'Bound to very soon. So.' Harmock lifted a stem finger. 'No interviews, Dolne, and that goes for all your staff. You're to maintain a media silence for as long as I say. This situation will have to be handled with extreme care.' He lifted a bushy eyebrow. 'I hope I make myself clear.'

'Perfecly clear, Mr Harmock.' He was referring, of course, to the election, now made inevitable. 'I shall contact Mr Rabley's party immediately and order the shutdown of his autocam.'

Harmock nodded. 'Good. You see, no party should have an advantage - I mean, no party should be permitted to broadcast from the front itself. Most unfair, and potentially dangerous. Get Rabley on a shuttle and back here quick as you can.' He made a big show of consulting his watch. 'Now look, Dolne, I'm going to have to go. I have to prepare my broadcast to the network.' His delivery sank for a moment into sententious smoothness. 'The citizens will need my a.s.surance on this -' pause '- the most difficult day in all all our lives.' He reached forward and clicked off the link. our lives.' He reached forward and clicked off the link.

Dolne shut off his own screen and immediately leapt to his feet. 'h.e.l.l, h.e.l.l, d.a.m.n, d.a.m.n,' he said, and paced back and forth over his thick-pile carpet.

The unventilated stuffiness increased his tensions. In a reflex movement he poured himself a double measure of Scotch from the minibar and knocked it back in a couple of gulps. A hundred questions a.s.sailed his mind. How was he going to break the news to his staff? Which way would the electorate turn? What would be Jafrid's reaction? He had no plan for this eventuality, no scheme, no matter how rough-hewn, to effect escape. And there was the most dread consideration of all, the prospect of which made him tremble all over. What if the war turned real? Real orders, real fighting, real weapons. Real deaths. The red walls, irrelevant mere minutes before, took on a ghastly new significance, and he squirmed at the suggestion of blood.

He got himself another drink. 'I would never,' he said out loud, 'have believed this possible.' The liquid caught a twinkling rainbow pattern in its depths - the distorted refractions of the stones of Jafrid's dagger. Dolne felt a pang of real regret. 'Oh, my dear friend. What are we to do?'

There was a knock at the door. Dolne snarled and waved his drink dismissively, which the environment computer of his quarters unfortunately took to mean he was allowing access. The door swished open to reveal one of the junior staff, Hammerschmidt. He gave a perfunctory salute and held out a sheaf of papers. 'Morning, sir. Welcome back. Er, would you sign this, please?' He seemed edgy and distracted, and kept looking both ways down the corridor.

Dolne s.n.a.t.c.hed the papers from him. They were out-dated washing-up rosters. 'What do I want with these?'

Hammerschmidt lowered his voice and looked cautiously about again.

'Inside, sir.'

Dolne flipped through the papers. Concealed within was a greetings card, adorned with a floral design and the legend 'Sorry To Be Losing You'. The post had signed their names inside. He noticed the signature of Viddeas, bold and underlined importantly, straight away. 'Who's this for?'

'Pollis,' whispered Hammerschmidt. At Dolne's blank look he added, 'From com-maintenance, sir. Going back to homeworld at the end of the week.'

He gestured vaguely down the corridor. 'He's about here somewhere, sir, so if you could sign it quickly and give it back, because he might stroll along and catch us.'

Dolne thought. It was all Hammerschmidt ever did, he decided. Walk along corridors clutching a concealed leaving card, jangling a bag of change for the present. It was ordinary, unproductive, inefficient, symptomatic of the entire operation. It had never bothered him before. Now, he did something he had never done in all his admiralship. He shouted 'Get out!' and threw the card at him, and slammed the door shut.

He collapsed against it, panting, and ran a hand through his dishevelled, sweat-streaked hair. Was it getting hard to breathe? Or had Harmock's news been too much for him?

He brushed away a fly from his brow (insect life from Metralubit had a way of evading the quarantine regulations, although lack of sustenance meant crawlies never lasted long) and set about putting his thoughts in some kind of order.

It didn't work, so he cried instead.

Harmock's face, distorted by the ripples of the watery screen, creased with worry. 'Oh, Dolne, it...' 'Oh, Dolne, it...' He put a hand to his brow. He put a hand to his brow. 'Phibbs. They're about to 'Phibbs. They're about to publish.' publish.'

The Darkness chittered its excitement. Excellent news. Disruption. The unexpected. Another rift to exploit.

It was now time to connect with the second remote host.

Viddeas was having trouble. He'd put through a call to the patrol escorting Rabley, and ordered them to return to the post immediately. Their reply, though audible, was submerged by a sussurating wash of squeaks and hisses over an odd droning sound. Viddeas tightened his grip on the earpiece and called, 'Division G, are you there? Codie, do you copy?' He could hear the voice of the patrol leader fading out under the wave. 'd.a.m.n it.' He waved across the room, lifted one side of his headset, and bellowed, 'Teer, clean out my channel, it's awash with enemy interference.'

