatural to their environment and so clearly wrong, prompted her to throw up her hood and sniff again.

She turned around.

Smoke was coming from Glenn’s table, so much smoke that she couldn’t see him. Nevertheless, the nauseating smell told her he was there. Swatting the hood off her head, she ran to his machine, flipped off the ignition switch and, while her reaction was fast, her movements automatic, her mind froze on one thought. Heart attack.

The horrible stench gagged her as much as the smoke did, speaking too clearly of burning clothing and worse. As horror urged retreat, she grabbed the lead to get the stringer out from beneath him, at the same time pushing against his shoulder to roll him off it. In that instant something struck her forearm.

Through tearing eyes and suffocating smoke she saw a metal rod—no, one of the Maiden’s lances.

The spear was impaled through Glenn’s back.