'You must have been pretty desperate, taking on a job like that.'

Dakota shook her head. 'Don't even ask. Every time this disruption happened, the systems always came back online eventually. To cut a long story short, it turned out I was fetching Bourdain a GiantKiller.'

Josef's eyes were just about popping out of his head by this point. 'You're s.h.i.tting s.h.i.tting me,' he said, after a moment. 'A GiantKiller? Those things are supposed to be only a rumour. So they really exist? And that's what ripped up Bourdain's pride and joy?' me,' he said, after a moment. 'A GiantKiller? Those things are supposed to be only a rumour. So they really exist? And that's what ripped up Bourdain's pride and joy?'

'Yeah, but not before he grabbed me and started torturing me, since he seemed to think I'd sneaked a look at his cargo and figured out what it actually was.'

'Wait a minute.' Josef put up a hand. 'So you didn't know what you were delivering. But you just said it was a GiantKiller. Who told you that-Bourdain?'

'No.' Dakota thought fast for a moment, but a sense of self-preservation kept her from mentioning the Shoal-member. 'I kind of read between the lines when something started eating the asteroid. I witnessed the whole thing, after the atmosphere gave out and I managed to escape. If it is a GiantKiller, your guess is as good as mine as to what made it go off.'

'So, what, you think it self-activated? Or someone else set it off?'

'Why not? Think how many enemies Bourdain must have. Think how much sense that would make. I deliver the GiantKiller, and somebody else detonates it. Who gets the blame? Me. When this all blows over-if it ever does-the first thing I'll do is find the shipping agent who acted as the go-between in all this. That's where I'll get some answers, I'm sure of it.'

'This shipping agent. Anyone I know?'

'Constantin Quill, based in-'

'I know of him. Or at least I do now. He's dead.'

Dakota started. 'He-?'

'Don't know the circ.u.mstances, but apparently what was left of him was pretty messy. Somebody put him in the same room as a couple of half-starved Mogs. That's not official news, but you get to hear things on the grapevine.'

'Great.' Dakota lowered her gaze and sighed. She then accepted a gla.s.s of the pink coffee and tasted it, feeling a warming numbness slide down her throat and into her stomach. She began to relax despite herself. 'Nice to know the kind of future I've got to look forward to myself, then.'

'If Bourdain's responsible for Quill's murder, then it means he's covering his tracks. Losing the Rock is a major blow for him, but if it gets found out he was involved in acquiring illegal alien technology like a GiantKiller. . .'

Josef let the words trail off and fixed her with an inquisitorial gaze. 'Okay, now you get to tell me what you want from me.'

'I know you don't owe me anything.'

'You get special dispensation. We had something going, the two of us, even if it was a long time ago.' get special dispensation. We had something going, the two of us, even if it was a long time ago.'

The coffee was making it harder for Dakota to stay focused. She put down the empty gla.s.s and pushed it away with unsteady fingers. 'You were always particularly good with contacts.'

'Rich family, generations of businessmen. It helps.'

'Yeah.'

'Where do you want to go now, Dakota? Somewhere far away?'

'The further the better. For a long, long time.'

Josef shook his head. 'I'll try, but it isn't going to be easy.'

'How so?'

'You're being blamed for the destruction of a minor world. A couple of thousand people are dead, and you're the prime suspect for their ma.s.s murder. Worse, you're a machine-head, directly implicated in the Port Gabriel ma.s.sacre. How long was it before you got yourself black-market implants?'

'Why do you care?'

'Humour me.'

'I survived OK for about six months after they let us all out of internment. Then they took away our Ghosts, and I wanted to die. I had new implants put in as soon as humanly possible. Pretty well immediately.'

'How about countermeasures?' he asked.

'I don't know what you mean.'

'Sure you do.' Josef chuckled. 'I'm talking about methods to survive your implants being compromised.'

'Everybody has their own way of dealing with that possibility.'

'And what's yours? Some means of wiping or disabling your own implants, maybe a coded message?'

'That sounds like suicide.'

'But better than the alternative, like losing your mind to outside control, don't you think?'

'I guess. And even if I did-'

'You wouldn't tell me? Fine. And there's nothing else you want to tell me?' Josef's eyes were searching her face.

'Perhaps . . .'

'Yes?'

'No, Josef, there's nothing else I can think of.'

He obviously wasn't satisfied with this answer, but she couldn't find any real reason to burden him with the truth. a.s.suming he would even believe her, which struck Dakota as unlikely.

