No, Odal would be helpless and lost in this situation.
He would attempt to hide among the throngs of people. All Dulaq had to do was to find him.
The terms of the duel limited both men to the pedestrian walks of the commercial quarter of the city. Dulaq knew this area intimately, and he began a methodical search through the crowds for the tall, fair-haired, blueeyed Odal.
And he saw him! After only a few minutes of walking down the major thoroughfare, he spotted his opponent, strolling calmly along a cross walk, at the level below. Dulaq hurried down the ramp, worked his way through the crowd, and saw the man again, tall and blond, unmistakable. Dulaq edged along behind him quietly, easily. No disturbance. No pushing. Plenty of time. They walked down the street for a quarter-hour while the distance between them slowly shrank from fifty meters to five.
Finally Dulaq was directly behind him, within arm’s reach. He grasped the stat-wand and pulled it from his tunic. With one quick motion he touched it to the base of the man’s skull and started to thumb the button that would release a killing bolt of energy.
The man turned suddenly. It wasn’t Odal!
Dulaq jerked back in surprise. It couldn’t be. He had seen his face. It was Odal . .. and yet this man was a stranger. Dulaq felt. the man’s eyes on him as he turned and walked away quickly.
A mistake, he told himself. You were overanxious. A good thing this is a hallucination, or the autopolice would be taking you in by now.
And yet … he had been so certain that it was Odal. A chill shuddered through himHe looked up, and there was his antagonist, on the thoroughfare above, at the precise spot where he himself had been a few minutes earlier. Their eyes met, and Odal’s lips parted in a cold smile.