‘Then,’ Emily said, delicately sipping her drink, ‘Lord Hampton looked down and said, “Madam, I said that the Honourable Member needed the persuasion of a lady to stand at election.” Most embarrassing, I can assure you.’
‘What did you do?’ Carveth asked.
‘Do? I merely rose from my knees and vacated the drawing room. One has to keep some dignity.’
They sat around a table in one of the company bars.
This one was for lower-ranking workers, non-executives, and was called Norm’s. It had wooden fittings and stools – unlike Spritzers, the choice for more important company men, which had no seats and served only wine.
‘Well,’ said the artificial wife, ‘it is a woman’s purpose to make her husband happy, after all.’
‘ No,’ Carveth replied firmly, raising a finger. All thought of being a sergeant-major had vanished now: her mind was too busy concentrating on staying upright. Her finger meandered in her vision, and she tracked it with an effort.
‘No,’ she reasserted. ‘You do not have to do anything unless you want to. You get him to do it instead. That’s exactly what I’m talking about. You’ve got to listen,’ she added, her voice rising, ‘because this is feminism, right? You have a duty to great feminists like Emily Pankhurst and, um. . . Gloria Gaynor to get ahead. Because if a woman’s place is in the kitchen, a man’s place is on the kitchen table – on his back. I speak from experience here.’
‘It is a truth universally acknowledged,’ Emily added, ‘that all men are bastards.’ She paused and finished her Tia Maria and coke. ‘Would anyone care for a choral interlude?’
Carveth looked over her shoulder at the small stage at the back of the bar where Yoshimi was belting out ‘Carwash’ on the singalongatron. ‘Job well done,’ Carveth said to the bottles on the tabletop.
‘So,’ she added, sitting up, ‘I hope you’ve learned something today, because I intend to teach you useful stuff for the real world. You there, Rachel! What’ve you learned today?’
‘How to operate a laser rifle and how not to whore myself to just anyone who walks past.’
‘Good! And with that thought I will leave you,’ Carveth added, lurching to her feet. ‘Tomorrow, we will learn some other stuff about guns and drill and all that. Goodnight, ladies: it’s been a pleasure.’
She turned and walked out, a feeling of contentment swelling within her. I trained them well, she thought. My robot sisters.
The door to the bar swung shut behind her. Overhead the neon sign flickered and buzzed. She sniffed and fished a map out of her pocket. Time to go to work.
Carveth took a left, meandered down the corridor and found a door marked ‘Authorised staff only’. For a moment she wondered if this sort of work might be better done whilst entirely sober. Ah, but wasn’t that exactly the sort of thing that the company would expect? Her drinking spree was therefore a cunning ruse to fool them into thinking she was drunk, which admittedly she was, which was in turn a double bluff – or something. . . She slipped the keycard out of her thigh pocket and ran it through the lock. Apparently she was authorised.
Carveth slipped through and closed the door behind her.
She crept down the corridor, the carpet tiles muffling her boots. There were framed pictures on the walls: a motivational poster, a pin-up elf from Galaxy of Battles, a girl in leather smalls draped over some circuitry. The air was stale. She was in the computer department.
As if to confirm this, voices burst out from an office to the left: two technicians, shouting over one another. One started laughing at his colleague’s stupidity as Carveth ducked down and crept under the window. She grinned at her own cleverness.
Standing up again, she felt less clever. Her brain swayed worryingly inside her skull, slopping about in Bacardi like a picked frog in ethanol. She reached the lift, pressed the button and watched the big red digital display count up to her floor.
From one of the offices a voice broke out in a snarl.
‘Liar, wicked liar! Computers don’t break, you fool! You broke it!’ The door rolled open and she slipped inside, remembered Dreckitt’s instructions and keyed in ‘sub-basement four’. The lift sank. Pan-pipes started playing The Safety Dance.
Dreckitt sat back in his chair and poured himself a shot of rye. He stared into the glass, reflecting how much whisky looked like the urine sample of a habitual whisky drinker.
He took a sip and pulled the face he tended to pull when drinking. No matter how many times you swirled it round the bottom of the glass, Famous Teacher still tasted like tractor fuel.
He got up and walked to the little window. It was snowing outside, pitch-black except for the lights on the landing strip. He wondered what was going on in Smith’s spaceship. Probably something cheerful. He grimaced and took another sip.
The company radio stations played power ballads and synthesiser pop, so Dreckitt had brought his own records.
