“My apologies, sir, I must have mislaid it.”

  For a second, Morton thought she’d misheard. It was only after she’d looked again at the face of the man she’d been treating for the last few minutes that she realised who it was. Mahbarat. The shock caused her grip to slacken on the twist of material she’d been holding and she had to work quickly to gather it back together.

  Even now, knowing Mahbarat’s true identity, it was difficult to reconcile her memory of him with the man stretched in front of her. For a start, she’d never seen him without his armour and here he was wearing no more than a grubby, grey utility suit. His breathing mask was cracked and was starting to come away at the side while his left eye was so badly swollen that he couldn’t open it.

  Sunderam made a sweeping gesture taking in the whole room. “How did all this happen?”

  “How does anything happen? I explained my plan to them: I intended using them as hostages in an attempt to persuade you to come in and open negotiations.”

  “Negotiations!” Sunderam laughed. “If I’d set foot in here I’d have been a dead man.”

  Mahbarat made to protest but a wave of pain swept across his face.

  Instead, he said, “I have taught you a little too well, I think. You’re right of course. I’d even set up a little ambush.”

  He indicated two bodies lying next to the door.

  “How long did it take the others to realise that you weren’t bluffing?”

  “Once I killed the first, it didn’t take long from there.”

  “Which one was it – if you don’t mind me asking?”

  “Karrayar, of course. He was always so trusting. But he was the only representative from House Fortitude. He had no natural allegiances so it was always going to be him. The others seemed to realise it, even if he didn’t.”

  “I see,” Sunderam nodded slowly. “And were they quick to learn from his mistake?”

  “Annerat was the first to move against me which was a shame. In many ways he reminded me of you. But he was cunning enough to get Filibara to do his dirty work for him and that was nearly my undoing.”

  “But of course, you survived.”

  Mahbarat coughed, red foam bubbling at his mouth.

  “That seems to be the way of things,” he said attempting to sound dismissive but failing.

  Clutching his side, Sunderam lowered himself down onto one knee.

  “So, what happens next?”

  “I think we both know the answer to that: you will take charge until I am fit to resume my duties. Then we’ll take another look at this incident and see how it might have been avoided.”

  “I imagine that the insurrectionists will have to be tracked down and dealt with.”

  “I imagine that they will.”

  From their tone, they could have been mistaken for two old warriors reflecting on past victories.

  “Will I fall into that group, do you think? The Insurrectionists?”

  Mahbarat narrowed his eyes slightly. “None of us can be above suspicion, commander. I have yet to decide what the outcome of that investigation might be.”

  “Which surprises me,” Sunderam reflected. “Because I’ve already made my decision.”

  At that, Sunderam lightly took Morton’s hands and removed them from the tourniquet, only to replace them with his own.

  Morton felt herself being grabbed from behind before being hauled to her feet.

  “Let go of me,” she said, expecting Sunderam’s immediate support, but he seemed completely disinterested.

  Instead, he began to slowly unfurl the material which had been binding Mahbarat’s leg. The blood loss must have impaired Mahbarat’s senses because it took him a few seconds to realise what was actually happening. Then, when he tried to sit up, Sunderam single-handedly pressed him back down.

  For the first time, panic registered in Mahbarat’s face.

  “What are you doing?” Morton protested. “You’re going to kill him.”

  Sunderam turned to her, his eyes clear and unrepentant.

  “I’m sorry, doctor,” he said. “Perhaps you shouldn’t see this.”

  He nodded to one of the men who’d been holding her, prompting them to drag Morton from the room.

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  Ardent was in a bad mood as she followed the young woman down the corridor.

  Corporal Acosta was one of the Marines who’d been stationed with her aboard the Dardelion. Webster had insisted that the woman transfer over with her when she joined the Renheim, clearly intending that she oversee Ardent’s day-to-day security – only it hadn’t worked out that way. Meyer had been suspicious of her from the start, refusing to allow Acosta access to the whole sections of the ship, hugely limiting her usefulness as Ardent’s aide.

