Fear that man

after it, every inch a mile to me.
        And the Beast was on me.
        I kicked out with a last ounce of strength, caught it on the chin, stunned it. But it recovered and lunged again, thrusting claws deep into my hips and twisting them. I howled and found another ounce of strength despite what my body told me about this being the end. I kicked it again, pushed myself ahead a few more inches. My fingers slipped over the gun. It was a hard and reassuring feeling. I seemed to draw strength from the cold metal. Bringing it around, the barrel centered on the brutish face, I choked as my finger wrapped the trigger.
        “See!” he shouted, reaching a long, hairy arm out for me.
        Myna bird? Could I be certain?
        The arm brushed my chest.
        Strange scenes of a house afire, of a woman burning, of people turning into animals flashed through my mind. Noses became snouts everywhere I looked… I pulled the trigger, saw his face go up in a red fountain, and collapsed backward into darkness.
        
        When I came to, it was to see a blue sky overhead, trees flashing by on both banks, and blue water underneath. Crazy had broken the top from one of the glass bubbles, had used it as a boat, placing it in the small river that drifted through Congressman Horner’s ranch. This would be a much swifter route than the one by which we had come.
        “How are you feeling?” Lotus asked, rubbing my forehead.
        “Relieved,” I croaked.
        “I know,” she said, running a tiny hand over my cheeks.
        “No. No, you don’t,” I said, turning my face to the glass bottom where the water was revealed in depth.

----

    THREE: DIMENSIONAL LADDER
        
    Ye shall know antiquity floating dragon-head on new waters…
        

----

    I
        
        “ We will be arriving in eleven minutes, Mr. Penuel,” the hostess said, smiling white-white teeth and sparkling blue eyes. “We drop from hyperspace in three minutes.”
        “Thank you,” Sam managed to say between yawns.
        She smiled, turned and walked up the aisle, trim legs flashing tan and smooth in the dim light of the passenger cabin.
        Penuel… Penuel… It had been ten months now since Hurkos had destroyed the pink grub in Breadloaf’s office. Ten months since the empty tank beyond the wall had poured forth cold air like the maw of a frozen reptile giant. Still, he was not used to his name. Often, he never thought to answer to “Mr. Penuel.” It had been Breadloaf’s suggestion. Penuel was Hebrew for “the face of God,” and Alex was fascinated by the pun.
        Penuel… Without Alex, he would still be just plain Sam-and just plain lost. He was still lost, surely, but a little less than he had been that night ten months ago. It had been Alex Breadloaf’s encouragement and camaraderie that had saved him in his direst moment. It had been Alex Breadloaf’s concern and influence that had gotten him the position as Congressman Horner’s aide, a position that swamped him with work and forced him to forget about all the problems plaguing him. He had answers now. Temporary answers, but answers good enough to let him live comfortably with himself as long as he didn’t get morbid or melancholy and start recalling his previous funk.
        There was a subtle whining and a stiff, prolonged bumping as the giant liner slipped from hyperspace into the real thing.
        Sam flipped the switch on the viewer in front of him and stared at the picture embedded in the back of the other seat. Blackness of space, everywhere… then, slowly, the ship’s cameras tilted down and to the left, catching the green haze-covered sphere that was Chaplin I, an Earth-type, advanced colony. It looked normal from this altitude, but there had been no radio report from either of Chaplin I’s cities. Three and a quarter million people were either sleeping, in dire distress and dispossessed of their broadcasting stations, or dead. The government on Hope wanted to rule out the last thing. Common sense ruled out the first. That left only the middle, and this ship had been rushed to the rescue.
        What sort of rescue, no one knew.
        It was generally believed that some new sort of Beast had mutated on Chaplin I, since it had been a nuclear target during the last war a thousand and more years ago. With this ugly possibility in mind, one of the top bounty hunting teams had been brought along, complete with a huge, armored,