At the moment, a warbling crooner was telling him that this was not goodbye, but au revoir. Dreckitt didn’t believe a word of it.
Looking into the black, he suddenly realised that he was lonely. Carveth made him feel uneasy, as well as making him wince, but he didn’t feel quite so miserable when she was around. Even the perpetual rain and flickering neon of his homeworld would have been bearable with her. I ought to tell her that, he thought. Let her know she’s a doll. Maybe not: doll was probably the wrong word for a reprogrammed sexbot.
Someone knocked on the door. Dreckitt opened it.
A sour-faced security officer stood outside. ‘Company business,’ he said. ‘Step aside.’
‘I’m stepping,’ Dreckitt replied.
‘I’m here to search the room,’ the officer said, walking in. ‘Just a routine check.’ He took a scanner from his belt and ran it up and down the curtains.
‘Sure, it’s routine,’ Dreckitt said. ‘It’s routine, just like a kangaroo practising law. It’s routine as a two-bit grifter getting three aces against Nick the Greek.’
The security man frowned, struggling to comprehend. ‘So, um, not routine, then?’
‘Damn right. Take the breeze, pal. Scram.’
The man’s face hardened. ‘No deal,’ he said, and he reached for his gun. Dreckitt whirled, grabbed at the table and as the gun appeared he smashed the whisky bottle over the agent’s head.
The security man crumpled like a sack full of old clothes. The smell of whisky was overpowering. Dreckitt lifted his pillow and took his pistol from underneath. ‘Too bad you wouldn’t leave,’ he said. ‘But then again, who does?’
The lift stopped and the piped music cut. As the door opened, light jazz began to play.
‘Bloody hell,’ Carveth said.
She was looking across a marble hall at a bronze torso, ten feet high. It was stylised: the lack of detail made it eerie. The muscles of the chest were smooth slabs, the face featureless except for a stern brow and a bland horizontal stripe of mouth. On the statue’s plinth was one word: COMMERCE.
Awed, she stepped into the hall. Her soles squeaked on the floor. Walnut panels stretched up the walls. Marble women stood on tiptoe at the edges of the room, holding up glowing balls. Everything was sleek.
Carveth felt uneasy, watched.
There was a picture on the wall beside the statue. She closed one eye to stabilise her vision. The picture showed a man in a double-breasted suit, big and healthy, staring into the camera with an expression that was at once jocular and threatening. He had a pencil moustache like W’s, but neater hair, and he looked much less ill.
‘Lloyd Leighton,’ said a voice.
Carveth spun around. Emily crossed the hall in a soft hiss of skirt, her bootheels clicking on the marble.
‘The former owner of the Blue Moon Corporation, co-founder of Leighton-Wakazashi. He used to be the richest man in the galaxy,’ she explained. ‘Until he disappeared.’
‘I, um, I just needed some air.’
‘Of course. A fundamentally vulgar business, commerce,’ she observed. ‘Nobody of any real worth makes money. One either marries or inherits it. Lloyd Leighton made roller-coasters.’
Carveth peered at the picture: Leighton looked like a tyrant on his day off. ‘Roller-coasters?’
‘Gaudy, nasty things,’ Emily said. ‘Not like the sort of entertainments we have at Mansfield Theme Park. We offer lawn croquet and then a little sit-down. But Leighton felt he could make money that way. He went missing at the start of the war, after Leighton-Wakazashi took over Blue Moon.’ She looked down at Carveth, frowned and said, ‘You seem somewhat lost.’
‘Yes,’ Carveth said. ‘I took a wrong turn somewhere –all a bit much. . .’
‘I agree. It’s all so crass and cheap-looking. Terribly vulgar.’ Emily sighed. ‘Would you care to join me for a stroll?’
‘I’m alright, thanks.’
‘Then goodnight. My constitution demands that I retire.’ Emily smiled, turned, and disappeared down the corridor, her skirts whispering around her.
Carveth watched her go and exhaled. She glanced at the map. Nearly there. The bronze statue glowered at her as she left the room.
Smith answered the doorbell with a pistol in the pocket of his dressing gown. ‘Dreckitt?’
The android stumbled in and slammed the airlock behind him. Suruk, who had been hiding behind the door with a machete, waved.
‘We’ve got a problem,’ Dreckitt said.
‘What is it?’
