Текст книги "The Abyss Beyond Dreams"

Автор книги: Peter F. Hamilton

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 13 (всего у книги 44 страниц)

The ‘wife’ held her hand out. Slvasta thought she was around sixteen or seventeen, a sweet-looking girl with plenty of freckles and a mane of thick dark ginger hair, tied into a single tail. He felt sorry for the poor thing, but refrained from comment. Arranged marriages were relatively common out in the countryside, and Nigel’s odd clothes were clearly expensive. Her attitude was a copy of Nigel’s, but with less emotional control. The contempt she felt for him and his troopers was a whole lot easier to ascertain. She was human, too.

‘Gentlemen,’ Nigel gestured the rangers forward. They walked over to Slvasta one by one to be checked.

Slvasta didn’t know what recruitment was like in Erond county, but the rangers looked more like a town’s gang of thugs than troopers. And they made no attempt to hide their scorn of him, a couple of them openly sneering at his stump.

‘All clear,’ Slvasta announced after the last one dripped red blood into the rain. He couldn’t keep his puzzlement from showing. ‘What in Uracus are you doing out here? This is nowhere. We only just arrived.’

‘Chance, really,’ Nigel said. ‘I’m a trader. My boats were in Dural with a cargo of folax. I was looking to exchange it for hethal seed. We saw the beacons light up and volunteered to help sweep. Everybody does what they can, right? The regiment captain in the town sent us upriver.’

A large bird came swooping through the rain to land on one of the boughs above them. The whole bough swayed under its weight. Slvasta had never seen anything like it before. It had broad wings, well over two metres across, and the face was definitely mod. Yet the size and grace was way beyond anything any adaptor he knew had ever produced. ‘Is that a mod-bird?’ he asked.

‘A ge-eagle,’ Nigel said. ‘Yes.’

‘A what?’

‘A type of mod-bird, a very good one,’ Nigel glanced up affectionately at the bird, who stared unblinkingly at Sergeant Yannrith and the troopers round him. Its claws were metal tipped, Slvasta saw.

‘Where did you get it?’

Nigel’s smile was sardonic. ‘A man from Ashwell village used to craft them. But that was long ago and far away from here.’

‘I see.’ Slvasta was aware he was losing face in front of everybody. ‘We’ll need to search your boats.’

‘Of course,’ Nigel said.

Sergeant Yannrith took a squad on one boat, wading out through the shallows. Corporal Kyliki took the other.

‘You trampled down a pretty big track across the countryside,’ Slvasta said. ‘That’s how we found you. What were you carrying?’

‘Just us,’ Nigel said.

‘It looked like you were dragging something. Something large.’

‘A couple of the horses were hitched up to stone boats, yes. We piled them up with our camp equipment. Something wrong with that?’

‘What’s a stone boat?’

‘A flat sledge. They move quite quickly, allow us to sweep more ground. After all, you can’t use a cart out here, lieutenant. No wheels will work in this kind of country.’

The way it was said – emphasizing the completely obvious, as if Nigel was explaining to a class of five-year-olds – made Slvasta feel stupid. Which was probably the intention.

‘Check for sledges,’ he told Yannrith and Kyliki.

‘If you don’t mind me asking,’ Nigel said. ‘The arm?’

‘I fell into a Faller nest,’ Slvasta replied impassively. ‘I was being eggsumed when the Marines arrived.’

Nigel gave his nicked thumb a quick glance. ‘I haven’t met anyone who escaped that before. You were lucky.’

‘Yes.’ Slvasta tried to block out the memory of Ingmar, the awful pleading.

‘And so now you understand the threat as few ever do, you’re one hundred per cent committed to the regiment, to defending Bienvenido. That must worry your senior officers.’

‘Why do you say that?’

Nigel looked at him as if judging from on high. It was all Slvasta could do to return the stare.

‘You’re better at the task than they are. They know that and so do your troopers here. Your level of dedication will also unnerve them. Belief always does that to old men grown comfortable in their position and privilege. Comfort is the enemy of change. Comfort is easy. It’s a good meal and nights in a warm bed. Anything that challenges that is seen as dangerous.’

