“Interesting.” She unhooked her bra.

It was the signal for Dudley to struggle out of his own shirt, desperately trying to get it off over his head and getting badly tangled up in the hurry.

“You know, he hasn’t been seen for years.”

“Who? Ozzie?”

“Yes. I found that out when I was researching this. Not that it’s unusual—he’s always traveling through the Commonwealth. They say he’s visited every planet, and had a child on each of them.”

Mellanie stepped out of her panties and walked through into the bathroom. She turned the shower on, grateful the water was mildly warm. “If he’s so important, it’s strange he hasn’t said anything about the Primes. You know, there was a lot of pressure on the Baron show not to mention the asteroid habitat. I wonder what’s happened to him.”

“That’s Ozzie for you: one crazy dude.” Dudley was trying to get his pants off; he had to grip the door frame to stop falling over. “I’d like to be like him.”

“If he’s as rebellious as everyone says, he might let us use his wormhole anyway.”

“We’d have to find him first.”

“I’ll ask around the office. Somebody there might know where he is.”

Dudley finally got his pants off, and made for the shower.

“Wait there,” Mellanie said sharply. He came to a halt in the middle of the small bathroom.

She started to rub the thick soapy gel onto her body. “Watch me first. I’ll tell you when you can join me.”

Dudley sucked on his lower lip and whimpered.

***

Nigel followed his three bodyguards out of the wormhole gateway. It was daylight in Ozzie’s gigantic, hollowed-out asteroid, the balmy air carrying the sweet scent of flower blossom. A wide white canvas awning arched above the gateway, allowing visitors to acclimatize to the bizarre curving landscape as they moved out from under it. As he walked forward, more of the cylindrical cavern was revealed, two green wings sweeping up on either side, becoming steeper and steeper until they began to arch overhead. Sizzling white light shone out of the axis gantry, its glare obscuring the ground directly above him. Tall, impressively craggy mountains jutted out from the curving landscape at all angles around him, disorienting in their fantastical perspective. The sight coupled with the rotational gravity field produced a momentary sensation of motion sickness that made his legs weaken. One of the bodyguards actually stumbled, falling to his knees. His colleagues hauled him up, trying not to snigger.

“This way,” Nigel said, and headed down the gravel path that led away from the cliff where the gateway was embedded. Birds were singing not far away.

The interior was almost as he remembered. It was the trees that had changed; they were all mature now, adding to the elegance of the panorama. He didn’t like to think how many decades it would take to produce such a gap between his last recollection and today; judging by the height and density of the forests it could easily be a century.

Several gardenbots were busy on the grass, tending the rhododendron bushes and little spinnies of silver birch. There was no sign that several thousand people had poured through here like a runaway tide: no garbage, no trampled plants.

At the end of the path, the small bungalow was just as he remembered it. A single deck chair was sitting in the garden underneath a broad copper beech tree, waiting for its owner to return.

Daniel Alster’s call icon popped into Nigel’s virtual vision. He sighed, and opened a connection.

“Sorry, sir,” Daniel said. “There’s a development I thought you should know about.”

“Go ahead,” he said, knowing it would be important. He trusted Daniel to filter most of the output from the Dynasty’s political office.

“The Halgarths have just gone nuclear against the Burnellis in committee.”

“Hmm, which committee?”

“Security Oversight.”

“Really?” As always, Daniel had been right. The Security Oversight Committee was normally immune to the usual political maneuvering and squabbling between Senate factions; and at this time it should have been completely sacrosanct. For any kind of spat to have spilled over into its sessions was serious indeed. “What happened?”

“Valetta Halgarth tried to bump Paula Myo out of Senate Security this morning.”

Nigel was suddenly very interested. The Dynasty had been indebted to the Investigator on more than one occasion; after one case he’d even thanked her personally. Not that she pursued anyone for political reasons. He’d almost intervened himself when the political office told him Rafael Columbia had engineered her removal from navy intelligence; then Gore had stepped in, and there’d been no need. “What’s she done to annoy the Halgarths now?”

“We’re not quite sure, it’s probably ongoing. The Burnellis are worried about the Halgarths increasing their power base within the navy hierarchy.”

“They’re not alone. Go on.”

“The reason Valetta gave was Myo interfering in navy intelligence operations. Apparently Myo made an official request to her old Paris office to put Alessandra Baron under observation.”

“What does Myo think Baron has done?”

“We don’t know.”

“It’s probably not relevant to the Halgarths; as you say, this is a direct power struggle. I’ll talk to Jessica. I think we need to start keeping a closer eye on the Halgarths and their plans for the navy.”

“Yes, sir.”

The call ended, and Nigel came to a halt, considering what he’d just been told. The bodyguards waited respectfully. If there was one thing he knew about Paula Myo it was her honesty; she wouldn’t put Baron under observation on purely political grounds no matter how hard the Burnellis insisted. Then there was Thompson’s shocking murder, which remained completely unsolved. The assassin’s reappearance at LA Galactic was also something that hadn’t been satisfactorily explained. Something was going on at a level that affected the Dynasties and Grand Families, and to his considerable annoyance, he didn’t know what. That was almost unheard of. His virtual hand reached out and touched Nelson’s icon. “Got an information collection job for you,” he told the Dynasty security chief.

Nigel knew the bungalow was deserted before he stepped through the open archway that was its entrance. There was something about an unoccupied home that spoke directly to the human subconscious. Nonetheless, he called out: “Ozzie, you about, dude?” as he wandered through into the lounge.

After an extensive investigation to locate Ozzie, Nelson had drawn a complete blank. Nigel had been girding himself for the news that Ozzie had set up home on one of the Lost23 worlds. But no, the last trace Nelson’s department could find was a ticket to Silvergalde. A team of Dynasty security agents had descended on Lyddington to find out what they could. The town was in chaos from the number of refugees flooding to Silvergalde in the belief that the Silfen would defend their world from the Primes. And there were no electronic records to review. That left money and alcohol to liberate tongues and unreliable memories. Ozzie had been in town; a stable owner claimed to have sold him a horse and a lontras. He hadn’t stayed long. A tavern landlord said he’d set out to walk the Silfen’s deep paths in the woods. No one in Lyddington had seen him come back.

As Ozzie legends went it was credible, suitably mythic and epic. Nigel wasn’t so certain. Ozzie had feigned disinterest in the Dyson Alpha barrier, but that was the usual Ozzie bullshit. Nigel had checked: it was the only time Ozzie had ever turned up at an ExoProtectorate Council meeting. His friend was interested, all right; enigmatic alien Big Dumb Objects were the kind of thing Ozzie loved. For him to then vanish off into a forest full of elves was difficult to understand.

Nigel’s inserts sensed several arrays activating in the lounge. A holographic portal projected a life-size image of Ozzie right in front of him, dressed in a shabby yellow T-shirt and creased shorts; from his bleary eyes it looked like he’d just woken up with a hangover. “Hi, Nige,” it said. “Sorry you’re here. I guess I must have been gone awhile and you’ve started worrying. Well, this is a recording I made to reassure you I’m okay. I love the idea you’re gonna build a starship, man, that’s gonna be so coolio. Hey, I bet you wind up going on the voyage in the end, you’ll find some excuse.”