Stanton broke into a jog and ducked down behind the wall with them. He looked with a kind of tired curiosity at the dracoman clinging to Cormac’s arm. Cormac pointed at it.

‘This fella is very anxious about my security. Understand that he’ll rip you apart if you try anything.’ Cormac nodded to Thorn. ‘Search him.’

Thorn quickly and efficiently ran his hands through Stanton’s clothing. He pulled aside a ripped trouser leg to expose the empty sheath there, then nodded at Cormac before ducking back down. Stanton crouched as well.

‘What have you got now, Aiden?’

The Golem’s voice sounded different now. Cormac realized that this difference stemmed from the fact that it was no longer speaking. It was broadcasting directly.

‘Trace blurring now. They are dividing. Five bodies . . . Dracoman gone . . . We are going for cover now.’

‘Remember, fire only when they reach the camp. Which of you has that stun gun?’

‘I do,’ said Cento.

‘Well, put it away. We no longer need a live one.’ He turned to Stanton. ‘What will they have?’

‘Assault weapons, a mortar and a few laser carbines. One of them has a Devcon loaded with seeker bullets.’

‘Passing us now,’ said Aiden.

Suddenly there was a scream, then the stutter of a pulse-rifle. Garish flashes lit the trees. One tree was blasted to flinders. The scream ceased.

‘That cuts it,’ came Arn’s annoyed comment.

‘Damn! Hold fire until you’ve identified your targets. I don’t want one of you hitting Cento or Aiden.’

A flare went up through the trees and a man was halfway across the clearing before the light gave him away. He opened fire on the tents. Flames and smoke revealed the beam from a laser carbine. There was the blue flash of a pulse-rifle and he went facedown in the dirt. More firing, then a horrible hornetlike buzzing. Two explosions in the buildings to the right. A horrible sucking gasp over the com.

‘Shit! Seeker bullets!’

‘Heat flares!’ shouted Cormac.

Like the finale of a fireworks display, orange flares shot in every direction amongst the buildings. The buzzing continued. Two flares went out and a nearby explosion rained flakes of rubble down on Cormac’s head. The dracoman pulled him lower and he swore at it. Another stuttering pulse of light.

‘They’re back to the lasers,’ said Arn.

‘Where are you, Cento? Aiden?’

‘Moving clear,’ they replied simultaneously.

Then Aiden said, ‘There’s one to the left of the carrier operating a mortar. Can’t get a clear shot from here.’

‘Got him,’ replied Thorn.

There was a purple flash and loud crack. A white explosion split in two a tree with a trunk a metre thick. Subliminally Cormac saw something, which might have been a man, blacken, disappear.

‘There’s one just beyond that burning tent—no, the dracoman’s on him.’