A light flashed in communications space, and at the same time an identifying glyph crackled in the air overhead. Ransome sighed, recognizing the image–knowing too well that the caller was the kind who did not give up–and muted his images with a wave of a gloved hand. With the other hand, he reached into the main control space to connect himself with the communications channel. “What the hell do you want, Sanci?”

“About fucking time, Ransome.”

There had been no delay. Ransome sighed again, shoved the familiar face–sharp chin framed by a short and tidy beard, eyes always slightly narrowed, as though he were looking into a bright light–to one side of the Game net images. “What do you want?”

“Have you been tracking the Game nets–the Old Network, by any chance?” Sanci smiled. “You might want to tune in.”

“I doubt it,” Ransome said.

Sanci’s smile widened, and Ransome realized the other man was tracking his net hookups. “Someone’s playing with your toys.”

“What channel?”

“The mainline feed out of Shadows.”

Ransome shoved Sanci’s image farther to his left, reached into control space to fiddle with the icons hanging there. He opened a connection to the Old Network, not even thinking of the costs. Shadows was easy to find, its distinctive icon flashing to signal an interesting session in progress, and he brought it on‑line, feeding the image into a small space directly in front of his eyes. Figures moved in an unfamiliar, cell‑like room, altogether too like Jericho’s prison system. He reached for the session precis even as he recognized two of the templates. Lord Faro was an old favorite, and so was Ibelin Belfortune, and if they both were there… He flicked the precis into prominence, skimmed quickly through the screen. Desir of Harmsway’s name seemed to leap out at him.

“Who’s running this?” he said aloud, and felt rather than saw the malice in Sanci’s look.

“I knew you’d be interested in this one. And it’s not a fill‑in‑the‑background session, either. That’s Ixion’s Wheel you’re looking at.”

I put those characters on Ixion’s Wheel to keep them out of other people’s hands. And Desir of Harmsway is my character, my property–more than that, my creation. Who the hell does this session leader think s/he is, using my persona in a session? Ransome bit back his instinctive reaction–Sanci didn’t deserve the satisfaction–and said again, “Who is it?”

Sanci sighed, rather theatrically. “Woman named Lioe, out of the Republic. She did the Frederick’s Glory scenario everyone was so hot about.”

Ransome said, “She’s good, or so I hear.” His hands were busy in the control space, expanding the picture, so that hand‑high figures moved in a cube of space half a meter square.

“Good enough?” Sanci murmured, still with that knowing smile, and Ransome managed a shrug.

“It’s possible, I suppose. I don’t follow the Game that closely these days.”

Sanci sneered, but said nothing. Ransome hesitated, wanting to lie, to deny that he would follow this scenario now that it had been brought to his attention, but knew that Sanci would recognize the truth–knew too that Sanci would probably try to trace the taps, and blocking him was hardly worth the trouble. But I’ll be damned if I’ll thank him for this. “Good‑bye, Sanci,” he said instead, and flicked away the other man’s image. The movement cut the communications channel as it sent the bearded face spinning, so that it turned end over end three times before it disappeared.

The gesture had done something to soothe his feelings, but Ransome was still frowning when he sat up fully. The image‑shell shifted with him, so that he looked down at the narrowcast from Shadows as though it were a desktop screen. He banished the rest of the images with a quick gesture, brought up the sound until he could follow the dialogue in the little world that hung in the air in front of him. One did not forget the Game, not when one had spent as much time in its worlds as he had done, but one did get out of practice. He scowled at the characters, reading the iconography of clothing and Face/Bodynumbers, and reached into control space to tap the session leader’s display bar. In the Game, Belfortune and Lord Faro whispered together, fearful of interruption, and a familiar figure moved through the hall behind them, deliberately eavesdropping. Avellar…

He studied the string of glyphs and numbers that bloomed along the base of the main image, skimmed quickly through the overlapping screens to confirm what he suspected. The overall shape of the Game was almost as familiar to him as the layout of his studio, and it was easy to see where this scenario would fit into the whole. It was ostensibly a Rebel scenario, but it was tied both to the Psionics variant and the Rival Claimants offshoot of the Court Life Game– and all of that done through Avellar and Desir of Harmsway, who was my character, and the situation between them was my invention–Ransome reached out to expand the image, drawing out the details. Some of the players were old friends, old rivals in the Game–Peter Savian he’d known for years, and Kazio Beledin; Imbertine was another familiar name, as was Roscha, though he’d never met the latter off‑line. But they were players, not session leaders: it was the leader who’d chosen to play with these characters– my characters, and it should have been my Game. This Lioe’s got nerve… He rolled the name over in his mind, recalling the little he’d heard. She was a notable‑in‑the‑making, or so everybody said, a pilot out of the Republic, off Callixte, which was a good introduction in the Game… and her first name was Quinn, Quinn Lioe. He hesitated for a moment, running down the list of friends who still followed the Game and who would give information, and reached into control space to open another line. The Game session still swam in front of him, the characters murmuring to each other, and he pushed it aside to make room for the new image.

A disk of static appeared, a hazy oval that flickered through so many colors so quickly that the eye could only read it as grey: the system had made contact. “Hally?”

A face took shape, forming from the disk itself, so that it became a mask hanging in space, a face thin and rather fine beneath the canalli weathering. Earrings gleamed in both ears, and a fine chain–a datawire, Ransome guessed–ran from one particularly elaborate stud to a jewel‑rimmed socket at the inner corner of his right eye. The iridescent strand seemed to glow against his pale brown skin. “Ransome?” Thin, delicately arched eyebrows rose in surprise, then contracted into a frown. “I’m watching a Game,” Hally Ventura said, and broke off, seeing the face in his own screens.

“From Shadows?” Ransome asked, and was answered by a brief, lopsided smile.

“That’s right. So what do you want to know about her, I‑Jay?”

“What do you know?”

“About what everyone does. She’s been a name on Callixte, everyone says a notable‑to‑be. And she’s a pilot, union pilot, also works out of Callixte for that. Angele up at the port says her ship’s in for repairs, and she’s come to play. People’ve been at her to quit space, go into the Game full time, but she’s not been interested.”

“Piloting’s a good job,” Ransome said. “I’d think twice before I quit.”

Hally shrugged. “She’s very, very good at the Game.” His eyes shifted, looking at something outside his own display. “Look, I‑Jay, I want to watch this session. Was that all?”

“I just thought, if anyone knew anything, it would be you,” Ransome said, and was rewarded by a quick smile: the apology was acceptable. “Thanks, Hally.”

“Not at all,” Hally answered, and the hanging mask dissolved into the oval of static. Ransome cut the connection.

The Game session floated back in front of him, expanded at a gesture to display its full detail. Belfortune sat with his head in his hands, answered, low‑voiced, Lord Faro’s questions. The tension between them was palpable: the players’ affair had been over for years, but its memory still informed their play. Mijja Lyall, the scientist/technician, watched uneasily, her gaze flickering between the two men and the metal face that hung on the wall overhead. Baron Vortex, the Game’s great villain, was overseeing this himself.