‘My cover’s blown,’ Dreckitt said. He was shivering, Smith saw: he wore his raincoat over a shirt, hardly sufficient for the cold outside. ‘They sent some gunsel to check out my room. He drew on me and I knocked him cold.’
‘Dammit,’ Smith exclaimed. ‘Are you sure?’
‘If I’m not sure, I just wasted good hooch on some guy’s head. We’ve gotta go. If they’ve found me, they’ll find Polly.’
‘Right,’ said Smith. ‘I’ll radio in to HQ.’
‘That’s really bad!’ They looked round: Rhianna stood in the corridor, wearing a kaftan. ‘This is an act of corporate oppression, not to mention attempted murder! We should picket their offices at once!’
Dreckitt turned back to Smith. ‘Why the hell are you packing a rod in your pyjamas?’
Smith took the Civiliser out of his pocket. ‘For close encounters.’
Dreckitt shook his head. ‘This whole place’s gone crazy.’
‘Nonsense,’ Suruk said. ‘It has become good!’ He disappeared into his room and returned a moment later, spear in hand. ‘I have never taken the skull of a yuppie,’ he said, ‘but I understand that they often have a bull and a bear in their market. It should be an interesting fight.’
The basement was deserted. Carveth crept through a little communal mess-room, down a narrow corridor and reached the main data archive. A sealed glass door blocked the way. She pushed her keycard into a slot in the wall and the main lights flickered into life. The computer made a set of staccato mechanical barks and the door slid back.
The data archive consisted of one seat and a terminal.
Diodes flashed on the walls like Christmas lights. She had no idea what they did.
Carveth lowered herself into the seat and turned on the monitor. She wiggled her fingers, ready to go to work.
Lines ran up and down the screen. It emitted a stuttering rattle, as if its gears were not quite meshed, and then the screen flashed white, black, and white again. In the upper left corner of the screen was the message: Go to Line 10.
She put her keycard into the memory slot and words clattered across the screen: How can I help you today?
Carveth closed her eyes, the world wobbling a little behind them, and remembered her mission. ‘Show me all files relating to selling things to the Ghasts,’ she said.
Sorry! the computer replied. Those files are encrypted. Special company order.
‘Can’t I just copy them?’
Sure! You just won’t be able to read them, that’s all. Copying right now.
Bloody computers, Carveth thought. It wasn’t like this in the Empire. Proper computers had cogs and paper spools.
‘Just out of interest,’ she said, eyes fixed on the screen, ‘who encrypted the files?’
There is no name on file, the computer replied. It’s credited to ‘a lady’.
‘A lady?’ Carveth said.
She flopped back in the seat. ‘A lady’. Who the hell would call themselves that, except—
A sense of leaden horror dropped over her, like a curtain coming down. ‘Oh, hell,’ she said.
Words scrolled across the screen. Download complete.
She reached forward and pulled out the keycard. As the screen went black she saw Emily’s face reflected in it, like a ghost.
‘It would be only understandable for one to expect an explanation.’ A blank, meaningless smirk spread across the lady android’s face. ‘One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other,’ she observed. ‘But it can never resist sticking its nose in to have a look around, can it now?’
Carveth started to rise.
‘Not so hasty,’ Emily said. ‘I believe we have a little unfinished business to discuss. Tell me, did it not occur to you that the company might have the gumption to install a sleeper in the ranks, as the common people put it? Someone to keep an eye on proceedings, to guard the data files, to keep our papers safe from a dirty little back-stairs menial like you?’
Carveth leaped out of the seat. Emily made a grab for her, Carveth ducked, and in a moment they faced one another, the armchair between them. ‘Now look,’ Carveth said, ‘let’s be reasonable here, right?’
‘One does not reason with the likes of you!’ Emily snarled. ‘A thief, a spy, and. . . and a social climber !’ She lunged around the chair. Carveth darted left, spun the chair and ran. She thumped the panel and sprang through the airlock as it slid open. She tore down the corridor, stumbled, glanced back and saw Emily rushing after her, filling the passage with skirts that hissed against the wall, a tidal wave of silk. Emily’s legs were longer – and as Carveth reached the mess-room Emily grabbed her pony-tail, yanked her back and tossed Carveth across the room.
She hit the floor. Like a mad bride Emily stood in the centre of the mess, looking round. Her hands shook as she slid a fountain pen from her decolletage.
Carveth pulled herself onto her hands and knees.
Emily’s twitchy fingers started to dismantle the pen, turning it into some kind of weapon.
