He reached a position near the central hallway from which he could see the base of the stairs. He couldn’t move any closer to his goal without exposing himself to enemy fire. Taking a vial from the pocket of his bodysuit, he threw it to the floor halfway between himself and the stairs. The vial shattered and the chemicals that had been separated in the two halves combined to produce a thick cloud of black, smelly smoke. Richard ran out through the middle of the cloud toward the foot of the stairway. The smoke blinded him as much as the Mentad, but he knew what direction he was going in. Because there were so many of them, he had much more chance of firing blindly and hitting an enemy than they had of hitting him.
He reached the base of the stairs and hurled another smoke bomb up toward th
