SO HERE�S A solid fact: Warm Niflheim is a much nicer place than Cold Niflheim. It�s green and wet and covered with all manner of crawly things. You can even go outside now without wrapping yourself up in six layers of thermals. You�ll still need a rebreather, but the partial pressure of oxygen is almost twenty percent higher now than it was when we made landfall, so you won�t feel quite so much like you�re drowning while you�re walking around. On a good day, you can almost imagine that we�ve found the sort of place that they promised us when we boarded the Drakkar.

Here�s another solid fact: Warm Niflheim isn�t going to last forever. Winter is coming.

Miko Berrigan and his minions in Physics have spent most of the summer poring over records of the thirty years of observations that were made of Niflheim�s sun before the Drakkar boosted out. There were three warm spells in that period. The longest lasted seven years. The shortest was eleven months. The four winters that surrounded them ranged from two years to nine. The transitions weren�t abrupt, and they weren�t smooth. They were marked by lengthening oscillations between hot and cold that eventually stabilized into one steady state or the other. The season we�re in now went through a half dozen false starts before it really settled in.

The physicists back on Midgard thought what they were seeing was all due to interference from interstellar dust. Cute, right?

We haven�t been wasting the summer. Hieronymus Marshall is a jackass, but he isn�t stupid, and he wants this colony to live. We�ve been stockpiling food, studying the local fauna to figure out how they survive the winters, building out the dome to accommodate the first round of decanted embryos, releasing engineered algae that are supposed to begin the work of pushing the atmosphere further toward something we can breathe, etc., etc., etc.

The problem is that it all takes time, and that�s something we don�t have an infinite supply of. All the things that keep us alive here take enormous amounts of power, and right now the only real power source we have is the Drakkar�s antimatter reactor, still spinning away under the hub, slowly drawing down the last of the fuel supply that brought us here.

Which brings me back to Maggie Ling, hustling another me down Spoke Three toward the hub. Without the reactor, we might just barely be able to get by, as long as the weather holds.

That�s the thing, though. The weather is not going to hold.

�BARNES,� MARSHALL SAYS. �Have a seat.�

I let the door swing shut behind me and settle into one of the chairs across the desk from him. This is the first time I�ve spoken to Marshall, let alone been in his office, in almost two standard years. The last time, I resigned my post and he threatened to have me killed. I�m hoping that this meeting goes at least marginally better.

Marshall leans forward, plants his elbows on his desk, and stares me down for a solid ten seconds, which gives me time to reflect on how little he�s changed in the eleven years since I first met him. The brush cut and mustache have a bit more gray in them than they did then, but other than that? Hieronymus Marshall is probably the oldest human on Niflheim. Even back on Midgard he�d be well into middle age�but looking at him now, I have a sudden premonition that he might outlive us all.

�So,� he says. �It�s been a while since we�ve had a chance to catch up. How�s retirement treating you, Barnes?�

Huh. That�s not what I expected.

�Oh,� I say after a short, awkward pause. �It�s great. Thanks for asking. I�ve been playing pog-ball, mostly, and doing a little traveling. The grandkids don�t call as often as I�d like, but what can you do?�

He leans back, and his face twists into a scowl.

�Fine,� he says. �So much for pleasantries. Do you have any idea why I called you in today?�

I shrug. I have my suspicions, but I�m not sure this is the time to voice them. Marshall�s scowl deepens. �Before we get into that, let�s get this on the table right up front: You�re not pulling your weight, Barnes. You haven�t been since the day you decided that the job you�d agreed to do, the job that got your unqualified ass onto this mission in the first place, the job that you fully understood at the time you agreed to take it on was a lifetime appointment, was no longer to your liking. For the past two years, you have not been a colonist. You have been a freeloader�and while that sort of thing may have been fine back on Midgard, where I�m quite sure you were perfectly content to drift through life as a subsidy brat, you know as well as I do that freeloading is not permissible on a beachhead colony.�

I open my mouth to say something sarcastic about how, sure, I might have been a subsidy brat and I might not exactly be doing the things I signed on for at the moment, but that on the other hand as far as I can tell he hasn�t done an honest day�s work since we boosted out of orbit eleven years ago�but then I remember at the last moment that this man actually does have the power to have me killed if I push him to it. I back up, clear my throat, and start again.

�I hear you, sir. However, I do feel that I should point out that I have not, in fact, been freeloading. I pull a duty shift every day, just like everyone else on Niflheim. I�m basically doing exactly what I was doing before I resigned, give or take the occasional gruesome death.�

�Yes,� Marshall says. �I�ve reviewed your duty schedule. Tending the tomatoes. Cleaning floors in the chem lab. Playing with bunnies. You�re doing make-work, Barnes. The occasional gruesome death, as you put it, was what you were brought here to do. The rest was just killing time in between your assignments. The honest fact, and I think if you examine yourself you�ll be forced to agree, is that nothing you�ve done over the past two years has contributed anything of any actual value to this colony. The survival of a beachhead is a knife�s-edge thing, and every day that you continue to exist here, eating and excreting, drawing resources and putting nothing back, tips us that much further toward failure.�

�Okay,� I say. �So you�re suggesting I should�� kill myself? Because I have to tell you, sir, that�s going to require a lot more convincing than what you�ve done so far.�

Marshall leans forward again, and his voice drops to a growl. �No, Barnes. Much though I might appreciate that, I am not suggesting that you kill yourself. I am suggesting that you consider the burden that your existence has been to your fellow colonists since your retirement, and that you then make a decision to do something that will even the scales.� After a painfully awkward pause, Marshall leans back in his chair and folds his arms across his chest. �You�re obviously thinking that I�m asking you to return to your previous position. To be clear: I am not. As I just said, I am not asking you to kill yourself. In fact, I�m asking you to consider doing what is necessary to save yourself, as well as everyone else in this colony.�

�Riiiiight,� I say. �And this thing you�re asking me to do, it really doesn�t involve me dying in some incredibly painful way?�

�No,� he says. �Not necessarily, in any case.�

I roll my eyes, push back from the desk, and get to my feet.