  Ardent had felt sorry for her – it couldn’t have been easy being separated from her comrades like that. But she also admired her resilience. Acosta was there waiting for her each morning when she left her cabin and was always there when she left the bridge at the end of watch.

  Tonight she’d been waiting in her usual place and Ardent had been happy for Acosta to escort her back to her cabin. Only it hadn’t happened like that.

  She’d surprised Ardent first of all by actually talking to her. Other than the usual pleasantries, the pair had exchanged no more than a handful of words since they’d arrived on the Renheim but now, Ardent found she couldn’t shut her up.

  She couldn’t make head nor tail of what Acosta was going on about so in the end simply gave in and allowed herself to be taken down into the bowels of the ship.

  The whole journey had taken a lot longer than she’d anticipated and after a thankless day watching the events on Laxx unfold she was in no mood for such distractions. She just wanted to see this thing – whatever it was – and then retire to bed.

  “It’s just in here, ma’am,” Acosta said. She’d stopped at the door of what appeared to be an ancillary room leading off the main cargo bay. There appeared to be no one else about and there was something odd about the way that Acosta was standing, as she waited for Ardent to enter, which set off warning bells in the governor’s head.

  She’d had no reason to doubt Acosta’s loyalty previously but now, suddenly, she was starting to have second thoughts. No one knew that they were down there and Ardent didn’t doubt for a second that Acosta had the ability, if it came to it, to overpower her.

  Ardent stood on the threshold for several seconds, considering her options but eventually, and largely through a sense of embarrassment, she stepped inside.

  A waft of cool air hit her as she found herself looking down a tight corridor. At the far end, a figure detached itself from the shadows and started towards her.

  “It’s alright,” Acosta assured her. “She’s with me.”

  Ardent didn’t know whether that was meant to reassure her or not but felt that she had no option but to go along with it, for now.

  The woman who approached them was thickset, wearing a pair of unflattering overalls which had seen ample use. Her hair was cut short and had been parted neatly to one side.

  She shook Ardent’s hand.

  “Chief Petty Officer Rylance, ma’am. Pleased to meet you. If you’d like to come this way.”

  Ardent made a quizzical face then followed along. She could think of no-good reason why Acosta might bring her down here but felt oddly comforted by the arrival of Rylance. Her no-nonsense approach suggested a lack of artifice which she found disarming.

  It was noisy walking down what was essentially a maintenance corridor. The walls around her pulsed with indistinguishable working sounds which were redolent with the life of the ship. The sort of sounds she was cloistered away from on the upper decks.

  After a series of sharp turns, they ended up in front of what appeared to be a large cool room. The sight of it was enough to stop Ardent dead in her tracks.

  “What’s in there?” she asked, struggling to keep the fear out of her voice.

  “It’s difficult to explain,” Acosta said from behind her. “You’d best see it for yourself.”

  “There’s nothing to be concerned about, ma’am,” Rylance said. “Nothing at all. We can leave you alone if you’d rather. So you can make up your own mind.”

  “No,” Ardent said. The thought of being abandoned down there was worse than anything she could think of on the other side of the door.

  She indicated for Rylance to take the lead and Rylance complied by levering the door open.

  The cold hit them straight away causing Ardent to catch her breath. The interior was split into several sections by long rows of dark shelving which Ardent quickly checked out.

  “What’s this used for normally?” she asked.

  “Mostly food-stuffs,” Rylance replied. “Once we take delivery, stuff’ll spoil if you leave it standing around. We stick it in here and then it’s up to catering to come and collect it.”

  “Mainly foodstuffs. What else?”

  Rylance stepped past her and moved down between a set of shelves. “Anything that’s perishable, really. Hydroponics store stuff down here until they need it but they’re actually pretty good. Don’t take liberties.”

