There were at least fifty islets, all no larger than fifty metres across. Keech slowed the scooter and eased it down to the centre of the largest of them. He saw that his landing area consisted of worn stone inset with quartz crystals of every shade imaginable. Scattered loosely on this surface were broken shells and fragments of pink and white chitin like broken porcelain. The scooter crunched on these as it settled. Keech dismounted and immediately inspected the vehicle’s wing: there were scratches on the metal, but it was otherwise undamaged. But the rhinoworm had come close to tipping the scooter over before its beak slid off, and from the organic part of his brain Keech had felt a surge of emotion that felt very much like fear. He gazed back out to sea and recognized the sinuous wave of the worm approaching. It was persistent; he had to give it that. Movement close by then attracted his attention and he glanced down at the shore close by to see a mass of spiral shells shifting about. Abruptly one of these bounced into the air on a thick white foot like an anaemic tongue, and came in to land only a few metres away from him. From this shell rose two eyestalks. As one, from all those down on the beach, rose a small forest of similar eyestalks. He had never seen anything quite so ridiculous. But when the shell nearest to him tilted back to expose a large circular mouth full of more moving parts than a high-tech food processor, he quickly remounted his scooter and took off. As he passed over those on the shore, a couple of them leapt up in the air and bounced off the underside of his scooter. He raised it even higher above the sea as he sped for his destination. The creatures here would have found his flesh unpalatable, but that would be little comfort to him.

With the rhinoworm and those things which he supposed must be frog whelks a couple of kilometres safely behind him, Keech eased the steering column to rest and shut off the motors. The scooter drifted along twenty metres above the waves while he again studied the map. Twelve kilometres to go, and then he must go down again. He reached behind him to get hold of his black attaché case, which he opened on his lap. From the objects inside, he selected a short QC laser carbine to complement the JMCC pulse-gun at his hip. He also selected a tray with a touch-control panel on the side. In this tray rested three innocuous two-centimetre-diameter steel spheres. He then selected a program via the panel, and ran it. The three spheres rose out of the tray and positioned themselves around him. Satisfied, he studied the disassembled weapon that remained in the case. The dealer on Coram who had supplied it to him, had taken a huge risk for which he had been well recompensed, yet Keech felt he would not be needing such armament unless wholesale war broke out on Spatterjay. He closed the case and replaced it in the luggage compartment before easing the steering column forward. The spheres held their positions around him as he proceeded.