‘Brigadier Venize is an excellent commander.’

Nigel smiled knowingly. ‘I’m sure he is. But consider this: is he as good as you would be if you had command of the regiment?’

‘I . . . That’s a ludicrous question. I’ve only just made lieutenant.’

‘And yet I’ve known ambition like yours, lieutenant. You, of all people, must realize that the Falls will never end. That the regiments and even the Marines, Giu bless them, are nothing other than damage limitation. If the Fallers are to be defeated, first this sheep-like attitude of acceptance must be broken. After that, after the status quo – so welcome to old powerful families – has been swept away, new attitudes can prevail. Then, and only then, can we dare to dream once more, as someone said long ago. And if that ever happens, life on Bienvenido can change.’

Slvasta was aware of just how uneasy the troopers were with this talk. For himself, it was unexpected, yet Nigel spoke the right of it. These were the very thoughts he never dared to voice. He would have very much liked to sit down and have a long, long conversation with this enigmatic man. Yet . . . something about the whole encounter was wrong. Nigel seemed about as far from a gang boss as you could get – cultured, suave, self-assured beyond even a National Councillor – yet the men with him were a type Slvasta knew so well. And he still didn’t get Kysandra. The girl was clearly no simple submissive trinket Nigel owned. In fact, she didn’t seem fazed by any of this, just stood there, tired and trail-dirty, but with a superior knowing smile on her face. The way Quanda looked at me. Could some Fallers have red blood? Uracus, I’m paranoid.

‘They have sledges, sir,’ Yannrith’s ’path voice announced.

Slvasta couldn’t decide if that was a good thing or not. Nigel was giving him an expectant glance – waiting patiently for him to do the right thing.

‘Stand down,’ Slvasta told his troopers.

‘Thank you,’ Nigel said as the carbines were returned to their slings and holsters. ‘Now, if you have a map, I’ll be happy to show you the area we’ve swept. Duplication is waste. And every day an egg lies free is a day it can lure someone to Fall.’

‘Of course.’ Slvasta went further under the huge wanno tree, where it was practically dry. He took out his map and unrolled it. ‘Did you get a good price for your folax?’

‘Haven’t sold it yet,’ Nigel said. ‘I’ll try again, downstream.’

‘You must be a good trader. Those boats don’t look cheap.’

‘I have a rich family.’

‘But you struck out for yourself?’

‘Yes. Estates can provide you with a very comfortable life, but it’s a life that doesn’t change. There’s never anything new. You never go anywhere or see anything fresh; you’re never challenged. That means you can never achieve anything.’

‘You’re very keen on change, aren’t you?’

Nigel raised an eyebrow. And for once his smile wasn’t mocking. ‘Don’t tell me you’re not. I haven’t seen any regiment squads as motivated as yours. That’s a substantial achievement, especially on this world. I know what it’s like to push against the dead hand of inertia and tradition. If I have any advice for you, it would be: don’t let the bastards grind you down. Keep pushing, lieutenant. That and the obvious, of course.’

‘What obvious?’ Slvasta asked, feeling helpless to stop the conversation.

‘Old law: for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. If you keep going the way you are – and I hope to Giu you do – then the effect you will have on those around you will grow larger. Ripples, my friend. People will look at you, what you’re doing, rewriting the regiment rule book, and they’ll want to do the same for themselves. That’s when you’ll start to run into resistance. That’s where the politics begins. And that’s the dirtiest fight there is.’

‘Right.’ Slvasta nodded seriously. It was as if his brain was fizzing from the impact of these words. He’d been waiting his whole life to hear them.

‘Don’t be afraid of your future,’ Nigel said earnestly. ‘You have principles. Stick with them, but don’t think that you can fight fair to achieve them. Make the deals, build alliances with anyone who’ll support you, walk away from people when it’s convenient or they’ve outlived their use. Because, trust me, your opponents will use those same skills to bury you. That’s the game. The only game. Play it well, and you can achieve miracles.’