‘Time,’ she said, ‘for this pen of mine to dwell on guilt and misery. Yours.’
Carveth jumped up. Emily jabbed, but missed, and Carveth fell across the mess table. Emily sprang onto her, pen raised to stab, and Carveth’s hand closed around a bottle on the tabletop. Emily lunged and Carveth twisted round and smashed the bottle over the lady android’s head.
Emily fell in an explosion of sauce. Carveth stumbled back and Emily rose from the floor. Her scalp was covered in salad cream. She looked as if she had been standing under an albatross.
A droplet of salad cream trickled down Emily’s forehead. She sniggered.
Carveth ran.
In the wrong direction.
Suruk led the way, Dreckitt following. Smith was next: he kept glancing back to make sure that Rhianna was still with them. Nobody tried to stop them: tough executives turned and fled rather than confront them, three-wheeled scooters rattled away from the sound of their boots.
‘Down here,’ Dreckitt said, and they hurried into the stairwell. ‘We don’t have long.’
Suruk raised a hand. ‘I smell something. It is like. . .fizzy drink and food that is taken away. I smell men.’
‘Food?’ Smith said. ‘Carveth may be nearby. She’s like a dustbin sometimes.’
‘No,’ said Suruk. ‘I mean men.’
‘We must be in the computing section.’ Dreckitt cocked his huge automatic. ‘Not far now. We just need to—’
A door dropped out of the ceiling behind them, cutting them off like a portcullis. Smith glanced round, and with a crash a second door fell at the far end of the passage, sealing them in.
Dreckitt drew his pistol. ‘Trapped! Those cheap punks’ve scammed us!’
Smith frowned. ‘In which case,’ he said, ‘follow me.’ He threw open one of the doors leading off the passage and stormed in. ‘Hands up, everybody!’
In the light of a dozen computer screens, two men raised their hands.
‘You there, computer people,’ Smith said, nodding at the nearer and fatter of the two. ‘I need your help. This is a matter of extreme importance to the security of the British Empire. As employees of the Leighton-Wakazashi Company, which is subject to British law, I am commandeering you to – what’re you looking at?’ he glanced to his right. ‘Ah, yes. This is my colleague, Suruk the Slayer, a Morlock. He is a noted warrior and decent fellow and—’
‘It’s a girl!’ said the fat man.
His friend, still sitting at his desk, nodded. ‘A real one,’ he whispered. ‘With – you know—’ He made a gesture in front of his chest.
‘Quiet!’ Smith barked. ‘Now listen closely. We need those security doors outside lifted. We are on a mission of utmost urgency.’
‘Yeah, as if,’ said the thin man. Now that the shock of their arrival had passed, his voice had become tired and slightly contemptuous. ‘Can’t do it. Those are director-controlled only. Even if you did bypass the anti-hack firewall without neural blowout – which you couldn’t do – the grid it’s running on’s parallel, so you can’t jump from one to the other. I programmed that,’ he added to Rhianna. ‘I could show you how it works sometime.’
Smith glanced at Dreckitt. ‘You’re an android – did you understand any of that?’
Dreckitt nodded. ‘Sure. In layman’s terms, he’s saying that if you want the little dame busted out it’s nix but an inside job. The joint’s sewn up tighter than a Bay City caboose.’
Puzzled, Smith looked to Rhianna.
‘It’s all about the flow of negative energy—’ she began.
‘Not so!’ Suruk put in. ‘Mazuran, imagine the fierce beasts of two hunting packs, bound together in a network of blood—’
‘Everyone, please!’
They fell silent, waiting for Smith to speak.
‘Our friend is trapped in the data library, deep below here. We have to talk to her – urgently. Do you know how to do that?’
The thin man’s fingers clattered over the keyboard. ‘Nope, can’t do it, line’s down. Place is sealed up. There’s two life forms in there, but the door’s jammed from the looks of it.’
Suruk was leaning against the wall, arms folded.
‘Perhaps this man could help us.’ The M’Lak pointed to a picture on the wall. It showed a pixie holding a massive blunderbuss. ‘He could burst the door with his hackbut.’
‘That’s not a real person,’ Smith said. ‘It’s some character from Galaxy of Battles, a computer game. It’s only a pretend hackbut.’ Something touched Smith’s arm and he glanced round. ‘What is it, Dreckitt?’
