The inside of the inverted cockpit smelled of scorched heat padding, spilled man-made signal oil. The bitter, chemical stench of boiled away nerve stimulants.
Arthur Vance climbed through the snapped emergency hatch. He lowered his boots onto the inverted cabin ceiling. His brass sight monocle hummed softly, cutting through the swirling gray haze with high-contrast infrared vision.
Suspended upside down from a tangled harness of braided steel cables and air-powered life-support tubes hung Baron Korgan Rask.
The Baron was in the throes of total neuro-chemical delirium. The emerald intravenous lines running into his neck had dumped maximum dosages of man-made catecholamines and combat stimulants into his bloodstream. He drove his automatic nervous system into violent tachycardia. His skin was mottled with purple stress hemorrhages, his lips flecked with blood-stained foam. His eyes bulged wildly as his dilated pupils darted across the shattered displays.
In his right hand, Rask clutched a gold-embossed ritual star-fire pistol, its energy cell whining as it primed a lethal discharge.
“You... Gutter vermin...” Rask hissed, his voice a ragged, choking rasp. “I’m House Rask... I’m the master of Sector Four... You’ll burn...”
Arthur didn’t hesitate. His reflexes were those of a frontline trauma surgeon facing a sudden blood rupture.
