didn't seem to bother them. They dug those hooflike feet into the ground and leaned forward as they walked. But if there was any rubble on the paths, any loose rocks, anything that could cause them to stumble, they avoided it. If they came to a sharp turn, they looked first before they took a step. They didn't seem to be aware they were doing it, but it helped Cole plan his escape route. Steep didn't matter; twists and turns and obstructions did.
Let me check one last thing, just to make sure I'm not committing suicide here. He slowly adjusted his position until there was a guard between him and the setting sun. He looked at the star through the glass of the Bortellite's helmet. It wasn't polarized, which meant they would be every bit as blind looking into the low-hanging sun as he hoped.
He had about three minutes left. Is there anything I've overlooked, any way to distract them during the first ten or twenty seconds?
I wonder . . . , he thought. Your shoulders are rigid, and your arms are joined very differently from mine. I'll bet you couldn't scratch an itch on your back if your life depended on it.
His hand snaked down to his pocket. They'd taken his weapons, of course. He felt around. Had they left him anything? Then his fingers came into contact with three coins. He closed his hand around them, withdrew it carefully, then stood still, waiting for the sun to drop just the tiniest bit lower.
When it did, he whipped his hand around his back and threw the coins. One of them clicked off a helmet forty feet away. Another bounced off a Bortellite's wrist. Both Bortellites emitted little exclamations of surprise. Cole didn't turn to look, but his guards did. Since their bodies weren't capable of allowing them to throw something behind their backs, they never considered that Cole might have been the cause of the exclamations. They turned to see what had happened, and as they did so Cole took off, straight toward the sun.
The maneuver only bought him about three seconds, but that was better than nothing. Pulse fire tore up the ground around him, but their eyes hadn't adjusted yet. At this angle the sun bothered his eyes; it had to be excruciating to them. He dove over a slight rise as a laser beam barely missed him, then began racing down the rockiest slope in a zigzag pattern.
The element of surprise had given him a fifteen-second head start, but now they were chasing him down the slope. He couldn't continue running straight into the setting sun; the terrain wouldn't allow it. He saw a rocky outcropping about thirty yards ahead. If he could make it there, he could change direction before they saw him do it; that might help him extend his lead by another few seconds.
He heard the thud of a body falling and chanced a quick look back. The Bortellite closest to him had slipped on a patch of gravel, and the one immediately behind him had fallen over him. The terrain was such that no Bortellite was going to risk jumping over both bodies, so they began altering course and running around them, and that bought him still more time to add to his margin.
He reached the outcropping, took a hard left, and ran past a number of caves. The rocky ground was too hard to show any footprints; that meant some of his pursuers were going to have to inspect each cave, just to make sure he hadn't ducked into one of them.
There was a forest coming up on his right, and his first urge was to head for it and hide among the trees, but he realized that all they would have to do would be to train their laser pistols on the trees and both he and the forest would go up in smoke.
He knew he had to do something soon. When the sun dipped just a little lower, he'd lose his advantage. He'd still be able to negotiate the rocky surface better than they would, but their eyes would adjust to the dark far better than his, and their fire would become that much more accurate.
He couldn't just keep running. No matter how fast and surefooted he was, he couldn't
Let me check one last thing, just to make sure I'm not committing suicide here. He slowly adjusted his position until there was a guard between him and the setting sun. He looked at the star through the glass of the Bortellite's helmet. It wasn't polarized, which meant they would be every bit as blind looking into the low-hanging sun as he hoped.
He had about three minutes left. Is there anything I've overlooked, any way to distract them during the first ten or twenty seconds?
I wonder . . . , he thought. Your shoulders are rigid, and your arms are joined very differently from mine. I'll bet you couldn't scratch an itch on your back if your life depended on it.
His hand snaked down to his pocket. They'd taken his weapons, of course. He felt around. Had they left him anything? Then his fingers came into contact with three coins. He closed his hand around them, withdrew it carefully, then stood still, waiting for the sun to drop just the tiniest bit lower.
When it did, he whipped his hand around his back and threw the coins. One of them clicked off a helmet forty feet away. Another bounced off a Bortellite's wrist. Both Bortellites emitted little exclamations of surprise. Cole didn't turn to look, but his guards did. Since their bodies weren't capable of allowing them to throw something behind their backs, they never considered that Cole might have been the cause of the exclamations. They turned to see what had happened, and as they did so Cole took off, straight toward the sun.
The maneuver only bought him about three seconds, but that was better than nothing. Pulse fire tore up the ground around him, but their eyes hadn't adjusted yet. At this angle the sun bothered his eyes; it had to be excruciating to them. He dove over a slight rise as a laser beam barely missed him, then began racing down the rockiest slope in a zigzag pattern.
The element of surprise had given him a fifteen-second head start, but now they were chasing him down the slope. He couldn't continue running straight into the setting sun; the terrain wouldn't allow it. He saw a rocky outcropping about thirty yards ahead. If he could make it there, he could change direction before they saw him do it; that might help him extend his lead by another few seconds.
He heard the thud of a body falling and chanced a quick look back. The Bortellite closest to him had slipped on a patch of gravel, and the one immediately behind him had fallen over him. The terrain was such that no Bortellite was going to risk jumping over both bodies, so they began altering course and running around them, and that bought him still more time to add to his margin.
He reached the outcropping, took a hard left, and ran past a number of caves. The rocky ground was too hard to show any footprints; that meant some of his pursuers were going to have to inspect each cave, just to make sure he hadn't ducked into one of them.
There was a forest coming up on his right, and his first urge was to head for it and hide among the trees, but he realized that all they would have to do would be to train their laser pistols on the trees and both he and the forest would go up in smoke.
He knew he had to do something soon. When the sun dipped just a little lower, he'd lose his advantage. He'd still be able to negotiate the rocky surface better than they would, but their eyes would adjust to the dark far better than his, and their fire would become that much more accurate.
He couldn't just keep running. No matter how fast and surefooted he was, he couldn't