‘Wait,’ Dreckitt said. The dim glow of screens gave his face an unhealthy, sepulchral look. ‘There is something. Polly told me she had an account. All the machines here are wired to Galaxy of Battles. I’ll guard the doors, and you could. . . enter the matrix.’
‘Sorry?’ Smith said. ‘It sounds unnatural.’
Suruk’s eyes widened slightly. ‘I have heard of such things. Computers linked for the sharing of images of nude human females. We can turn this evil to our own ends! Quick, let us don the helms of virtuality – and rescue Piglet!’
Rhianna folded her arms and peered at the pictures on the wall. ‘It looks kind’ve. . . puerile. All the women have really demeaning outfits. Can’t I help Polly without having to look like some kind of teenage fantasy-figure?’
‘Carveth needs us,’ Smith replied. ‘We must all make sacrifices, Rhianna. If Suruk and I are willing to expose ourselves to death and danger, you must be willing to expose yourself to. . . um. . . us. Dreckitt, watch the doors. Suruk – fetch the hats!’
Smith opened the door of his level-one hovel and stepped into the sunlight. Rhianna was waiting for him.
They stood on the edge of a forest. Ahead, the fields rolled away to a rather-too-perfect sunset. Something large and multi-winged flapped its way across the sky.
The dusk made Smith’s armour glow. Galaxy of Battles had analysed his brain activity, giving him an appearance suited to his personality: he wore a breast-plate, mail shirt and leggings and there was a sword at his waist. Smith thought that he looked rather dashing.
Rhianna crossed her arms and huffed. It was surprising how much decoration they could fit on so small a metal bathing suit, Smith reflected. She sported a staff, a kind of tea-towel that hung between her legs and a look of deep annoyance.
‘Hello there,’ Smith said.
‘I feel totally objectivised,’ Rhianna said. ‘I wanted to be a druid. Druids don’t dress like this.’
‘You’ve got leaves in your hair.’
‘That is not druidism, Isambard! Druidism is an authentic pre-Christian religion. This is me, cold, in a metal bikini. If I’d have wanted a piece of chain up my ass I’d have sat on a bathplug. I only hope Polly has not been put through this indignity.’
Smith felt that he ought to calm the situation. ‘You do look jolly nice, though,’ he suggested.
‘Huh!’ Rhianna snorted and turned her back. On the minus side, he seemed to be in her bad books again.
On the plus side, she had been absolutely right about the underwear. Fantastic. Why did women have to be so difficult?
‘Right then,’ he declared. ‘Time to find Carveth. Any thoughts?’
Suruk stepped out of the trees. The programme had given Suruk a savage appearance: he wore a dented patchwork of armour, and his exposed skin was a lattice of scars. Bones and trophies hung from his belt; knives were strapped to every available surface of his body. He looked much the same as usual. ‘Behold!’ he declared.
They turned: behind the hovel was a very large white castle. Unicorns grazed on its lawns, minded by strapping young grooms. Flashing lights stretched between the gaudy turrets. They spelt out the words: Princess Polly’s Magic Castle.
Suruk pointed. ‘There, perhaps?’
Carveth was back in the data library, looking for a weapon.
The only thing that could have worked was a screwdriver, now wedged into the door controls to stop Emily getting in.
Even that would not hold for long. Croquet and vigorous social dancing had left her cunning and tough.
‘Open the door this minute, young lady! I will not hesitate in inflicting crippling malfunctions!’
‘Shove it up your crinoline!’ Carveth shouted back.
Emily paused. ‘I have food out here,’ she called. ‘A most diverting rack of lamb. I could have Cook save you some, if you agree to come out. . .’
‘Jump in a lake!’
‘Venture out, you pint-sized slattern, or I’ll fix it so you never waltz again!’
With a calmness that surprised her, Carveth looked through the door at the refined, furious face pressed against the glass. ‘I will,’ she said. ‘But only if you tell me what’s on those files.’
‘You perused the files,’ Emily retorted. ‘I thought it was obvious.’
‘I didn’t see them.’
‘Sales,’ Emily said. ‘Commerce. Nasty things like that. Selling things to some dreary moon-people for some war or other.’
‘What things?’
‘Oh, information. Some piffle about Lloyd Leighton. Goodness knows. Anyway,’ she added, cheering up, ‘enough chatter.’
She had been fiddling with the controls, Carveth realised. The door shook but did not open, but whatever Emily was doing to it she was not far from gaining access.
‘I’ve rewired the door panel, Polly. It would be far easier for both of us if you’d let me in.’
