"OK, they've gone," he croaked through the backlash of neurohormone pain. Even that sliver of sound seemed distant.

Victor was kneeling beside him, a rictus grimace on his face, rolling Ellis's body off. The back of the skull had cleaved open, a fried jelly offal spilling out.

Victor wrenched aside and vomited; coughing, dry retching, and sobbing for an age. When his convulsions finished he was on all fours, his hair hanging in tassels down his forehead, skin sallow and filmed with cold sweat. "Jesus, what did that to him?"

Greg looked at the wall opposite the balcony door; it was criss-crossed by narrow black scorch marks. Glass fragments from the cabinets were heaped on the carpet, figurines glowed a faint cherry pink on smouldering shelves. "Maser," he said. "Probably a Raytheon or a Minolta, something packing enough power to penetrate the silvering on the glass."

"Bloody hell. What now?"

Greg wriggled his legs from under the small of Ellis's back, and propped himself up on his elbows, gulping down air. Looking anywhere but at the ruined flesh at his feet. The world was a mirage, wavering nauseously. "Cover up. Call your squad, this apartment has got to be scrubbed clean, there must be nothing left to prove we ever visited. You'll have to take the body out tonight—cleaning truck, something like that. And get these Crays to Walshaw. Lord knows how long it'll take to go through their contents, though."

"No police?"

"No police. We need the Crays' data. Besides, I'd hate to try and explain what we were doing here. Let Ellis become another unperson, nobody's going to ask questions."

"Oh. Yes." Victor was dazed, moving and thinking with a Saturday night drunk's shell-shocked apathy.

"Call your squad now."

"Right." He tugged his cybofax out of an inner pocket. "Your nose is bleeding."

Greg dabbed at the flow with some of Ellis's tissues while Victor yammered out increasingly urgent instructions. Flies were beginning to feed on the open skull. Greg pulled a white lace tablecloth over Ellis, and collapsed into one of the low chairs, exhausted.

"On their way," said Victor. "You want to flit, find a doctor or something?"

"No. I think I'll just sit here for a minute. Oh, and be sure to have this place swept for bugs." His nose had stopped bleeding.

Victor hovered anxiously, head swivelling round the apartment, missing the body each time. "Bloody hell, what a cock-up."

"Not your fault. But it proves one thing."

"What's that?"

Greg gave him a battle-weary smile. "I'm close."

"Yeah, but Greg… What have you got left now?"

"A name. Confirmation."

"That di Girolamo character you mentioned?"

"Yep. It was beautiful the way Ellis's mind funked out. You should've seen it."

"If you say so. This is all way above my head. Surveillance and backup, Walshaw says. You sit there and take it easy for a while. I'll see to the clean-up."