�Look,� I say, �I don�t know what you�ve got in mind here, sir, but I�ve honestly got a pretty full plate at the moment, what with the bunnies and the tomatoes and, let�s not forget, the creepers. So unless there�s anything else��

�Barnes,� he says. �Sit down. Please.�

It�s the please that gets me. I don�t know that Marshall has ever used that word with me before. I sigh, and drop back into the chair.

�Fine,� I say. �What�s the ask? Clearing a jam in the reactor core?�

His eyes widen slightly, and I can see the muscles in his jaw bunch.

�What do you know about the reactor core?�

Huh. That�s interesting.

�Well,� I say, �for one thing, I know you�ve grounded Berto and Nasha to conserve power.�

His eyes narrow. �That was a routine measure. Aerial reconnaissance is not productive at this time. The lifters were grounded as a matter of basic efficiency.�

�I also know that you�ve been pulling copies of me out of the tank, and I know you�ve been throwing them into the core. Is that routine?�

That brings Marshall to a full stop. When he finally speaks again, his voice is a flat monotone.

�Who told you that?�

I give him a tight-lipped smile. �Nobody told me. I saw one of them in the corridor yesterday. He was with Maggie Ling. They were clearly in a hurry. I wasn�t one hundred percent sure where they were going, but your reaction pretty much confirms it, huh?�

Marshall stares me down for what feels like a very long time.

�Once again, to be clear,� he says finally, �I have confirmed nothing. Do you understand?�

I hesitate, then shake my head. I�m honestly not sure that I do.

�As I said before,� Marshall says, his voice now low and even, �this colony exists on a knife�s edge. This is true of all beachhead colonies, but given our unique circumstances, perhaps even more so for us.� He pauses then, and I consider mentioning how many of our current unique circumstances are the direct consequences of his decisions. Discretion is the better part of valor, though, so I hold my silence until he goes on. �Many elements could finally be responsible for pushing us over the edge, Barnes. Crop failure. Equipment failure. Hostile action. Do you know what the most common cause of colony failure is, though?�

It takes me a moment to realize that this isn�t a rhetorical question.

�No, sir,� I say. �Please. Enlighten me.�

His jaw tightens at my tone, but otherwise he doesn�t react.

�Panic,� he says. �The most common cause of colony failure is panic. Every beachhead encounters difficulties. Many encounter disasters. The ones who face these setbacks with calm leadership and courage survive. The ones who succumb to rumors and viral fear? They die. Do you understand what I�m saying to you, Barnes?�

�Um,� I say. �I think you�re telling me to keep my mouth shut about the reactor?�

He leans forward in his chair, hands flat on the desk in front of him. �I�m telling you there is nothing wrong with this colony�s antimatter reactor. It has sustained us for eleven standard years now, and it will continue to do so for as long as we require it. I am also telling you that we have not been pulling expendables out of the tank. To say that we have is inflammatory, and could lead to exactly the sort of panic reaction among the general colonists that we need to avoid. Again, do you understand?�

�Yes,� I say slowly. �I think so.�

�You think so?�

�No, sir. Not think. I do. I understand.�

His face relaxes, and he gives me what might even be the hint of a smile.

�Excellent. So I can rely on you to avoid spreading these types of rumors?�

I�ve already spread them to Nasha and Berto, of course, and would have to Jamie as well if he had the cranial capacity to understand them. This probably isn�t the time to mention that, though.

�Yes, sir. I�ll be sure to keep my thoughts on these topics to myself.�

�Excellent,� he says. �I�m happy that you understand the necessity of discretion.�

I nod.

He nods.

I glance over my shoulder. The door is still closed behind me.

�So,� I say. �This was very helpful. Can I go, then?�

�What?� Marshall says. �No. Do you think I called you down here to talk about these ridiculous rumors? I told you, we have a job for you.�

Right. That.

�Two years ago,� he says, �you went down into the creepers� labyrinth with two antimatter bombs. When you came back, you only had one.�

I shake my head. �I only carried one. Eight had the other one, and Eight was not me. I thought we�d established that.�

Marshall�s mouth twists in disgust. There must have been a really good reason for him to start pulling Mickeys out of the tank again. He can�t even talk about multiples without looking like he�s about to be sick.

�I�m not interested in semantics,� he says. �The two of you left this dome with two bombs, and you only returned with one.�

I shrug. �Okay. So?�

�So,� Marshall says. �I need you to go back to the creepers now. I need you to get that bomb back.�

I let that hang between us for a beat. Marshall�s belief that the creepers have possession of that bomb is the thing that�s guaranteed my continued survival for the past two years. I do not want to disabuse him of that notion, and even more than that I really do not want to bring that bomb back to the dome.

