This place was frigid and the only liquid water existed around volcanic vents a mile underneath the ice sheet. From these hidden warm seas, wells spiralled to the surface, and by tracing a surface trail from one of these, King came upon a great furry serpent heading out from one of the landmasses towards them. On the land itself grew forests of trees resembling pines in their strategies for surviving cold, though lower in stature, with thicker denser trunks and fruits like cut diamonds. Flying mammals fed upon the latter, while the furry serpents reared up high to graze on the needles. King found no large predators, but soon discovered the reason -the parasites growing inside the many varieties of creature in the forests kept populations down by taking gradual control of their hosts and forcing them down the ice wells, where young parasites could hatch out of their drowning bodies in the warm water below. Closer scanning revealed swarms of the adult form of these things climbing continually up out of the wells. They resembled a minuscule version of the screaming wobbling thing seen on the adjacent world. Here again, deep under the ice, were some of those hollow granite cubes, but still no sign of Erebus’s presence. The AI felt both disappointment and relief as, continuing its straight-line course, it once again dropped into U-space.

A breath of cold wafted from the neck ring of D’nissan’s hotsuit and Mika wondered if it was only that which made her shiver.

‘Who?’ She nodded to the image on the screen.

‘No “who” involved,’ the ophidapt replied. ‘We suppressed cerebral growth in the amniotic tank. Our friend there is lacking in everything but autonomic functions. He possesses less intelligence than that of your average insect, and what he possesses is only by dint of hardware implanted in his skull.’ D’nissan glanced at her. ‘And by that I mean singular insects—not hives of them.’

The shaven-headed man in the isolation chamber stood naked, and utterly still. He bore no expression and his face seemed characterless. However, this did not make Mika feel any less uneasy about what D’nissan intended doing to him.

‘Implantation was successful, then?’

‘Apparently, though we’ll see soon enough if it works.’

Directly opposite the man stood a small tripod-mounted auto-gun.

‘Test one,’ said D’nissan.