The first one had got too near; Rynason hadn't realized how
easily they could approach in this near-darkness. He felt the numbness
of the stunnerbeam spreading nearly to his shoulder; his left arm was
useless. Cursing, he trained the disintegrator along the line of the
steps and fired.
The disintegrator cut through the stone as though it were putty, for a
range of twenty feet. Rynason played the beam back and forth along the
steps, cutting them down to a smooth ramp which the attackers would have
to climb before they could get to him.
One of them tried to leap the last few levels before Rynason could cut
them, but he sliced the man in two through the chest. The separate parts
of the man's body fell and rolled back to the untouched levels below. He
had not had time to utter even a cry of pain.
For a time, now, there was complete silence in the wind. Rynason could
see the inert legs of the last attacker projecting out over the edge of
the third level down, and undoubtedly the others saw them too. They were
hesitating now, unsure of themselves.
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