was in the thicker shadows,
but there seemed to be no one following him.

At the gate of the dome, he looked back again, then ducked into the
locker building. He threaded through the maze of the lockers with his
knife ready in his hand, trying not to attract suspicion. At this hour,
though, most of the place was empty. The crowds of foremen and
deliverymen who'd be going in and out through the day were lacking.

He found his suit and helmet and clamped them on quickly, transferring
the knife to its spring sheath outside the suit. He checked the tiny
batteries that were recharged by generators in the soles of the boots
with every step. Then he paid his toll for the opening of the private
slit and went through, into the darkness outside the dome.

Lights bobbed about--police in pairs, patrolling in the better streets,
walking as far from the houses as they could; a few groups, depending on
numbers for safety; some of the very poor, stumbling about and hoping
for a drink somehow; and probably hoods from the gangs that ruled the
nights here.

Gordon left his torch unlighted, and moved along; there was a little
illumination from the phosphorescent markers at some of the corners, and
from the stars. He could just make his way without marking himself with
a light.

Damn it, he should have hired a few of the younger bums from Mother
Corey's. Here he couldn't hear footsteps. He located a pair of
patrolling cops, and followed them down one street, until they swung
off. Then he was on his own again.

"Gov'nor!" The word barely reached him, and Bruce Gordon spun around,
the knife twitching into his hand. It was a thin kid of perhaps eighteen
behind him, carrying a torch that was filtered to bare visibility. It
swung up, and he saw a pock-marked face that was twisted in a smile
meant to be ingratiating.

"You've got a pad on your tail," the kid said, again as low as his
amplifier would permit. "Need a convoy?"

Gordon studied him briefly, and grinned. Then his grin wiped out as the
kid's arm flashed to his shoulder and back, a series of quick jerks that
seemed almost a blur. Four knives stood buried in the ground at Gordon's
feet, forming a square--and a fifth was in the kid's hand.

"How much?" he asked, as the kid scooped up the blades and shoved them
expertly back into shoulder sheaths. The kid's hand shaped a C quickly,
and Gordon slipped his arm through a self-sealing slit in the airsuit
and brought out two of them.