�I�m sorry, sir,� I say finally. �I don�t think that�s possible.�

�Think again,� Marshall says, his voice suddenly flat and cold. �When you sat in that same chair two years ago and announced that you were refusing to do your job, when you resigned from a position that you had no right whatsoever to resign from, we were forced to send a drone into the core in your place to attempt to reload the fuel from your bomb. The drone malfunctioned. Ling believes that the intensity of the neutron flux in the core damaged the damned thing�s brain. It, in turn, severely damaged the antimatter feed mechanism, although that did not become apparent until very recently. Six days ago, we came within ten seconds of an uncontrolled chain reaction that would have turned this colony into a smoking crater a hundred kilometers across.�

�Oh. But you did shut it down, right?�

He rolls his eyes. �Yes, Barnes. The fact that you are sitting here in one piece and not dispersed into your component elements and drifting through the stratosphere right now is a strong indication that we were able to bring the situation under control. In order to do so, however, we were forced to spoil over ninety percent of our remaining fuel stores. Do you understand what that means?�

�Um��

�What it means, Barnes, is that we do not currently have the necessary energy reserves to survive another winter.�

Oh. That�s not good.

�But�� I mean, there are ways other than antimatter annihilation to keep warm, right? Humans survived weather as cold as Niflheim�s back on Earth, back when all they had to keep them warm were animal skins and fires.�

Marshall sighs. �Setting aside the advisability of starting a fire inside the dome, or the possibility of doing so outside in an atmosphere consisting of less than ten percent oxygen, or the practicality of making a warm winter cloak out of a creeper�s chitin�what do you suppose those hardy humans back on old Earth were eating?�

I actually have no idea what prehistoric humans ate. Probably not creepers? I�ve already had this conversation twice, though. I know where he�s going.

�Even with what we�re managing to grow outside right now,� he says, �the cycler is still responsible for over a quarter of the calories our population consumes. Moreover, our population cannot remain static. At some point relatively soon, we need to begin decanting babies. If we wait too long, there will not be enough adults left to raise them when we do. There have been extensive studies done to determine the optimal number of infants per caretaker, and that number is closer to one than to a thousand. In order to feed those babies that will need to start coming out of storage soon, we will absolutely need the cycler. Do you have any idea how much power that system draws?�

I do, actually. That was one of the things Jemma Abera covered in detail during my training back on Himmel Station prior to boost.

The answer, in case you were wondering, is a hell of a lot.

�Look,� Marshall says. �I don�t particularly like you, Barnes. This shouldn�t come as a surprise to you. I objected to the inclusion of an Expendable on this mission on principle, but I was overruled on that point. I objected to not throwing you out of the air lock after we boosted out from Himmel Station, but I was overruled on that as well. I was extremely displeased that you returned from your mission to the creepers alive and with your weapon still on your back, and I was even more so when it became apparent that I would not be able to shove you into the cycler face-first afterward. Are we clear on all of this?�

Again, this is apparently not a rhetorical question. After a long, awkward silence, I nod. Marshall leans across the desk, and for an instant I think he�s going to kill me where I sit.

�Good,� he says, �because I want you to understand how much it hurts me to say this: Get me that bomb back, and everything is forgiven. I will not ask you to perform the duties you signed onto this mission to perform, ever again. I will sit quietly and watch you tend tomatoes and play with bunnies until the end of your days, if that is what you choose to do. Without that antimatter, we are lost. Once the weather turns, our reliance on the cycler will jump to nearly fifty percent of our total caloric requirements. Under that load, our current remaining fuel stores will last for a year�maybe two if we cut rations to an absolute minimum, reduce the base temperature in the dome, and minimize waste cycling. Berrigan in Physics tells me this star�s next down cycle may last for seven years or more. If that is true, and if you cannot retrieve the antimatter that we require, I tell you that there will be nothing in this dome but starved and frozen corpses when the weather finally warms again.�

He leans back and looks down at his hands.

�Well,� he says. �Actually, I don�t suppose that�s entirely true. Once the last natural colonist is dead, the central processor will start pulling copies of you out of the tank, and it will presumably continue doing so for as long as it is able.� He looks up again, and gives me a grim half smile. �So, that�s what you have to look forward to, Barnes. A series of brief, painful lives, wandering the dark, frozen, empty corridors of a dead colony. How does that sound? Are you feeling a bit more motivated now?�

THERE ARE A lot of profoundly shitty things about being an Expendable. Start with the way people treat you. The Natalists are bad enough. They think the whole process of memory uploads and bio-printed bodies is an abomination, and that anyone who�s come out of the tank is basically a soulless monster. In a way, though, they�re easier to deal with than the rest of the general population. With the Natalists, I know where I stand. Take Marshall, for example. He wants to kill me. I know it. He knows I know it. It lends a certain amount of refreshing honesty to our relationship.

With the others, though?

Everybody knows what Expendables are for. We die, over and over, so you don�t have to. You�d think maybe folks would be grateful for that, but that�s not how the human brain works. Watching someone else run into a fire while you stand safe and sound on the sidewalk outside doesn�t make you feel grateful. It makes you feel guilty. Nobody likes feeling guilty, so on some level you convince yourself that your Expendable deserves what he�s getting.

That was easier back on Midgard. We didn�t use many Expendables on the surface, and the ones we had on the orbital stations were mostly conscripted criminals. Plenty of people here on Niflheim still assume that�s how I wound up with this job, and they mostly treat me accordingly. Even the ones who believe me when I say that I volunteered to be here tend to keep their distance, because, really, what kind of nutjob would do that? Back on Midgard, I had friends. Here on Niflheim, outside of Nasha, Berto, and Cat Chen, I really don�t.

I know what you�re thinking. Boo-hoo, right? Jamie Harrison doesn�t have many friends either. And you�re right, of course. The worst part about being an Expendable is not the social isolation. It�s all the dying.

