Brother Assassin

On the planet Sirgol the death machines have a unique and subtle mode of attack—for all the galaxy only on Sirgol is time travel possible. Now, fought to a standstill in the present, they have turned to the past in an attempt to destroy the very roots of life. The time and place of the next attack has been pinpointed: the berserkers will try to eliminate Vincent Vincento, an early genius whose loss will cost mankind a hundred years of progress in the physical sciences. Derron Odegard, one of the elite corps of Time Operatives, has the toughest assignment in Sirgol's history: protect Vincento at any cost. The berserkers have chosen to focus their latest attack upon one individual. Their target, King Ay of Queensland. His removal from history would have disastrous consequences for us . . . In nineteen or twenty days' present-time, the historical shock wave reaches us. I'm told that the chances of our finding the enemy keyhole within nineteen days are not good. Rearing over the ship was a head out of nightmare: a dragon face from some evil legend. The eyes were clouded suns the size of silver platters, the scales of head and neck were gray and heavy as wet iron. The mouth was a coffin, lid opened just a crack, all fenced inside with daggers . . . Ay met it bravely. But the full thrust of his long sword, aimed straight into the darkness of the throat, counted for no more than a jab from a woman's pin. The doorllike jaws slammed shut. For a moment, as the monstrous head swept away on its long neck, there could be seen the horrible display of broken limbs dangling outside the teeth. . .