‘That sounds . . .’

‘Cynical? Damn right. It’s a big bad world out there. Kill or be killed, son, that’s nature. But I don’t have to tell you that, do I?’

Slvasta saw Yannrith and Kyliki wading ashore. ‘Thank you.’

‘Pleasure.’ Nigel shook his hand. ‘Good luck. Axe one of those bastard eggs apart for me, huh?’

‘I will,’ Slvasta was smiling, and he couldn’t say why. This was still all very weird.

He stayed on the riverbank, watching Nigel and Kysandra wade out to the boats, holding hands. The last three horses were taken on board and settled in the mid-hold. Then the hawsers were untied. The boats puffed out steam from their aft vents as the pistons began to pump away with a loud clattering.

Slvasta waved solemnly as the boats chugged out to midstream. Nigel waved back before he and Kysandra went below deck.

Sergeant Yannrith came up beside him. ‘Orders, sir?’

It was like the breaking of a spell. Slvasta glanced up at the sky. The clouds were thinning out. Sunlight haloed the treetops, producing a perfect double rainbow. He checked his pocketwatch with a scan of ex-sight. ‘Dark in three hours. We need to connect with our horses and make camp. We’ll resume the sweep first light tomorrow.’

‘Yes, sir.’ The sergeant looked at the map Slvasta was holding. ‘Will we be sweeping the area the rangers cleared, sir?’

‘Every damn centimetre of it, sergeant.’

‘What were they really doing here? You can’t get any closer to nowhere.’

‘I have no idea.’

As the troopers picked their way back along the track Nigel had made, Slvasta sent his mod-bird flying as high as he could. His ex-sight was strong, allowing him to sense a good distance. The bird could see the two boats sailing down the river, three hundred metres away now. He hadn’t realized they were that fast. Two large specks floated effortlessly in the air above them.

Two – what did Nigel call them? Ge-eagles? Slvasta started to wonder just how long Nigel had known the squads were chasing him.

How would you prepare if you had that kind of warning?

‘Andricea.’

‘Yes, lieutenant?’

‘Send your mod-bird as far downstream as you can. Tell me what you see.’

‘Yes, sir.’

Her mod-bird soared away, gaining altitude as it headed west. She had the longest ex-sight reach in the squads, as well as a prodigious ’path voice. Slvasta sought out the mod-bird’s eyesight, seeing the meandering river slicing through thick bands of jungle and broad swathes of scrub. Far ahead of the two boats, a smudge of smoke was wafting up from a jungle which hid the river.

Slvasta groaned in dismay. There had been three boats. By waiting for them at the river, letting them check out him and his rangers, Nigel had pulled off a perfect delaying tactic.

‘What in Uracus is on that boat?’

*

Slvasta had them break camp at first light. He was grumpy and unsympathetic to the troopers’ grumbling. It had been a despondent night. Sleep had been elusive as he’d wrestled with the problem for hours.

Nigel was engaged in some kind of dubious activity. That was in no doubt. Slvasta’s only active option was to send one squad back to the nearest sheriff’s office in Marlaie, a day away, and alert them that there may be something illegal on a boat – only he didn’t know what the boat looked like or where it was by now. The sheriff was probably out on a sweep, and if he was there he would probably laugh it off – after all, what could he do? Even if by some miracle a law officer caught up with Nigel, that dazzling charm would be played to the full, and there would be nothing incriminating on his boat, that was for sure.

It was like facing down Quanda all over again, just without the life-and-death stakes. There was simply no way he could win this one. All he cared about – as Nigel had so smartly determined – was running a successful sweep. By comparison, Nigel’s activities were petty and irrelevant. But it galled him that he’d been suckered like that. He was furious with himself for being so gullible. And maybe, that nasty unquiet thought at the back of his head kept insisting, it was because Nigel was so obviously from the landowner class – smart, intelligent and confident. The background Slvasta lacked and had been taught to respect.

