‘You know what?’ he said. ‘I’m sorry I said that. I take it back. It takes balls for a man to go into a fight when he knows how to fight. It takes a damn sight more to go in when he doesn’t. Not to have a clue, but to go for it anyway. Balls of steel.’

‘That’s what we’ll call him from now on,’ said Macks. ‘Balls of steel.’

‘Head full of stupid, mind,’ she added.

Nayl smiled.

‘This is a very big deal, isn’t it, Nayl?’ asked Drusher, gesturing at the machine above them. ‘What’s happening here is, uh…’

‘The biggest,’ said Nayl.

‘So then,’ said Drusher with a shrug. ‘Eisenhorn was right, really. We’re all expendable. In the face of this. This isn’t Eisenhorn’s private war. The outcome affects everything we know, everything we are. Right?’

‘Right,’ said Nayl.

‘So we should help Eisenhorn in any way we can,’ said Drusher. ‘I mean, we may not be any use at all, but we should try. How did you put it? “To not have a clue, but to go for it anyway”?’

‘Something along those lines,’ said Nayl.

‘I agree with the magos,’ said Voriet.

‘Shut up,’ said Macks. ‘You can barely stand.’

‘Doesn’t stop me agreeing, marshal,’ said Voriet.

‘All right,’ said Nayl. ‘We go up. We take a look. If it’s out of our league, we get the hell out. Find a way out of this place. Least we can do is get to Medea and get a signal sent.’

‘To the ordos?’ asked Macks.

‘Yes,’ said Nayl.

‘The ordos?’ asked Voriet.

‘I think we’re way past hiding now, Darra,’ Nayl said. ‘I think Eisenhorn would reckon so too. We’ve got solid intelligence on the Cognitae here. Old… differences, they don’t matter now. If we can’t help Eisenhorn, we scream for help and bring the Holy frigging Inquisition down on this place, guns blazing.’

‘Even if that means… spending the rest of your life incarcerated?’ asked Drusher. ‘Or being burned as a heretic? They still do that, right?’

‘Even if,’ said Nayl.

‘Well, I agree with that last part,’ said Macks. ‘Call in the ordos. The Magistratum. The Territorial Guard. Anything and everything. But as for the rest of that big-talk pissing contest, I utterly despair of men, sometimes.’

‘Me too,’ said Nayl. ‘We’re hardly packing much kill-power.’

Between them, Nayl had his big Tronsvasse auto, Drusher had his Regit compact, which Macks had recovered and reunited with the clip in Drusher’s pocket, and Macks had Streekal’s laspistol.

‘Let’s go then,’ said Nayl. He turned and started climbing the gantry stairs again. Drusher took a turn supporting Voriet, and Macks went ahead of them, behind Nayl.

‘Thank you,’ said Voriet quietly as Drusher helped him up the stairs. Every step made him wince and sigh.

‘For what?’