Were it not for the scale of suffering involved the idea would have been absurd - laughable even. But it also presented Steve with an exciting opportunity - and a difficult choice. He could either try and escape with Clearwater and her child and face all the ha.s.sle and uncertainty that joining up with Cadillac and Roz would entail or... he could stay where he was and ride the wire.

All the way to the top ....

This was no longer a case of them and us; the outgunned underdog fighting a ruthless and vastly more powerful opponent. It was Mute against Mute - except that one side held all the cards, and had the soldier-citizens of the Federation to fight its battles.

Steve was forced to admire the First Family's duplicity.

One could not ignore the fact they were a ruthless bunch, with the killer-instinct of the D'Troit, but they were also extremely smart cookies. Always one step ahead of the game - and that was exactly the way Steve liked to play it.

If he grasped this opportunity wholeheartedly, allied himself to the First Family body and soul, he could have the best of both worlds. He could have power and freedom, the s.p.a.ce to breathe and all the hi-tech gadgetry that made life easier. And he might even get to grind Cadillac's nose in the dust.

But there was more to it than just besting his rival. As he developed these ideas in his mind, Steve saw an even grander opportunity ahead.

If he managed to manoeuvre his way into the highest reaches of the Family, he might be able to halt the present policy of extermination.

Instead of setting Tracker against Mute, the First Family could use their manipulative skills in a positive way, making it possible for the Mutes to be accepted for what they really were fellow human beings.

None of this could happen overnight, but gradually, rigidly-held att.i.tudes could soften, bringing about an eventual reconciliation in which both parties accepted each other's right to exist side-by-side in the blue-sky world.

It was not an impossible dream, but Steve knew he could never persuade Clearwater to share it. And it wasn't just a moral dilemma that confronted him. Even if she consented to stay and he succeeded in getting her released from the Life Inst.i.tute after the birth of her child, how on earth was he going to maintain his relationship with her and keep Fran happy at the same time?

Steve's future sleeping arrangements was just one of the problems a.s.sociated with Clearwater. Another arose from the fact that they were unable to discuss any of these startling discoveries and tentative conclusions.

Once again, he had no hard proof, but he had to a.s.sume that the unit in which she was housed at the Life Inst.i.tute contained hidden microphones - and probably miniature video cameras too.

Way back - it seemed a lifetime ago - when he was returning in chains on the shuttle to Grand Central to face a Board of a.s.sessors and a charge of desertion, Roz had reached out to him over the mind-bridge, warning him to be careful and telling him that they were watching her.

And it hadn't been some meat-loaf d.o.g.g.i.ng her footsteps. When they'd showered side by side aboard Red River, Roz had told him of the videotapes Karlstrom had played back to her. Tapes which recorded the wounds that appeared in her face at the same moment Steve submitted to a Plainfolk test of courage known as 'biting the arrow'. There had even been a hidden camera trained on her while she was asleep!

Standing under or close to running water appeared to be the only way to have an untaped head-to-head. And you could bet your a.s.s that the Family had come to the same conclusion and were working on that one too.

Sub-aqua conversations might be safe for the moment but they weren't a viable option in the present situation.

It would look a bit odd, to say the least, if he suddenly took to scrubbing himself down at the Life Inst.i.tute in the next shower stall to an enemy prisoner. Because that - despite the relative luxury of her surroundings - was what Clearwater was.

The medical skills of the Federation were dedicated to making her whole, but those same skills were also being used to scrutinise every aspect of her physiology. Bone, organs, tissue, every nerve, brain and blood cell had come under or was due for microscopic examination.

Clearwater was the first really powerful summoner to fall into the hands of the Federation. Before her capture, to reinforce his image as a loyal soldier-citizen, Steve had already told Karlstrom about some of the things he'd seen her do - including her feats of magic at the Heron Pool. Which was just as well, because his testimony confirmed and fleshed out the garbled second- and third-hand reports AMEXICO had received from other sources inside Ne-Issan.

But Steve hadn't told the full story. No one, including Karlstrom, knew that she could plant a delayed mental imperative inside somebody's brain, which would cause them to say or do whatever she required.

Steve was keeping that to himself in case he needed Clearwater's help to get them both out of a tight corner.

Although the Family had taken the precaution of housing Clearwater in an overground annexe, they did not feel unduly threatened by the destructive powers of her earth-magic. Soon after their arrival, Steve had been at. the foot of her bed when Karlstrom had issued his double-edged warning. One false move on her part would lead to his immediate execution - and vice versa. Comprendo . . .?

Si, si commandante ....

This meeting had preceded his heart-warming interview with the President-General and his promotion to captain'but he imagined the threat still held good. And with his elevation to membership of the First Family it meant he had even more to lose.

Steve had no intention of rocking the boat but the knowledge that his life depended on Clearwater's good behaviour was a sobering reminder of just how precarious his position was. He had finally got his feet firmly on the golden ladder only to discover that the rungs could snap from under him at any moment. Steve was sure that Clearwater would not put the life of her unborn child at risk, but that only took them up to mid-December. If she then started to develop itchy feet and he appeared to be dragging his it could make things very difficult.

Not good. Not good at all.

Steve tried to remind himself why and how they'd both landed in this mess. He had put Clearwater into the hands of the Federation because that was the only way to save her life. And he'd wanted her to live because of the feelings she had aroused in him. She was the 'only person he really cared about, and it was through their relationship that his eyes, heart and mind had been opened.

For the first time he had been able to see the world as it was, in all its rich variety, its endless possibilities, and he had also discovered the untapped potential within himself which, if allowed to flower, would enable him to become his true self.

It was knowing how he felt about Clearwater which had driven Roz into that jealous rage. But she had changed.

