But this… this was beyond his considerable framework of knowledge. He wanted to know what it was. He wanted to understand how it could be, how it could exist. It was just organic waste, the skeletal relic of a dead human being. It had no life. It was a broken frame that had once supported life, but that was all. Even on a basic level of organic engineering, the greater part of the mechanism was missing. There were no muscles or tendons left to support or move the bones, no blood supply to feed those muscles, no nerves to stimulate motion and control balance, no heart to pump the blood, no organs to fuel the process, no brain in that cranium to make walking a desire, no eyes to see them with.

But it saw them. And it walked, a precarious, slow walk like a frail old man. It saw Valentin Drusher and Germaine Macks, and it walked towards them.

‘That,’ Drusher said, almost brightly, ‘that is highly unlikely.’

Macks mumbled something that wasn’t properly a word. The approaching figure appeared to shudder slightly. Drusher realised that the powerful stab-beam transfixing it was quivering. Macks’ hands were trembling wildly. He could hear her sobbing and hyperventilating.

He knew, under any other circumstances, he would be doing the same thing. His mind would have closed down in the choking paralysis of fear.

‘Germaine?’ he said gently. ‘Germaine?’

He put his arm around her shoulder. She was shaking so badly it felt like she was vibrating. She was making an odd, mewling sound. She couldn’t not look at it.

Drusher couldn’t look away either. But he reached out with his free hand and took the riotgun from her, keeping the stablight aimed at the walking thing. He squeezed his arm tight around her quaking shoulders.

‘Germaine? Come on,’ he said. ‘Come with me. Take a step backwards. That’s it. And another.’

He edged them towards the parlour door. She shook against him. Drusher could smell the thing advancing towards them. He could smell rot: not the gross, gagging stink of putrescence, but the faded, dry fragrance of end-stage decomposition.

‘Germaine? Another step.’

They had reached the parlour door. He pushed Macks into the room, and she almost fell through the doorway.

Drusher turned back to face the walking thing.

‘What are you?’ he asked. ‘Can you speak? You shouldn’t be able to, but then you shouldn’t be able to walk either. Can you tell me what you are? Can you tell me how you are possible?’

The figure could not. It simply continued its inexorable trudge towards Drusher. Its right arm began to rise, as if it were reaching out to touch him.

‘I’d like an answer,’ said Drusher. ‘If you won’t answer or you can’t, I’d like you to go.’