"Fuck," whispered Hans, as he heard a scream from the opposite side of the castle. He stopped on the stairs that led down to the ready room, wracked with indecision.
He waited that way for several long moments. Had there been more such screams, he'd likely have gone back. If Hamilton had asked he'd have gone back. As it was, it
The path to the ready room led past the sealed pen in which the experimental slaves were kept, near the observation and cremation chamber. There was a light on in the pens. Hamilton looked in on the children. There were too many to count. Besides, lacking beds they lay on each other in a twisted tangle of heads, arms and legs. He could only hope they were all present and accounted for.
Already there were sounds coming from the last barracks room, men rising, questions being asked, the mechanical sounds of weapons being taken from racks.
Hamilton re-slung his submachine gun and grabbed the last two jars. On the smoothly polished floor his feet scrabbled for purchase, to propel him towards the still ajar door. His speed picked up . . . too fast. By the time he'd closed on the door it was all but impossible to stop. Cradling the jars against his chest, he let himself fall backwards to the floor.
He slid on back and side, closing to very near his target. His feet struck the bleeding corpse of the janissary he'd shot. That stopped him.
Hamilton smashed the jar of cyanide crystals just inside the barracks room. He could see the scattered pile. The jar of acid he smashed too, just before the spot with the crystals began. Acid splashed. Crystals began to dissolve, releasing their deadly gas.
Hamilton rolled away from the door as fast as he could, rolled and rolled and rolled until he smashed against the wall opposite the barracks. He arose to one knee, unslinging his weapon as he did. His aim lined up on the door opposite just as the first janissary emerged, barefoot, yelping, and automatically stepping high to try to avoid the burning acid below. The poor janissary had a chemical hotfoot.
Hamilton put a three-round burst into the janissary's chest, causing him to fly back into the barracks room. The door swung back and forth on its hinges, fanning the cyanide gas emanating from the crystals on the floor.
A knot of three janissaries entangled themselves and their arms at the door, each trying to force his way through and all making it impossible for any. Hamilton fired again, a long and normally tactically unsound burst. The mass of tangled men didn't fly back this time. Instead, held in place by the common mass, they oozed downward, creating a small obstacle at the base of the portal.
The next janissary out vaulted the bodies at the foot of the door. Hamilton fired and missed, fired and missed, fired and hit, spinning the janissary down, broken and bleeding.
Originally, Hans had intended to take control of the ready room and give Hamilton time to thin the exterior guards, and possibly even to divert reinforcements from af-Fridhav. There wasn't going to be time for that, now.
Hans knocked on the clear glass window beside the ready room door. The guards inside were already rising. "Open up!" Hans ordered. "Open up! The enemy is upon us."
