Hanson flung himself face down on the stone. There was a roar of
tortured air from overhead and a thundering sound that was unlike
anything except the tearing of an infinity of cloth combined with a
sustained explosion of atomic bombs. Then it seemed as if the
thunderbolt of Thor himself had blasted in Hanson's ears.
The sky had ripped again, and this time the entire dome shook with the
shock. But that wasn't the worst of it.
The sun had broken through the hole and was falling!
VII
The fall of the sun was seemingly endless. It teetered out of the hole
and seemed to hover, spitting great gouts of flame as it encountered the
phlogiston layer. Slowly, agonizingly, it picked up speed and began its
downward rush. Unlike the sky, it seemed to obey the normal laws of
inertia Hanson had known. It swelled bit by bit, raging as it drew
nearer. And it seemed to be heading straight for the pyramid.
The heat was already rising. It began to sear the skin long before the
sun struck the normal atmosphere. Hanson could feel that he was being
baked alive. The blood in his arteries seemed to bubble and boil, though
that must have been an illusion. But he could see his skin rise in giant
blisters and heal almost at once to blister again. He screamed in agony,
and heard a million screams around him. Then the other screams began to
decrease in numbers and weaken in volume, and he knew that the slaves
were dying.
Pages:
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94