'OK,' he said at length. 'I can't help thinking I might come to regret this, but I'll see what I can do for you.'

She tried not to look too obviously relieved.

Dakota woke from a dream-filled sleep to find that already fourteen hours had pa.s.sed since her meeting with Josef.

In the meantime she'd found herself a room-cell would be a more accurate description-in an echoing warren of twenty-four hour rentals that accepted anonymous payment. She could have stayed on the would be a more accurate description-in an echoing warren of twenty-four hour rentals that accepted anonymous payment. She could have stayed on the Piri Reis, Piri Reis, of course, but Mesa Verde's docks would be Bourdain's first port of call if he came looking for her. of course, but Mesa Verde's docks would be Bourdain's first port of call if he came looking for her.

When she woke, it was from a nightmare of being incarcerated in a tiny s.p.a.ce at the centre of Bourdain's Rock that got steadily smaller and hotter, squeezing in around her until she couldn't breathe. The room she'd hired was too small to stand up in, and for a few moments she panted asthmatically, staring up at a ceiling that was far too close, until she got her bearings.

Her thoughts smoothed out as her implants soothed her jagged brain waves, and she began to breathe more easily. Her Ghost informed her that Josef wanted her to return to his office. Apparently he'd found something suitable for her.

The dream had felt so real she felt half-sure she'd find the door out of her rented room locked when she tried to open it. Crouching to stop her head b.u.mping against the ridiculously low ceiling, she felt an irrational wave of relief when the door opened smoothly on to a busy public corridor.

'My name is Gardner. David Gardner.'

Gardner stood up and nodded politely to Dakota as she entered Josef's office. He had close-cropped hair that she suspected he'd allowed to grow grey just enough to lend him a certain air of authority, and his dress was just this side of conservative. She thought there was something cold in the way his pale, milky eyes appraised her.

'I've already explained how you're looking for work, Mala.' Josef took her by the elbow and guided her to one of the couches directly facing Gardner as he resumed his seat.

Dakota noticed the way Josef was subtly deferential towards the other man, the way Gardner sat with his arms draped across the back of his chair in a pose making him seem so much at home. It was as if they were in Gardner's office, rather than Josef's.

'You're a machine-head,' Gardner stated flatly.

Dakota glanced at Josef, who nodded go on go on to her as he took a seat to one side of them. to her as he took a seat to one side of them.

'Yes.'

Gardner nodded thoughtfully, as if carefully considering this information. 'Josefs explained to me you weren't anywhere near Redstone when those ma.s.sacres took place. Nevertheless, I'm sure you understand why it's important I ask you how well your artificial immune system can be trusted to protect you.'

Dakota knew Gardner was referring to her Ghost's ability to react to and then prevent hostile intrusions. She glanced sideways at Josef, but he was carefully avoiding her gaze. She wondered how worried that should make her.

'It's the best available,' she replied. 'That's all you need to know.'

Dakota wondered if she saw a glint of amus.e.m.e.nt in Gardner's eyes. 'Yet there are never total guarantees, are there? History can repeat itself.'

'I'm sorry,' Dakota said, turning towards Josef, 'but who the h.e.l.l is this?'

Josef leaned over and put a hand on her arm. 'Just listen to him.'

Gardner continued as if she had said nothing. 'There must be very few people, apart from others like yourself, whom you can fully trust. I gather it's quite a wrenching experience to lose your Ghost implants.'

'It is,' Dakota replied levelly. 'It's the worst thing you could imagine.'

Gardner chuckled and glanced at Josef, who smiled tightly. Internal alarm bells that had nothing to do with her Ghost circuits were starting to clamour inside Dakota's head.

Gardner leaned forward. 'Let's not beat about the bush here, Miss Oorthaus. I understand you are used to dangerous work, and the job I specifically require a machine-head for may prove very dangerous indeed. But ultimately extremely profitable.'

'I appreciate that, Mr Gardner, and my piloting skills are the best. But you're going to have to tell me just what it is you need me to do.'

'You are familiar with colonial surveys?'

Ah, that was it.

Because humanity, in the form of the Consortium, was restricted by the Shoal to travel only within a bubble of s.p.a.ce a few hundred light years across, potentially habitable worlds within that bubble were becoming a precious and dwindling resource. In fact, most of the systems to be found within that bubble of s.p.a.ce did not contain any Earth-like worlds. In those systems that did, few of the worlds were life-bearing, and even fewer of those were capable of supporting human beings unaided.

