He again checked his communicator, switching to one of its many facilities. The beacon setting sent his location out to the destroyer, just as it revealed the location of the destroyer to him. It was still sitting out there at the bottom of its trench. Vrell heaved himself ashore and pulled the medpack from his underside. A few shell patches should be enough to keep any more leeches out of his wounds if he were forced to swim the huge expanse of intervening sea. He fervently hoped that would not be necessary.

As Vrell softened his shell patches and spread them with glue, he was aware that he was only delaying things. But then, the better he made himself feel, the more persuasive he could be with his father. He took his time affixing the patches, drying them afterwards with the blower from the medpack. When he had finished, and neatly stowed away the medpack, he noticed with some surprise that the sky was getting lighter. It suddenly occurred to him how visible he would soon become to the ships out in the cove. He backed up the beach into the cover of dingle, and again took out his communicator.

‘Father?’

There was a long pause before he received a reply.

‘Vrell, my son, you are an adult now,’ said Ebulan. ‘Have you completed your mission upon the island?’

‘I... I encountered more resistance than expected,’ said Vrell. As a Prador very new to adulthood, it did not yet occur to him to lie openly - only to bend the truth a little.

‘You failed, then,’ said Ebulan.

‘The fault is not entirely mine. Captain Drum came ashore—’

‘No matter,’ Ebulan interrupted. ‘I will be taking care of this matter myself, now.’

‘You’ll be coming here?’ Vrell asked, with renewed hope.

‘I will come.’

‘And you will pick me up?’

The grating, bubbling sound that issued from the communicator was the Prador equivalent of a laugh - something Vrell had rarely heard. He held the communicator away from his body, and gave it the full attention of all his remaining eyes.

‘Vrell, you are now an adult male, and as such you are no longer of any use to me. You are more of a hindrance and a threat. So when I reach your location and shower it with CTDs to kill off the Old Captains, your death will be an added bonus.’

‘But, Father—’

Ebulan cut off, and Vrell stared at the communicator for a long moment before his survival instinct belatedly kicked in. He stood up and made ready to charge down the beach to the sea. But the sight of twenty rowing boats heading for the shore had him drop back on to his belly like a falling dinner plate. He watched the men step ashore, as he slowly backed through the dingle, wondering if the ground back there was still soft enough somewhere to dig.

* * * *