The communications officer stared stupidly back. 'No, Sir.

'What do you mean, no? Do it!'

'I meant there are no enemy bales running at present,' said Teer. He gestured haplessly at his screen, which indeed showed a clear field.

Viddeas ripped the headset off and raised it for all the room to hear.

Everyone turned around to face him, and he glowered to make them feel it was all their fault, which it probably was. 'What do you suppose this is, then? Another Another fault, perhaps?' fault, perhaps?'

'We have been getting electrical distortion quite a lot lately, sir,' pointed out Cadinot.

Viddeas sighed and dropped the headset on to his desk. His collar was unbearably restrictive in this heat, but he would not loosen it. That would be going against regulations. And he looked better with a stiff, upturned collar anyway. He reached out a finger and cut off the howling. The silence that followed was embarra.s.sed and unnerving, the team going about their business with a dutiful quietness accusatory in itself.

His personal com bleeped. Glad of the distraction, he took it from his belt and pressed the accept b.u.t.ton, blowing a trickle of sweat from his nose as he said, 'Viddeas here.'

'Sir, it's Vann from the detention block,' said a voice in the casual tone that was the curse of the place. There was a lot of shouting going on behind him. 'Our "prisoner" is demanding to speak to the Admiral.'

'Surely it's my right!' came the shouting voice, which Viddeas recognized as belonging to their artist.

He bristled. 'Vann, tell the prisoner he has no rights. Tell him also that no matter how much this resembles a garden party it is actually supposed to be a war. And tell him to get back in his cell before he is sedated again.'

'I know what I saw!' the artist shouted. 'You can't -'

Viddeas switched off his com and hooked it back on his belt. 'I just did,' he said, quietly enough to suggest he was making a joke to himself and loudly enough to make sure everyone else heard him. The team laughed in their dutiful way.

There was little time to enjoy this moment, however, as Viddeas had become aware that someone was standing behind his chair expectantly.

He swivelled round impressively, careful not to overshoot. An overswivel robbed the swiveller of dignity. 'What now?'

Another adjunct was standing before him, a sheet of torn paper in his hand.

'Sir, it's the photocopier again.'

Viddeas thumped the arm of his chair. 'Bleisch doubles up on photocopier maintenance. Wait for him to get back up from the pipes. I mean, it's not important, is it?'

The adjunct shuffled. 'It's the invites to Pollis's leaving do, sir. For Friday. If we don't get them to the enemy by tomorrow they might arrange to do something else, which would be a shame, as Pollis got along quite well with some of them in his patrol days.'

Viddeas stood up, s.n.a.t.c.hed the sheet from his hand, and stalked off in the direction of the copying annexe. 'All right, I'll take a look at it.' He sounded irritated. In fact he was glad of the very mundanity of the problem after the trials of the last few days. 'It can't be that difficult to fix.' He called over his shoulder as he left, 'Cadinot, maintain that call to division G. We need them back here right away!'

'Yes, sir,' said Cadinot.

The copying annexe stood just off the Strat Room, where the new machine had been moved to minimize disruption. It had arrived not long ago, and was supposed to be one of the latest models, as used in the Parliament Dome in Metron. It certainly looked attractive, with a smart, streamlined grey fascia of moulded plastic and a neat set of touch-sensitive controls.

Yet after an initial settling-in period it started to display a talent for grinding, chewing, jamming and leaving sooty deposits that marked it down as the son of its fathers.

Viddeas advanced on it with a murderous expression in his eye. It was the only person or thing left in the post that took any real notice of his authority, and secretly he relished its tantrums and looked forward to the chance to kick it. 'What's the problem this time, then?' he muttered. The machine's front had been opened on a hinge, revealing its complex innards: rollers, trays and several cavities whose function was mysterious. 'Let's have a look at you.' He knelt and stroked the edge of the front panel tenderly.

'I've done all it told me to,' said the adjunct, who had followed him through.

'I've cleared all the paper from the trays but it still doesn't work.'

'All right, all right.' Viddeas shooed him out. 'You cut along. I'll deal with this.'

'Sir.' The adjunct withdrew.

Alone with his great enemy, Viddeas rolled off his gloves. They peeled away with a smack, revealing fingers that were clammy and pink from the heat and which he drummed against the copier's instruction panel. He pressed the control requesting information.

PAPER JAM IN TRAYS 1+2 PLEASE CLEAR, the machine told him on its small digital display.

Viddeas grunted. 'You've tried that before.' He pulled out the specified trays with slightly more than necessary violence. They were empty, as the adjunct had said. 'Right.' He swung the outer panel shut and looked up at the information screen.

PAPER JAM IN TRAYS 1+2 PLEASE CLEAR, it said.

