Ivanov had gritted his teeth against the shocking pain from his arm while his neural nanonics slowly recovered on the ride down. When he slid out of the chute the axon block was established, cutting off all the impulses from the mangled wound. Physiological shock was more difficult to counter.

With only one arm to flail around with, he tumbled awkwardly from the chute as the hem released him. Louise rushed forward to help, only to gasp when she saw the state of his bloody arm.

“No,” Ivanov groaned. He rolled onto his knees, gripping the long wound tightly, trying to staunch the blood. “Go,” he said earnestly.

“But you’re hurt.”

“Doesn’t matter. You go. Now.”

“I . . .” she stared round in despair at the dark deserted streets. “There’s nowhere to go.”

Ivanov’s expression altered, a subtle but definite change. “This is Charlie. Run, Louise. Run now. And keep on running. Go down the Holloway Road to start, there aren’t many of them in that direction. Shoot anyone you see. I mean it, don’t ask questions, just shoot. Once you’re clear, find somewhere deserted to hole up. I promise I’ll do what I can to save London. You know that, Louise.” He looked up. A bulge was sliding down the chute, already halfway down. “Now go! Please. Go on, leave. I’ll take care of them here. They won’t be following you for quite a while.”

Ivanov winked. Louise knew that was him, not Charlie. She nodded and backed off. “Thank you.” Then she was gone, running hard down the Holloway Road.

Behind her, Ivanov swung round to face the chute. He let go of his injured arm, allowing the blood to flow freely again. His good arm brought the anti-memory weapon up to point at the chute hem, just as Billy-Joe’s head popped out.

The fluorescent yellow frisbee soared high above the white sand. Haile had to formshift her tractamorphic flesh into a long tentacle to catch it. Jay clapped excitedly, hopping about. “Throw it back, throw it back,” she squealed.

Haile’s tentacle curled round the rim, and released the frisbee with a fast flick. It flew back, travelling twice as quickly as when Jay threw it, tracing a perfectly flat trajectory.

The little girl had to jump to have any chance of making a catch. It hit her hand with a sharp smack, and she tumbled over onto the sand.

“Ouch!”

You feel painfulness?

“Not half.” Jay scrambled up, shaking the tingling out of her hand. She gave the clubhouse along the beach a guilty glance. Tracy had started to warn her about the amount of times she was using the provider for medical aid when she went surfing, threatening to confiscate the board. Asking for something to ease her stinging palm would probably result in more scolding.

“Rest time,” she announced, and flopped on her towel.

Haile lumbered over and used her tractamorphic flesh to scoop out a shallow depression in the warm dry sand. She settled into it, emitting strong thoughts of grateful satisfaction.

Jay eyed the cooler box again, then looked back to the clubhouse. “What are they watching now?”

Corpus is displaying pictures from sensors on Earth for them.

“Really? Where from?”

London. Fletcher Christian has arrived to help the police locate Quinn Dexter. Tracy is concerned that the security services have acquired the life-pattern disrupter weapon.

Jay sighed with impatience. Tracy kept telling her how momentous events were back in the Confederation. Privately Jay thought the way the old observers got into such a tizz over all the political shenanigans was stupid. All she really wanted to know was when it was all going to be over and she could see her mother again. Loads of politicians arguing about who they should ally their planets with wasn’t going to bring any sort of end to the crisis.

Friend Jay, what is wrong?

“I want to go home.” She hated how miserable and whiny she sounded.

Corpus asks that you be patient.

“Huh!” Suffering quickly turned to a spike of anger. “As if it cares.”

It does care,a distressed haile said. All Kiint care.

“Right.” She wasn’t going to argue with Haile, it always upset both of them.

Tracy comes,haile said with a note of hope.

Jay saw the old woman riding a chrome-blue air scooter towards them. Several of the Village residents used the little vehicles to get about on, each one as individual as its owner. Tracy’s was a fat ellipsoid shape with a recessed saddle in the middle. Stubby triangular fins with red tail lights protruded from the rear third; for show Jay assumed. There were also some positively anachronistic circular headlights on the front, like glass jewels. Tracy called it her T-bird.

Another thing Jay was banned from using by herself. She was convinced the sleek-looking vehicle could go a lot faster than Tracy’s maximum speed.

It glided silently through the air at about twenty kilometres an hour, keeping a good two metres above the ground.

Jay stood up, brushing sand from her swimsuit as the T-bird landed beside her.

“Sorry I’m late, poppet,” Tracy said. “Haile, my dear, you’ll have to look after yourself this afternoon. I’m going to take Jay to Agarn.”

“What’s Agarn?”

Tracy explained as they walked back to the chalet, the T-bird following faithfully behind. Agarn was another planet in the Arc, inhabited by a small number of Kiint. They didn’t involve themselves in the kind of life practised by the majority of the Arc, preferring more philosophical pursuits. “So mind your manners,” Tracy warned. “They’re a very dignified group.”

“Why are we going there?”

“The Agarn Kiint are slightly different from the others. I’m hoping they’ll intervene in our favour. It’s a bit of a last resort, but things are turning ugly in the Confederation. I’m worried the situation will result in a squalid kind of stalemate. Nothing will be resolved, which is one of the worst outcomes there can be.”

She inspected Jay’s clothes, a pair of khaki shorts and a blue T-shirt, with sturdy hiking boots. “You’ll do, quite the little explorer.”

“Why am I going with you?”

“So they can get a look at a true human.”

“Oh.” Jay didn’t like that idea at all. “Can’t they look at the pictures from the Confederation like you do?”

“In a way they already have. They haven’t turned their back on Corpus. If they had there wouldn’t be any point to visiting them.”

Jay just smiled. She still really didn’t understand Corpus.

Agarn didn’t have any buildings within sight of the teleport circle they arrived on. They were on the rolling foothills of a wide valley. It was kind of like the parkland of Riynine, but left untended for a couple of centuries. Lush emerald grass-analogue swamped the ground. Trees were twisting towers of clustered magenta bubbles. A dozen waterfalls poured over tall rock cliffs lining the valley, while every crevice was home to a stream, emptying into crater lakes that were stepped down the slopes.

Tracy looked round, dabbing at her forehead with a lace hanky. “I’d forgotten how hot it is here,” she murmured.

Jay put her sunglasses on, and they walked down to one of the crater lakes. Two Kiint were bathing just off the shore.

Hello, Fowin,tracy said.

The Kiint raised a blunt length of tractamorphic flesh, and began to wade ashore. Greetings to you, Tracy Dean. You are Jay Hilton? Query.

“Yes, thank you very much. Hello.” Jay pushed her sunglasses up as the Kiint reached the shore and walked out onto the thick grass-analogue. It was very similar to Haile’s parents, though she thought the breathing vents were angled steeper, and the legs were flatter.

I thank you for this visit,tracy said. I wish to ask you to consider intervention.

I know this. Why else do observers visit me? Following the Gebal stabilisation, every time a new species encounters a problem I am asked to be favourable towards them.