«Now do you think it was worth it?» I asked faintly. It needed asking. Her face retained a vestige of that last confused expression, all sad and innocent. «Stupid, dumb pride. And look where it got you. One dive, that's all we wanted. Why don't you people ever learn?»

I shook my hands, wincing, as the spikes slowly telescoped back into their sheaths. They stung like hell, the fingertip skin all torn and bleeding. It would take a week for the rips to heal over, it always did. Price of invisible implants.

«Neat trick,» Sonnie said. The syllables were mangled, but the words were quite distinct. «I'd never have guessed you as a spetsnaz . Too pretty by far.»

One eyeball swivelled to focus on me; the other lolled lifelessly, its white flecked with blood from burst capillaries.

I let out a muted scream. Threat-response training fired an electric charge along my nerves. And I was crouching, leaning forward to throw my weight down, fist forming. Aiming.

Punch.

My right arm pistoned out so fast it was a smear. I caught her perfectly, pulping the fat tissue of the tit, smashing the ribs beneath. Splintered bone fragments were driven inwards, crushing the heart. Her body arched up as if I'd pumped her with a defibrillator charge.

«Not good enough, my cute little spetsnaz .» A bead of blood seeped out of the corner of her mouth, rolling down her chin.

«No.» I rasped it out, not believing what I saw.

«You should have realized,» the corpse/zombie said. Its speech had decayed to a gurgling whisper, words formed by sucking down small gulps of air and expelling them gradually. «You of all people should know that hate isn't enough to give me the edge. You should have worked it out.»

«What the sweet shit are you?»

«A beastie-baiter, the best there's ever been.»

«Tells me nothing.»

Sonnie laughed. It was fucking hideous.

«It should do,» she burbled. «Think on it. Hate is easy enough to acquire; if all it took was hate then we'd all be winners. Dicko believed that was my edge because he wanted to. Male mentality. Couldn't you smell his hormones fizzing when I told him I'd been raped? That made sense to him. But you've gotta have more than blind hate, spetsnaz girl, much more. You've gotta have fear. Real fear. That's what my team gave me: the ability to fear. I didn't get snatched by no gang. I crashed our van. A dumb drifter kid who celebrated a bout win with too much booze. Crunched myself up pretty bad. Jacob and Karran had to shove me in our life-support pod while they patched me up. That's when we figured it out. The edge.» Her voice was going, fading out like a night-time radio station.

I bent down, studying her placid face. Her one working eye stared back at me. The blood had stopped dripping from her puncture wounds.

«You're not in there,» I said wonderingly.

«No. Not my brain. Just a couple of bioware processors spliced into the top of my spinal column. My brain is elsewhere. Where it can feel hundred-proof fear. Enough fear to make me fight like a berserk demon when I'm threatened. You want to know where my brain is, spetsnaz girl? Do you? Look behind you.»