Captain Liam O'Leary muttered groggily: "They don't want to escape. All they want is to make trouble. I know cons!"
He came fully awake and sat up and focused his eyes. His head was hammering.
That girl, that Bradley, was leaning over him. She looked scared and sick. "Sit still! Sauer is just plain crazy—listen to them yelling out there!"
O'Leary sat up and looked around, one hand holding his drumming skull.
"They do want to escape," said Sue-Ann Bradley. "Listen to what they're saying!"
O'Leary discovered that he was in a cell. There was a battle going on outside. Men were yelling, but he couldn't see them.
He jumped up, remembering. "The governor!"
Sue-Ann Bradley said: "He's all right. I think he is, anyway. He's in the cell right next to us, with a couple guards. I guess they came up with you." She shivered as the yells in the corridor rose. "Sauer is angry at the medic," she explained. "He wants him to fix Flock up so they can—'crush out,' I think he said. The medic says he can't do it. You see, Flock got burned pretty badly with a knife he made. Something about the tanglefoot field—"
"Eddy currents," said O'Leary dizzily.