Cormac looked down at the dracoman and clapped his hands.

Its slotted pupils flickered and it let out a hissing breath. After a moment it stood up and looked around. Cormac clapped again, then turned away. The dracoman followed him from the cave.

As soon as they were out into the light, Cormac broke into a run. The dracoman lengthened its stride to keep up, its motion bearing a strong resemblance to a running ostrich. As they came to the AGC, Cormac waved the others inside. They obeyed in silence, Mika and Thorn shuffling over to make room for the dracoman.

‘Take us up immediately. We’ve got about twenty minutes before they blow. I want to be well away by then. Maximum speed, and step on it.’

Aiden took the car up into the sky in a steep climb. They were all thrust back into their seats as he used full AG and the boosters.

‘What happened? I would have thought it would have killed them . . . the dracomen,’ said Thorn in a strained voice.

‘Found him unconscious, a little way inside. Scar’s dead though. Maker killed him. Don’t know why this one was left unconscious.’

‘Levelling . . . Three hundred kilometres per hour. Four hundred,’ said Aiden.

‘What speed will this thing do?’ asked Cormac.

‘It’s restricted to five hundred on manual, a thousand on AI guidance. They don’t like people breaking the sound barrier here.’

‘A thousand is quite enough. You’re an AI, so take us up there.’

‘City ordinances restrict the—’

Cormac took his chip card from his pocket and waved it in Aiden’s face. He then pushed it into a slot in the onboard computer. A sexy voice spoke from the speakers.

‘Manual governors are offline. All city controls are denied. It would be inadvisable to proceed.’

The gentle ting of a bell sounded after the voice, then the voice repeated itself, only faster this time. By the third repetition that same voice had become the shriek of a hag, and the ting a discordant clank. The computer moaned and something death-rattled inside it.

‘That’s illegal,’ said Thorn.

‘So’s detonating a CTD on an inhabited planet,’ said Cormac.

Aiden shoved the control stick forward. In less than a minute the AGC was travelling at 1000 kilometres per hour. A quarter of an hour later they reached the runcible complex.

Aiden brought the car down in the empty AGC park, as close to the installation as he could. As they climbed from the car, Cormac glanced at the clock on the dash and then looked to the east.

‘Come on, we’ve got to find a screen.’ He ran into the complex surrounding the runcible installation. The others hurried along behind, Thorn with a little help from Aiden.