Jeff let his contacts guide him towards Mitchell’s coordinates, which ominously enough indicated somewhere inside a huge cemetery sprawling across the grassy lower slopes on the far side of town. As he walked along neatly mown paths laid out between the rows of headstones, his contacts identified the coordinates by means of a giant cartoon arrow hovering straightad and pointing downwards. Before long Jeff came to a small fountain, ringed by wooden benches. The arrow remained directly overhead, but there was no sign of anyone else around.

Nearly twenty minutes had passed before he spotted a lone figure making straight towards him down an alternative path, the newcomer’s face largely obscured under the broad hood of a hunting jacket. As he came closer, one grizzled hand reached up to pull the hood back, and Jeff saw that it was Mitchell – looking just as bruised and battered as he himself felt. He swallowed hard, more relieved to recognize the man than he was prepared to admit even to himself.

‘I’ve got to be honest,’ Jeff began, ‘there’s a part of me that’s not sure if you’ve really come here to help me or . . . or to kill me.’

Mitchell regarded him with unwavering pale-blue eyes. ‘Why would I do that?’

‘I’ve learned to become paranoid over the past couple of days.’ Jeff glanced around. ‘Why here? Why a cemetery, for God’s sake?’

Mitchell shrugged. ‘There’s good all-round visibility, and not much in the way of public surveillance. If anyone comes looking for us, we’ll easily see them first.’ He looked around. ‘Where’s Dan?’

‘He . . . Dan’s dead.’

‘Dead?’ Mitchell’s gaze became suspicious. ‘How?’

‘There were people trying to kill us.’

The frown on Mitchell’s face deepened. ‘I don’t understand.’

Jeff quickly explained the events of the last few days. When he got to Lucy’s death, Mitchell closed his eyes and inhaled loudly.

‘And all of this made you think I might want to kill you?’ he asked, opening his eyes again.

‘You’re still part of ASI. And we stole those files.’

‘Jesus!’ Mitchell clasped his head in a gesture of despair. ‘Who the hell do you think got Lucy access to the security deck in the first place?’

‘I don’t know. I guess I assumed she and Farad found some way of hacking it remotely.’

‘We had a thing together,’ Mitchell replied. ‘Me and Lucy. I guess you didn’t know.’

At first, Jeff couldn’t think what to say. ‘I . . . didn’t,’ he finally stammered.

‘She knew I was sympathetic, and I helped her out. She took a big chance through confiding in me, but I knew how badly things were being run. So I gave her my access privileges – it seemed the right thing to do.’