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  Meitchars was the first to release himself from the confines of his plastic prison. He very soon found Grader and then Madeleine. And the three of them went off in search of Boz and Renton.

  But Meitchars soon began to appreciate just how large a chamber they were in, and how difficult it might be to rendezvous with their colleagues. It was only good fortune that had brought the three of them together so quickly, and to find the rest of the team could take forever. They could not call them on their radios - without alerting Kanker to their presence. They could not just shout to them - as they were in the middle of a vacuum. And they stood little chance of seeing them in such a vast area and in such poor light. It was beginning to look as though they would have to proceed on their own, press on and just hope that their friends would find them on the way to the eye. Then they caught sight of Boz.

  He was still in his hardon cannonball. And he was still in it because it was caught in the upper reaches of some twisted pipework, and the pipework was pressing against its exit hatch. He was trapped.

  Meitchars leapt up the pipework as mere mortals would have leapt up a staircase. Within seconds he was beside the sphere and ready to rescue its incarcerated passenger. But then he froze. Boz was not moving. Not a muscle. And his eyes were closed. It looked wrong. He must be injured. No, he must be dead. Boz was dead! He hadn't survived that plasma pulse. He'd been in the fourth cannonball, the cannonball that had taken the first hit. And it must have…

  Then Boz's eyes opened. And then his jaws began to widen into an impossibly huge grin. Then he mouthed something, something about… well, Meitchars wasn't at all sure. His jaw-reading skills were a little rusty. Then he understood. Boz had taken his enforced confinement as an opportunity for forty winks - to get over the excitement of the trip. He wanted to be fresh for the next stage of their journey.

  Meitchars began to laugh inside his helmet. And he laughed a lot. It wasn't until two minutes later that he'd composed himself and was able to get on with the job of releasing young Bostrom.

  And then there were four. But they still needed to find the fifth, and time was running out. Before the assault on the Godhead, they had set themselves a timetable, a series of time markers by which they could measure their progress towards the vessel's right eye - and towards the mote in that eye. They would soon have passed the first marker, the time by which they should have left the giant machine room.

  Its exit was an airlock at the centre of the right hand wall of the chamber. Meitchars had worked out where it was by taking bearings on his entry point. And he had also calculated how far away it was. He decided there was now only one course of action. The four of them would spread out as far as they could without losing visual contact with each other, and they would then move towards the exit as a trawl. If Renton was within this path, great. If he wasn't, then they'd have to go on without him. They couldn't afford to wait.

  This plan was communicated to the other three through a combination of mouthings and hand signals. The enthusiasm it met with was communicated back through expressions. Grader looked devastated. Boz looked morose. And Madeleine looked near to tears. But Meitchars knew they would also know how he felt, how hard he would find it to abandon a colleague with whom he had shared so much. And that would make them accept his plan without question. It had to be done this way. They were on a very special mission. And that had to come first.

  That logic got them going. But it failed to temper their sadness, as when they arrived at the airlock, they were still only four. Renton was still in the chamber somewhere. But quite where and in quite what condition, they could only imagine. There had, after all, been four hits to his sphere…

  Meitchars needed to move them along quickly - before sadness turned to hesitation and then to the ruin of their mission. He opened the airlock and beckoned them in. It was time to go and see Kanker, and time, for the moment, not to think of Renton.

  Both tasks were going to be tough.

  52.

  Kanker had been dozing. And why not? After all, there hadn't been much to do other than to wait. And anyway, he wanted to be as alert as possible for the big breathing event. For the very first punishment meted out by the new Lord. For his very first act as a God.

  And Shrubul so deserved it! What a pathetic lot they were! Just one hit-and-run sortie and that was it. Christ, even the Pandiloop bunch had stayed around for a bit longer than that - and they hadn't lost any ships. And why no thermite attack? They hadn't even challenged a statement that on the face of it was improbable to say the least. What could they possibly lose by throwing a few cluster bombs at him? It wouldn't work - but they couldn't be sure. But they hadn't even bothered. And what about the breath threat? Did they believe it? Were they ignoring it?

  Kanker didn't know. Because all they'd done was to go into some sort of conclave, the president and his advisers and the military. And they'd sent him just two messages. The first told him of the conclave, and that they were considering his demands. And the second told him that they were still considering his demands. Fantastic! So much for their skills of negotiation. So much for their optimum use of their twenty-four hours of grace.

  And then a third message had come, with less than five hours to go. It was longer than the preceding two, although it still contained no firm statement of their chosen response. Instead it was a list of questions, the sort of questions that a civil servant might have posed. Kanker was dumbfounded.

  The list ran as follows:

  1. Within the terms of the absolute authority conditions proposed by yourself:

  [a] What executive powers will remain with the established government, its servants and its officials?

  [b] What rôle will the judiciary play at global and at regional level?

  [c] What restrictions, if any, will be placed on the pursuit of religious practices?

  [d] What restrictions, if any, will be placed on the free movement of the population both within the sovereign territory of Shrubul and outside this area?

  [e] What fundamental changes, if any, will be made to the established constitution of Shrubul, and during what period will such changes, if any, be imposed?