Yet Nigel told me to kick against that. Very convincingly.

He made an effort to rein in his frustration as he called Yannrith and the corporals over. A breakfast of hot tea and honey bread was served. They spent ten minutes discussing how the squads would be dispersed across their area. He was keen to make up for the lost hours yesterday.

Tents were packed up. Equipment stowed on the horses. Packs loaded.

Nebulas were still visible in the dawn sky as they set off. Giu was at the zenith, the scarlet crown of the heavens, with translucent prominences radiating out in all directions, captured stars within their gauzy veils twinkling brightly. The gold and turquoise flower that was Tizu was sinking below the horizon as the sun rose, while Eribu’s misty spiral contained many ruby-tinged stars. And the Forest was visible if you squinted against the sun’s glare, like a scintillating equatorial tumour in the corona. Thankfully, Uracus was on the other side of the planet. Having that scarlet and sulphur gash casting its benighted glow down on him would have been too much like a bad omen this morning.

Once they were underway, Tovakar came over. He looked somewhat on edge, with a hard shell round his thoughts. Slvasta waited patiently, knowing the man would speak his mind eventually. Trusting officers didn’t come easy to Tovakar.

‘I have a cousin, sir,’ Tovakar said. ‘A third cousin, mind, we’re not close.’

‘Of course not. And what does this cousin do?’

‘Nothing much. He’s a bit of a layabout, in truth. Got a cabin out in the Noldar wetlands.’

‘That’s good soil, so they say.’

‘Yes, sir, when it’s drained properly. Thing is, some farmers out that way grow narnik.’

‘I see.’ Slvasta had tried smoking the herb when he was younger, just like every teenager did, probably right back since the Landing. Ingmar had sneaked a wad from his older brother’s stash, and the two of them had bunked off school one afternoon. It hadn’t been what he’d expected. The loss of control had scared him, and he’d been sick most of the next day. He found out later they’d smoked far too much at once.

His second taste came from the Marine doctor back in Prerov, who had dosed him up with the plant’s refined extract to deal with the pain from his amputated arm. This time he’d welcomed the weird dreams and visions that replaced rational thought. So afterwards he could appreciate the pull it exerted, taking the edge off an impoverished existence. It would have been easy for him to slip into a life bolstered by that sweet narcotic smoke. But those last haunting minutes with Ingmar were stronger than any cravings to annul self-pity. He had been spared, one of very few who had ever escaped being eggsumed. And in return for that gift, he was determined to be guided to the Giu nebula a fulfilled man. Throughout all the weeks of misery and pain, lying there in hospital, he had sworn that to himself.

Narnik’s subversive, life-wrecking appeal had resulted in the Captain’s Council banning its use outside medicine during the reign of Captain Leothoran, two thousand two hundred years ago. Which of course meant there was a lot of money in its underground trade.

‘The farmers, they bale it,’ Tovakar said. ‘Big bales, sir.’

‘Ah. Big enough that you’d need a stone boat to carry one?’

‘Can be, sir. Or so I’ve heard.’

Slvasta grinned understandingly at the trooper’s anxious face. ‘Thank you, Tovakar.’

They were almost back into the wretched purple-tufted bamboo again. Slvasta pushed the first stems aside automatically. It was hard to believe Nigel was a narnik trader. Unless, of course, he was the junior son of some noble estate family who didn’t want to let go of his expensive lifestyle. Narnik was easy money if you had the nerve to go for it. Even so, that was a hard stretch. Nigel just didn’t seem the type; that self-belief of his was like nothing Slvasta had encountered before. Though he was something of a rebel. Or at least preached it. Which might have been part of his cover.

What in Uracus was on that third boat?

Slvasta was desperate to find out. He certainly had enough leave time built up, as the regiment’s adjutant was always pointing out. You didn’t rise from the ranks to reach lieutenant inside five years without putting in some long and difficult hours. It would be easy for him to take a month off any time he wanted.

