The paralysis that had gripped Megan until that moment suddenly slackened. She stumbled backwards, preparing to take her chances and run . . .

The noise cut off abruptly, the machines attack systems folding themselves away and the carapace closing back over them once more.

She felt suddenly numb with relief. Maybe Kazim hadnt been lying after all

A flickering beam of energy shot out at her from another section of the mech, propelling a flood of fire through her nerve endings. She fell backwards, slamming the rear of her skull on the ground, her jaw clamped in a rictus grin as her body twitched and shuddered.

She caught sight of the mech leaping back into the sky, like some oversized mechanical locust, before rapidly vanishing out of sight amidst the stars.

With an extreme effort, she was just about able to turn her head to where she could see Kazims override unit lying near one outstretched hand.

Ill kill you, thought Megan, in those last moments before consciousness slipped away. I should never have listened to you, Kazim, you lying piece of shit.

Megan finally came to again some hours later, the grass feeling cool and damp beneath her cheek. Beside her knelt a heavily muscled man with intricate tattoos on his neck and a look of deep concentration as he searched through the contents of her satchel. She instantly noticed he had a rifle slung over one shoulder.

She tried to say something, but her tongue felt sluggish and unresponsive. Even trying to form a few words made the muscles in her throat ache, and she could barely feel her arms and legs as she tried to move them. Nevertheless, a faint tingling in her extremities suggested the return of sensation, though she could no more command them to obey her than she could sprout wings and fly away.

She glanced beyond the man and saw a spider-truck parked nearby, with two headless and bare-chested figures standing next to it. These were bead-zombies, she realized, their bodies controlled by microscopic devices implanted in the nub of spinal column that protruded from the healed-over stumps of their necks. Each carried a long, curved sword in one hand and a pistol in the other.

Bead-zombies were, she knew from experience, incapable of feeling pain. Taking them on in a fight was a good way of getting yourself sliced into chunks, regardless of how much damage you might inflict on them in the meantime.

But the zombies didnt worry her nearly so much as the neck-tattoos on the man still searching through her satchel. They signified that he was a Freeholder and a native of Redstone, and the tattoos represented the number of people he had killed in one-to-one combat. He wore a traditional Freehold blade on his hip, its haft wrought in a fine filigree the colour of jade and ivory, depicting stylized human figures in close combat.