"This is class," he admitted reluctantly while Michael burrowed into the fake mahogany bar for beers. "I think we've got three options," the Englishman said, forcing the top off a bottle and taking a long drink.

"One: we find the most efficient-looking mercenaries money can buy before midnight. We've got to move that fast. Taking any longer will give people more time to start checking us out more closely. Not a complication we want. I can spread enough money around to buy us quality, but let's face it, you can't pay anyone enough to risk his life against a nosferatu."

"A nosferatu mage," Serrin said.

"We don't know that for sure," Michael replied. Serrin's look told him to take some things on trust.

"But mercenaries might cut and run," Michael continued. "Which wouldn't be very convenient for us. That leaves us two other possibilities. One I've already discounted, but I'd like to mention it so you can follow my thinking."

He's back in form, Serrin thought. He has that hypo-manic glint in his eye, and I think he actually believes his line that Englishmen are almost bulletproof.

"Forgive me for this one, but it's Humanis."

Tom was half-out of his chair when Michael, genuinely afraid that the troll might deck him with a watermelon-sized fist, waved him back.

"I said I'd discounted that. It's just that the master race would die willingly to deal with the problem we've got. We might not even have to pay them. Come on, be fair, you have to admit they'd be motivated."

"I've put about maybe a dozen of those guys into the ground over the years and I'm not ashamed to say I've never lost a minute's sleep over it," Tom growled.

"That leaves us a third possibility. There's the Ork Liberation Army. I should say the Ork Anarchic Commune, the Wardogs, half a dozen of 'em, but it's the same thing. Orks are a quarter of the population here. The real activists divide into two groups. One bunch, the ones I've mentioned, are hard guys, but they protect what they've got and work to get a bigger slice. They're organized, so there's a general ork policlub. The other bunch are the ones to avoid. The Horde. They just like killing anything that doesn't look like a big, bad ork. The trick is to recruit from the former and not from the latter."

"Can we do that?" Serrin wondered.

"There's a bar, the Meld In, in Grenzstrasse. Ironically enough, it's a hangout for Berliners who actually want to improve relations between metatypes. Won't find any Horde members there. But we'll find everyone else. Now this is a tricky one. We need types smart enough to be enraged by the idea of what Luther's doing, while avoiding the ones so over-motivated that they'll want to rip our heads off first."

"Why orks, specifically?" Tom asked.

"Just because they're the most numerous and best-equipped muscle available here. But, slot, if there are

dwarfs, trolls, or anyone else willing to come along and help us out, the more the better. The other good thing about orks is that they'll keep it to themselves."

"And what about me?" Serrin asked. "We're going to ask them to blow away a megalomaniacal elven racist, and here's an elf asking them to do it. Isn't that going to look rather suspicious?"

"No," Michael said slowly. "Not if they see you're really there with Kristen." Avoiding Serrin's uncomfortable look, he continued. "Look, let's do a quick inventory on ourselves. One troll. One elf. One white man. One black woman. Are we a plausible group for furthering some kind of racist plot?"

"Probably not," Serrin agreed.

"No. We're actually not an unlikely collection of folks to oppose that very thing."

"Maybe it would be better if Serrin didn't actually go along to meet the orks. Your logic is right," Tom told Michael, "but life isn't logical."

"More's the pity," Michael said dryly. "No. I don't want to deceive them, even by omission. We go in on this together. That's what we'll be asking them to do."

"What about a compromise? Maybe I arrive a little later at this Meld place? Without me around, it might be easier for you to prepare the ground," Serrin offered.

"Good idea. Now, let's start making a shopping list of what we're going to need in the way of hardware. Sadly, not even in Berlin can we lay our hands on a tacnuke not in the time we have available to us but apart from that we've got enough money to get what we want."

Michael began to unpack his cyberdeck from its travel case. "I think I should also investigate some places less well-known than Meld In. Shouldn't take more than half an hour.

"While I'm doing that, maybe Tom could hit the place and just kick back, have a drink, be seen. Then, when we go back, it will look like we've sent someone to scope matters out and that we like what we heard. When the time comes to parlay, it might get us some respect, like we know what we're doing."

"Makes sense," the troll said, getting to his feet. "Where is this place again?"

Michael gave him the exact address. "Hang around for half an hour maybe. Try not to look obvious, like you're checking everyone out."

"Look, chummer, I may not be smart, but I'm not dumb either," Tom retorted.

"Sorry," Michael said sheepishly. "I'm just a bit twitchy, that's all."

When Tom had gone, Serrin questioned Michael as he was rigging up the Fuchi. "Look, why should you go along on this? You're no samurai."

"I'm a damn good shot with the Predator, though. Come on, I live in New York. It's basic survival instinct, old boy. Anyway, I intend to stay behind the front line. Isn't that the same deal you made with Kristen?"

Serrin looked ruefully at the Englishman. Once again, he'd proven to be one step ahead in his guesswork. It would be nice if he would only guess wrong now and again.

Michael readied himself to jack in. "Now, let's find ourselves somewhere to buy things that make pleasingly big explosions."

Despite some initial qualms, Tom immediately felt at home in the bar. He'd hardly gotten through the door before various people had forced at least a half dozen pamphlets into his hands, each espousing the virtues of racial co-existence in all its many-faceted glory. He judged that the capabilities of the eager, but innocuous-looking, clientele probably didn't match the grandiose ambitions in the pamphlets. Somehow it seemed wrong to sit in a German beer cellar with a mineral water, so he ordered a stein of the alcohol-free variety. Back in UCAS, alcohol-free beer tasted like devil rat piss, but surely that couldn't be true in Germany.

The troll's eyes widened as he took a gulp, then studied the half-empty stein. It was excellent. Yeast and hops, barley and something indefinable hit his taste buds. He was just pondering ordering another when all hell suddenly broke loose in the doorway. Shock waves rippled through the bar and Tom was hurled off his chair. He hit the ground hard, dazedly taking in the faces and metal and fire sprouting around the door, the screaming in German and the hefting guns ready to follow up the concussion-grenade hit. Broken glass and shards of furniture flew around him. He dimly felt one or two cuts on his arms, but nothing hit him in the face.

The Roomsweeper wasn't the right weapon under the circumstances. He should have had a pistol for standing outside and dumping heat inside rather than the other way around, but he rolled with it, took aim and emptied the clip in the direction of the doorway. He could only hope that everyone originally within it had been blown far enough by the shock wave to be out of the arc of fire.

Smoke obscured his view by the time the clip was empty. Gunfire chattered all around, echoing off the walls, deafening everyone. Half a dozen bleeding bodies lay, some at horribly unnatural angles, on the floor. Looking up, Tom saw a female ork swaying and muttering as she cast a spell. Then a bolt of fire ripped through the doorway and hurtled into the street outside. The effects weren't visible through the smoke, but the screams were audible even over the yelling and shooting inside the bar.