It took the rest of the morning for the defences to be set and foxholes to be dug. The ground was very stony, and a metre down was a layer of permafrost. They had an electric shear that could slice through almost anything, and EM blasts from a pulse rifle soon melted the permafrost, but in the end the men had to dig the holes with shovels. It was tiring work for men unused to it, and would perhaps not have been finished until nightfall had not Cento and Aiden lent a hand. The sergeant and his men rested in their tents afterwards, perhaps trying to remember if the ES recruiting officer had said anything about having to dig holes. Aiden and Cento moved into the trees.

Night descended and now there was nothing to do but wait. Cormac surveyed what he had wrought, then headed for the carrier.

As he reached it, Cormac spotted Thorn ferrying Stanton back inside. Even boosted men must empty their bladders sometime. He followed them inside and watched while Thorn tied the prisoner back in place. Then he sat on the bunk opposite, as Thorn nodded to him and left them, his proton gun tucked under one arm. Cormac looked round to see the sergeant was up near the front studying a screen flipped up from the control console. Mika he could hear moving about in the rear section somewhere.

‘You know, John,’ he said, ‘you’re culpable for just about every crime on the book.’

Stanton looked at him tiredly. ‘I know that.’

‘Why? Ever since I first met you, I kept wondering why. The way you operate, you didn’t need to resort to crime. You could easily have made your fortune in the Polity. Was it the buzz? The danger?’

‘Maybe,’ said Stanton. ‘But how many people do you know who made informed choices when they were young? For me, crime was a way of survival at first, then a way of life afterwards. You know what it’s like beyond the Line.’

‘I know.’ Cormac turned away from him, then looked back. ‘I don’t think there’s anything I can do. You’ve killed people and some of those people were innocent Polity citizens,’ he said.

Stanton was about to reply, when Aiden spoke from Cormac’s comunit, which he took from his pocket.

‘What is it?’

‘A message from Viridian,’ came Aiden’s voice. ‘It may not be relevant, but a shuttle just launched from the old ring station.’

‘Who’s there normally?’

‘Outlinkers, apparently, but Viridian tells me they don’t often come down to the surface. About once every ten years . . . in exoskeletons . . . to buy supplies they cannot manufacture. It may be nothing.’

‘All right, keep me informed.’

Cormac dropped the unit back in his pocket and looked questioningly at Stanton.

‘Nothing to do with Pelter. No way of getting back up there,’ Stanton told him.