tion id="u7fa72bf2-c202-53c1-9ed3-977e3e6d29eb">
Only too aware, now, of the deadliness of his deceptively quiet surroundings …
… Gregory stood up.
Despite being insulated by the surrounding vacuum, he could feel his shipboard utilities—which with helmet and gloves doubled as an emergency environmental suit—stiffening around him, could feel the cold as though it literally were seeping in.
Impossible, of course. Heat was escaping his body, not cold seeping in, but that was what it undeniably felt like. His feet … he couldn’t feel his feet anymore, and his legs were starting to burn.
He felt oddly tranquil, despite the pain, despite the sudden realization that he may have just made a serious mistake. The landscape was serene, dark, utterly silent. It would have been easy to step out of the ruin of his Starblade and onto that flat, rock-strewn plain. That step, he knew, would have been lethal.
He also felt heavy. The planet’s gravity was dragging at him with almost twice the pull of home. But he managed to stand up straight … and raise his arms.
Overhead, St. Clair’s fighter descended like an unfolding blanket … the alien robots encircling it at a range of thirty meters. The blackness descended on him, scooped him up, folded him in …
And Gregory screamed with pain.
HarperVoyager
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
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London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain by HarperVoyager 2015
Copyright © William H. Keith, Jr 2015
Jacket layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2015
Cover art by Gregory Bridges
William H. Keith, Jr asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 9780007483792
Ebook Edition © May 2015 ISBN: 9780007483839
Version: 2015-04-23
For Deb, and, as ever, for Brea
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