“And you forgave them?”

“Of course. I can see now that it was a genuine accident and the public has to accept equal risks if we are to have abundant clean energy, limitless food and household electrodefragmentizers.”

He was carrying a sheaf of papers, not the application form that I had to fill out but leaflets on how to join New Goliath. Not as a consumer but as a worshipper. I had always been deeply distrustful of Goliath, but this whole “repentance” thing smelt worse than anything I had so far witnessed. I turned, tore up my numbered ticket and headed for the exit.

“Miss Next!” called out a familiar voice. “I say, Miss Next!”

A short man with pinched features and a rounded head covered with the fuzz of an aggresively short crew cut was facing me. He was wearing a dark suit and heavy gold jewelry and was arguably the person I liked least—this was Jack Schitt, once Goliath’s top advanced-weapons guru and ex-convict of “The Raven.” This was the man who had tried to prolong the Crimean War so he could make a fortune out of Goliath’s latest superweapon, the Plasma Rifle.

Anger rose quickly within me. I turned Friday in the other direction so as not to give his young mind any wrong ideas about the use of violence and then grasped Schitt by the throat. He took a step back, stumbled and collapsed beneath me with a yelp. Sensing I had been in this position before, I released him and placed my hand on the butt of my automatic, expecting to be attacked by a host of Jack’s minders. But there was nothing. Just sad citizens looking on sorrowfully.

“There is no one here to help me,” said Jack Schitt, slowly getting to his feet. “I have been assaulted eight times today—I count myself fortunate. Yesterday it was twenty-three.”

I looked at him and noticed, for the first time, that he had a black eye and a cut on his lip.

“No minders?” I echoed. “Why?”

“It is my absolution to face those I have bullied and harangued in the past, Miss Next. When we last met, I was head of Goliath’s Advanced Weapons Division and corporate laddernumber 329.” He sighed. “Now, thanks to your well-publicized denouncement of the failings of our Plasma Rifle, the corporation decided to demote me. I am an Apology Facilitation Operative Second Class, laddernumber 12,398,219. The mighty has fallen, Miss Next.”

“On the contrary,” I replied, “you have merely been moved to a level more fitting for your competence. It’s a shame. You deserved much worse than this.”

His eyes twitched as he grew angry. The old Jack, the homicidal one, returned for a moment. But the feelings were short-lived, and his shoulders fell as he realized that without the Goliath Security Service to back him up, his power over me was minimal.