In fact, I must have made a good account of myself during the brief fight, since it lasted longer and was even more painful than I expected. Finally, as the world spun and I blacked out, the last words I heard were – “Let’s’ toss him to the Zoomz, if they want him so bad.”

Pondering later as consciousness returned, I didn’t much like the sound of those words, even in recollection. At the moment, though, I had other worries as I lay in the dark, sprawled on my back on a cold, hard surface.

No bones seemed broken, but I hurt all over. Stars could be seen overhead – occulted by the outlines of clouds and tree branches. It was damn cold. Worse yet, my uniform was torn!

That was bad. Circuitry woven into the fibers was essential to communicating with my crewmates in orbit. Wincing at the effort, I pressed my collar tab anyway, and tried to transmit. My voice warbled and scritched like something made of tin.

“This is Ship’s Advisor Montessori, calling… calling Clever Gamble. Come in, Clever Gamble. Do you read?”

No answer. The nanos in my ears remained silent – though I couldn’t rule out the possibility that Besh and his boys had knocked them loose, along with half my fillings.

Maybe it would help if I sat up and smoothed some of the kinks out of my abused shirt. I pushed up to my elbows, and for the first time got a glimpse of my surroundings. My call to the ship trailed off as I made out rows of grayish white forms, mostly rectangular, arrayed in rows that vanished into the gloom in all directions. Some of the slabs stood upright. Others tilted awkwardly or had toppled on the ground. I now lay upon one of the latter kind.

An overturned grave stone.

Frissons of panic climbed my back while my gorge churned. It wasn’t just your typical queasiness, mixed with surprise. When you’ve spent as much time with demmies as I have, you can’t help picking up their penchant for superstition. Right then, my sepulchral surroundings didn’t make me any more appreciative of the direction life was heading.

Then I noticed something else that didn’t help my sense of well-being. Of the tombstones I’d thought “toppled,” several of those nearby seemed deliberately positioned on the ground, with metal fixtures along one side.

Hinges, I realized, unhappily, soon noting that the slab I lay upon came so equipped. Why would anyone put hinges on grave slabs?

As if that weren’t bad enough, it was about then that a voice murmured out of the darkness behind my back.

“There, you see, Sully? He got up. I told you he must be dead. You owe me five.”