Roughly a mile down the path from the stream, Blade stopped abruptly. On either side of the path, ferns, vines, bushes, and even small trees were crushed into the ground. A trail of more of the same damage led off into the woods to the left. A large tree at the head of the trail showed a black scar. Blade looked more closely at the tree. Something had gouged out bark and wood to a depth of at least six inches, and also burned the edges of the wound to charcoal.

Blade followed the trail. It came to an end within fifty yards, and the smell stopped Blade even sooner. Decay and insects hadn't left enough of the animal to make it worth going closer. It must have been about the size of a large bear, and its skull and ribs showed the same sort of blackening as the tree.

Blade began to wonder just how primitive the people of this Dimension were. They'd obviously wrecked much of their civilization. Just as obviously, they had enough technology left to produce a weapon very much like a laser. That didn't make them any less dangerous, of course. Civilized people can be as unfriendly to strangers as primitive ones. With machine guns, lasers, and artillery they can also be unfriendly at a much greater range and in a much more destructive way.

It was also more important than before to get out of the woods before nightfall. Blade was sure he could outtalk, outfight, or if necessary outrun most human opponents. He wasn't nearly so confident he could do the same with a creature ten times his weight and probably carnivorous.

Blade returned to the path and started off again, moving a good deal more briskly than before.

Chapter 3

Blade covered at least two miles at a trot, then saw the path was sloping downhill. At the same time the trees began to thin out. Soon Blade could make out the tumbled, overgrown stone blocks of a wall ahead. He climbed over the wall and picked his way across another stream on the half-submerged ruins of a bridge. After a few hundred yards more through young trees, Blade found himself on an open hillside. The sun was still well above the horizon. At the foot of the hill the city of towers loomed against a pale sky. In the clear air Blade felt he could reach out and touch it. Even from this distance it showed remarkably little damage. Most of the windows and doors were black and gaping, and here and there stone had crumbled or metal paneling had corroded through. Bushes sprouted from cracks in the streets, and the wreckage of one of the aerial bridges completely blocked an intersection. Otherwise the city might have been sleeping rather than dead. It was easy to tell that its builders had loved beauty and put that love into their city, without a thought for the war which their love of beauty hadn't been able to prevent.

On the hillside sloping down to the city, Blade saw clusters of ruined buildings. Some of the clusters were practically small towns in themselves, others were isolated and overgrown. The «suburbs» hadn't been so robustly built as the towers of the city itself.

In a way, Blade found the city of towers a more depressing sight than the ruins to the west. He was glad it was late enough in the day to give him an excuse to stay out of the city until morning. He didn't care for the thought of prowling dark streets where the least superstitious man might find himself watching and listening for ghosts.

Blade stiffened as he realized the morbid and dangerous turn his thoughts were taking. He'd been letting his attention wander, at a time when he had to be even more alert than he'd been in the forest. He took cover behind a bush and found that when he could no longer see those dead towers looming over him, the gloomy thoughts went away.

He also realized that if he hadn't been alone he wouldn't have felt this way. He wouldn't be too particular about the company, either. He remembered some of his old comrades from MI6A, dour men who seldom talked about anything except their profession and the price of whisky. Even one of them would have been a relief.

Blade was as much a loner as any sane man can be. He wouldn't have joined MI6A in the first place if he wasn't. But even a man as naturally solitary as a cat can occasionally want someone to talk to or at least to guard his back. But Blade didn't even have someone else who'd faced the dangers of Dimension X and could swap stories with him over a bottle of Scotch! According to Leighton, they were one step closer to sending someone else to Dimension X, once an alloy-weapon or suit could he manufactured to increase the survival chances. Still, even if such a protective device were made, they'd still have to find someone who could travel into Dimension X and return alive and sane, and the search for such a person was as far from success as ever.

Blade decided that if he had a choice between a happy marriage in Home Dimension and a comrade-in-arms for travel into Dimension X, he'd choose the second. It was hard to imagine a woman worth marrying who would accept being shut out of most of her husband's working life. She would be shut out-the Official Secrets Act would see to that. Even worse, she'd have a good chance of ending up a widow without ever being allowed to know how!

Blade rose, stepped out into the open, then stopped in midstride. Smoke and dust were rising from one of the clusters of ruins, less than half a mile away. Then he saw running figures burst out of the ruins onto the open hillside. They seemed to be human, with dark skins or wearing dark clothing. Some ran singly, others in pairs. Darker shapes, low to the ground, seemed to be running after the people and among them. As Blade watched he saw the reddish flicker of sunset light on metal, then a longer, greenish glow which looked artificial. Lasers?

Blade drew his knife and started down the hill, using every bit of cover he could. About halfway down the hill he saw what the low dark shapes were. He saw the short legs, the smooth brown coats, the pointed heads with ugly red eyes, the obscenely hairless tails.

Rats.

Rats the size of German Shepherds!

Blade charged out from behind a stretch of broken wall and plunged down the hill like an Olympic sprinter.

Blade loathed rats. He'd loathed them ever since a night on one of his first missions for MI6A. He'd spent that night in a hut on the outskirts of Calcutta, along with the rat-gnawed corpse of a baby no more than three months old. Ever since that night he'd killed rats any time he had a chance, coolly, efficiently, and as thoroughly as possible.

Blade went down the hill with all thoughts of having no one to guard his back quite forgotten. He didn't quite forget that he had a back to guard. He never went that far, one of the reasons he was still alive after so many years of enough dangers to kill a dozen men. Instead of staying under cover of the ruins, Blade now stayed in the open, as far from any cover as possible. Crumbling walls and fallen roofs could hide the rats. With his knife and club, Blade could fight them safely only if he saw them coming a long way off. It would also help if he didn't suddenly burst out of nowhere at the people fighting the rats. They might be just a little bit trigger-happy right now!

Blade counted about a dozen people and at least twice that many rats. Four of the people seemed to be armed with rifles firing lasers or some other type of energy beam. The others carried bows or spears. All of them carried short swords strapped to their hips. So far none of the rats were close enough to make the people draw their swords.

The battle was moving uphill toward Blade, and the people were leaving a trail of dead or dying rats behind them as they climbed. Every time one rat went down, two or three more seemed to pop out of the ruins, and they were tough. Blade saw one lose a leg to a laser beam but keep coming on three legs until someone else put an arrow through its brain.