That�s closer to the truth, but still not quite right. Everybody has to die. We�ve figured out a lot of neat stuff on the science side, but we still haven�t managed to get around that one. The worst thing about being an Expendable, the thing that separates me from everybody else, is that I have to die over and over again, and more importantly, I have to remember all that dying. When an Expendable goes down, his handlers make every possible effort to make sure he uploads the experience. Because of that, I know what it feels like to be ripped to shreds on a cellular level by high-energy subatomic particles. I know what it feels like to go through the end stages of infection by brain parasites, and lung parasites, and gut parasites. I have nightmares about those things, but the nightmares are nowhere near as bad as the actual memories.

Which makes what I need to do now absolutely terrifying. If I�m right about what�s happening, there�s only one person who really knows exactly what�s going on in the reactor core.

It�s me.

If Marshall has really been throwing Mickeys into the core, he�s probably been forcing them to upload before they die. I need to see what they saw. I wish there were a way to do that without also feeling what they felt, but��

Yeah, there�s not.

Fuck me. This is gonna suck.

I GET A ping from Berto the next morning. He�s bored, and he wants to know if I�m up for some hiking. I blink to my duty roster.

It�s empty.

That�s weird. I thought I was on tomato duty today.

I check tomorrow.

Empty.

Next day?

Empty.

Now I�m spooked. The only time you get three straight days duty-free on Niflheim is when you�re dead. I send a query to the AI that runs human resources. A half second later it bounces back a note letting me know that my schedule has been cleared for the indefinite future, by order of Commander Marshall.

Oh well. After a quick check to make sure he hasn�t canceled my rations as well, I bounce back to Berto and let him know I�m game.

�NO,� NASHA SAYS. �No way, Mickey. I am not stealing a man�s thumb for you.�

�Oh, come on.� I lean my head against her shoulder and look up at her. �It�s just one thumb. It�s not like I need you to steal his whole hand.�

We�re back at the overlook that Berto launched himself from yesterday afternoon. I wanted Nasha to see this place. Unlike Berto, I thought she�d appreciate it as something more than a convenient place to kill yourself. I used to do a lot of backpacking back on Midgard, wandering around in the wilderness and looking for places like this to sit and think. I wanted to give Nasha a glimpse of that part of me.

Also, of course, I wanted to bring her someplace where we could talk without being overheard.

�Seriously,� she says. �How do you expect this to work, Mickey? I sneak up behind him with a pair of pinking shears? Snip, grab, and run?�

�Look, I haven�t thought through all the details.�

She laughs behind her rebreather, shakes her head, and leans back on her elbows. �Babe, the fact that you�re here on this planet tells me everything I ever needed to know about your ability to think through all the details.�

Yeah, that�s a fair point.

�Look,� she says. �What do you actually know about the lock on the download system? I mean, do we need his entire thumb? Is it a print reader? A DNA sniffer? Both?�

I shrug. �No idea. All I know is that he always had to put his thumb to the pad before it would go.�

Nasha rolls her eyes. �You�re hopeless, you know that?� She lolls her head back and looks up into the clear pink-blue sky. �If it�s just a print reader, we could maybe�� I don�t know�� get a scan of his thumbprint somehow? If we had that, we could mock up a duplicate with one of the small-bore printers.�

�Huh.� Down below us, something leaps from the cliff face, spreads two meters� worth of spidery wings, and soars off into the distance. �That�s��

Nasha sits up again and turns to look at me. �That�s what?�

I point to the dwindling black vee out over the grassland.

�That�s the first flying thing I�ve seen on Niflheim,� I say. �Do you see it?�

�I see it,� she says. �Can we focus, though?�

�I am focused. One of the things I�m focused on is that there�s a ton of stuff on this planet that we have no idea about. I mean, what was that thing? It looked like what you�d get if a tarantula fucked a bat. What else are we missing, you know? The more of that kind of stuff I see, the less I want to kill myself based on a bunch of Miko Berrigan�s assumptions.�

She tilts her head to one side. �Assumptions? Like what?�

�I don�t know. Like that it�s gonna get cold again, and stay that way. Like that we actually need that antimatter back.�

�That�s not an assumption, Mickey. That�s a science fact. This place was a snowball when we got here, remember? What possible reason would we have to think that it�s not gonna be that way again?�

�I don�t know. What reason would we have to think that it will be that way again?�

Her eyes narrow, and her cadence becomes slow and deliberate. �Thirty years� worth of observations, Mickey. Thirty years of watching this place from Midgard, and then two years of modeling from Berrigan�s people since we got here, and also the basic fact that if it was cold as hell two years ago it�s definitely going to be cold again someday because that�s just how planets work. You�re not making sense, babe.�

�Thirty years� worth of observations from Midgard had them thinking this place was warm and wet, remember?�

She shakes her head. �Their observations were spot-on. They just blew the explanation. You know this, Mickey.�

�Okay. So who�s to say they�re not blowing their predictions now?�

Nasha pulls her legs up under her, rocks back, and then pushes to her feet. �Look,� she says. �I�m trying to be helpful here, but if you don�t want to be serious about this, I�m out.�

�No,� I say. �Wait.� I catch her hand. She makes a halfhearted effort to pull away, then sighs and sits back down. �I�m sorry. It�s just��

�Just what, Mickey?�

Just that I don�t want to be serious about this. I don�t want a solution to the problem of not knowing, because if we manage to steal Quinn�s thumb or whatever and I find out that what Marshalltold me is true, I�m gonna have to dig that bomb up and hand it over to him.

Can�t say that, though.

