‘The Maker’s secondary purpose.’

‘The primary?’

‘To seed Jain nodes.’

‘It was to shut you down, then take the nodes in your possession, and seed them itself around the Polity?’

‘No.’

‘Why don’t you just tell me?’

‘I destroyed its ship. There were no nodes aboard. You found none in its escape pod, either. And that it was so willing to return home meant it possessed none. Yet, the Maker most certainly brought more nodes with it.’

A shiver travelled up Cormac’s spine. He began using cognitive programs to pick the bones out of what Dragon had told him -looking for flaws and broken logic chains.

Eventually he said, ‘Tell me about Dracocorp augs.’

‘The people wearing them were my eyes within the Polity.’

‘But they are hierarchical—ultimate control devolving to yourself. Why would you need such control of human beings if they were just your eyes?’

‘They were intended to be an army at my disposal.’

Again the cognitive programs and, after a moment, ‘Dracomen.’

‘The events of Samarkand focused Earth Central’s attention on the Dracocorp aug networks, which are now being destroyed and, through them hunter-killer programs seek me out. At Masada I sacrificed part of myself to create a new army.’

‘Why?’

‘I saw Skellor provided with a Jain node. I have tracked vessels and alien entities arriving from outside the Polity. The nodes that were in the Maker’s possession are in the control of someone or something out there.’

It all made perfect sense and Cormac could find no catastrophic breaks in the logic chains, no flaws and no anomalies that fell outside the story’s parameters. This meant that Dragon was telling the truth—or else was an Olympian liar. Unfortunately, Dragon could be precisely the latter.

The AI Coloron ran twenty-four runcibles: ten were located in vast complexes spread throughout the main arcology or MA, six located in the growing arcology called inevitably SA, secondary arcology, and the other eight serviced the rest of the planet. Twelve of these runcibles were permanently set for departure, and the remaining twelve alternated evenly. It was a deliberately designed disparity which elsewhere worked to reduce the planetary population—it being simply more difficult to come here than to leave. However, though the runcibles remained in constant operation, still the birth rate here exceeded the emigration rate.