‘Stick—’ the screen flickered at the corner of her eye. A picture was forming there, a dragon, and above it a message: Captain Smith and Rhianna are online. Carveth grabbed the controls.
Smith’s feet were silent on the thick red carpet. In the castle foyer, a baby dragon fluttered between the chandeliers, trailing sparkling dust like radioactive farts.
‘So this is where the ship’s computer budget went,’ he said.
Suruk growled. ‘Hear me, Mazuran,’ he said. ‘I have fought in foul places, on a hundred worlds, but never have I been anywhere that grieved me as much as the inside of the little woman’s head. How can there be so many ponies and so little dung? This is the Abyss.’
‘Carveth designed it,’ Smith said. ‘We can only hope she realises that we’re here.’ Before I go completely mad, he thought.
At the far end of the hall the carpet rose over a set of steps. At the top of the steps was a thick curtain.
Smith reached for his sword. Suruk made his purring, croaking sound.
Beside him, Rhianna said, ‘It’s. . . um. . . kind of tacky, isn’t it?’
Lights flared up around the steps. The great curtains rolled back to reveal a small figure in a ballgown and a tiara slightly smaller than a radio mast. Princess Polly hovered a few inches from the ground: she floated towards them down the stairs.
‘Hello Boss,’ said Carveth. ‘Welcome to my. . . uh. . .castle.’ She glanced around, a little embarrassed, and fluttered her fairy wings. ‘Look, I’m stuck in this little room and there’s this crazy android who thinks she’s Jane Austen trying to kill me with a biro – I know this sounds strange–’
‘Not here it doesn’t. Listen, Carveth,’ Smith said. ‘We’re coming to get you out. But we need the information you downloaded. Can you pass it to us here?’
She glanced around. ‘Well, alright. Here you go.’
Carveth reached to her side and took out a magic wand.
She pressed a button, and the star on the end flashed into life. ‘I give you data,’ she said, tapping Smith on the head with it. ‘You’d better work quick. If you’ve got a gun I could borrow. . .’
Smith glanced down. ‘I’ve got a sword,’ he said. ‘But I don’t think it’ll work in real life.’
‘ I know!’ Rhianna exclaimed. ‘Polly, true empower-ment comes from knowledge, not weapons.’ She raised her hand: the palm glowed with green light. Rhianna touched Carveth’s shoulder. ‘The Ancient Arts of the East,’ Rhianna said.
‘Thanks,’ Carveth replied. ‘I’d better go. Wish me luck!’
The screen went dead. Carveth’s eyes flicked open. She disconnected the terminal and looked around the archive room.
‘I know Feng Shui,’ she said. ‘Well, that’s just great.’
Smith took off the helmet and turned to the programmers.
‘You there: send that data to our ship on the landing pad and copy it to the Imperial Navy. Tell them to send a dreadnought at once.’
‘Or I splice your mainframe,’ Suruk added, eyeing the computers. They typed.
Smith stepped into the corridor. ‘How’s things, Dreckitt?’
The bounty hunter stood by the pressure door at the end of the passage, trying to pick the lock. ‘Almost done. . .That’s it!’ Dreckitt exclaimed and the pressure door slid open. ‘Let’s go!’
Smith ushered Rhianna in. An alarm sounded from outside. Smith slipped into the door after the others.
Dreckitt jabbed at the controls and the door slammed shut behind them. Smith blasted the lock.
‘Now then,’ he said, ‘let’s find Carveth.’
Carveth dropped onto her hands and knees and crawled under the console. She felt terribly vulnerable: Emily could be in at any moment, wielding her fountain pen, and if that happened, Carveth knew she would fare better without her backside in the air.
Carveth’s hands found what she was looking for: the plug. She yanked it out of the wall and the computer and the winking lights went off. In the dark, she could hear the fans powering down as if she stood in a huge, disconnected amplifier.
Quickly, she wheeled the chair to where it would be guaranteed to create negative vibes and laid it on its side.
Then, she picked up the bible-sized Galaxy of Battles instruction manual.
The door shot open like a greyhound trap and Emily rushed into the room and fell over Carveth’s chair.
Carveth heard a prim voice cry ‘Shite!’ and she raised the manual and brought it down hard on Emily’s bonnet.
Emily made a garbled malfunctioning noise, tried to rise, and Carveth hit her again. ‘Read this, Regency bitch!’
