“No. Not for about nine months now, unfortunately. I told you, we’re not very fashionable at the moment. We’re going to mount another recruitment drive in the general workers unions. But that won’t be for weeks yet. Why?”

“Just checking.”

Sabbah hated himself for what he was doing. The comrade was obviously well connected in the Party, probably in the executive cadre. Which meant he truly believed in what he was doing, especially if he’d been truthful about the grain train.

It wasn’t that Sabbah didn’t believe in their cause. He absolutely hated the way everyone else in the world seemed to be doing better than he was, that his background had condemned him to one life lived badly. The way society was structured prevented him from bettering himself. That was what attracted him to the Socialists in the first place, the way they were working to change things so that people like him would get a chance to live decently in an inclusive world.

All of which only made this worse. The comrade was actively working to bring down the companies and the plutocratic state that supported them. Which was a lot more than Sabbah ever seemed to do. All the seventh chapter did was hold endless meetings where they argued among themselves for what seemed like hours. Then there was the canvassing, days spent being abused, insulted, and treated with utter contempt by the very people they were trying to help. And of course the protests outside company offices and factories, ambushing politicians. Sabbah had lost count of how many times he’d been on the wrong, and very painful, end of a police shockwhip. The real reason he kept going these days was because of the rest of the chapter. He didn’t have many friends outside, not anymore.

But he didn’t have any choice. Not in this.

It was nine years ago when he met the woman. The job that night had been so easy it would have been criminal not to do it. He’d gone along with a couple of old mates he’d known back from his gang years, when they’d all pulled a tru from the reform academy to run the streets. Their quarry was a delivery truck that made a nightly run from the CST planetary station to various local wholesale warehouses about town. It was carrying crates of domestic goods from Augusta, all high quality. And the van was old, its alarm a joke.

Thanks to some decent targeted kaos software bought from a contact they’d managed to intercept the van and lift its load clean within ten minutes. Sabbah even took a couple of maidbots with him when he went home in addition to his cut.

She was waiting for him when he walked through the door: a middle-aged woman with mild Asian features, her shoulder-length raven hair flecked with gray strands, wearing a smart business suit. Sitting in his living room, looking like she belonged in that dingy two-room apartment more than he ever did.

“You now have a choice,” she said as his mouth was gaping open in surprise. “Either I’ll shoot you in self-defense, because you were assaulting a government official in the pursuit of her duties, or we make a deal and I’ll let you keep your dick.”

“Whoo…” Sabbah frowned at his door, silently cursing its alarm circuit for not warning him she’d broken in.

“Or do you believe the Velaines public medical insurance scheme will pay for a new dick, Sabbah? That’s where I’m aiming, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

In horror he saw she had some kind of small black metal tube in her hand, and it really was leveled at his groin. He shifted the boxes containing the maidbots, gradually lowering them until they covered his hips and the hugely valuable personal organ situated there.

“If you’re police, you won’t—”

The violent crack that her weapon produced made him cower. Scraps of foam packaging drifted through the air while the remnants of the maidbot dropped to the floor. The little machine’s crablike electromuscle limbs spasmed for a while before collapsing limply. Sabbah stared at it. “Oh, Christ on a crutch,” he whispered. He gripped the remaining box even tighter.

“Do we now know where we both stand?” the policewoman asked.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“All I want is for you to do something for me. A small thing. Will you do that?”

“What?”

“One day someone will turn up at your chapter, and I want to know about it. I can’t give you his name, he changes it every time. But he’ll be looking to buy things, weapons most likely, or kaos software, or samples of diseases, or components with the wrong specifications which will screw up whatever they’re installed in. That’s the kind of person he is. A very unpleasant individual. He’ll claim to be a Party member, to be doing what he does for a noble cause. But he’s lying. He’s a terrorist. An anarchist. A murderer. So I want you to tell me when he visits you. Okay?”

Sabbah didn’t like to think of the alternative. She was still pointing the weapon right at him, aiming low. “Yeah, sure. I’ll do that.”

“Good.”

“When’s he coming?”

“I don’t know. It might be tomorrow. It might be in thirty years’ time. It might be never. Or I might have caught him before he ever reaches Velaines.”

“Uh, right, okay.”

“Now turn around.”

“What?”

“You heard.” She got to her feet, the little weapon still pointing at him. Sabbah reluctantly turned to face the door. His hands were grabbed, forcing him to drop the maidbot box. A cold band of malmetal coiled around his wrists immobilizing them. “What the hell…”

“You’re under arrest for theft.”

“You’ve got to be fucking joking! I said I’d help you. That was the deal.” He turned his head to try to look at her. The weapon was jabbed into his jaw.

“There is no deal. You made a choice.”

“That was the deal!” he yelled furiously. “I help you, you get me off this rap. Jesus!”

“You are mistaken,” she said relentlessly. “I didn’t say that. You committed a crime. You must face the consequences. You must be brought to justice.”

“Fuck you, bitch. Fuck you. I hope your terrorist blows up a hundred hospitals, and schools. I hope he wipes out your whole planet.”

“He won’t. He’s only interested in one planet. And with your help, we can stop him from damaging it further.”

“My help?” The word came out as a squeak he was so shocked. “You stupid bitch, you can suck me and I’d never help you now. We had a deal.”

“Very well. I will lodge a plea with the judge, asking him for leniency.”

“Huh?” This was so weird it was doing his head in. Right from the start the woman scared him. He wasn’t even sure she was a policewoman anymore. More like a serial killer.

“I will tell him you cooperated fully, and agreed to be my informer. The file will not be encrypted when it is attached to your court record. Do you think your friends will access it when they see you receiving a light sentence? Will they be happy about what it says? My colleagues have already arrested them for tonight’s robbery, by the way. I expect they’ll be curious about how we knew.”

“Oh, goddamn.” Sabbah was near to tears. He wanted this whole nightmare to end. “You can’t do that to me. They’ll kill me, a total death. You don’t know what they’re like.”

“I think I do. Now, are you going to tell me when my target turns up?”

So through clenched teeth he said, “Yes.”

And that had been the way of it for nine years. He’d been given a suspended jail term for the robbery, and made to perform two hundred hours’ citizen service. It was the last time he’d done a job—well, anything major, anyway, just the occasional rip off.

And every three weeks there would be a message in his e-butler’s hold file asking him if the man had come. Every time he replied no.

Nine years, and that superbitch had never let it go. “Time,” she’d told him on the way to the police station, “lessens nothing.” She’d never said what would happen if he didn’t tell her. But then, it wasn’t something he wanted to find out.