�Just that I get off onto tangents sometimes and lose track of what we�re actually supposed to be talking about,� I say. �I�m focused now, though. Fake thumbs, right? So we don�t actually need pinking shears?�

Nasha shrugs. �Maybe not. Depends on how serious they are about security on the download system.�

�Why would they put heavy security on something like that? It�s not like people are dying to find out what it�s like to have terminal radiation poisoning.�

�Yeah,� Nasha says. �That�s probably true. Fine. You get something with Quinn�s print on it, and I�ll see if I can figure out how to make us a thumb.�

She gets to her feet again, then takes my hand and pulls me up beside her.

�Okay,� I say. �What if it doesn�t work?�

�Well,� she says, �I guess then we can talk about breaking out the pinking shears.�

SO THAT�S WHAT I�m thinking about when Nasha mashes the pad with her fake Quinn thumb: I wonder if these other Mickeys are going to hate me. It�s not like they wouldn�t have totally valid reasons to. I resigned, after all. If I hadn�t, I would have been the one going into the reactor to do whatever it was that Ling and Marshall wanted done, and at least one of them would have gotten to take over my life. From their perspective I�m the worst kind of shirker�the Expendable who decided he didn�t want to die. I�ve been spending the past two years tending bunnies and picking tomatoes and snuggling with Nasha. Their entire lives probably consisted of coming out of the tank, getting irradiated, and bleeding out. If I were in their shoes, I could see wanting to borrow one of my hands one night to shank me in my sleep.

I�m just starting to think that maybe this isn�t such a great idea after all, that maybe I should tell her to stop, when she says, �Should something be happening right now?�

I open my eyes. The restraints won�t let me turn my head far enough to see her. �Did you press the thumb onto the pad?�

�Yeah,� she says. �I�m doing it right now.�

I�ve never been conscious for a download, but I�m pretty sure this isn�t it.

�Sorry,� I say. �I guess it�s not a print reader after all. What now?�

She sighs. �Time to get the pinking shears, I guess.�

The door slides open behind me.

�Pinking shears?�

�Oh shit,� Nasha says. �Hey, Quinn.�

I try to turn my head again, but the restraints are cranked down tight and the helmet won�t budge. Doesn�t matter, though. Quinn comes around and squats down in front of me.

�Mickey? What the hell are you doing here?�

�Oh,� I say. �Hello, Quinn. What, ah�� what brings you here?�

He glares at me. �You brought me here, idiot. The AI that monitors the facility pinged me to tell me that you�d come in for an upload.� He looks up at Nasha. �Is that a thumb?�

�Not a real one,� she says, and slides it into her pocket.

�Seriously,� Quinn says. �What are you doing?� He stands and walks around behind me. �You�ve got the cables wrong, you know. They�re set for download. What the hell, man? Are you trying to fry your brain?�

I hear the click of the restraints releasing, and my head comes free. Quinn pulls the helmet off of me, stows the cables, and then squats again to open the straps on my wrists and ankles.

�Look,� I say. �I know this looks weird, but��

Quinn stands and looks down at me. �But what, Mickey? If you wanted to upload for the first time in two years, why didn�t you just ask me? That�s my job, you know. And if you were actually trying to do a download�� well, I have no idea what to say to that except that you need to get some help.� He turns to Nasha. �And you, Adjaya. You�re supposed to actually like this guy, right? You should have been talking him out of�� whatever this is. Instead, you�� actually, I don�t know what you�re doing here. And seriously, was that a fucking thumb?�

Storm clouds are gathering on Nasha�s face, and it occurs to me that if I don�t step in here it�s likely that I�m about to see a man get beaten to death. I get to my feet and step between them.

�Look, Quinn. You�re right, I should have asked you about this. The thing is, though�I actually tried to, the other day in the cafeteria. You remember? You wouldn�t even let me get the question out.�

His face goes blank for a moment.

�The caf? You didn�t ask about an upload. You wanted drugs.�

I roll my eyes. �No, Quinn. I did not want drugs. I told you that. I also didn�t want an upload, though. I wanted a download.�

Quinn looks at me, then over at Nasha, then back at me.

�A download.�

�Yeah,� I say. �A download.�

�I�� what the hell, Mickey? What the actual hell? You want to do a download into an active cortex�and it�s of your own memories. For what possible reason could you want that? You�ve got early-onset dementia? You forgot where you left your wallet two years ago? You want to reminisce about freezing your ass off? What?�

I shake my head. �I don�t want my own memories, Quinn.�

�You�� He stops, glances over at Nasha again, then back to me. �Oh.�

�What are we on by now? Nine? Ten? More?�

Quinn sighs. �Marshall would probably kill me if he knew I was telling you this, but I guess you�ve got the right to know. We�ve pulled two copies out of the tank since you quit�five days ago, both within a couple hours of each other.�

�Right,� I say. �I want one of their memories. The second one, I guess�Mickey10, right?�

Quinn shrugs apologetically. �Sorry, Mickey. Can�t do that.�

�They�re his memories,� Nasha says. �You�ve been using his body to do whatever you�ve been doing. You owe him this, Quinn.�

Quinn turns to her. �First of all, I haven�t been doing anything with Mickey�s body. Marshall and Ling come in here and say they need a copy pulled, and I do what they tell me to do. That�s my job. Once they walk out that door, it�s out of my hands. Second, I don�t disagree with you, okay? I didn�t say I won�t give you their memories back. I said I can�t. The fact is, neither of them made it back here for an upload. Whatever Marshall needed them for, I can only assume that it killed them in a hurry.� He turns back to me. �I�m sorry, man. I�ve got no memories to give you.�

I meet Nasha�s eyes. She pulls the thumb out of her pocket and holds it out to Quinn. �Prove it.�

Quinn�s eyebrows meet at the bridge of his nose. �What the hell?�

�He doesn�t need that,� I say. �He�s got his own thumb, remember?�

�Oh,� Nasha says. �Right.�

Quinn sidles past Nasha to the control panel and puts his thumb to the reader. The display panel lights up. �You know how to read this, right, Mickey?�

I move over to stand beside him. He�s pulled up a menu of available downloads. The most recent time stamp is from over two years ago�the last time I uploaded, six weeks before Berto abandoned me in the creepers� labyrinth and Eight came out of the tank.