  2. In the event of compliance with the request for unconditional surrender and complete demobilisation of the armed forces of Shrubul:

  [a] What arrangements will be made for its senior personnel with respect to alternative gainful employment, retention of status, remuneration and pension rights?

  [b] What arrangements, if any, will be made for junior ranks, non-commissioned officers and enlisted troops with respect to redeployment?

  [c] What plans exist for the maintenance, safekeeping and/or disposal of equipment, craft, offensive weapons and munitions?

  3. Further to questions 1 and 2:

  [a] What compensation arrangements are envisaged for the president, and what provision will be made for the presidential staff?

  [b] What compensation arrangements are envisaged for members of parliament, senate representatives, regional deputies and civic councillors in the event of their rôles being diminished?

  [c] What compensation arrangements are envisaged for members of the judiciary in the event of their rôles being redefined significantly?

  [d] What compensation arrangements are envisaged for existing suppliers of all equipment, matériel and comestibles to the Shrubul armed forces?

  4. Is the demand for absolute authority and the request for the unconditional surrender and complete demobilisation of the armed forces of Shrubul a full and fair statement of your proposals and one which therefore omits no material further conditions whether explicit or implicit?

  What a bunch of plonkers! They're worse than the League Council. By a mile!

  Compensation arrangements? Retention of executive power? Religious freedom? Can you believe it? Religious freedom! Shit! Don't they know they're looking down the barrel of a gun? And it's going to blow their friggin' heads off - and in less than five hours?

  How can they be s
o stupid? How can they go through all that crap and not even ask for an extension to the deadline? Another two months while some other civil servant drafts the answers.

  They're a joke. More concerned for their own power than they are for their world. They deserve everything that's coming to them. And the rest of them, the Shrubul plebs. If they've been stupid enough to let that lot run the place, then they deserve it too.

  But before then, a response to their questions. The authorities did deserve that. To facilitate their debate. To assist in their consideration of his original proposals. So he sent them one. It said: 'Go forth and multiply.'

  Succinct, and biblical as well. Perfect, he thought.

  53.

  On balance, Renton felt very fortunate. The hardon spheres had worked a treat. And overall, his bizarre idea had proved more brain-waved than harebrained. They were all now in the Godhead - and very likely, all unscathed. If he was OK - and he was, despite all the battering he'd suffered - he was pretty confident that the others would be as well. And as well as being uninjured, he was “free”; he'd extricated himself from his spherical cell without even the slightest of problems.

  Indeed, there was really only one little niggle, one teeny-weeny fly in the ointment: he was stuck seventy feet above the floor of the machine room with no way to get down.

  His sphere had entered the chamber well away from the others. The plasma-pulse mugging had knocked it well off its course. That in itself shouldn't have been a problem. But its landing on the top of a seventy foot silo, out of sight and out of reach of his colleagues, definitely was. The silo's top had an indented centre - which was where the sphere had come to rest. But its sides had nothing; they were featureless - completely. They were smooth-as-glass metal with not so much as a suggestion of a handhold anywhere. There was no way he could climb down.

  It took Renton about twenty seconds to assess this, but nearer twenty minutes to accept it. For all that time he patrolled the perimeter of the silo's top, peering at its sides, at the machinery nearby, and at the roof of the chamber above. But it was useless; he had to accept the inevitable: he was trapped. All he could do now was wait for his colleagues and hope that in some way they could get him down.

  He sustained this view of his predicament for no more than three minutes. There were two reasons for this. The first was his knowledge of his team's schedule. He knew the deadline for his friends leaving the bellows chamber was now only minutes away - and that they would meet that deadline if they possibly could. And that meant they wouldn't be looking for him. They wouldn't have time to. So they wouldn't be turning up. He was certain of it.

  The second was his knowledge of the remarkable qualities of the hardon sphere. If it were dropped seventy feet onto a solid floor, anybody inside it would, in theory, be entirely unharmed. Heck, this thing had just been fired up a giant nostril into a metal scrap-yard, and Renton had not been harmed at all. Yes, it had even taken four plasma hits - and nothing, just a few major thumps to his frame…

  So he now had to accept a revised view of his predicament, one where he was not trapped but where he would have to descend seventy feet onto a hard surface in a clear, plastic ball. And that was a problem. It was one thing to be fired into space in a container, quite another to roll off the top of a bloody great silo in one. It was just… well, just so unnatural, and so… so cold-blooded.

  However, resistance to the idea was useless. He was a Tickler now, a Tickler on one of the most important Tickler missions of all time. And he had some friends to find, some friends who might need his help. He had to capitulate. He had to get on with it. He had to get into that sphere and down off the silo…

  So he rolled it out of the indentation and onto the rim. And, as he did so, he thought of his Dumpiter escapade. In particular, he thought about his incarcerations in a variety of novel containers throughout that adventure. He obviously hadn't lost the knack for it. Containerisation was becoming a way of life. He just wished it didn't have to happen quite so frequently - and… well, quite so inevitably.

