Mickey Pileggi licked at the beads of sweat that had suddenly erupted on his upper lip. “I got them under control, Al. Yeah. Sure thing.”

“Mickey, you’re full of crap. This whole fucking joint is going down the pan. We’ve been humping away at the Confederation so bad, we ain’t noticed the rain coming in.”

“That’s what you wanted.”

Al stopped in full flow, hauling back on his anger. He’d just been getting nicely into his spiel. “Kiera, stop being such a ballbuster. I did what I had to to protect us. Ain’t nobody here gonna argue with that.”

“I’m not arguing, Al. I’m saying the same thing as you. We are where we are, because this is where you’ve brought us.”

“You want to be somewhere else right now?”

“No.”

“Then shut the fuck up. I’m telling you, all of you; now is when we start getting things working properly again. You gotta start keeping tabs on the soldiers under your command, else everyone’s gonna finish up going AWOL like Webster. And that way, we wind up in deep shit. We gotta have things working smoothly around here again. If you don’t start exerting some proper discipline then the whole Organization’s gonna fall apart. And if it goes down, then we go down with it.”

“Al, the Organization is set up to keep the fleet working,” Kiera said.

“Hey, fucking lady Einstein, you just worked that out for yourself, or did one of the kids from the gym explain it when he was banging you?” Al chuckled loudly, encouraging the others to join in.

“I’ve always known it. I just wondered if you did.”

Al’s humour faded out. “What are you getting at?”

“The only reason we need the fleet is if New California remains in this universe.”

“Aw shit, not this crap again. Don’t you get it? If we leave, then the Confederation longhairs are going to be free to dream up some way of snatching us back. We have to stay here, it’s the only way we can see what’s coming.”

“And if you see something like that coming at you, Al, what are you going to do about it? A technology powerful enough to pull a planet back from the other side of the beyond. Launch a combat wasp at it? Believe me, if the Confederation ever gets to be that powerful, then we don’t stand a chance. But I don’t think they’ll ever learn how to do anything like that. We can do it because we’ve got the devil’s own power charging us up. No chunk of machinery can challenge that. If we leave, then I say we’re going to be a hell of a lot safer there than we are here.”

There was an itch in Al’s palm, running across his skin exactly where he gripped the handle of his baseball bat. He held off from making it real. Her talk about the devil being behind them made him uncomfortable. A Catholic by birth, he didn’t like examining the implications of what he was now, nor why. “We ain’t pinning our future on what you think might be right, sister,” he growled. “If we want a certainty, then we stay right here.”

“The Organization can be transported down to the planet,” Kiera said, as if Al hadn’t even spoken. “We can use the SD network to keep our power base secure until we assume control of the cities. After that, we use ground troops to enforce order. Al was right about that. There’s been too much slippage allowed recently. We know we have to keep the farms and a lot of the industries going if we want any kind of decent life on the other side. It’ll take a strong, positive government to achieve that. And that’s us.”

“We can do all that crap, and still stay here,” Al said. His voice had become little more than a whisper. That worried those who had been with him the longest, though Kiera didn’t seem to notice the barely concealed danger. “When I want someone else to tell me how to run my Organization, I’ll let you know. Got that, baby doll? Or do I need to make it real plain for you?”

“I hear what you say, Al.” The tone was amused indolence.

“That’s smart of you. Now I want the rest of you guys to start doing like I’ve said. We need a crackdown like God’s foot is stomping through the clouds. I want things up and jumping around here. Put the word out to your soldiers, as of now you shape up or ship out. And out is where you don’t want to be.”

Al told Emmet and Silvano to stay behind after the others trooped out. He flicked a switch to turn the wall clear, and waited impatiently as transparent waves skidded about in front of him. With his mind all het up, it was hard to cool down his energistic power. Eventually, the wall stabilized, giving him a view across the SD Tactical Operations Centre. Five people were sitting behind the long ranks of consoles; two of them playing cards.

“The bitch is good,” Al said. He was surprised more than anything.

“She used to be married to a politician,” Silvano said. “Knows how to sound plausible.”

“Certainly convinced me scooting our asses out of here is a good idea,” Al muttered. He turned back to his two senior lieutenants. “Emmet, is what she said right? Can we take the planet out of their reach? I mean, right away?”

Emmet wiped a hand across his forehead. “Al, I can make the machines we’ve got work for you. Do a few repairs, make sure everything’s plugged in where it oughta be. But, shit, questions like that . . . That’s out of my league, Al, way out. You need a theoretical physicist, or a priest. But even if they can learn how to do that, it’s not gonna be tomorrow. We’d be safe there a long time. And could be we’d learn how to keep ourselves there. Shit, I just don’t know, Al.”

“Ha.” Al sat himself down, annoyed by how badly he’d come out of the clash. “And we don’t get to find out, neither. God damn that bitch. Now she’s declared for the running away option, I’ve gotta make my stand to stay here. And you can be certain she’ll start shouting her idea about.”

“Leaving this universe has a strong appeal to the possessed,” Silvano said. “It’s intrinsic. Perhaps you should bow to the inevitable, boss.”

“You think I’m gonna knuckle under to that whore?”

“Not to her, no. But she’s backing a winning idea.”

“I still need the hellhawks a while,” Al said. “Emmet, you done anything more about building another feeding trough for them?”

“Sorry, Al, haven’t had time.”

“You’ve got it now.”

Banneth was making her preliminary preparations to Kilian when one of the senior acolytes pounded on the door of her sanctum. Kilian gurgled weakly as she eased the slim tube deeper inside him.

“I’ll be back in a minute,” Banneth promised him cheerfully, and fastened a clamp around the incision to stop the bleeding. She stripped the thin isolation gloves from her hands as she walked over to the door.

“A body, High Magus,” the acolyte panted. “There’s a body in the temple.”

She frowned. “Who?”

“Acolyte Tilkea, High Magus. He was butchered. We didn’t authorize it. Tilkea is one of the better ones.”

“I see.” Banneth datavised a codelock at her sanctum door, and strode off towards the temple. “How awful, a corpse we didn’t authorize.”

“Yes, High Magus,” the acolyte agreed nervously. Like everyone in the headquarters, he never knew if she was joking or not.

Even by the standards of the sect, the killing was fairly extreme. The remains of acolyte Tilkea were suspended from strands of carbon wire above the altar, arms and legs extended wide. Large hooks punctured the skin above his shoulder blades, as well as his buttocks, wrists, and ankles, fastening him to the wires. His chest had been split open from throat to crotch, ribs levered apart to allow the internal organs to spill out. They’d splattered down on the altar, along with a small lake of blood. Banneth circled the corpse carefully, while a gaggle of acolytes stood at a respectful distance. It was ironic, she thought, that a death in the temple where they themselves had killed hundreds over the last few decades should invoke such trepidation. A sign of the times.