�I don�t understand. They always made me upload before I died. Even after I took a beam of ions moving at point-nine-c to the back of the skull they managed to get me into the helmet before they let me go.�

Quinn shrugs. �Like I said, these guys must have died quick.�

�Maybe,� Nasha says. �Or maybe Marshall doesn�t want a record of what they were doing.�

I shake my head. �Doesn�t matter. They�re not here. Sorry to get you out of bed for nothing, Quinn.�

He looks back and forth between us. He really does look sorry, and I�m starting to wonder if maybe I should have given him a bit more of a chance over the years.

�No problem,� he says. �I can�t honestly say I�m sorry that there�s nothing here to download, because I�d hate to be responsible for turning you into a raving psychotic, but I�m sorry I can�t give you what you need. You�re right. You ought to be able to find out what they�re doing with your body.�

�Thanks,� I say. �Seriously, Quinn. I appreciate it.�

I pat him on the shoulder and turn to go. Nasha and I are halfway out the door when he says, �Hey, that thumb�it�s got my print on it, right? You thought you could use it to run the download without me.�

Nasha stops and half-turns. �Maybe?�

�You can�t. I mean, obviously. What kind of idiot would secure something this sensitive with a thumbprint? Still, though�can I have it back, please?�

Nasha looks at me. I shrug.

�Fine,� she says. She pulls the thumb out of her pocket and tosses it to him.

�Thanks,� he says. �I�m not sure what you could have done with it, honestly, but it seemed weird to have you running around with this thing.�

Fair enough. I take Nasha�s hand, and we go.

BERTO DROPS INTO my desk chair and runs his hands back through his hair. �You�re kidding.�

Nasha shakes her head. �He is not.�

�You hid it.�

�Yeah,� I say. I�m pacing, which is pretty unsatisfying in a three-by-four space that�s ninety percent full of stuff. �I hid it.�

�Under a rock pile. You hid the most dangerous object on this planet under a rock pile.�

Nasha sighs, pulls her feet up onto the bed, and leans back against the wall. �Yes.�

�And you left it there. For two�� goddamned�� years.�

�Fine,� I say. �I get it. Not my finest moment, but I didn�t have a lot of good options.�

�And now it�s gone.�

Nasha sighs again, louder this time. �Get past it, Berto. We didn�t bring you in on this so that you could tell Mickey how stupid he is.�

He rounds on her now. �How stupid he is? What about you, Nasha? You were in on this from the start, right? If I�m understanding this correctly, he showed you where he buried that thing two years ago. What the absolute hell were you thinking?�

�I was thinking I wanted Mickey to stay alive,� she says, voice ice-cold now. �I guess that�s where you and I are not on the same page.�

Berto�s eyes narrow and he starts to reply, but I cut him off before he can start something that he�s not going to be able to finish. �Look, Berto, we can all agree that this hasn�t turned out the way I hoped it would. Mistakes were made, okay? But Nasha�s right. We need to decide what to do now, not what we should have done two years ago.�

He looks like he has something more to say on the topic, but after a moment�s hesitation he pulls in a deep breath, holds it, and then lets it back out. �Fine. Fine. You�re right. This isn�t the time to worry about how your dumbassery has doomed us all to freezing to death in the dark. Let�s try to figure out if there�s any possible way we can get un-doomed.�

�Right,� Nasha says. �If Marshall has the bomb��

�Marshall doesn�t have it,� Berto says.

�You don�t know that.�

�Yeah,� Berto says. �I do. Mickey�s still alive. If Marshall had the bomb, Mickey would be seventy kilos of slurry right now.�

�But��

�No,� Berto says. �You two are overthinking this. Marshall isn�t some kind of super-villain from an adventure vid. I know you think he�s a monster, Mickey, and from your perspective I guess he probably is, but he�s also a down-the-line administrator who is very focused on keeping this colony alive. If he had the bomb, he would have ordered you to feed the fuel elements back into the reactor. If you refused, he would have shoved you into the cycler, pulled a new you out of the tank, and ordered him to feed the fuel elements back into the reactor. What he would definitely not have done was wasted valuable time playing some kind of fucked-up mind game with you. So, the fact that you�re still alive tells me that Marshall definitely does not have the bomb.�

�We thought about all that,� Nasha says. �Remember, though: Marshall pulled two copies of Mickey out of the tank this week.�

Berto shrugs. �So Mickey says, based on one unconfirmed sighting. I�ve known cryptids with a better evidence base.�

�No,� Nasha says. �We�ve got confirmation on that part, at least. Quinn Brock admitted that he pulled two copies within a few hours of each other five days ago.�

�Huh.� Berto leans back in his chair and scratches his chin. �That�s interesting. Does it change anything, though? I mean, did Quinn tell you what Marshall did with them?�

I shake my head. �He didn�t know. He did say Maggie Ling was with Marshall, though. If Marshall told me the truth about that whole spoiling business, I guess they might have been dealing with whatever damage was done to the reactor itself by that mess. I don�t have a ton of confidence in Marshall to tell me the truth right now, though.�

�Maybe,� Berto says. He sits silent for a moment, then shakes his head. �No. No, I�m not buying it. If Marshall has the bomb and he�s already used copies of Mickey to feed the fuel back into the reactor, what possible reason would he have to keep you around? I think I�m back to my original position. The fact that Mickey is alive is proof positive that Marshall doesn�t have the bomb.�

Nasha looks at Berto, then at me. I shrug. He makes some good points.