Somehow, he just knew, you didn’t find a man like Nigel in a month. Not unless Nigel wanted you to find him.

*

‘Fallen egg!’

The ’path shout from corporal Kyliki came down the line like wildfire. Good training and better discipline saw the squads close on the egg’s location in the pattern Slvasta had drilled them in. Nobody, nobody, was to approach within two hundred metres alone: those were his standing orders. So they formed up in a circle, two hundred and fifty metres away. Only after a check to make sure everyone was present, did Slvasta ask: ‘Where’s the goat?’

‘I have it, sir,’ Trooper Jostol answered.

‘Keep a good hold,’ Slvasta replied. ‘Sergeant, move us in.’

‘Aye, sir. Everyone, mod-birds back and on the ground. Once they’re down, move forward. Watch your advance-partner for signs of lure.’

Slvasta ordered his mod-bird back with the rest. Through its eyes, he’d seen the tear in the bamboo’s purple canopy, sent the bird skimming fast for a confirmed sighting. The egg was there, sitting at the centre of a small impact zone. What he saw could have been a piece of ridiculously elegant artwork, with the dark globe of the egg in the middle, surrounded by bamboo stalks flattened radially, as if they’d transformed into some kind of freakish earth flower.

It was invisible to his eyesight as he pushed forwards through the thick stalks, but his ex-sight remained fixed on it during his approach, alert for any treachery. The squads emerged cautiously from the upright bamboo into the impact zone. Slvasta felt it then. An aroma that made you want to step forwards and get a better smell, then a taste – all you had to do was lick the dark surface. A sensation hinting of unparalleled joy if you just stepped forwards and reached out. An elusive melody so sweet that you had to hear it properly, if you just stepped close enough to put your ear to the surface of the sphere it emanated from. As always, his heart began to race as his body reacted to the promised pleasure of the lure. If only someone had taught him this was what happened when you encountered an egg. Then Ingmar would still be alive – and Quanda with her devious incitement, manipulating the lure with the addition of sexual provocation, would have died in a blaze of flame and pain. If only . . .

‘Hold fast.’ Yannrith’s stern warning barked round the small clearing.

Slvasta hadn’t quite been going to take a step, but the appeal the egg’s strange thoughts radiated was darkly enticing every time. ‘Remember this, all of you,’ Slvasta said. ‘Look at your enemy and know its treachery, know its lust for your flesh.’ He glanced round the faces of the troopers, seeing each of them fight their own battle to resist. The new recruits were having the worst of it. Several were having to be physically restrained. ‘I need you to be strong enough to resist this bewitchment every time. We are going to stand here until you learn to scorn its trickery and lies. That promise you feel is death. It will kill you forever; it will consume your soul. If you Fall, there will be no fulfilment, and you will never be guided to the Heart of the Void. The Skylords do not come for the Fallen. They come for humans alone. They come for the worthy. And that is who I want in my squads. So will you show me that? Will you show me you are worthy?’

‘Yes, lieutenant,’ they chorused.

‘I cannot hear you. Are you worthy?’

‘YES, LIEUTENANT.’

‘Do you wish to discover the false wonder it offers?’

‘NO, LIEUTENANT.’

‘Good.’ He looked around the clearing again. The new recruits were standing firm. Nobody moved. ‘Trooper Jazpur.’

‘Yes, lieutenant?’

‘Release the goat.’

Jazpur let go of the leash. The goat, which had been silent as soon as it emerged into the impact zone, trotted forwards. It reached the egg and looked up at it, then pushed the side of its head affectionately against the dark surface. And stuck.

‘Now watch,’ Slvasta commanded.

The egg’s powerful psychic lure died away as the goat’s grubby hide began to sink below the surface. As always, Slvasta moved closer, probing with his ex-sight, trying to sense what was happening, trying to understand the process. As always, he was baffled. He perceived the surface structure, the thick living fluid inside. The strange uniform thoughts circulating within. The fizz of activity around the goat’s skin and skull as it sank into the bizarre yolk.

