Oh, Lord.

Quite. We've been running constant monitor programs on the critical units of this deal to see if there has been any movement. Charlotte applied for a replacement card through a New London office, but her identity was verified by the company's memory core on Earth. She followed that by buying clothes at Toska's.

Clothes? At a time like this?

Yes.

Idiot girl! And if we know…

Correct. Leol Reiger, the Dolgoprudnensky, and Clifford Jepson are all hunting her. The hotrods will be running monitor programs similar to ours. We must assume one of the three will be told, if not all of them.

Bloody hell What does Greg think he's doing?

Perhaps he doesn't know.

Well, he ought to. She opened her eyes. The study was as depressingly sober as always. Wilholm without the children had little appeal. She might just as well be in the office.

Open Channel to Victor Tyo.

Where are you? she asked.

I'll be landing at Prior's Fen in five minutes.

Forget that. Come direct to Wilholm; you and I are going up to New London.

I'm sure Greg and Melvyn Ambler can handle the situation.

Ha! She told him about Charlotte's Amex. That gives us three reasons to join them. Greg says the alien is there. Royan told me he's gone up there to test his prototype nanoware. And now everyone and their mother knows Charlotte Fielder is up there. I'd have to go up eventually, might as well be now.

All right, Julia. But I still don't see how Royan and the alien can be tied together. Not now we've established that he grew the flower himself, that it didn't arrive in the solar system on a starship. In fact, I'm not entirely convinced that there is an alien any more.

Greg says he sensed it.

I know. Julia, I've known him as long as you, remember? But, well, I admit his espersense is perfection. Hell, I wish I had psychics half as good in security. It's just this intuition of his—

You don't believe him.

I'm sceptical, that's all I'm saying. Especially when you should be concentrating on the bid for the generator data.

There's no such thing as coincidence.

That's one hell of a bon mot to gamble your entire future on.

She sighed and gave a half-smile. Thank heavens for Victor, always gave his opinions straight.

What do you three think? she asked the cores.

I think Greg knows what he's talking about, Juliet, her grandfather said. This atomic structuring is just too odd.

Yes, we concur, said NN core two.

Unanimous, then. Sorry, Victor, you've just been outvoted.

All four of you?

'Fraid so.

OK, Julia. I'll be at Wilholm in seven minutes.

Fine. In the mean time, I'm going to phone Clifford Jepson.

Whatever for?

A truce. I want this hardlining to stop. There's been too much already.

Clifford Jepson was behind his desk in the Globecast office, dressed in an expensive light grey German Suit. His round manufactured face gave her a vicious smile. "Julia. Gonna make your bid?"

"No, Clifford. I want to ask you a favour."

He lounged back in a high-backed leather chair, toying with a pearl-textured light-pencil. "A favour? Changing your tune, aren't you, Julia? Coming down to Earth with the rest of us?"

Burn the conceited little shit, Juliet, Philip Evans raged.

No, Grandpa. And please don't interrupt unless it's a relevant observation.

That was a relevant observation in my book, girl.

Behave, NN core two said.

"My bid will be in tonight, Clifford. But I'd point out that you haven't filed a patent on the nuclear force generator yet."

"It'll be filed. Don't you worry about that."

"If you say so. But in the mean time, I'd appreciate it if you put the brakes on Leol Reiger."

The light-pen pointed rigidly at the ceiling. "Goddamn, Julia, it was your people at the Colonel Maitland."

"Only after Reiger went on the rampage. I think your judgement in selecting him was execrable, Clifford."

"Not your type, huh? A bit too direct for you, Julia? I've got no complaints."

"Well, you ought to have. After all, what has he accomplished for you so far? And Jason Whitehurst was a friend of mine."

"Yeah." A muscle twitched under Clifford Jepson's right eye. "I couldn't help that. Reiger wouldn't have done anything if Whitehurst had seen reason. The old man told his bodyguards to shoot Reiger's squad. He didn't leave Leol with any choice."

"I was there, Clifford, and what you're saying is absolute tabloid. You have no control over Reiger, he's as much a danger to you as anyone else."

"What do you mean, you were there?"

Julia gave him a level stare, then accessed her personality package memory files in Wilholm's 'ware and pulled the recording taken from the camera in Jason Whitehurst's study. She squirted it over to Clifford's terminal. He watched the scene as Leol Reiger confronted Jason Whitehurst. The rip gun fired.

"Motherfuck." Clifford Jepson winced, lips peeling back from his teeth.

"I know Reiger got clear of the hospital in Lagos," she said. "Call him off, Clifford, pay off his contract and dump him."

Clifford Jepson raised his gaze to a point above the camera. Julia watched the shadows of doubt forming across his face, she imagined cogs turning behind his too-smooth skin.

"And then what?" he asked faintly.

"Sorry?"

"What happens after that? I mean, let's not flick around here, Julia. You've got the Fielder girl, right?"

"She's under my protection. I won't let anyone harm her, least of all you and Reiger."

"That's just it, Julia. This goddamn AV recording; lifting her out from under Reiger's team like that; and now I'm told Harcourt might get blown away in a cabinet reshuffle. Jesus, Julia, how do you do that? You're just laughing at me. Reiger was one of the best, and he barely gets out alive. I mean, nobody's that good. It's goddamn frightening the way you operate. I'm fighting for my life here, Julia. You know what I mean: the Fielder girl. She could screw me. My contact is playing a very elusive game, I'm not hiding that. You go barging in there with Fielder and that freak Royan, and I'm flushed. I ain't gonna roll over and let that happen. No way."

Julia watched the light-pen being tapped on the edge of the desk, it was hypnotic. The pressure was starting to get to Clifford Jepson.

And he's not the only one.

"Risk you take playing in this league, Clifford. So I'll make you an offer. In return for giving me your source and dumping Reiger, I'll cut you in on forty per cent of the profits from atomic structuring."

"No." He shook his head. It was paper defiance, she thought.

"If I get to the source first, you won't get a penny."

"I play to win, Julia. I'm not backing out now. You're just as worried as me or you wouldn't have called."

"Don't count on it," she said, and broke the circuit.

He hasn't got the generator data yet, her grandfather said. We could come out of this holding the trumps.

Providing we secure the generator data first, NN core two said. Clifford knows he's going to have to produce it tomorrow to satisfy the bidders. He must be reasonably confident about that. That doesn't give us much time.

Are we all agreed that the alien is the source? Julia asked.

Yes.

Looks that way, girl.

And it's currently up in New London?

Concurred.

Right then. Let's see if we can prevent it from squirting the data down to Clifford.

Sean Francis's face formed on the study's phone screen. His shoulders straightened when he saw who was calling.

"Good afternoon, ma'am," he said respectfully.

She smiled, showing him he was in favour. Sean Francis took life a mite too seriously, but he was the best executive in the company. Even so, she considered forty-five thousand kilometres was just about an ideal separation distance.