  The ball was now as close to the edge of the silo as he dared push it. Getting into it was going to be dicey. If he moved it too much before he was safely in, and it went over the side, he'd be a gonner. But it had to be that close to disaster. Further in, and more than likely he would roll back into the centre of the silo's top. And he certainly wouldn't be able to wobble it over the side from there.

  He took a deep breath and raised his right leg to place it in the sphere. But then he stopped. What if those plasma pulses had done some real damage after all? What if this thing had lost its hardon magic? It might just shatter on the floor below. What would happen then?

  'Oh get on with it, Tenting. You're just playing for time. You know that's rubbish. More likely you'll knock the thing over; you're so bloody clumsy. Just concentrate. Just get on with getting in. Now.'

  Suitably chastised by his sensible self, Renton lifted his leg again and placed it through the sphere's opening. Then he slowly transferred his weight to it, and by steadying himself with his hands on the sphere, he was able to bring in his other. The sphere rolled towards the edge. He froze. Then it rolled back along the edge and he leaned forward to stop it. And before it had time to roll anywhere else he dropped into the inner membrane and snapped shut the hatch.

  And it was already time to open it again. The sphere was on the machine room floor and Renton had performed a faultless escape. He was fine, the sphere was fine, and it had even thoughtfully come to rest the right way up.

  Then he was out surveying the new view and generally enjoying his continued good fortune - now without that worrying niggle. And being trapped seventy feet up had been a genuine niggle. It just wasn't the sort of thing you could ignore. But thanks to the sphere, the sphere that was his idea, he had won through. So it deserved a pat before he left it, just to say thanks.

  And he did. He patted it gently with the tips of his gloved fingers - and it disintegrated into a mound of plastic pieces. The plasma pulses had, after all, had their effect. The hardon's integrity had been shattered - literally. It was now just a pile of bits at the foot of the silo.

  Renton felt dizzy. He could have been in that pile. He could have been distinctly hors de combat. Or rather more likely, distinctly “mort de combat”…

  But despite the dizziness, on balance, he now felt more fortunate than ever.

  54.

  Meanwhile, back at the airlock, the leading quartet weren't feeling very fortunate at all. In fact, they were in a bit of a pickle.

  The airlock was a large square room, its floor, walls and ceiling as featureless as the sides of Renton's silo. But that was normal. Nobody in an airlock was ever given the ability to leave it in either direction until the conditions were right, until an atmosphere had been installed or a vacuum created, depending on whether you were coming or you were going, so to speak - and then an exit presented itself automatically. What was not normal, however, was that although the foursome had been able to enter the airlock without a problem, they were now not being allowed to leave it - despite their own atmosphere gauges telling them that the pressure and air mix were fine.

  At least out of their helmets, they were able to discuss their predicament.

  'The plans showed this as a normal airlock,' said Grader. 'I just don't understand it. What do you think, Meitchars? Any ideas?'

  'None at the moment,' replied Meitchars. 'I'm afraid I'm as much in the dark as you are.'

  'Perhaps it's just bust,' offered Madeleine. 'Things do break down, you know. Perhaps we should just blast our way out.'

  'Well, we could do,' said Meitchars without much conviction. 'But I think that's got to be a last resort. It'd be really risky. And anyway, we can't just assume that it's bust. It could easily be something else…'

  'Well, I hope my gauge is bust,' interrupted Grader, 'else we've got ourselves some real problems.'

  Meitchars looked at his own gauge immediately and then back at Grader. 'No, it's no
t,' he said. 'Mine shows it as well. It's going up like a rocket.'

  'Crikey,' said Madeleine. 'So's mine. Look at the way it's moving.'

  All their atmosphere gauges were showing the same thing: that the pressure in the airlock was now past normal atmospheric and was still rising - rapidly. If it continued to rise at this rate, all our heroes would be dead within five minutes. They had that long to get out of the airlock.

  'It's a trap,' said Grader. 'It might have been shown as just an airlock on the plan, but it's a trap all right. No doubt about it. I bet you need a code key or something. Then it works normally. But if you don't have one, then this happens. The thing doesn't work normally at all. And it's goodbye to anyone without an invitation. Like us.'

  'Yup, that's about it, my friend,' chuckled Boz. 'You got it in one. In 'bout five minutes time, this here lill' bastard is gonna have squeezed our lill' lives out of us, and no mistake.' Then he paused. 'However, jus' maybe not. Jus' maybe we can work us some magic. I mean, like some savin'-our-skins type o' magic. How about that? How does that grab ya, eh?'

  'You mean blasting our way out?' asked Madeleine impatiently.

  'Well, in a manner o' speakin', my dear. But not with these here masers. Hell, that's sorta dangerous, my child. An' it's sorta inelegant as well - if you knows what I mean.'

  'Well, what little magic would you suggest?' said Grader. 'With the greatest respect, this isn't Korpulund, you know. And this isn't a bio-lock we're trying to crack…'

  As Grader was speaking, Boz extracted a pipe from his spacesuit and then a pouch of tobacco. To the obvious amazement of his three colleagues he then loaded his pipe, tamped the tobacco into the bowl, and then lit the thing - with undisguised relish.

  Madeleine managed a question. 'Boz, are you alright? I mean, are you sure you're alright?'