‘But it does make a difference,’ Dolo said quietly. ‘Remember that we need to manage the historical stability of the Expansion. Far from being damaging, I now believe this proto-religion might actually be useful in ensuring that.’ He laughed. ‘We will probably support it, discreetly. Perhaps we will even write some scripture for it. We have before. In the end we don’t care what they think they are fighting for, as long as they fight.’

‘Why?’

‘Why what?’

‘Why do you do this? And—’

‘And why do I so obviously enjoy it? Ha!’ Dolo tipped back his Virtual face. ‘Because it is a kind of exploration, Novice. There will always be another battlefield - another star, even, one day, another Galaxy - and each is much like the last. But here we are exploring the depths of humanity itself. How far can a human being be degraded and brutalised before something folds up inside? I can tell you, we haven’t reached the bottom of that yet, and we’re still digging.

‘And then there is the war itself, the magnificence of the enterprise. Think about it: we are trying to build a perfect killing machine from soft human components, from swarming animals who evolved in a very different place, very far from here. It is a marvellous intellectual exercise - don’t you think?’

Luca dropped his face. He said, ‘How can we win this war?’

Dolo looked puzzled. ‘But we have no interest in mere winning, but in the perfecting of humanity. And to achieve that we need eternity, an eternal war. Victory is trivial compared to that.’

‘No,’ Luca said.

‘Novice—’

Dirt showered over him. Fragments rained through Dolo’s Virtual, making it flicker. Luca looked up. A machine had broken through the roof of the cavern, revealing the light of the Galaxy Core.

Skinsuited troopers clustered around the hole. One leapt down and just picked up Luca under his shoulders. Luca cried out at the pain of his wound, but he was hoisted up towards the sky and released.

For a second, two, he floated up through the vacuum, as if dreaming.

Then more strong hands caught him. He was wrapped in a med cloak. It snuggled around him and he immediately felt its warmth.

Everywhere he looked he saw more teams digging, and bodies floating out of the dirt. It was as if the whole Rock were a cemetery fifty kilometres across, disgorging its dead. And over his comms system he could hear a great murmuring groan. It was the merging of thousands of voices, he realised, the thousands of wounded that still littered this battered Rock, who themselves were far outnumbered by the dead.

‘No,’ he muttered.

A visored face loomed over him. ‘No what?’

‘We have to find a way to win this war,’ Luca whispered.

‘Sure we do. Save your strength, buddy.’ The med cloak probed at his shoulder. He felt a sharp pain.