‘Once you have touched that surface, you are stuck,’ Slvasta said. ‘You cannot pull away.’ He thrust his stump out. ‘You can be cut free, but only if your friends are quick. If your chest is eggsumed, you are Fallen. Once your head is inside, you have Fallen. Now, despite the rumours you have heard, no cloth you wear can prevent eggsumption, no herbs can make it spit you back out, no teekay can lift you free. Fire will not make it let go. If a friend is Falling, be a true friend and kill him!’ Slvasta drew his pistol and shot the placid goat in its head. ‘Sergeant, axe the egg.’

‘Aye, sir.’

The recruits were given the first chance to swing their axes. It was hard work, for the blackened, rumpled surface was tough enough to survive a plummet through the sky. But they persisted, hacking away until cracks began to appear. Dribbles of pale white goo started to leak out. Then the second batch of troopers moved in and began swinging. The cracks were widened. The goo began to spray out in thin jets.

After twenty minutes, the holes were large and the internal pressure had been released. The peculiar substance of the egg simply poured out, forming big puddles on the ground.

‘Burn it,’ Slvasta ordered.

Five troopers with flamethrowers moved in. They began to play their fierce arcs of flame over the egg. The stench of burning jellyoil and roasting egg churned through the air. Slvasta had smelt it enough times before, but several of the troopers were gagging.

‘We’ve found one,’ Slvasta announced to his squads as the hot stinking flames incinerated the dead egg. ‘That means there will be another three or four somewhere close by, maybe even more. The eggs never Fall alone. So we’re going to go back out there, and we’re going to sweep this whole county if we have to. We will find those eggs, and they will be axed and burnt before any human Falls. Now, let’s get to it!’

*

Thirteen days later, Slvasta stood outside the tall glossy double doors of Brigadier Venize’s office. He was still in his field uniform, filthy from travelling and camping. The NCOs had led their squads back to the barracks to unpack and clean up and get themselves a decent meal in the headquarters’ long mess hall. They were the last of the regiment’s troops to return from the sweep. It had been a civilian passenger train which had brought them back to Cham; the troop train with the rest of the regiment had returned a week before.

One of the doors opened, and Major Rachelle came out. She was the regiment’s adjutant, in her late nineties, with silver-grey hair wound into a tight bun. Her skin was leathery from decades spent out in the sub-tropical sun commanding sweeps. Slvasta had to respect the service she’d put in. But that time was over, and now she was just another outdated officer clogging up headquarters. There were dozens of them, soaking up the region’s budget to pay for their extravagant salaries – money that could have been better spent on front-line troopers, in his opinion. And as for the regulations they invented that sapped the regiment’s operational performance . . .

‘He’s ready for you,’ she said curtly.

Slvasta followed her back through the doors. Brigadier Venize’s office was another indulgence. A huge tiled room with arching windows that reached up to the high roof. Large fan flaps swung gently above the open shutters, their cord pulled by a mod-dwarf who sat in the corner, rocking back and forth. More irrelevance, Slvasta thought, as he walked the length of the room to the brigadier’s desk. It wasn’t as if the fans made any difference to the heat. But he kept his shell smooth and impregnable, unwilling for anyone to know his sense of frustration and disappointment at the failure of the sweep.

‘Sir.’ He reached the desk and stood to attention, saluting.

Venize was pretending to read a thick folder. The previous month had seen a regimental dinner celebrating his one hundred and twentieth birthday, with the nobility from across the county filling the officers’ mess and two pavilions set up on the parade ground. Slvasta had seen the final bill, which presumably was one of the major reasons the regiment hadn’t yet bought terrestrial horses to replace all the mod-horses.

The brigadier looked good for his years. Still fit and active, with a set of thin wire-rimmed glasses to compensate for shortsightedness, and a slim moustache to add to the dignity of age. He looked up from the folder and extended a finger, pointing to one of the two chairs in front of the ancient leather-topped desk. ‘Sit down, lieutenant.’