Emily froze, stiffened and said, ‘A remarkable prize bullock—’ and dropped onto the floor like a landed fish.
Carveth stared down at her, panting.
The loudspeaker crackled into life in the corridor outside. ‘This is HMS Hampson, dreadnought of the British Space Empire. You are to drop your weapons and surrender or we will commence orbital diplomacy. You will cease your nonsense at once. I repeat: at once.’
Carveth glanced round and saw Smith in the doorway, pistol in hand. ‘Are you alright?’ he called.
‘I’m fine,’ Carveth replied. ‘I knocked her out cold. Actually,’ she added as Dreckitt entered the little room, ‘I’m not fine at all. Swooning!’
She collapsed. Dreckitt was left with no choice but to catch her. ‘Easy, lady,’ Dreckitt said. ‘Let’s get you upright – hey, hands, hands!’
Dreckitt holstered his pistol and rubbed his backside.
His arm around the unsteady Carveth, he helped her from the room. They stepped past Smith and Rhianna and started down the corridor. Carveth looked back and gave the others a broad, wide-awake grin.
‘Poor old Dreckitt,’ Smith said.
‘I think it’s kind’ve sweet,’ Rhianna said.
Smith looked at her. He realised that he didn’t know what she meant. Was this an insinuation? Was Rhianna saying that she missed him? That she wanted someone else? He felt a sudden rush of anger and, with it, despair.
Damn her and the whole bloody woman business! The sooner he was back in space and fighting in proper company the better, drinking gin and blasting holes in Gertie, with Wainscott on one side and—
Suruk strolled into the corridor, mandibles open, beaming. His spear was in one hand, and something football-sized and gory was in the other. ‘Greetings! Look what I acquired!’
‘Oh Buddha,’ Rhianna groaned.
‘All is well, floaty woman. This enemy executive was calling reinforcements on his mobile telephone when he was cut off. Or at least his head was.’ He sighed, deeply contented. ‘I could get used to corporate headhunting.’
‘I don’t see what good this is supposed to do,’ Carveth said, unfastening Emily’s bonnet. ‘She’s a complete nutcase.’
They stood in the sitting room of the John Pym: Emily had been laid out on the dinner table. Outside, policemen in long blue coats were carrying boxes and personnel out of the company buildings. The Empire had the evidence it needed.
‘She may have information vital to our cause,’ Smith explained. ‘The company has been trading information to the Ghasts. We just need to know how. Initiate her startup sequence.’
Carveth picked up a mug of water and tipped it over Emily’s head.
Emily awoke with a start, twitched, coughed and sat up. ‘I seem to have fainted.’ She looked around, alarmed. ‘What manner of iniquity is this? Unhand me at once!’
‘It’s alright,’ said Smith. ‘You’re quite safe.’
‘Who are you dreadful people?’
Suruk stepped closer: Emily recoiled. ‘Suruk the Slayer, trophy displayer,’ he announced.
‘Polly Carveth. You tried to murder me with a pen.’
‘Ah yes,’ Emily said. ‘I do seem to recall your face. No hard feelings?’
‘ No, you tried to murder me with a pen.’
‘Well, you broke a bottle of salad cream over my head. Do you have any notion how long that will take to wash out?’
Rhianna smiled and said, ‘Rhianna Mitchell. Namaste.’
‘ You clearly wouldn’t,’ Emily said, peering at Rhianna. ‘Talking to you about washing would be as worthwhile as trying to explain “exciting” to a Belgian. Well, if you want me to talk, you can forget it. As if I would spill the beans to a stumpy android, an unwashed colonial and an alien! I can assure you that I shall inform you of absolutely nothing.’ She folded her arms and cocked her head back as if preparing to fire something out of her nose.
Dreckitt was sitting on the other side of the room. ‘Reckon you’d better sing, Florence Nightingale. Squeak like a rusty mouse.’
‘Now look here,’ said Smith, stepping closer to the table. ‘You are under arrest for facilitating the diversion of materiel to the enemy. You’re in a tight spot and no mistake.’
‘Well!’ said Emily. ‘And who are you to say so?’
‘I am an officer in His Majesty’s merchant space fleet,’ said Smith. He opened his coat, revealing his red jacket and insignia.
‘Oh I say,’ Emily said. Her eyes widened, and to Smith’s surprise there was a smile forming on her prim features: a rather large smile, similar to the one Suruk made in times of war. ‘Well, that is a smart uniform. A real fleet officer?’