�Fine,� Nasha says. �Marshall doesn�t have it. Who does?�

�Well,� Berto says, �I guess there�s an off chance one of our people might have found it and then not turned it over.�

�Why?� Nasha says. �Why would anyone do that?�

Berto shrugs. �Didn�t know what it was? Wanted to keep it for themselves? Planning to strong-arm Marshall into tuning the cycler to make whiskey instead of slurry? I don�t know, Nasha. I�m just throwing out the possibility.�

�No,� Nasha says. �I�m not buying that one at all. If one of our people had found the bomb, they would have either turned it over to Marshall or accidentally killed us all by now.�

�Okay,� I say. �Marshall doesn�t have it. Nobody else has it. Where��

I trail off. Berto is grinning now, hands folded behind his head.

�What have you been telling Marshall for the past two years, Mickey? The creepers have the bomb, right? Congratulations, buddy. Looks like those little fuckers finally made you an honest man.�

<Mickey7>: Hello?

<Mickey7>: Are you still listening?

<Mickey7>: I know it�s been a while, but��

<Mickey7>: Please.

<Mickey7>: We need to talk.

�I�M COMING WITH YOU.�

I pull my head out of the gear locker I�d been rooting through. Nasha is standing there, arms folded across her chest.

�I�m not going anywhere,� I say. �I was just��

Nasha rolls her eyes. �You�ve got an overloaded pack and two rebreathers laid out on the floor, Mickey. What am I supposed to think you�re doing here?�

I sigh. �Marshall called me in after breakfast. He wanted an update on the negotiations.�

�Okay. What does that have to do with the fact that you�re packing up for some kind of expedition?�

�I told him things were at a delicate point.�

�And?�

�And he told me negotiations of this magnitude are best concluded face-to-face.�

Nasha breaks into a grin. �Do creepers even have faces?�

I dig back into the locker, pull out a box of protein bars, and stuff it into the pack. �Not the point. The point is, I�m going into the labyrinth, and you�re not invited.�

Nasha shakes her head, pops the locker next to mine and pulls out a rebreather, then walks over to the weapons rack and pulls down a linear accelerator.

�Seriously,� I say. �You can�t come with me, Nasha.�

She straps the accelerator across her back and picks up a burner. �Yeah. I heard you.�

�I haven�t talked to them in two years. For all I know, they�re just gonna tear me to pieces as soon as they see me.�

�Seems totally possible. What�s with all the gear?�

That stops me.

�It can�t be more than a half-day�s walk to get where you�re going,� she says. �Why are you packing like you�re going on a journey?�

�Oh. Well. If they don�t immediately tear me to pieces, I�m thinking this might actually take some negotiation, and I doubt they�ll have anything for me to eat.�

�Huh,� she says. �Fair point.�

She pulls a pack from her locker, digs around a bit, then pulls out a half dozen tubes of slurry and stows them away.

�Nasha. Stop.� She turns to look at me. Her eyes are slitted and her mouth is a thin, hard line. �Look, there is a very good chance that this is going to end badly, okay? You can�t come with me. You�re not an Expendable.�

�Neither are you,� she says. �Remember?�

And the hell of it is, I actually hadn�t remembered, not until she said it. I haven�t uploaded in over two years now. Even if Marshall winds up pulling another Mickey Barnes out of the tank when I�m dead, it won�t be me.

Nasha�s face softens. She takes a half step toward me and touches my shoulder with one hand. �You�re not an Expendable, babe. You�re just Mickey Barnes now. That means you don�t have to die for me anymore.� She puts one hand behind my neck and pulls me to her until our foreheads touch. �That means you don�t get to die for me anymore.� She kisses me softly, and then brings her mouth close to my ear. �I�m coming with you,� she whispers, �and if you give me one more word of shit about it, I�ll break both of your legs, and then neither one of us will go.�

I REMEMBER BEING hot the last time I was down here.

�You could have warned me about this,� Nasha says, as a fine mist of condensation forms around her rebreather. �I could have packed a thermal.�

The last time I was here, of course, it was below zero outside, and I was dressed accordingly. It�s probably the exact same temperature down here now that it was then, but it feels distinctly chilly in nothing but a jumper and a single-layer skin suit.

�Sorry. I�m not any better dressed for this than you are, you know.�

We�ve been underground for most of an hour by now, working our way gradually deeper through a mix of clean-cut tunnels and what appear to be natural seams in the rock. We haven�t yet seen any signs of habitation. We�ve just reached a crossroads, with a smaller, rough-cut tunnel slanting upward, and two larger ones forking off to our right and left. Nasha leans back and plays the light clipped to her shoulder up the smaller one.

