Inherit the Earth - Brian Stableford [87]
He stepped to the very edge of the abyss, spread his arms wide as if they were wings, and jumped.
Perhaps he could have flown, if he’d only known how, or even if he’d only had enough faith in himself—but he didn’t.
Damon fell into the awful abyss, and terror swallowed him up.
He lost consciousness long before he reached the bottom, and was glad to be received by the merciful darkness.
Nineteen
W
hen Damon awoke he was not in pain, but his mind seemed clouded, as if his brain were afflicted by a warm and clammy mist. He had endured such sensations before, when his internal technology had been required to deal with the aftermath of drink or drugs. In such circumstances, even the most vivid dream should easily have drifted into oblivion, but the unnaturally lucid dream of the mirror man clung tight to memory, and the legacy of that final fall was with him still.
When he finally forced his eyes open he found that he was, as the mirror man had insisted, lying on a bed, wearing neither a hood nor a bodysuit. He looked down at himself to find that he was dressed in the same suitskin he had been wearing when he stepped into the elevator with Rajuder Singh. It was not noticeably dirtier than it had been then, but there was a ragged tear in the middle of his chest that hadn’t had time to heal.
He sat up. The bed on which he was lying had a heavy iron frame that gave it the appearance of a genuine antique, although it was presumably there for utility’s rather than art’s sake. His right wrist was handcuffed to one of the uprights.
It took him a few seconds to realize that his was not the only bed in the room, and that he was not the only prisoner it held. He blinked away the mucus that was still obscuring his vision slightly and met the inquisitive gaze of his companion. She was not as tall as recent fashion prescribed, but he judged that she was nevertheless authentically young. Her blond hair was in some disarray, and she was handcuffed just as he was, but she didn’t seem to be in dire distress.
“Who are you?” he asked dully.
“Catherine Praill,” she told him. “Who are you?”
“Damon Hart,” he replied reflexively—a second or two before the significance of what she had said sunk in. He reached up with his free hand to rub the sleep from his eyes. His hand was trembling slightly.
“Are you all right?” the girl asked. She seemed a little tremulous herself—understandably, if she too had been kidnapped by the man of mercury and his associates.
“Just confused,” he assured her. “Do you know where we are?”
“No,” she answered. Then, as if fearing that her bluntness might seem impolite, she added: “I’ve heard of you. Silas mentioned your name.”
Damon inferred that she hadn’t been in a position to keep tabs on the Eliminator boards, or she’d surely have mentioned Operator 101’s last message before recalling that Silas Arnett had “mentioned his name.”
“I’ve heard of you too,” he said. “Lenny Garon told me you’d disappeared.”
“Lenny?” She was genuinely astonished by the introduction of that name. “How did he know? I hardly know him. Didn’t he leave home or something?”
“He asked after you when your name came up in connection with Silas Arnett’s kidnapping. How long have you been here? Who brought you?”
She recoiled slightly under the pressure of the doubled-up questions. “I don’t know anything,” she protested defensively. “I was in a car—the police were taking me home after questioning me. I must have dozed off. I’ve been awake for about an hour but I haven’t seen anyone except you. I don’t feel hungry or thirsty, so I can’t have been asleep very long—but if you think you’re confused. . . .” She left it at that.
“So you’ve no idea what day it is, I suppose, or where we might be?” Damon looked around the room for clues, but there were no obvious ones to be seen. There was nothing visible through the room’s only window but a patch of blue sky. The patterned carpet that covered the floor looked as old as the bedstead, but it was probably modern. It was faded but quite free of dust and crumbs—which suggested that it had a suitskin