Antagonist - Childe Cycle 11 (104 page)

There
came
a
moment
when
his
hand,
reaching
out
in
the
rhythm he
had
fallen
into,
found
nothing
but
air.
He
reached
out
farther, thinking
he
might
have
twisted
as
he
fell,
and
swept
the
hand
about him;
but
there
was
nothing.

He
quelled
an
impulse
to
activate
the
control
that
would
light
the face
of
his
wrist
control
pad,
knowing
that
the
pulse
he
had
sent
out from
his
room
would
have
killed
the
pad.
His
mind
wanted
to
reproach
him
for
not
having
brought
some
non-electronic
light
source; but
he
thrust
those
thoughts
from
him.

But
he
could
not
avoid
thinking
of
the
possibility
that
something had
gone
wrong,
that
he
was
still
dangling
in
the
darkness
high above
the
floor
of
the
stairwell.
The
cord
he
was
suspended
on
was
a monomolecular
fiber—so
strong
it
could
easily
carry
his
weight,
but so
thin
he
had
to
use
the
gloves
to
keep
it
from
slicing
through
his flesh.
Could
it
have
damaged
the
descent
mechanism,
somehow?

Or
had
he
reached
the
bottom?
He
simply
could
not
tell.

He
reached
out
with
his
free
arm,
sweeping
it
about
him;
but
again he
found
nothing,
and
his
movements
set
him
rotating
and
swinging as
he
hung
there,
like
some
great
pendulum
...
until
the
absurdity
of that
image
made
him
control
his
body's
frightened
instincts.

—And
there
came
a
noise
in
the
darkness,
a
kind
of
double-click and
a
tiny
creak;
and
the
stairwell,
which
up
to
that
point
had
been totally
silent,
seemed
now
to
explode
into
noise.

A
door
had
opened,
and
through
it
came
a
buzz
he
recognized
as the
rising
and
falling
of
voices—voices
that
were
generally
angry, but
now
and
then
held
a
high
pitch
that
spoke
of
fear.

As
if
that
noise
had
broken
a
spell
in
the
stairwell
itself,
he
heard
a thump
high
above
him;
and
more
voices
began
to
echo
down
the stairwell.

Within
seconds,
more
of
the
stairwell
doors
were
thrown
open. He
hung
in
place,
furious
that
he
could
no
longer
use
his
ears
to
try to
discover
what
was
happening
about
him.
The
hotel's
guests,
he supposed—those
awake
enough
to
have
noticed
the
outage—had concluded
there
might
be
danger
in
this
blackout,
or
perhaps
they had
simply
been
overtaken
by
an
instinctive
dread
of
the
darkness. But
he
now
had
no
way
to
tell
whether
the
danger
he
had
been
signaled
to
run
from
might
be
pursuing
him
down
the
stairwell.

The
lower
half-dozen
floors
of
the
hotel
were
largely
given
over
to businesses,
which
were
presumably
closed
for
the
night;
so
if
he
had made
it
to
the
bottom
of
the
stairwell,
he
had
a
few
minutes
before the
guests
from
above
could
make
their
faltering
ways
down
in
the darkness.

He
heard
cries
from
above,
and
what
sounded
like
a
fight—and then
a
scream.

He
shut
his
eyes.
There
was
nothing
to
see
in
this
darkness,
but closing
his
eyes
would
help
him
concentrate.

He
hung
there,
trying
not
to
reach
out,
but
only
to
receive.
And
in
a
moment
he
felt
a
small
stir
of
pleasure
awakening
inside
him— a
pleasure
that
seemed
to
radiate
from
a
source
outside
his
body.
He recognized
it
as
the
kind
of
reaction
his
brain
had
been
trained
to give
when
his
tactile
senses
were
detecting
a
nearby
heat
source.

His
brain
was
registering
the
heat
reaction
the
cord
raised
in
the glove
that
held
it,
but
there
was
another
source
nearby—a
human body,
silent
in
the
darkness
but
surely
there.
Its
presence
gave
him a
reference
point
against
which
to
gauge
his
existence.

"Are
you
all
right?"
a
voice
asked
softly.
He
recognized
it.
As
instructed,
the
man
was
not
using
his
name.

"Yes,"
Bleys
answered,
also
keeping
his
voice
low.
The
voices from
higher
in
the
stairwell
continued,
coming
slowly
nearer.
"I'm not
sure
how
far
above
the
floor
I
am,"
he
said.

The
heat
source
strengthened
on
his
left
side,
and
in
a
moment
a hand
touched
his
leg.

"You're
about
a
meter
above
the
floor,"
the
voice
said.
"Put
your free
foot
in
my
cupped
hands
and
you
can
step
out
of
the
loop
and let
yourself
down."