"Yes, well, he might be right, you know...." said Juliana hesitantly, knowing that she was risking an angry exchange by bringing up Angus Mengsk.

But thoughts of Angus didn't anger Arcturus so much now. Irritatingly, the more years that passed, the more he found himself thinking back to his father with the uncomfortable realization that a great deal of what he'd said now made sense...

Growing up, Arcturus had always thought of his father as the stern, authoritarian patriarch of the Mengsk family, a man utterly unsympathetic to the concerns and ambitions of his young son. In Arcturus's adolescent world, Angus Mengsk had never been young, never run wild or known what it was like to be a teenager, a creature possessed of a deluded belief in its own infinite wisdom and a conceited sense of entitlement and immortality.

"Maybe," conceded Arcturus, and he smiled at the look of astonishment on Juliana's face. "I'm not saying he was right about everything, but the more I see, the more I think that perhaps he knew what he was talking about after all."

"So what does that mean for you now?"

"I don't know," said Arcturus, and that admission was more painful than he had imagined it would be. His self-belief had seen him through his tempestuous relationship with his father, but to know that he hadn't steered his destiny as cleverly as he'd thought was a galling realization.

"I have to finish out my term in the Marines," said Arcturus, "but once that's done, I'm heading out into space and away from all this. Somewhere the Confederacy doesn't care about and where I can live my life away from politicking and corruption."

"That might be a hard place to find."

"It might be," admitted Arcturus. "But when I get back to Korhal I'm going to think long and hard as to where it might be."

"Are you going to see your father when you go back home?"

"Yes," said Arcturus. "It's the first time I've gone back to Korhal on leave, so Mother has arranged a grand family dinner. My attendance is apparently mandatory. I'm dreading it."

"Nonsense," said Juliana, reaching over the table to take his hands. "It will be wonderful."

"I hope so," Arcturus said with a smile, the idea of rapprochement between himself and his family giving him an alien, but not unwelcome, sensation in the pit of his stomach.

"Though, to tell you the truth," he said, "I'm more worried about seeing Dorothy. I think she's still mad at me for leaving, and that little girl can hold a mean grudge."

"She's not so little anymore," said Juliana. "She's a precocious six-year-old now, the grand matriarch of her junior school."

Arcturus smiled with real pleasure at the thought of Dorothy ruling the roost at school.

"She's a Mengsk," he said. "It's what we do."

With the meal finished, Arcturus paid the bill and they left the restaurant and emerged into the fragrant, ocean-scented evening of Tyrador IX. The lights garlanding the trees shone like miniature stars, their brightness waxing and waning, and the silk lanterns bobbed in the freshening wind from the coast. The air had cooled and Juliana pulled her pashmina lightly around her shoulders.

Cepheid Boulevard was busier than it had been earlier, the crowds drawn by the glittering lights, festive feel, and many attractions designed to part them from their cash. Arcturus watched the smiling faces walking past him, attractive men and women, and fell a wave of annoyance that he would have to leave so soon.

Tyrador IX was a place of comfort and respite, and it would be nice to return here sometime soon. Juliana slipped her hand into his and they walked, hand in hand, back along the street, with the two Umojan security personnel following al a discreet distance.

"Thank you," said Juliana.

"For what?"

"For tonight. I had a wonderful lime, Arcturus. I like being around you."

Arcturus smiled, pleased at the compliment, and said. "Yes. I enjoyed myself as well."

"You sound surprised," said Juliana.

"I don't mean to," said Arcturus, suddenly finding that he was genuinely sad to be leaving her tomorrow. "It's just that it's been a while since I've been in genteel company. You spend enough time with soldiers, it's easy to forget the simple pleasure of spending an evening with a beautiful woman."

"Well, as long as you think I'm beautiful that's all that matters."

"You are beautiful," said Arcturus. "I don't think you know it, and that's what makes it so incredible."

Juliana squeezed his hand tightly and stopped, leaning up lo kiss him.

"You realize," she said, "that flattery will get you everywhere?"

"Then you had better get used to it," he said, kissing her back.

A raucous cheer sounded from nearby, and Arcturus looked up to see the soldiers they had passed earlier waving at them from the bar, their glasses raised in salute.

"Just like graduation," said Juliana with a smile.

Arcturus smiled and sketched a roguish salute to his fellow marines.

"Almost," he said. "I think these men are a little tougher than the students of Styrling."

Even as Arcturus formed the thought, the hairs on the back of his neck bristled and he turned to see a group of five men lounging by one of the handcrafted iron benches at the side of the boulevard. They looked out of place, their features rugged and pinched—the faces of men who had grown to adulthood without a properly balanced, nutritious diet.

It was a peculiar facet of human development Arcturus had noticed—that you could tell the quality of a person's upbringing from the briefest glance at their facial bone structure. Even down to their skin, there was a definite difference in the development of the face that distinguished rich from poor.

These men fell into the latter category, without a doubt, and he wondered why they had not moved on. Perhaps they were indentured workers on a break, remembering how Diamond de Santo's family had labored behind the scenes to make the resorts of Tyrador IX such paradises.

Then why were they here, mingling with resort guests and their betters?

One of the men looked straight at him, a man with a bulky trench coat that reached to his shins and whose head was shaven clean with a tattoo of a snake coiled around his ear.

"Is something wrong?" asked Juliana, sensing the sudden tension in his posture.

"Hmmm? No, it's nothing...” he said, not wishing to alarm her.

As she followed his gaze, Arcturus looked behind Juliana to where her security loitered, both men watching a pair of silver-skinned fliers pass overhead. He looked at the shaven-headed man with the snake tattoo, and their eyes met through the laughing crowds.

"Juliana, get inside," he said, recognizing the hard stare of a professional killer.

"What?" she said, but Arcturus was already moving, dragging her back toward her guards while keeping his eyes fixed on the occupants of the bench. The man with the tattoo saw Arcturus move and knew that his cover was blown. He said something to the men next to him, and reached inside his long trench coat.

Arcturus instinctively reached for his slugthrower, but his hand grasped empty air, the pistol resting in its locked, foam-lined case in his hotel room safe. Snake Tattoo raised a long-barreled weapon, an old-model AGR-14 assault rifle, and Arcturus's heart hammered against his ribs as he saw it.

He had gone through boot camp with such a rifle, a no-nonsense gun capable of firing supersonic jacket less slugs that could tear through a human body and leave nothing behind but shredded meat and bone. The four men with the tattooed assassin unveiled a varied mix of pistols and rifles.

"Gun!" shouted Arcturus.

Heads turned, too slowly, and Arcturus bore Juliana down with him as he heard the screams of the crowd upon their seeing the guns. Juliana cried out as she hit the ground, but the deafening roar of gunfire swallowed the sound. The AGR-14 was a powerful weapon, one designed as much to intimidate as to wound, and Arcturus scrambled on all fours, Juliana beside him. He looked over at the gunmen, watching as they played their fire over the front of the bar beside them. The wooden frontage of the bar exploded into splinters, the glass shattering like a million diamonds.