There was nothing in the voice to give away what tone the meeting would take, and his shell was even sturdier than Rachelle’s.

Slvasta sat, keeping his back straight. Major Rachelle sat in the other chair, looking at him.

The brigadier slid the folder onto the desk, next to a pile of similar ones. ‘So, lieutenant, would you care to tell me what happened?’

‘Sir, we intercepted some kind of criminal called Nigel operating in our designated sweep area. It’s my belief he’s captured some Faller eggs.’

‘Indeed, and why is that?’

‘He was dragging something behind his horses. He claimed it was their own camping equipment, and that they were helping with the sweep. I couldn’t prove otherwise at the time, so I let him go. Then we found an egg.’

‘Well done. Go on.’

‘One egg. We both know that never happens.’

‘Nobody escapes from eggsumption,’ Rachelle said. ‘Another well-known fact. There are always exceptions.’

Slvasta gave her an irritated glance. ‘We swept that area thoroughly. There were another two impact zones, but there were no eggs in them. However, each zone had been visited; we found the tracks. He took the eggs.’

‘So this Nigel is actually a Faller?’ Venize asked.

‘Sir. Not him personally, no. His blood was red.’

‘Then the people with him are?’ Rachelle pressed.

‘No,’ Slvasta said. ‘I checked them all. But one of the boats he used was downstream. We didn’t know at the time.’

The brigadier blinked. ‘I can accept that a nest could reach the eggs before our squads. You of all people are aware of that behaviour. But what kind of criminal gang takes Faller eggs? They have no black market value. Not that I’m aware of. Do they, major?’

‘No, sir. They do not.’

‘Lieutenant, are you aware of their having any monetary value?’

‘No, sir,’ Slvasta admitted.

‘Then why would Nigel take them?’

‘I don’t know, sir.’

‘The only humans who ever move an egg are the Marines, nobody else is qualified or authorized. And that’s a rare event; they only ever take one back to Varlan when the Captain’s Faller Research Institute needs one to examine. Isn’t it more likely that a nest got to them and carried them away?’

‘It is possible, sir.’

‘And you’re using Nigel as an excuse for your failure to find them?’ Rachelle said.

‘No! There was no other activity in the whole area. Nigel took them.’

‘If you’re right, then we must assume he is such a piece of lowlife that he’s actually in the pay of a nest,’ Venize said. ‘How extraordinary. I never thought I’d live to see such a thing.’

I . . . know that’s not true, Slvasta thought. Nigel is no one’s puppet. ‘That is an explanation, yes, sir.’

‘Very well,’ Venize said. ‘We will alert the Captain’s Marines that a nest has acquired a Fall. I hope you understand what such a notice will do to this regiment’s reputation and status.’

‘Yes, sir. I do.’

‘Now, moving on. Tell me about the Bekenz farm, please, lieutenant.’

Slvasta did his best not to wince. ‘That was where we discovered one of the empty impact zones, sir, in the wild just outside the farm’s boundary.’

‘How did you confirm that?’ Rachelle asked. ‘You just said there were no eggs.’

‘I know what an impact zone looks like, thank you,’ Slvasta said.

‘It was quite a long way from the Bekenz farm’s boundary, actually, wasn’t it?’ Rachelle said.

‘The farm was the closest human habitation,’ Slvasta replied tightly. ‘I had a duty to ensure they were safe.’

‘And you checked everyone in your usual fashion, correct?’ Venize asked.

‘Yes, sir. They were all human.’

‘Yes, they are human, and Bekenz, it turns out, is the seventh son of Hamiud, the largest estate owner in Prerov county.’

‘So he claimed, yes, sir.’

‘In fact, he told you that when you ordered your troops to slaughter every neut and mod-animal on the farm, is that correct?’ Rachelle asked.

‘Yes.’

‘Yet you still went ahead with the slaughter?’

‘Sir, the Fallers can control the mods much better than we can. I know that for a fact. There’s no telling what kind of orders the egg might have given the mods. They could have murdered every one of Bekenz’s family. There were children on that farm.’