She watched the dawn chase the night across the planets northern hemisphere. Even from this altitude, the damage done to the Demarchy was clearly enormous. Great brown and grey streaks mottled the entire west coast of the continent on which the Demarchy lay. The lights of cities and outlying settlements speckled the globe everywhere but along that coast. She dreaded to think of what it must be like for the few survivors wandering through the ruins down there.

She began thinking about what lay ahead. The Tabernacle was rife with speculation about just when the Accord would send heavy forces into the Montos de Frenezo to strike back against the Freehold forces hiding there. She had, at most, a few days to track Bash down and get him out before that entire mountain range became one huge battleground.

Redstone revolved beneath her, the Demarchy slipping into night while another, craggier continent came into view. The jump-car began dipping downwards, shaped-fields flickering into life all around its hull as it roared on through the upper reaches of the atmosphere.

Less than two hours after departing Aguirre, the vehicle was cruising just a few hundred metres above a gorge in the foothills of the Montos de Frenezo. A river lying to the east sparkled blue and white.

Alerts began to flower around Megan, warning her that she was entering an Accord restricted zone. She swept them away, focusing instead on the dusty jagged peaks ahead. She was now fewer than a hundred klicks from where Sarbakshians tracer told her that Sifras dropship had only recently touched down.

Something appeared then on the jump-cars radar, about a hundred and fifty kilometres south-west of her current location. Whatever it was, it was clearly too small to be carrying passengers.

The radar display floating before her blinked and changed. The blip was now only a hundred and thirty kilometres away, and closing in on her fast.

She felt her brow prickle with sweat. That had to mean it was a missile of some kind. Possibly it had been launched automatically, but almost certainly it belonged to the Freehold.

She tried to see if she could pick up echoes from its internal circuitry, something that might allow her to gain access to its control systems and divert it. But when that didnt work, she wasnt really surprised. Weapons and bombs had actually become dumber and cruder over the past few centuries, making them proof them against such attempts at remote intervention. The best she could hope for was to outrun it.

The blip jumped again. Suddenly it was a great deal closer, altering its course slightly to match hers, and still closing.

Definitely a missile, she thought. However fast Sarbakshians pride and joy might be, the missile was clearly a lot faster. She could try and outmanoeuvre it, but the g-forces required would render her unconscious, possibly even kill her.

That left her with a simple choice: land now or die.