  Rylance stepped out into a wider aisle. There were more storage shelves on the other side going back into the distance but she wasn’t concerned with that. She was looking at a trolley which had been covered with a tarpaulin. Acosta came around so that she stood facing Ardent.

  “Is this it?” Ardent asked.

  Acosta nodded, her face transformed. For a woman whose main expression up to this point had been a scowl she now looked incredibly vulnerable.

  Ardent motioned to Rylance who pulled the tarp aside and let it drop to the floor.

  “Is that an auto-doc?” Ardent said.

  “’S’right,” Rylance stepped around behind it, her breath ballooning in the air.

  “Why’s it in here? I mean what’s inside it?”

  “You’d best look for yourself.”

  The glass canopy had turned opaque where the moisture had frozen so it was impossible to look inside but on the auto-doc’s dark casing was a message written in clear white marker.

  ‘Captain Robert Faulkner formerly of USDC Mantis. Held in stasis aboard Yakutian Imperial Vessel Serrayu.’

  Beneath this was a date which was six days old. Under this was a signature with a name printed beneath.

  Surgeon Captain Elsbeth Morton

  Ardent pointed numbly at the message. “Is this for real?”

  Rylance shrugged. “We can’t confirm whether it really is Captain Faulkner, but there is a body in there.”

  “Oh my God! And is he alive?”

  “We’ve detected a baseline pulse but not much else, if I’m honest. You think it’s some kind of joke?”

  Ardent rubbed at the frosted glass but barely made an impression.

  “How did it end up in here?”

  “We got a signal lock on it and then a service-bot was instructed to retrieve it. Straightforward enough, really.”

  “We need to alert Captain Meyer,” she insisted. “Straightaway.”

  Neither Acosta nor Rylance moved.

  “What’s the matter?” Ardent said.

  The pair of them looked at one another.

  “We did that already,” Rylance said. “Told the captain, I mean. He was very clear about what he wanted us to do with it. We’ve got a cargo launcher down here. Intended for ship-to-ship transfers. Got some real oomphf! Well, every couple of weeks we put together a container of hazardous waste and stick it in the launcher.”

  Ardent couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

  “You’re telling me that he wants you to fire this thing off into space? Without even checking it?”

  Rylance considered her next few words very carefully indeed.

  “Captain Meyer’s orders were very explicit: we were to include the auto-doc in our next despatch but not to list it on the launch manifest.”

  Ardent was suddenly very angry.

  “Have you launched those other waste materials yet?”

  “Not yet,” Rylance admitted. “I wanted the chance to speak with you first.”

  “Then I suggest you follow orders and get this thing loaded.”

  Acosta and Rylance stared at the auto-doc in disbelief.

  “Once we’ve got Captain Faulkner clear of it first.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  They brought down the shuttle as close to Nash as they dared. Webster wasn’t concerned about setting off any more mines – these were anti-personnel devices after all and he imagined that the shuttle would be equipped to deal with such things.

  He instructed the pilot to set down between Nash and the Da’al camp. He didn’t want to give them the opportunity to take pot-shots at them once they’d decamped. But what he hadn’t considered was the amount of down-draft created by the shuttle. It was strong enough to pummel Nash where he stood and he visibly struggled to remain upright. He’d only have to make one misstep in order to trigger the arming mechanism.

  Wouldn’t that be the perfect irony: if Nash’d waited all this time only to get blown up now. Webster’s stupidity seemed to know no bounds.

  He waited until the engines had started powering down before indicating to the pilot that they’d be exiting the vehicle together. Webster was careful to keep his pistol well out of the thing’s range – he still wasn’t entirely sure what they were capable of. That little demonstration back at the camp where they’d started trilling along with one another had unsettled him and he was conscious that if the pilot did anything rash, he was liable to shoot first and ask questions later.

  But the Da’al appeared to be aware of this also, moving towards the rear ramp with all four of its arms flush against its sides.

