The battledrones were a pair of satellite discs, held aloft on thrumming anti-grav fields, diagnostically manipulating the heavy weapons slung to their bellies, checking targeting facilities and functionality.

“Interface successful,” Lusha grunted, instinctively running through his missile pod tracking checks and practice locking on thin air. “Confirm preparations.” A series of affirmations tumbled across the comm.

He took another deep breath, thinking back to the ill-fated infantry deployments at first light, all those long decs ago. How had Kais felt, he wondered, standing on the brink, staring down into an abyss of unknown horrors and glories? He remembered the advice he’d given. The advice the boy’s own father had given him, tau’cyrs earlier during the be’gel incursions.

Don’t make the mistake of thinking you’re ready for this.

But Kais had been ready. More than ready. Too ready The youth had sounded... broken, when last he spoke from the Enduring Blade. There was no other word for it. The comm-line had gone dead and his bio trace had blinked from the scans with a solitary blip. He’d stared into the abyss and it had opened up and swallowed him whole.

He was dead, then.

The tau’va preached pragmatism over indulgence. In the face of loss, the sio’t espoused, an efficient tau was expected to nod in acceptance, recognise that there was nothing to be done and no sense in sorrow, and simply get on with things. It was easier said than done.

“Kor’vre?” He pushed the unsettling thoughts from his mind and opened a channel to the dropship pilot. “Ready when you are.”

“We’re at a safe altitude, Shas’el. Splitting the deck now.”

The world fell away beneath his feet. Dividing along a central connection, the floor of the drop bay swung open — two halves of a giant trap door hinging apart in unison. As always a wave of dizziness surged over him, filling his mind with the clouds racing below: wave-borne froth vaguely concealing a dark seabed. It was an enthralling sensation.

The certainty of plummeting through the yawning hole to tumble and spin, shrieking, into the gulf of air, was a falsehood: thick connector joists held the battle-suits securely to the drop hold’s ceiling. They began to extend with a piston hiss, the four hulks lowering from the belly of the dropship like string-suspended wind-chimes. Lusha marvelled at the strangeness of it all: his mind was convinced it could feel the cold air rushing past despite the chassis’ encapsulating presence.

“Status checks,” he commanded.

“Ready.”

“Ready.”

“Ready.”

He grinned. “Kor’vre?”

“Standby, Shas’el... Umbilicals will disengage in five, four, three, two, one...”

The connector parted from the upper chassis of the battlesuits with a half-heard click. There was a jolt, spinning the world sideways. A half-formed impression of the dropship sailed overhead and was gone. And then gravity reached out and pulled, tumbling madness overwhelming his senses. The ground was on all sides at once.

Stability returned quickly, arms outstretched, gyroscopes locked off and balance reasserted. The silence was endless.

“Steady descent,” Vre’Tong’ata reported, breaking the airy quiet with a hint of nervousness in his voice. This was only his second high-altitude drop.

“Drones?”

“Maintaining position.”

“Good. Unit three?”

“All signs are good.”

“Four?”

“Fine, Shas’el.”

“Coolant regulators are holding out, Kol’tae?”

“Clean and efficient, Shas’el.”

He nodded happily. “Stay alert. Engage packs at five hundred tor’leks. Not a second after. And easy on the deceleration — I don’t want any mid-air liquidations.”

The cloud layer dissolved around him, its ethereal paleness replaced by the sudden visual shock of the ground beneath, approaching at impossible speed.

The onset of evening rendered the sand rose red — a sea of embers stretching across every horizon. Lettica, directly below them now, was a jagged ulcer marring the desert, uneven surface casting its clawlike shadow in an ever-extending clutch as the sun lowered.

The four suits hurtled earthwards, like misfired bullets cruising along their curvaceous trajectory. Slaves at the whim of gravity. A blue light flickered twice at the corner of Lusha’s HUD, informing him that terminal velocity had been reached.

Pinpricks of light dappled and criss-crossed the black city, weaponsfire and explosions seeming somehow unreal under the influence of distance: bright festival lights against a dark background.

“Shas’el?” the comm chimed. This is the Or’es Tash’var!

Lusha rolled his eyes. “Make it quick,” he replied, “or I’m a ge’ta-flatbread.” The other team members chuckled quietly, reassured by their leader’s joviality.

The voice on the comm sounded perplexed. “S-shas’el?”

“Never mind. You’ve caught me at a bad time, Kor’ui, that’s all.”

“It’s just something O’Udas thought you’d want to know, Shas’el...”

“Understood. Squad — eight hundred tor’leks, brace for firing.”

“Shas’el, should I contact you later?”

“No, no...”

“It’s Shas’la Kais.”

What?

“You said you wanted to know if there was any news.”

Lusha’s stomach turned over.

Pragmatism. Detachment. Efficiency.

He frowned. Pragmatism be damned — he’d known Kais’s father. He’d watched the youth’s progress all rotaa. He owed the shas’la his concern. “And?”

“We think we’ve found a trace. On the surface.”

“You think?”

“It’s patchy, but we’re confident.”

“Be sure, Kor’ui. Is it him or not?”

“Uh...”

Is it him? Lusha struggled to control his eagerness, aware that his squad were listening.

“Probably” The Kor’ui replied hesitantly. “It’s as if his signal’s being blocked by so—”

“Shas’el!” Vre’Wyr’s voice cut in urgently. “You’re too low!”

Lusha glanced at his altimeter, heart racing. The kor’ui’s news had short-circuited his attention for too long: he’d dropped below the five hundred tor’lek limit.

Hissing in alarm, he brought the jetpack online quickly, overfeeding the anti-grav bursts to compensate for his tardiness and ignoring the chorus of protest chimes from the AI. The rest of the team grew more and more distant above him, decelerating at a far more sensible speed.

He overrode the jet dampeners with a rank command, ignoring the squeal of metallic protest as the burners kicked in and aided the anti-grav. The ground came up to meet him inexorably, altimeter blinking red in alarm.

“Shas’el?” the comm chimed. He was too busy sweating and fighting for control to discern whether it was one of the team or the kor’ui.

At an altitude of two hundred tor’leks, with the city’s buildings fully formed and ugly beneath him, he was fairly certain he was going to make it. The jetpack was moaning like an infant at the exertions placed upon it, anti-grav distorting the very air in a long column of shimmering diffracted light. He strengthened the field higher still and felt a glut of blood rush to his head. His organs sat heavily inside him, crushed indelicately by the force of the deceleration. He choked back on the nausea and brought himself under control.

“Shas’el — are you all right?” The rest of the team were now just fifty tor’leks above.

“Fine,” he grunted, trying to sound unruffled. A bright stream of ordnance rattled past him, tracers peppering the sky.

Great, he thought sourly. Just what I need.

He tried to fix on the firing position but it was lost in a riot of explosions and gunfire. Until he was down amongst the violence and madness it was difficult to appreciate its reality — being detached from it by distance made it seem almost laughable, a lightshow for his own amusement.

“Setting down in ten,” he hissed, hoping the battlesuit could take the strain. It was going to be a bumpy landing.