ing wallop on the side of her jaw. Her head snapped up and
her knees caved in. She folded from the hips and went down bonelessly.
From her throat came the bubbly sound of air being forced painfully
through a flaccid wet tube.

I jumped outside of the cell barrier because I was certain that they had
some means of closing the cell from a master control center. I don't
know much about penology, but that's the way I'd do it. I was
half-surprised that I'd been able to get away with this much.

Catherine stirred and moaned, and I stopped long enough to take the key
out of the wall plate. The cell door closed on its silent slides.

I had hardly been able to more than run the zipper up my shirt when the
door opened and I had to dance like a fool to get behind it. The door
admitted a flood of bright light from the corridor, and Dr. James
Thorndyke. The cell door must have been bugged.

Thorndyke came in behind a large automatic clutched in one nervous fist.
He strained his eyes at the gloom that was not cut by the ribbon of
light.

And then I cut him down with a solid slice of my right hand to the base
of his neck. I remembered to jump off the ground as the blow went home;
there was a sickening crunch of bone and muscle as Thorndyke caved
forward to the floor. He dropped the gun, luckily, as his body began to
twitch and kick spasmodically as the life drained out of him.

I re-swallowed a mouthful of bitter bile as I reached down to pick up
his gun. Then the room got hot and unbearably small and I felt a frantic
urge to leave, to close the door upon that sight.

XXV

I was yards away from my door before my panic left me. Then I remembered
where and who I was and took a fast look around. There was no one else
in the corridor, of course, or I would not have been able to cut and run
as I had. But I looked around anyway until my reasoning power told me
that I had done little to help my position.

Like the canary, my plans for escape ended once I was outside of my
cage. I literally did not know what to do with my new-found freedom. One
thing was becoming painfully obvious: I'd be pinned down tight once I
put a foot outside of the dead area in which this building was
constructed. What I needed was friends, arms, ammunition, and a good,
solid plan of escape. I had neither; unless you call my jailed friends
such help. And there I could not go; the tell-tales would give me away
to the master control center before I could