After four jumps, muffled by his rubber-soled shoes, he found the vent. His next leap gained him two fingerholds and in a moment he had got a firm grip with both hands. Now what?
Why, he thought, I’ll bring my legs up and kick the plate until it comes loose, and then I’ll pull myself up into the hole and be off. Righto. He drew his legs up, and with a sort of half flip he kicked the plate with one toe. It made hardly any noise, but he was disappointed at how weak the blow was. This time he got swinging first, and then used the momentum of his pendulum motion to emphasize the kick as he flipped again and drove his heel at the grille.
With an echoing clang of broken metal his foot punched completely through the grille. The recoil of the kick wrenched his hands free, but he didn’t fall back to the floor; instead he hung upside down, his foot caught in the twisted wreck of the vent.
Shouts echoed eerily through the corridors, and the prisoners below Frank whimpered in uncomprehending fear. An alarm added its flat howl to the confusion. Frank, dangling from the ceiling, pulled at his trapped foot, hoping to be able to return to his cot before the guards arrived. Footsteps thudded in the corridor, and immediately the lights in Frank’s cell flashed on, blinding him. The will to move left his body and he relaxed, swinging limp from the mooring of his foot. He heard the door rattle and squeak open, and then something hard was driven with savage force into his stomach and consciousness left him.
FRANK came back to wakefulness by degrees, like a length of seaweed being gradually nudged to shore by succeeding waves. First he was aware of a hum of voices and a sense of being carried about. None of it seemed to demand a response.
Then he dimly knew he was sleeping, but it was a deep, heavy sleep, and he did not want to wake up yet even though it sounded as if some people were up already.
Abruptly, a cold finger and thumb pried his right eyelid open. Frank saw an unfocused sea of bright gray.
“This kid’s okay,” came a loud, gravelly voice. “Throw him over there with that clown who set his bed on fire.”
Frank had groggily assumed that the voice was speaking figuratively when it said “throw,” but now unseen hands clamped on his ankles and wrists. “Wait, wait—” Frank began mumbling. “Heave ho!” called someone cheerily, and Frank found himself lifted from whatever he’d been lying on and tossed sprawling into the air. His eyes sprang open wide and he grabbed convulsively at nothing. He saw the concrete floor rushing up at him and he managed to twist around in midair so that he landed on his hip instead of his head. The sharp, aching pain of the impact was his first clear sensation of the morning.
Laughter rang loud in the room, and Frank looked up from where he lay to see what sort of people were amused by this. A Transport captain and four guards returned his gaze with a mixture of humor and scornful contempt in their eyes. All of them wore pistols, and two of the guards held coils of rope.
“Take these two jerks first,” said the captain, pointing in Frank’s direction. “And tie their hands.” The man exited and the four guards walked over to Frank and rolled him over onto his face, then quickly and securely tied his wrists together behind him. They left him lying there and moved on to someone behind him.
“Get up now,” one of the guards said. Frank struggled to his knees and then stood up. His stomach was a collage of pain and numbness, and he sagged when he straightened up; the colors of unconsciousness began to glitter before his eyes. He lowered his head and breathed deeply, and the weakness passed. He heard a sigh behind him and turned to see a tall, thin man with graying hair. It must be the guy who set fire to his bed, Frank realized.
“All right, you two, get moving,” a guard said. “Out that door.”
Frank and his sad-eyed companion shambled out of the little room and, escorted by the guards, made their way down a corridor to an open doorway. Morning sunlight glared on wet asphalt outside, and the air was cold.
Somehow Frank was not very depressed. The light of day had dispelled the fears of the night, and his system was buoyed up by the realization that he was embarking on a perilous journey. Anything can happen, he thought.
The guards prodded the two blinking prisoners outside. Five hundred yards away the silver needle of a Transport ship stood up against the sky, gleaming in the sun like a polished sword. Even though it was the vehicle that was to carry him to Orestes, Frank was overcome with the beauty of the thing.
“Are these our two escapees?” asked a Transport officer who had walked up while Frank was staring at the rocket. He carried in his hand an object that looked like a rubber stamp or a wax seal.
“Yes, sir,” answered one of the guards.
“Open their shirts,” the officer said. A guard took hold of Frank’s shirt-collar ends and yanked them apart. Three buttons clicked on the asphalt. I’m glad this is just an old painting shirt, Frank thought automatically. He heard his companion’s shirt being dealt with in the same way.
“Now, boys, this won’t hurt a bit,” said the officer with a cold smile as he pressed the seal onto Frank’s chest. The metal felt warm and itched a little, but was not uncomfortable. “There,” the officer said. “Now everyone will know at a glance who you are.”
Frank looked down past his chin and saw a mark on his chest. It was a circle with a capital E inside it. “Escapee,” the officer explained. He turned to the guards. “Get these monkeys aboard. We lift at nine-seventeen.” He strode off without another word.
“You heard the man, lads,” grinned a guard. “Start walking. Your friends will be coming along as soon as you two maniacs are aboard.” Flanked by the arrogant guards, Frank and the bed-burner set off across the tarmac toward the ship. Frank’s eyes were becoming accustomed to the daylight and he looked around as he walked. To his right, a hundred yards away, was a chain-link fence topped with strands of barbed wire. Half-a-dozen big tractor motors were stacked against it at one point. Beyond the fence, he knew, was the channel in which the Malachi River surged its way to the distant sea. At his left was visible a cluster of undistinguished gray buildings. Not a really fine view, Frank thought, considering it’s probably the last time I’ll see this planet. The thought raised a clamoring flock of emotions in him, which he determinedly strangled and put away. It simply would not do, he told himself, to burst into tears out here.
The gray-haired prisoner who paced along beside Frank was acting oddly. He was whimpering, and his wide-open eyes flicked around as if he were watching the quick, erratic course of a wasp. “Are you okay?” asked Frank quietly.
“There’s no way,” the man said.
“What’s that?” asked a guard.
“There’s no way!” the man shouted. The guards, sensing a dangerous frenzy, backed away a pace. Frank did, too. The guards were all concentrating their attention on the crazed bed-burner, and it occurred to Frank that since Francisco Rovzar was already branded as an escapee, he had nothing to lose by trying it again. He took another step back, so that the guards were all in front of him.
“Oh my God, there’s no way!” shrieked the grayhaired man, who now took off at a dead run toward the buildings. At the same moment Frank turned and sprinted, as quietly as he could, toward the chain-link fence and the tractor motors. He heard, without thinking about it, angry calls behind him. Forget it, he thought, they’re after that old guy. Keep running.
“Hey. You!” sounded an exasperated shout. That’s probably me he’s yelling at; well, I have to play out the hand now, he thought. He strained for more speed, ignoring the shortness of his breath and the pain in his stomach. The fence seemed to slowly jerk closer. Vividly, he pictured the guard unsnapping the flap on his holster, lifting out the pistol, and raising it to eye level. Should I weave right and left to spoil their aim? No, that’d slow me down, he thought.