‘I know what it said. As long as it stays buried, I’m happy.’

Scribo shrugged. ‘As you wish. Anything else? A Phobos bolter? A Divinator auspex?’

Zidarov looked around. ‘You ever get claustrophobic in here, Scribo? Ever want to stretch your arms out?’

Scribo looked up at him from heavy-lidded eyes. ‘I pulled it off-system. I could push it back any time.’

‘Ah, then you’d have to give the slate back.’ He edged his way back to the door, deliberately giving the felid a threatening look as he went. ‘Thanks for the scanner. Look after yourself in here.’

Scribo didn’t reply. He was back to the sensor-box, pulling it apart, looking as happy as he was ever going to get.

He headed back to his cell. It was still dark outside, a grey-black shadow at every window, but the Bastion had an air of coming to more vigorous life again. The first diurnus-shift had started, and the corridors were half-full of men and women coming and going, either bleary-eyed from working too hard or bleary-eyed from not getting enough sleep.

Dawn was not far away. He’d grab another shot of caffeine at some point, find a pulse-shower that wasn’t too disgusting to use, clean himself up a bit. First, though, he had to calibrate the personnel tracker and make some checks on his system. It felt like he was juggling a number of things, all or none of which might link to one another. Over it all hovered the spectral presence of Vongella, who would want answers soon.

When Zidarov reached his terminal, he saw that Brecht was occupying the next cell. He looked as dishevelled as Zidarov felt, and smelled vaguely of alcohol. Brecht, like Draj, smelled of alcohol so often that it had almost stopped being noticeable. For a long time, Zidarov had found it amusing. Now, years later, he wasn’t so sure. There came a point where it stopped being a crutch and became a master. Not that it was easy to broach the subject, and he wouldn’t have known where to start. They all had their problems, their secrets, their little internal daemons.

‘Going well, then?’ Brecht asked, stirring himself as Zidarov took his seat.

Zidarov flicked the terminal activation. ‘Stellar,’ he replied. ‘You?’

‘Keeping busy.’

But Gyorgu didn’t look busy. He looked lubricated. He pushed his chair closer to Zidarov’s desk, peering over as he gently unpacked the tracker device.

‘Is that one of Scribo’s things?’ he asked.

‘Maybe.’

‘So you’ve hit a wall.’

Zidarov put the tracker down carefully, and leaned his elbows on the desk. ‘Not really. I was right.’

‘Of course you were. You uncovered that mole yet?’

‘There wasn’t one.’

‘You seem sure.’

‘It was a lapse. They hacked a probator’s iris connection.’

Brecht let out a low whistle. ‘Whose?’