"Oh dear," she said. "I don't think you're going to last very long, and I'm going to need your undivided attention for a good hour."

Sometimes Yallow could be hard work. He knew that she possessed enough control to hold off her orgasm, and that she liked to do so because the longer she held off, the bigger the multiple explosions at the end.

Releasing his penis she strode over to the bed, swept his clothing aside—an act that offended his sense of neatness—then climbed on her hands and knees. Looking back over her shoulder at him she said, "Time to get you into a state when that will last," then parted her knees and stuck her arse out at him.

She was right, he didn't last long the first time. Over the ensuing twenty minutes she dictated to him his every lick, bite and caress as his youthful hyperfit body returned him to the state she required. Next came a marathon that had sweat running into his eyes, and when she came, her hands clenching in the bedding to stop herself tearing the skin off his back, she lost control of her chameleon skin, and blushed with bursts of red, blue and yellow, like a slow firework display.

"There'll be no enquiry," said Cormac, as he and Yallow strolled from the barracks along the short curved track to the adjoining military township. Somehow he felt the need to return focus to things military, despite the fact that his legs felt wobbly and he really wanted a beer.

"Carl is in the top percentile for marksmanship," Yallow observed, gazing at him with an amused quirk to her mouth.

Cormac took a slow breath of the cool evening air, which for a change right then tasted clean. The urge for a beer being utterly understood, he also felt utterly relaxed, and understood the reason for that too. He felt the need to pause for a moment—not to hurry on to the next thing. Halting, he gazed at the nearby skarch trees. These were young examples of the plant that had managed to get a root-hold on many worlds. He walked over and rested a hand against a fibrous surface and peered at little green beetles gathered like metal beads in a crotch where one of the thick leaves sprouted from the stalk, or trunk.

The young trees stood a mere ten feet high with trunks the thickness of a man's leg. They were a tough terraforming hybrid of the kind sowed on worlds to rapidly create biomass for the production of topsoil, and therefore grew fast in even the most extreme conditions, rapidly increasing in height and bulk. As he recollected, the plants were a splicing of maize, bamboo and aloe vera. It occurred to him then that this was the first time he had seen them up close, though he had seen distant examples on the spoil hills about the Prador ship and pieces of them rotting underfoot in those same hills. This was what it was all about: actually being here, seeing and experiencing—not gazing at a picture on a screen.

He turned back to Yallow, who had halted too and was watching him.

"It is understood," he said, "that in his first firefight a soldier may not perform to standard. They thought he got a bit overexcited and just blasted away."

"Young soldiers do tend to get overexcited and blast away," she said, grinning.

He half frowned, half grinned and waved a dismissive hand at her.

She shrugged and continued, "Well, he won't be blasting away at anyone back there now."

Too true: the cases arrived on the morning after the shooting, and they spent most of the day unpacking and assembling their contents. Carl, whose speciality seemed likely to be weapons tech, had been in charge whenever Olkennon was not around. Assembled, the mosquito autoguns walked on four gleaming spidery legs, fat bodies loaded with ammunition and a mini-toc power supply, tubular snout for firing rail-gun projectiles at a rate capable of turning a man into slurry in a second. With them now guarding the perimeter around the Prador ship there would be no more mistakes. The guns had been programmed to go for leg shots, though whether there would be anything left of the legs after the shooting was debatable.

Yallow gave the skarch grove a long suspicious look, then began striding along the track again, and Cormac followed, guessing she was thinking about how many enemies such growth could conceal.

"Where's he gone, anyway?" Yallow asked, jerking her chin towards the military township.

"As you may have noted he's not very talkative lately, so he didn't tell me," Cormac replied. "Who wants to talk about their screw-ups? Maybe we should give him some space."

Yallow glanced at him. "He has spoken some to me, though it always strikes me as a bit false. He probably doesn't talk so much to you because you're a hard act to follow sometimes. When was the last time you screwed up?"

Cormac was surprised. He had always admired both Carl and Yallow and thought them likely to be better soldiers than he was. He shrugged; of course he screwed up, didn't he?

"Let's go get that drink," Yallow added, after an embarrassed pause.

The township was also comprised of bonded-soil domes with plasticrete gratings over the mud lying between them. The place swarmed with soldiers, and those locals who had come from the partially ruined city nearby to sell their wares. A number of eateries had been established, along with a number of bars that were already gaining a reputation as not the best places to visit and be sure to retain your teeth. ECS command could have clamped down on that, but felt that allowing the troops to blow off steam was one of the better alternatives to prescribed drugs and cerebral treatments. It was also true that there were many veterans here too, who preferred this old-fashioned approach. They took the view that busted heads and broken bones could be repaired, but that naïvety could kill.

The first dome with a lit façade that they came to was called Krong's. Cormac gazed at the sign and smiled to himself, remembering his childhood fascination with that character. Apparently Jebel U-cap Krong had survived the war and now ran a salmon farm on some backwoods world, though Cormac was not entirely sure he believed the story.

He and Yallow entered the smoky atmosphere and looked around. The place was starting to fill up, but there were still some tables available so Yallow snagged one and sat down, gesturing Cormac to the bar. He walked over and pushed through the crush there, ordered two beers, then scanned around while the barman, a brushed aluminium spider with limbs terminating in three-fingered hands, poured his drinks.

Carl?

Carl was ensconced with a few of the locals around a small table in one of the dimmer parts of the bar. They were drinking and talking, but did not show the animation evident at the tables surrounding them. Their discussion appeared serious, whispered and vehement. With his drinks finally before him, Cormac took them up, returned to Yallow and told her what he had seen.

"Works fast," she commented. "I don't think I've even spoken to a native yet."

"They don't look happy. Should we go over there?"

"Nah, if they start slapping him about it'll be character-building for him."

Yallow's attitude to violence had ever been thus, but then few people would ever be tough enough to slap her about. In training he'd seen her flip a Golem instructor—something only one in a hundred recruits was capable of doing. Then, thinking of her earlier comment, Cormac remembered the first time he'd managed to get the upper hand against the same instructor. Maybe he took his own achievements too lightly. He frowned, took a drink of his beer, and decided then to keep a wary eye on any inclination to arrogance growing in him; then he drank more, keeping pace with Yallow.

They took it in turns to go to the bar for each round and he was feeling a pleasant buzz when he saw one of the locals standing and pointing a threatening finger at Carl. Carl stood too, glanced about warily, then leaned forwards to say something. The man backhanded him and Carl took it, blank-faced, then turned and headed away. Cormac tracked him across to the door, watched him depart, then observed some altercation back at the table. The man who had slapped Carl abruptly turned and hurried for the door, and that he was checking the positioning of something underneath his coat did not escape Cormac's notice.