‘First, we get somewhere safe-’

‘I’m not going anywhere, Dakota. I’ve got to-’

‘It’s over, Corso!’ she yelled at him, her voice echoing from the bulkheads around them. ‘It’s over,’ she said more quietly. ‘Think about it. This whole thing was compromised from the start. Your secret is out. Your boss is a murderous nutcase with wild delusions of grandeur who wants to go up against a civilization that controls a fucking galaxy. When it all goes tits up and the Senator goes looking for someone to blame, who do you think they’re going to start with?’

Corso’s lips grew thin. ‘There’s nowhere we can go.’

‘Wrong.’ She peeled his hand off her upper arm with some difficulty. They were now in the Hyperion’s gravity wheel. She led him down a corridor towards the centre of the wheel, the gravity dropping to zero the further they moved away from the wheel’s rim.

To her surprise, Corso followed her with little protest. His eyes still had that faraway look.

‘At least tell me where we’re going,’ he grumbled eventually.

‘The cargo bay.’

‘What the hell’s there that’ll make any difference?’

She hesitated for a moment, and felt her resolve wobble. He’s still a Freeholder, she reminded herself.

‘Trust me,’ she replied.

Corso gazed through a window overlooking the interior of the cargo bay, seeing the assemblage of weapons and equipment stored there. Then he frowned and nodded towards the far wall.

‘Over there. It looks like…’

‘That,’ Dakota replied, ‘is my ship.’

He glanced to one side, as if trying to remember something. ‘This is what you wanted me to see? What’s it doing here? How the hell did you even get it on board?’

‘Anything we want to talk about, we can say it aboard my ship without any fear of being overheard. If there’s any attempt at surveillance, I’ll know immediately. As far as the manifest is concerned, the Piri Reis doesn’t even exist, and it doesn’t show up on any external surveillance systems either.’

‘You can still eyeball it, though,’ he replied, looking thoughtful. ‘Assuming anybody happened to look through this window and spotted it?’

‘Nobody has, yet.’

She drew him towards an airlock complex that led further into the cargo bay’s depressurized interior, and there had him pull on a light pressure suit. She did the same herself: letting him know about her filmsuit felt like a step too far just yet. Then she cycled the air out of the lock and moments later they were floating towards the Piri Reis.

It felt strange having someone else inside her ship. Once they were on board, he looked around the Piri’s compact interior with an astonished gaze.

He finally turned to Dakota as he peeled off his pressure suit. ‘Frankly,’ he said, ‘I still think you’re the one who needs to do the talking.’

‘This craft is the Piri Reis, and I brought it on board. Apart from me, you’re the only one who knows about it, and I’d like things to stay that way.’

Corso nodded carefully. ‘You said Arbenz was sending and receiving secret communiquйs to and from Redstone.’

‘Use that screen,’ she said, pointing. ‘You’ll find it won’t block you when you try to access the latest tach-net updates.’

Corso grabbed a handhold and swung himself up into a sitting position on a fur-lined bulkhead, then waited a moment as the screen turned itself towards him. Dakota watched as a series of icons appeared on the screen: the latest news updates from the interstellar tach-net transponder network. She chewed nervously on a finger as he read.

Piri, is there any reason to doubt the information from Redstone?

‹None. Independent Consortium observers present in the Freehold capital have filed separate reports of a coup.›

Corso became very still as he concentrated. Eventually Dakota got tired of waiting and went over to where he squatted intently, putting a hand on his shoulder.

It seemed it was all over for Senator Arbenz. The assault on the Rorqual Maru and the Uchidan encroachment on the Freehold capital had proved the tipping point for a coup led by Senate members with more liberal leanings-liberal, that is, by the standards of the Freehold.

‘I should be there,’ he said, sounding stunned.

‘But you can’t be. Look, they don’t say who was executed…’

He turned to gaze at her, and she fell silent. ‘They don’t need to. According to this, the pro-war faction -and that’s basically Senator Arbenz-killed every hostage they held when the Senate was stormed. That means my father and my sister.’ He shook his head in wonder. ‘They’re dead.’

‘You don’t need to do what Senator Arbenz tells you any more. He doesn’t have any-’

‘Yes, I know that,’ he snapped, and Dakota decided that erring on the side of silence might be the better option.

He stared off into space for a while, his expression bleak. ‘I knew this would happen, you know. It’s not even a surprise.’

‘What do you mean?’

He gazed at her levelly. ‘Arbenz and the Mansell brothers were all connected with death squads. They wanted to achieve political change through terror. It’s an old, old political stratagem. I’m just…’

He shrugged and sighed. ‘I’m just not surprised,’ he said, and pushed himself away from the screen. T need to go.’

‘Go where?’ she asked, alarmed.

‘I need to… I need to get some things.’

She looked at the expression on his face. It was much like she’d imagined her own expression might have been, following the mandatory removal of her original implants. A look of loss and betrayal-and something else there weren’t quite the words for.

‘Do you want me to-’

‘No,’ he said abruptly. ‘But you should know I won’t be telling the others about this. You’ve got my word on that.’

She nodded mutely in reply, then watched as he pulled his pressure suit back on and re-entered the Piri’s tiny airlock.

‘And then you’re coming back?’

He looked at her strangely, but nodded after a moment.

Half of her was sure he would come back, but the other half was even surer he wouldn’t.