Compet.i.tion for such limited resources was subsequently extremely fierce-and occasionally deadly.

It was not unknown for claim-jumping to take place. Rival groups chasing after the gradually dwindling number of colonial contracts could separately find their way to a promising system via coreship and, by the force of arms, prevent another colony from being set up there. The Shoal appeared to care little whether such armies were carried across s.p.a.ce in the Shoal coreships so long as they themselves were not threatened.

Most such incidents of colonial rivalry ended in decades of litigation, while Consortium warships remained in orbit above those barely habitable worlds until such time as the courts decided who should get which contract. The origins of the Consortium itself lay in arbitrating such conflicts: disparate private enterprises had been merged under a general UN charter, and an administrative Council set up to oversee exploration and exploitation in an attempt to bring order to an otherwise chaotic interstellar land-rush.

The precursors to such contracts were colonial surveys, whereby the potential colonists could raise funds to send ships and survey teams to a.s.sess the likely costs and time-scales for establishing viable settlements. Such expeditions were particularly p.r.o.ne to piracy.

'I've never taken part in a colonial survey, but. . .'

'Yes?' Gardner raised his eyebrows.

Careful, thought Dakota: she'd almost mentioned Redstone. thought Dakota: she'd almost mentioned Redstone. She She had been there, but Mala hadn't. had been there, but Mala hadn't.

'But I'm more than aware of the dangers involved. Particularly after the Freehold-Uchidan conflict.'

'So can I a.s.sume you're at least familiar with events on Redstone?'

Another quick glance at Josef, but his face was impossible to read. She looked back to Gardner. 'It would be extremely hard to be a machine-head and not not be familiar with what happened there, Mr Gardner.' be familiar with what happened there, Mr Gardner.'

Gardner smiled, looking pleased. 'Quite right, quite right. The reason I'm here involves the Freehold, as a matter of fact.'

'It does?' A trickle of ice began gliding down the length of Dakota's spine.

'Yes. But anything I tell you from now is on the condition that you have agreed to take on this job. Josef here can a.s.sure you the money you'll be paid is very, very generous.'

She glanced to one side and saw Josef's head bob energetically.

'As I understand it so far, you're surveying a new system, and you need a machine-head pilot who knows how to keep her mouth shut,' Dakota announced flatly. 'That's what we're talking about, isn't it?'

Gardner nodded. 'That about sums it up. Now tell me if you want the job.'

Dakota nodded tightly, trying hard not to let Gardner see the emotional turmoil she was in. 'I do, Mr Gardner. You have a pilot. But what I don't understand is why the Freehold would specifically want to hire a machine-head? What do they need me for-target practice?'

Gardner just stared at her.

'Easy, Mala,' Josef muttered. 'It took a lot to set this up, and you owe me.'

'Miss Oorthaus, you weren't on Redstone when the tragedy at Port Gabriel took place. There's still a lot of bad feeling there, that's true, but the Freehold Senate understands that the machine-heads present on Redstone were . . . subverted? Is that the right word?'

'Good enough,' Dakota replied.

'The truth is the Freehold are losing their war with the Uchidans. Because of this, the Freehold are in the market for a new homeworld, and they currently have a new charter up for consideration by the Consortium. The system in question is already under survey, but the Freehold's military resources have been badly stretched by the war on Redstone. They lost a lot of their capability during the Port Gabriel fiasco, and a good deal since. They have only three orbital warships left, all centuries old, and they need this colonial charter because, frankly, they're history without it.'

'You're saying these ships are old enough they're still set up for navigation by machine-head pilots, right? Aren't they worried the Uchidans could pull the same trick again if I was allowed to pilot one of their ships?'

'It's a good question, but they don't actually consider the Uchidans a major threat to the survey expedition. If it proved successful, and the Freehold won themselves a new colonial contract, the Uchidans would end up getting Redstone all to themselves. The main worry involves other, outside interests-other colonies, potential or real, prepared to go to war over an uninhabited world. Plus, the Freehold can't pilot their ships as well as a machine-head could. The frigate they'll be sending to this system would be at a disadvantage if it encountered any opposition unafraid of hiring someone like yourself. You'd be an essential part of their inventory, regardless of the past.'

Dakota leaned back, thinking hard. 'I hope that money you mentioned is really, really good.'

'Better than good.' Josef laughed and shook his head. 'The kind of money they're offering, you or I could find a rock and stick a planet engine in it and call it home. Let your Ghost talk to the Black Rock systems and see if it isn't true.'