That was how it was in life. Nothing stayed the same; it was a constant cycle of growth and decay. People changed, feelings changed, and if you wanted to change the world then, well. sometimes people got hurt in the process. Steve knew that if he had allowed his emotions to get the better of him, he could never have gunned down Commander Hartmann and the other crewmen he'd served with aboard The Lady from Louisiana. But it had to be done. He had found the strength to take the tough decision, to do the hard thing. Just like the First Family.

And now he had to do so again. When the time was right, he had two ways to go. Escape with Clearwater and her child, or come up with a plan that would get them out and leave him behind, without a shred of evidence to link him with their departure. Steve was confident he could figure out the mechanics of either scenario, but he was sorely tempted to go for the second, which would leave him free to climb the ladder - secure in the knowledge that with Clearwater gone, it would not break under him.

Steve tried to convince himself that staying behind was not the softer option. He might escape the daily grind of material existence but there were other pressures, other dangers. And it would involve sacrificing everything he had gained through knowing Clearwater and returning her love. Severing their relationship would mean the slow death of the soul. That was the price of reaching the pinnacle of power. And at some point during the next five months he had to decide whether he was prepared to pay it.

There was someone else who wanted to remove Clearwater from the Federation. Commander-General Ben Karlstrom, a.k.a. Mother, a member of the First Family and head of AMEXICO, the top-secret organisation to which Steve belonged.

Karlstrom's present anxiety could have been allayed just as easily by having Clearwater thrown down one of the many thousand-foot deep ventilation shafts after administering- for safety's sake - a ma.s.sive, surrept.i.tious dose of tranquillisers. But in the present circ.u.mstances that was not a viable option.

It was the President-General who had ordered the capture of Mr Snow, Cadillac and Clearwater, and he had now allowed himself to be persuaded that the child Clearwater was carrying might be the Talisman. A scan of a gene sample from the four-month embryo had revealed the three vital 'markers' - the divine fingerprint which, according to the opportunist quacks running the psionics department, would have to be present in the individual destined to become the Thrice-Gifted One wordsmith, summoner and seer.

Karlstrom, who was implacably opposed to the current vogue for this pseudo-science, had been appalled to learn that Jefferson the 31st intended to have the child reared as a member of the First Family. To safeguard his own position within the ruling hierarchy, Karlstrom was obliged to keep his views strictly to himself, but to his mind, the P-G's decision bordered on sheer lunacy. It was only storing up trouble. If the future could be foretold and the Talisman Prophecy was true, this individual would find his way back to the Plainfolk. The verses which predicted the end of the Federation would be fulfilled and the fact that the President-General had made him his adoptive son and heir would probably serve to hasten the process.

On the other hand, if you believed - as Karlstrom did - that the future course of events could be changed by resolute action, then the best way to begin was by eliminating every possible individual, of whatever age or complexion, who might become the Thrice-Gifted One, and every female whose genetic fingerprint marked her out as a potential mother of this troublesome sonofab.i.t.c.h.

Dumping Clearwater over the side now, while she still did not have two good legs to stand on, would save medical resources that could be better employed elsewhere and terminate her pregnancy in no uncertain fashion. If she was carrying the Talisman, he would have to go back to Square One and start his trip across the board all over again.

It was quick, simple and above all final, but Karlstrom knew he could not sell this idea to anybody, least of all the President-General. The only way out was to arrange her escape. But for that, he needed someone he could confide in, someone he could trust absolutely, someone who was prepared to betray his sacred oath of allegiance to the President-General in the higher interests of the Federation which - in this case - just happened to coincide with Karlstrom's.

In a society where informing on your errant comrades earned you the secular equivalent of sainthood, such qualities were hard to find, but Karlstrom thought he knew someone who might fit the bill. Steven Roosevelt Brickman ....

The thought of turning to Steve for help made Karlstrom laugh out loud.

He was always quick to appreciate the irony of a given situation and this one was doubly ironic. His future was already in Brickman's hands. Fran's new golden boy knew something which, if divulged to the wrong party, could threaten Karlstrom's position as head of AMEXICO and cause untold harm to the organisation itself.

From the operational summaries dealing with the loss of The Lady from Louisiana and the subsequent annihilation of the M'Calls, the President-General had a.s.sumed that the explosives used so effectively by the Mutes in their surprise attack had come from the Iron Masters.

Or, to be more precise, from the plundered wreckage of the five wheel-boats lost during the Battle of the Trading Post.

This was not, in fact, the case, but Karlstrom had decided not to set the record straight. Through an administrative error, real explosives had been supplied to a decoy unit made up of defaulters. As the sacrificial goats in an elaborate plan of entrapment, they should have been issued with dummy charges; AP mines filled with sand, foil wraps of PX containing a slab of modelling clay, and blank detonators. Some careless keyboarding lower down the line had resulted in them being issued with the real thing and it had ended up in the hands of the Clan m'call.

It was a potentially messy situation which reflected badly on AMEXICO, but fortunately, an alert member of his personal staff spotted the error when checking the requisitions. The computer records had immediately been 'sanitised' using Track-Back - a top-secret programme designed to cover AMEXICO's corporate a.s.s.

Conceived by Karlstrom and developed by a trusted subordinate, Track-Back could seek out sensitive blocks or trails of data stored anywhere on the network like a pre-H bloodhound following a scent.

Once it located the rogue data, it deposited a virus which caused it to self-destruct then re-sequenced the surrounding material to cover up any blank spots left on the storage tape or disk.

In a world run by computers, it was his insurance policy, and spring-board to the Oval Office. Track-Back did not only locate and destroy potentially incriminating data, it could also insert it at any point in the system without leaving any electronic fingerprints.