I was still two metres out from the end of the walkway when the bolts tore all the way out. Eishundo reflex threw me forward. I lost the Rapsodia, grabbed at the edge of the pen with both hands. The walkway dropped out from under me. My palms closed on rain-drenched evercrete.

One hand slipped. The gekko grip in the other held me up. Somewhere below me, the swamp panther struck sparks from the fallen gantry with its talons, then fell back with a shrill howl. I scrabbled for purchase with my other hand.

Segesvar’s head appeared over the lip of the pen wall. He was pale and there was blood soaking through the right arm of his jacket, but he grinned when he saw me.

“Well, fucking well,” he said, almost conversationally. “My old self righteous fucking friend Takeshi Kovacs.”

I heaved sideways desperately. Got a heel hooked over the edge of the pen. Segesvar saw it and limped closer.

“No, I don’t think so,” he said, and kicked my foot away. I swung out again, barely retaining grip with both hands. He stood above me and stared down for a moment. Then he looked away across the fight pits, and nodded with vague satisfaction. The rain hammered down around us.

“So for once I’m looking down on you.”

I panted. “Oh, fuck off.”

“You know that panther down there might even be one of your religious friends. That’d be ironic, eh?”

“Just get on with it, Rad. You’re a sell-out piece of shit and nothing you do here is going to prove any different.”

“That’s right, Takeshi. Take the fucking moral high ground.” His face contorted, and for a moment I thought he was going to kick my hands away there and then. “Like you always do. Oh, Radul’s a fucking criminal, Radul can’t handle himself, I had to save Radul’s fucking life once. You been doing it since you slimed Yvonna away from me, and you never fucking change?”

I gaped up at him in the rain, the drop below me almost forgotten. Spat water out of my mouth.

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“You know fucking well what I’m talking about! Watanabe’s that summer, Yvonna Vasarely, with the green eyes.”

Memory flared with the name. Hirata’s Reef, the long-limbed silhouette above me. A sea-wet, salt-tasting body on damp rubber suits.

Hang on tight.

“I.” I shook my head numbly. “I thought she was called Eva.”

“You see, you fucking see.” It came seething up out of him like pus, like poison contained too long. His face distorted with rage. “You didn’t give a shit about her, she was just another nameless fuck for you.”