Chaline grimaced. ‘You had to be there.’

‘So then you decided to set up the First Stage runcible?’

‘Not then, exactly. While we were surveying we picked up a U-space signature. A Maker ship appeared, just discernible at the core of a mass of substructure—it looked like a dandelion clock. It attacked immediately, suicidally. We took it out with a CTD. I don’t know what he heard, but Lucifer was briefly in contact with whatever was on that ship. He said it was time for us to go home, that other similar entities were closing in on us—the Maker versions of your friend Skellor. Lucifer also informed us that these entities would be able to track us through a standard U-space jump, and therefore we should escape via runcible. Graham and myself were a little dubious about this—they didn’t have runcible technology and we weren’t about to make a gift of it to them by leaving a first stage runcible behind.’

‘It perhaps means nothing,’ said Cormac, ‘but what was your impression of Lucifer’s attitude at that point?’

‘Well... he seemed almost guilty. But he could have been using emulation programs in the Golem’s base format program. We supposed the guilt, whether real or emulated, was what Lucifer considered a suitable response to the danger he’d put us in.’

‘Are you sure of that?’

Chaline frowned at him. ‘As sure as I can be. Why are you digging at this?’

‘Never mind. You set up the runcible.’

‘We did—after Lucifer demonstrated a knowledge of runcible technology he could only have acquired in the Polity. It was he who suggested a time-inconsistent runcible. We thought he didn’t understand how dangerous that could be. But he understood perfectly. His people were dead, wiped out by a technology that spreads like a virus, and he wanted to innoculate that particular area of space.’ She stared at Cormac, waiting for some comment or question. When none was forthcoming she continued, ‘We chose a barren and untouched moon circling a gas giant—the only planet in orbit of a nearby white dwarf. Other suns lay under a light year away and we were near to the centre of the Maker realm. We landed the Victoria—a difficult enough task in itself. I set up the runcible and we cannibalized the ship’s U-space engine for the parts to make that runcible time inconsistent. Lucifer provided some esoteric tech to enable us to fine tune things and boost the power from the fusion reactors we dismounted. We were running alignment tests when—’

‘One moment,’ Cormac interrupted, ‘you need an AI to run a runcible. I’d have thought that requirement even more critical in this situation.’

‘Yes . . . obviously we’d brought a runcible AI, in stasis, along with us.’

‘It sacrificed itself to get you back here?’