‘Yes,’ said Smith.
Her voice was a little breathless. ‘Good gracious. Well now, I think I might be able to divest myself for a smart fellow like you. I’ve always loved to hear about dashing young men in uniform.’ She turned to him and leaned forward, displaying her décolletage. ‘So tell me, Captain Smith: do you enjoy Hornblower?’
Twenty frightening minutes later, Smith knew all he needed to know, and more. In four hours, an unmarked company ship would deliver information and technology to the enemy. They would meet at the high-altitude research platform Tranquility Falls, a known rendezvous for pirates and criminals.
Smith sat in the cockpit, drinking tea. Carveth was making some last-minute checks on the ship before they left. Smith suspected that this involved counting the number of engines to make sure none had fallen off.
Dreckitt stood outside, smoking. Rhianna was guarding Emily in the sitting room.
Carveth strolled into the room and dropped into the pilot’s seat. ‘So, if you don’t mind me asking, what’s it like turning down a shag?’
‘Sorry?’
‘Austen-bot back there. She couldn’t get more eager unless she stuffed you up her petticoats. With us, she was all “Ooh, I’m too much of a lady”, but as soon as she sees you, there’s more snow-white frontage on view than a Harrods Christmas display. Her bosom really heaved.’
‘So did my stomach. She’s patently insane –’ he began, and Dreckitt wandered in.
‘Looks like we’ve enough dirt to kick the Leighton- Wakazashi highbinders in the can,’ he declared. ‘You’d better haul this boiler to Tranquility as soon as you’re able. I’ve got the co-ordinates,’ he added, passing Carveth a scrap of paper. ‘Me, I’m staying put till the boss man can get a shuttle down from the fleet.’
Smith nodded. ‘Righto.’
‘You’re not coming, then?’ Carveth said.
‘Nix,’ Dreckitt said from the door. ‘So long, lady. But I’ll be back.’
Smith stood up. ‘Will you be taking Emily?’
‘Yeah. The company boys programmed her to go section eight. Once we’ve sorted her noodle she’ll be on the square again.’ He looked at Smith and grinned. ‘She wants to say goodbye.’
Smith strolled down the corridor, past the cabins, to the lounge door. Behind the glass, Emily and Rhianna were engaged in animated conversation. He put his head round the doorframe.
‘Then more fool you,’ Emily said, jabbing a finger at Rhianna. ‘You’ll get to thirty-five, and then what?Darning, crochet and endless misery!’
‘It’s not like that!’ Rhianna retorted. ‘It’s not practical –oh, hi, Isambard. We were just talking about. . . um. . .the notion of marriage as fundamentally gender-oppressive.’
‘You’ve got a point,’ said Smith. ‘There’re some dreadful old girls out there.’
Emily was sitting at the table now, instead of lying on it. There was a mug of some herbal-smelling stuff in front of her. ‘We were discussing the possibility of one of us netting her man before she gets left on the shelf.’
‘I’m sure you’ll find somebody, Emily. No need to be downhearted. Now, we need to get moving. Would you mind joining the others at the airlock?’
In a rustle of skirt, Emily stood up. ‘Of course,’ she said, shaking her bodice into place. ‘You just can’t talk sense to some people,’ she added, and she stalked out of the room. Smith heard the others leave, and the door clang shut behind them.
‘What was all that about?’ Smith asked.
‘Nothing.’ Rhianna sighed and pinched her brow. ‘Nothing.’
Dreckitt closed the airlock behind him and pushed his hat down low against the wind. Up ahead, Emily was making her way towards the rail terminal, assisted by a policeman. Two officers helped Chairman Gecko into a blue police shuttle, his braces drooping in disgrace.
Dreckitt was halfway down the steps when Carveth caught up with him.
‘Hey!’ she called. ‘Aren’t you going to say goodbye?’
He turned. ‘Sister, I said goodbye.’
‘Then say it again,’ Carveth said, ‘and this time, take your cigarette out.’ She kissed him. ‘And no messing with Emily’s noodle, alright? You let the science people do that.’
‘Sure. Damn, it’s too cold out here to pitch woo. Here,’ he said, and he passed her his hip flask. ‘Look after it.’
Dreckitt pulled up the collar of his trenchcoat, turned to Carveth and looked into her eyes. ‘Now get on the damn ship, Polly. If you don’t go now you’ll regret it. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but – hands! Easy with the hands!’