"In here!" Roal shouted to Shorty. He leaped through an open door beside him into a sort of storeroom lined with shelves of chemicals and electrical equipment.
They were out of sight of the enemy for an instant and had time to catch a breath and a glimpse of their surroundings. The place looked like some biological or chemical laboratory. Sebours was dressed in a sterile garb as if about to perform some dissection or operation, they had noted. And he seemed to be in complete charge, for the Martians called him master, and hastened to obey him.
Roal and Shorty stationed themselves on each side of the doorway. As the Martians made futile attempts to burn them down the Earthmen slew them as they appeared in the line of sight. They were safe enough for the moment, but they didn't have time or ammunition enough to kill all the Martians that could attack. It was only a temporary stalemate.
On Roal's side there was a small window, evidently for passing supplies from the storeroom to the laboratory. But it was at right angles to the doorway and did not look out upon the main part of the laboratory. Roal had avoided getting in line with the window, but he glanced towards it hoping to find a means of escape.
Beyond the window was a polished wooden cabinet in which the lights of the room reflected. The cabinet door was half open and moving slowly with the motion of the air in the room. As Roal watched it idly he saw in its polished surface a distorted reflection of the laboratory.
Suddenly, in the reflecting surface, he saw Sebours cautiously leave his place of hiding and warn the Martians to stand guard. Then he returned to the table where he had been working. The swinging door shifted the reflection out of Roal's vision, but in that instant he had seen something that turned him cold.
On the table where Sebours was working lay a still form. A human body graced with a head of golden hair like none that Roal had ever seen. Except once—
Alayna.
He wished the door would swing back. But as if in confirmation of his identification a low cry of terror suddenly shot through the room. And it was Alayna's voice. Roal knew that he could never mistake it.