  There was an unpleasant burning smell as they descended the ramp, reminiscent of burning vegetable oil, hinting at some of the many differences between the humans and their new adversaries. Not for the first time, he ruminated on whether they’d ever come to the point where the two sides would see fit to share their diverse technologies. It had happened regularly enough following similar conflicts but for some reason, he doubted that that would be the case here.

  It was an uncharacteristically gloomy thought. Just the sort of thinking he’d challenged Faulkner over in the past. It seemed that warfare did change you, and rarely for the better.

  To his credit, Nash didn’t say anything about the down draft. He was the sort who seemed to accept their fate unconditionally. Neither did he seem particularly concerned about his current predicament, which Faulkner found impressive. Nash just got on with things, seemingly unconcerned about issues surrounding his own safety. Probably just as well. If he was prepared to risk everything as human cargo aboard a communications drone, he couldn’t afford to look into things too deeply. His chances of surviving all this were slim at best, though if that were true of him, it had to be true of Webster also.

  “You still here?” Webster asked, careful to keep his gun trained on the pilot.

  “Right where you left me.”

  Nash appeared not to have moved an inch since he last saw him. He was still wearing his rucksack. Probably a wise move. The simple act of removing it might be enough to cause his foot to slip, and that would be the end of it.

  “You still looking for a ride?”

  Nash used both hands to indicate his foot. “If you can get me out of this, then, yes. Any ideas?”

  “Funnily enough, I do.”

  Saying that, Webster went over to stand next to Nash, taking care to tread lightly. Once he was certain that the pilot was looking in his direction - which was always difficult to judge - he lifted his foot and made as if to ease Nash’s to one side.

  Initially, the creature didn’t seem to understand what he was getting at but after repeated demonstrations, the message seemed to strike home. Not that the pilot showed any eagerness to comply.

  “Not very cooperative, is he?” Nash said.

  “It’s almost like he doesn’t want to help.”

  Webster moved around in an arc, bringing his weapon up to waist height. This seemed to decide their captive, who glanced up at the sun before stepping across tentatively.

  There was a moment when the pilot’s foot slid in next to Nash’s where Webster wondered if the Da’al was physically heavy enough to keep the mine’s mechanism depressed, but he needn’t have worried. Both Nash and the pilot seemed to grasp the delicate nature of what they were attempting and after a little gentle jostling, they succeeded in trading places.

  Nash hopped away, holding his right leg out in front of him.

  “Thought the cramp was going to get me there.”

  Once he was a safe distance away, he dropped onto all fours and started massaging his hamstring. Webster waited until he was back on his feet before jabbing a thumb back towards the shuttle.

  “We should get going.”

  “Not so fast,” Nash was struggling to remove his backpack. “There’s something we need to do, first.”

  He spent a few moments rifling through it before removing a small rectangular case. After opening it, he took out something which very much resembled a harmonica.

  “You going to play us a tune?”

  “Something like that.”

  And so saying, he clamped the thing between his teeth and blew. Webster wasn’t sure whether it was the strange ululating noise it made, or the way that the flanges either end vibrated, which unsettled him the most. Whichever it was, Webster didn’t like it. It was chilling to see someone mimic them like that. It was bad enough when the Da’al did it.

  Not content with that, Nash curled a shiny Nautilus shell around his ear.

  “A translator?” Webster said. “Who’s come up with all this stuff?”

  “Linguists, mostly. They’re taking it all very seriously back on Earth Prime.”

  Webster’s eyes switched from the pilot to Nash and back again.

  “And does it work?”

  “I think we’re about to find out.”

  What happened next was one of the strangest interactions Webster had ever witnessed. It had the weirdest synergy about it: a cross between jazz musicians jamming and some bizarre mating ritual. The pilot, who appeared reluctant to get involved at first, quickly became caught up in it, producing sounds which were at times light and eloquent while at others harsh and unpleasant. Everything they said accompanied by a series of intricate hand gestures. Webster couldn’t comprehend most of it but there was a lot of meaningful pointing going on.