"Damnit. We have safeguards for a reason. Especially on weapons."

"Sir. I do have one possible lead."

"Yes?"

"The other mines were on standby, and the soccer teams were running all over that field for thirty minutes before the explosion. It must have been activated just before Chapell ran over it."

Ebrey brightened. "KillBoy transmitted a code."

"Yes, sir. If it went through the datapool we can try to trace it. Of course, it could have been an isolated transmitter. In which case, someone had to be close enough to send the code. I can review all the memories from every sensor in the district. The AS may be able to spot someone who fits the right behavior profile. But somewhere in today's data there should be some evidence."

"Whatever you need, as much AS time as it takes, you've got it. Your assignment has total priority. Just find this piece of shit for me. I don't care how long it takes, but I'm going to see Mr. KillBoy swinging from the top of this Town Hall before we leave."

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Earth. Once more.

The brilliant white-and-blue world continued to fascinate Lawrence as much now as it had during his first arrival five years ago. As always during the transfer flight down from Centralis to low orbit, he spent as much time as possible staring at the real-time images provided by the interorbit ship's visual sensors. As they curved in over the Americas he watched wide swirls of cloud twisting with soft grace out across the western Atlantic, congealing into a single storm spiral, pure white around the ragged edges, but darkening swiftly toward the dense high center as if night were erupting out of its heart. Within days the Caribbean islands would be cowering from winds and waves and stinging rain, unbound elements stripping the leaves from every tree and washing the land into new shapes. Once again their population would hunker down and wait for the howling winds to pass. And then afterward they'd carry on anew, treating the event like an unwelcome holiday. The palms would sprout new fronds, and people would sport and swim on the clean white sands. He smiled down at them from his angel's perch. Only on a world so teeming with life could such acclimatization occur, he thought. A world where life belonged, where symbiosis between nature and environment was the governing evolutionary factor. Unlike Amethi.

He still held a nest of feelings for his old homeworld. They weren't as strong now as they had been when he first arrived, and most of them remained antagonistic. But every now and then, he could recall times and places from that world when he'd actually been happy, or enjoyed himself. None of those times were with Roselyn. He still shielded himself from those recollections. There was too much pain involved, just as sharp and bright now as the day he left.

His hand went to the pendant under his shirt. He'd almost flung it away the day he left Amethi. Then he decided to keep it so he would never forget all of the treachery at loose in the universe. Nowadays it was a kind of talisman, proof he'd survived the very worst life could throw at him.

The Xianti 5005 carrying them down landed at Cairns spaceport in the middle of another of Queensland's bakinghot afternoons. There was no one waiting to meet Lawrence. He walked past his platoonmates as various families rushed forward in the arrivals hall. Wives and long-term girlfriends flung themselves at their menfolk, clinging tightly and trying not to cry. Until the starship arrived back from Quation two days ago, none of them had heard how the asset-realization campaign had gone; who was alive, who was injured, who wasn't coming back. Relief and fear echoed through the big air-conditioned hall. Children milled around the embracing couples, smiling and happy that Daddy was home again.

There had been a local girl called Sandy whom Lawrence could reasonably claim to be a regular girlfriend in the time between Floyd and Quation. Sandy had promised to wait for him, but that was just over nine months ago now. She was twenty-one; he never seriously expected her to hang around.

So he walked out of the terminal building into the clean sea air, taking a long minute to look around at the scrub-covered hills behind the spaceport, looming dark as the sun sank behind them. The humid breeze blowing in from the ocean. Gulls squawking. Another spaceplane splitting the air overhead like slow thunder. He smiled around at all of it, welcoming the scene as he might an old friend. He would always associate the sea and its smell with Earth.

The taxi rank was at the south end of the terminal. Lawrence walked down to it and slung the only luggage he had, his shoulder bag, into the backseat of the elongated white bubble. It had a human driver rather than an AS, an old Chinese man who wanted to talk about how Manchester United was playing this season. He thought Lawrence's accent was British.

"Never been there," Lawrence had to admit.

"But you know about Man-U?" the driver asked anxiously.

"I've heard of them."

"Of course you have. Most famous team on the planet I access every game. I installed a horizontal hologram pane in our apartment so I can watch the whole pitch. My wife doesn't like it."

"No kidding?"

"Yeah, she wanted a new sofa. I access through membranes as well. The last three seasons I've paid the team's media agent for multi-player-viewpoint feed. It costs, but it's worth it. This way I can see what's happening on the ground as well as get an overview. I like to stay with Paul Ambrose as my viewpoint when the first eleven play, he's got good ball sense."

"Sounds great."

"First eleven only play once every four days. I have to make do with second eleven and third eleven in between."

"Uh-huh."

"Afternoons, I access the under-twenty-one side. Sometimes I have to record them when I'm working. My friends in the other cabs, they have fun trying to tell me who wins. I turn my datapool access off and they drive up next to me and shout the result. I always have to shut my ears those afternoons. One day, when I save up enough, I'm going to Europe to watch them play live. My wife, she doesn't know that."

"Really." They had cleared the spaceport to merge with the short highway into town. To his left, Lawrence could see the thin strip of protected mango swamps running along the coastline. On his right, suburban apartments had colonized the land almost up to the foothills.

"You just down from Quation?"

"Yep."

"Your wife not meet you?"

"Not married."

"Wise man. You enjoy yourself while you still can, my friend. When I go to Europe, I won't take my wife. So you got anywhere to stay tonight?"

Lawrence could have returned straight to barracks; it wouldn't have cost him anything. But the whole fleet was on four-week leave, and the bonus pay for the campaign was sitting in his bank as well as the whole nine months' back pay. He'd made no plans at all. Some of the other single guys on the starship were talking about sailing between Pacific islands and raising hell on every beach resort they landed on. Colin Schmidt had invited him on a tour of the casinos in Hong Kong and Singapore. Others promised Perth still rejoiced in its claim to be party capital of the Southern Hemisphere, an easy train ride away. "No," he said. "I don't have anywhere to stay." He pressed the window key and let the glass slide halfway down; wind and highway noise rushed in. Up ahead the glare of lights from the Strip was already flickering through the town's outlying buildings. Lawrence laughed at the sight of the gaudy neon and holograms beckoning him back greedily. He'd never been so perfectly content. No cares, no obligations, plenty of money and lots of time to spend it in. Life didn't get much better.