Harker rolled his head back. The muscles in his neck crunched.

'I did tell you' Eve began.

'Yeah, yeah. Can't you fix it?'

Eve peered doubtfully at the keyboard. 'I told you'

'Yes, I know. Can you fix it, Eve?'

She chewed her lip. 'Well, I can try, but I can't promise anything. If the blood's got inside'

'Yeah,' Harker said wearily. He looked at his watch, then at Charlie. She gave him a look that said he must be joking.

He gave her one that said he wasn't. 'Half-an-hour, men, get ready to leave. We're going raiding again.'

Tallulah groaned. Banks grinned. Charlie glowered.

'Martindale,' Harker said, 'how's the ankle?'

'Fine, sir.'

'Daz?'

'Up to her, sir.'

Harker waved her off, and turned to Eve. 'I'll get you a new keyboard,' he said. 'Without blood on it this time.'

A flicker of a smile touched her lips. 'Don't suppose you could stretch to an iPod?'

Harker blinked at her.

Eve almost laughed. 'No, I didn't think so. Okay, well. Good luck.'

He nodded, and left the room, Charlie trailing after him.

'Sir, do we really need to do this?'

'Yes.'

'But what if she's just pretending it doesn't work? Sir, if she's got it working, she could be sending messages to the Coalitionists about where we are'

'Yes, Charlie, or maybe it's just not bloody working! She did say don't get it wet'

'Which makes for a very convenient excuse when we did, don't you think?'

'And how did she know Banks was going to shoot someone right in front of it?'

'I don't know, sir, I'm just trying to make sure you don't'

He spun around so fast she walked into him. 'I don't what?'

Her brown eyes narrowed. 'Forget your mission. Sir.'

Charlie, his oldest and closest friend, was challenging him. Except she wasn't his oldest and closest friend, dammit, she was his Lieutenant. She was a soldier, and so was he, and he had a job to do. He took a deep breath and let it out.

'I never forget my mission, Lieutenant.'

'No, sir.'

He started walking again.

'Uniform, sir,' she said, and he growled at her and reversed course.

'There,' Tallulah pointed to a glint of light. 'That's it.'

'Sure?' Harker whispered back.

'Yes, that's the monitor thing.'

Harker nodded, brought up his binoculars and peered at the truck as the back was closed up, and a soldier banged on the back of it. It set off, slowly, another truck in front of it and another behind. Men on horses flanked it.

Harker swore and crawled from his hiding place to Charlie's. 'Four cavalry, two trucks flanking,' he said, 'probably all full of armed men.'

'Want to wait until they get there?' she asked.

'Centre of town? Nightmare. We do it on the road. Banks? You got plenty of ammo?'

'Yessir.' Banks hefted his sniper rifle.

'Good. You're with Lieutenant Riggs, south side of the road. Go!'

They ran off into the night. With Tallulah and Martindale following, Harker darted through the trees to the north of the compound, chasing fast after the convoy. Good job the computer equipment was sensitive, or they'd surely have been moving too fast.

The trucks blazed with light as they rattled along the road. Stupid, Harker thought, that's like an invitation. They might as well have stuck a foghorn on top.

'Lu,' he said, as they reached the edge of the road. 'You up to this?'

She nodded and handed him her coat. The only one of them not in Coalitionist uniform, she was wearing something filched from the head housemaid, who'd surely be furious to find it missing. Not that there was much of it to miss. Tight, red, and showing lots of thigh, it was about a hundred times more vampish than Harker was comfortable seeing on someone he really regarded as something like a little sister.

If Saskia knew about this, he thought, she'd bloody kill me.

The thought cheered him. Annoying Saskia usually did.

'Off you go, then,' he said, and Tallulah ran towards the road, yanking down her bodice as she did. Harker heard cloth tear and caught a glimpse of pale breast, before Tallulah disappeared into the darkness.

'So that's why you sent Banks with the Lieutenant,' Martindale said dryly.

Harker glanced at her briefly before turning his attention back to the convoy, half-visible through the thick tree trunks. 'Don't reckon he'd be able to concentrate.'

'He'd probably challenge anyone who saw her breast to a duel.'

Harker, who still didn't really like the idea of Tallulah even having breasts, let alone showing them to anyone, fidgeted awkwardly. Then Tallulah's cry of, 'Help! Please!' sounded over the rumble of the truck engines, and he forgot all about her breasts and started hoping she'd get picked up.

More voices sounded, but he couldn't tell what they were saying. Creeping closer, he saw one of the cavalrymen halted by the side of the road, leering down at Tallulah, who was doing a very good impression of a helpless woman in distress.

Well. A good impression of what people thought a woman in distress ought to act like. Anyone who'd seen Mary White's glassy eyes would disagree with Tallulah's performance.

'I can't leave my post, miss,' the cavalryman was saying to Tallulah, 'but you're welcome to ride with me.'

Tallulah didn't hesitate. 'Are you armed, sir? I'm so frightened they'll come after me!'

'Yes, of course I'm armed.' He laughed, showing her his sword and pistol. 'Come on, then.' He held out his hand, and pulled her up on to his lap. Tallulah wriggled, which he seemed to enjoy pervert and they set off.

