This could be one of Ricard’s men – there was no guarantee all of them were in Hex Three, and in fact it seemed likely the bulk of them were standing guard over the technical staff attached to the base. The figure held up a hand, something clutched in it, and waved her down with the other hand. Instantly recognizing what he held, she dropped. He threw, and the cylindrical package arced over her head.

Light flared and something whoomphed. A blast picked her up and tumbled her forward. One gleaming shepherd leg cartwheeled past her in Martian air suddenly thick with dust. Then the figure was helping her up and she recognized Lopomac’s pudgy face, its skin webbed with ruptured capillaries, yet to heal since the decompression he had survived three months ago. Pausing only to snatch up the rifle she had dropped, he pulled her towards the airlock and inside.

‘You saw Le Blanc’s little speech?’ Var asked, after she removed her EA suit helmet in the suiting antechamber.

‘No,’ Lopomac replied, resting the assault rifle across his shoulder. ‘We were too busy watching you fucking over Hex Three.’

Carol was waiting here, Kaskan too, his eyes reddened. All three were watching Var with something approaching hunger. Carol and Kaskan wore EA suits too, as if all three had been readying themselves to come out to her, before Lopomac destroyed the shepherd and got her back inside. Should they go out again? She didn’t know. She needed to assess the situation here first.

‘We’ve been abandoned,’ she said, probing her cracked rib. ‘The Committee has left us out here to die, though apparently someone back there convinced Ricard that a reduced base staff can survive the fifteen or twenty years, until they build another Traveller to send out here.’ She decided not to mention Messina’s Alexander – it didn’t seem relevant.

‘Another Traveller?’ Lopomac echoed, puzzled.

‘All the others have gone through the Argus bubblemetal plants.’ She then focused on Kaskan. ‘Kaskan, I’m sorry . . .’

‘No need.’ He waved a hand in irritation, almost dismissively. ‘I saw what that shepherd grabbed from the crawler before Ricard turned it round.’

Her throat tight, Var turned to the other two. ‘What’s the situation here? Ricard captured Miska, and I’d have thought he would have got you two as well.’

‘Kaskan saw Ricard and two of his enforcers dragging Miska off towards Hex Three, and told us,’ said Lopomac, something odd in his expression.

‘Ricard seemed to have forgotten about the cams up on the roof, too,’ said Carol. ‘We were watching when you rounded Shankil’s Butte with that shepherd almost on top of you just about when he sent us a summons. We decided we’d best not respond, and broke into the geology storeroom instead.’

‘Hence the seismic survey charge?’ suggested Var.