'Oh, for crying out loud.' Viddeas opened the panel and shut it again. The message stayed the same. He performed the operation twice more, with mounting ferocity. When he opened the panel another time it was as if all the aggression he had held in check over the last couple of weeks of equipment failures and disappearances, of disobedient, idle staff and an uninterested commanding officer, had been unleashed. He pulled out all six of the paper trays, knelt down, and peered into each one. Empty. Then he stuck in a hand, searched the copier's deepest recesses. It was not going to beat him. He would win this war. His fingers quested about, seeking whatever minuscule sc.r.a.p was spannering the works.

By now the sweat was pouring from him, and he was uncomfortably aware of his urgent need for a shower. To his horror, he realized his lovely uniform smelt, and the cause of the smell was him. d.a.m.n the stupid ventilation! d.a.m.n Bleisch for taking so long! d.a.m.n Dolne for throwing the blame on him!

'Ah!' His fingers connected with something. It was an oddly shaped, oddly textured ball of something, gooey and not papery at all, stuck in the furthest comer of paper tray 1. 'Oh, I've got you now,' he said exultantly. He tugged at it, his vigour so consuming that only a small part of his brain remained active to question what the thing he was tugging at was, and how it had worked itself in there.

The object did not so much as budge an inch. Viddeas growled and decided to shift his position for a better grip. He made to remove his fingers - and found he could not. They were stuck firm, the tips embedded, absorbed into the gelatinous ball.

He pulled hard. No quarter was given. A spasm of cold fear pa.s.sed over him, and he looked up instinctively at the information screen. 'What the...'

He trailed off: made speechless by what he saw there.

CAPTAIN VIDDEAS, said the photocopier screen. PREPARE TO BE ABSORBED BY DARKNESS.

Viddeas struggled and tried to call out. But the words were stuck in his throat, and a horrific freezing sensation was making its way up his arm.

'No,' he croaked. 'No, I...' The coldness travelled through him with alarming rapidity, swallowing his legs and torso before moving up past his neck. 'No, I...'

YOU SHALL BE OUR INSTRUMENT, said the screen, TO HASTEN THE HOUR OF FEASTING.

Sensation flowed through Viddeas's brain, and it was as if his head was being plunged into a bucket of ice-cold water. There was a second's terrible pain as something deep inside him flared up and then died. Dimly he was aware that there were flies buzzing around him.

Then his hand came free. The copier door swung shut.

He stared at his hand. Apart from a minor wrinkling of the skin at the fingertips, of the kind one gets from spending too long in the bath, they looked completely normal. And though he was crouched in a very strange position in front of the copier his body felt refreshed and whole. The events of the last minute seemed rather like a dream.

The information screen read READY. SELECT NUMBER OF COPIES REQUIRED AND PRESS START TO BEGIN.

He shook his head and got to his feet. Had he hallucinated it all? Had the tedium of this life brought him down so low?

He straightened his uniform and walked briskly back towards the Strat Room. Inside, the team were going about their usual tasks in the usual way. n.o.body looked up, n.o.body turned to him, n.o.body, it seemed, had heard the great commotion from next door. So, he reasoned, there had been no commotion.

Cadinot looked up. 'Still no response from Codie, sir.'

'Keep trying,' he said without thinking. His voice was as firm-sounding as ever.

'And cells say they're still having trouble with you-know-who,' added Cadinot.

Viddeas flinched. Suddenly, for no discernible reason, he felt a terrible draught about his legs. At the same time a sort of horrid, red, swirling darkness came into his awareness somewhere behind his eyes. For just a second he saw the world from the viewpoint of an entirely different creature, saw his team not as human beings but as members of a quite alien species.

'Sir?' he heard Cadinot prompting.

He focused on the young man, and a revolting urge pa.s.sed through him at the sight of the boy's pretty white neck. He longed to spit on it. His tongue wetted itself as if in readiness.

Then, as quickly as it had come, the feeling faded, and he heard himself saying, 'Tell cells to sedate the prisoner.' This time several of the team did look up from their stations. Viddeas shuddered at the sight of their eyes, which were somehow revolting to him. He felt the need to withdraw, to sit down, to get this illness out of his system. Half an hour's rest and he'd be fine. He backed away slowly. 'I'm just going... to change...' he mumbled, and made for the door.

The relief he felt at getting out of the Strat Room was almost tangible. He sank against a wall in the connecting corridor, closed his eyes and pressed his eyeb.a.l.l.s. The redness surged up again, and his legs quivered in the cold.

For some reason he put a hand on his heart. It was only when he realized it had stopped beating, and that he had stopped breathing, that the real terror began.

A red indicator light flashed for a moment in the centre of the Darkness's Glute-screen. The secondary remote host was connected. The prime mover of the Metralubitan faction was bent to their will. The arena was prepared, on both sides.

Soon there would be much death.

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