'She can take care of herself, sir,' Martindale whispered, and Harker realised he was grinding his teeth.

'Come on,' he said, and they ran alongside the road, hidden by the trees and their dark clothes, as Tallulah turned big blue eyes on the cavalryman and spoke in a high, breathless voice.

'I'm so frightened, sir! Would you mind no, it's too silly.'

'No, tell me.'

'Well, sir, I'd just feel so much safer if you had your sword in hand,' she said, and her bosom heaved. Harker shook his head in disbelief. Ballet nothing, this kid could act.

The cavalryman gave what he probably thought was a dashing grin he even had a moustache, the twat and obliged by drawing his sword and twirling it showily. Tallulah gave him a shy smile.

'And your pistol, sir, how accurate is it?' she asked, as they drew level with the convoy again. The other horseman on the same side looked back and shook his head at his comrade.

'Oh, it's quite accurate. I can shoot a man at a hundred paces.'

Harker shared a glance with Martindale who, like him, could do that blindfolded.

'May I see it?'

The cavalryman, who clearly thought he was well in, drew his pistol, which Harker considered an extremely stupid thing to do. Tallulah clearly agreed, for she pressed it against his chest and pulled the trigger. The sound was lost in the rumble of the noisy truck next to her.

Harker liked fools, so long as they were fighting for the other side. Clearly, Tallulah's cavalryman and the one riding in front of her were both complete idiots, because they were dead within five minutes of her mounting the horse. Harker ran up, gave Tallulah her coat as she kicked the dead man away, and took his place on the other horse.

Everything went well, surprisingly well, in fact, as Banks shot out a tyre on the rearguard truck, and one of the riders on the other side hung back to see what the problem was.

Banks shot the remaining rider, which was when everything started to go wrong. Instead of falling quietly, he cried out, panicked his horse, and the beast reared, then began to gallop as its rider slumped to one side and dragged on the stirrups.

'What the hell?' said a voice from within the middle truck, and Harker swore and rode up to the cab.

'Keep going,' he said, 'it's nothing.'

The driver glanced up at him, and the light must have caught Harker's face, because the Coalitionist soldier reached for a small device on the dashboard, picked it up and said, 'Truck one, we have a probl'

Harker shot him.

The truck veered and wobbled, making his horse shy away, and the other soldier inside the cab started shooting.

Damn and bloody hell. Charlie and Banks came skidding towards the truck, and Harker pointed them on towards the vehicle at the front, which had stopped. Oh hell, that thing was a radio, he'd been talking to the other men, they were in communication!

The radio crackled, and a voice said, 'Truck two, what's your status?'

The soldier inside the truck grabbed for it, then slumped forward as Tallulah's bullet killed him. She swung inside the cab with admirable sang-froid just like Saskia and shoved the two dead men out of her way to take the wheel.

Handing the radio to Harker, she hissed, 'Tell them we're fine, they need a man's voice!'

He stared at the radio, then hit the button as the Coalitionist had done and said, 'We're fine. Just a problem with one of the horses.'

'Truck three is still back there. Reckon we should stop?'

'Uh, no. Keep going. You know our orders.'

That was a guess. But Harker knew how this sort of thing went.

'Yeah, you're right,' said the voice doubtfully. 'Okay th'

Another bullet cut that voice short. Charlie and Banks had reached the front truck. Breathing a sigh of relief that things were back on track, Harker dismounted, slapping the horse away, and jumped into the back of the truck as it was moving. Martindale ran alongside and leapt in after him.

'Excellent,' she said, and Harker grinned at her. He looked around the back of the truck, which contained a couple of trunks and a dead guard. He kicked the dead guy aside, unstrapped the trunks from their moorings, and started going through them.

'Just wait for Charlie and Banks to take the front car,' he said, 'and we're home and dry. Might as well drive this home.'

The truck bumped over something in the road, bouncing the boxes to the back of the truck. 'Front truck's moving again, sir,' Tallulah said, picking up speed to follow it.

'What about the Austin?' Martindale asked.

'I'm sure he can survive without it. We'll come back tomorrow. Lu,' he poked his head over the front seat, 'nice work.'

She shrugged nonchalantly, but she was smiling. 'I told you Saskia taught me to fight.'

'Yeah, but she's an officer. Who taught her to fight that dirty?'

'You did, sir.'

She met his eye through the rear-view mirror and grinned.

'Well, nice to know I'm good for something,' Harker muttered. He ripped open one box and found another CPU. Might be useful. A second held what Eve called the peripherals: a keyboard, mouse and a box of small devices he didn't recognise. They looked like they might plug into one of the many sockets on the back of the computer. He picked up a couple, turned them over in his hand, and tucked them thoughtfully into a pocket.

A sudden burst of machine-gun fire made his head whip around. Harker, keyboard in hand, shoved it inside his jacket in case he needed to make a run for it.

'Lu, is the first truck still moving? Charlie's got it?'

'They threw out a couple of men, sir. That's what we ran over.'

The truck shook with the force of more bullets, jolting Harker against the back of the seats.