�Think that runs to the surface?�

I shrug. �Probably? It�s too small for the big creepers to fit into, so I�d guess it�s either a quick exit for the little ones, or maybe an air shaft.�

�Huh.� She turns to face the two larger tunnels. �Which way?�

I shine my light down one tunnel, then the other. �No idea. They both look pretty ominous to me.�

�Are they talking to you yet?�

�Not yet. Maybe not ever. It�s been two years. The comm gear they took out of Six might have failed by now.�

She sighs. �Interpretive dancing aside, this is gonna be a really short negotiation if we can�t speak to them.� She steps closer to the wall, reaches up, and runs one finger along a shallow groove that spirals down through the stone before petering out a meter or so above the floor. �You think they used machines to cut these tunnels?�

I move over to stand beside her. �I�m not sure they make a distinction between themselves and their machines. The little ones are definitely hybrids. Wouldn�t surprise me if the bigger ones are as well.�

She slides her arm around my waist. �Seriously, Mickey�what happens if they can�t talk to us? Or if they won�t?�

�In that case, I�d imagine we die. That�s kind of why I didn�t want you with me down here, you know?�

She leans the side of her head against mine. �If that�s the way it plays out, we�re all finished, aren�t we? If not now, then whenever the weather turns.�

I sigh. �Yeah, it seems likely. Probably not by freezing, though. If we can�t get the bomb back by asking nicely, Marshall will have to try to get it back by force. No way he just squats in the dome and waits for death.�

�No,� Nasha says. �Waiting for stuff to happen isn�t his thing, is it? You think he could pull it off?�

�You�d know better than me. Our biggest advantage is our lifters, but they�re no use if the creepers stay in their tunnels. We�d need to draw them out into the open, and I don�t know how we�d manage it. As far as fighting down here goes, we�ve got plenty of accelerators, and we can make more, I guess. How many people could we pull together who know how to use them?�

She turns to look at me. �You know how to use an accelerator, babe.�

�Yeah, but��

And then I see where she�s going.

�He wouldn�t.�

She tilts her head to one side. �You don�t think so?�

�Leaving aside Marshall�s religious objections to multiples, which I�m guessing he�d forget about pretty quickly if the colony�s survival was on the line, every copy of me that he pulls out of the tank takes seventy thousand kcal out of our energy budget. That�s not even considering the calcium and phosphorus and trace minerals. How many of me could he make without bleeding our stores completely dry?�

�He wouldn�t care about bleeding our stores dry,� Nasha says. �If he gets the bomb back, he�s got plenty of power again, right? That means he can run the cycler all day for a month if he wants.�

Which means that all those Mickeys, after saving the colony, would be rewarded by immediately getting converted back into nutrients and trace elements.

�That�s dark,� I say. �You really think Marshall would go down that road?�

�If he thought it would work? Hell, yes.�

�And would it?�

�No idea,� Nasha says. �How many creepers are there down here?�

I think back to the still image Eight sent me just before he died. �Lots. Enough that I don�t think it matters how many Mickeys Marshall could pull out to fight them.�

�He�ll probably try anyway, you know.�

�Yeah,� I say. �Probably.�

She leans into me. �If it comes to that, I guess I�d just as soon go down today with you. Not sure I�d want to live in a colony that would be willing to go that far.�

I take her hand where it rests on my hip and give it a squeeze. She sighs again, straightens, and steps back from the wall.

�I�ve got a good feeling about this one,� she says, and gestures to the tunnel on the right. She pats my shoulder, turns, and goes. After one last glance at that cut in the rock, I follow her down.

<Mickey7>: Hello?

<Mickey7>: I hope you�re reading this. We�ve come to talk.

<Mickey7>: We�re in the tunnels now, hoping to make contact.

<Mickey7>: This is important, for both of us.

<Mickey7>: Hello?

<Mickey7>: Can you hear me?

IT�S MAYBE TWENTY minutes later when we run across our first creeper. We�re in a gradually upsloping tunnel and I�m thinking about maybe turning around and heading back to the last crossroads when it shows up in the wash of Nasha�s shoulder light, maybe twenty meters ahead of us. It�s one of the small ones, milky-white and a meter or so long, with a dozen legs and a pair of wickedly sharp-looking mandibles on its front segment. Nasha curses under her breath and reaches over her shoulder for the linear accelerator, but I cover her hand with mine and whisper, �Wait.�

The creeper rises up until it�s balanced on its last three segments. Its head weaves slowly back and forth, like a cobra preparing to strike.

�You said they don�t care about these things, right?� Nasha whispers, and eases the accelerator over her shoulder until she has it in both hands.

�I said they aren�t independently intelligent,� I say. No point in whispering when the thing plainly knows we�re here. �That doesn�t mean blowing this one to bits wouldn�t be interpreted as hostile, though. Imagine someone coming into your house, walking up to you, and cutting off the tip of your pinkie finger. You wouldn�t call him a murderer, but you�d still be pretty pissed.�

�Okay,� she says. �Fair point.� She lets the accelerator slide back until it hangs from the strap over her shoulder again and lowers her hands to her sides. �So what now?�

�Not sure,� I say. I take a deep breath in, hold it for a moment, then let it back out. The creeper�s head falls still.

I take a slow step forward.

�Mickey?� Nasha says. �What are you doing?�

�This is what we�re here for. I�m making contact.�

I take another step. The creeper stands frozen. Nasha steps up beside me.

�If it comes at us,� she says, �I will end it, diplomacy or no.�

�Fair,� I say, and take two more slow steps.

The creeper drops back onto its legs. I can hear Nasha�s intake of breath, and the clatter of the accelerator coming to bear. It doesn�t come for us, though. Instead it wheels around and starts back up the tunnel. After it�s gone a few meters, its head lifts and twists back to face us.

�I think it wants us to follow,� I say. Without waiting for Nasha�s response, I walk toward it at a slow, steady pace. After I�ve closed the distance between us to six or seven meters, the creeper turns and starts forward again.

�Okay,� Nasha says from behind me. �I guess this is happening now.�

I don�t take my eyes from the creeper, but I can hear her stowing her weapon again. A few seconds later, she�s walking beside me.

�If they decide they don�t want to talk to us,� I say, �we�re not likely to be able to shoot our way out of here. You know that, right?�

Nasha bumps against my shoulder. �You�d be surprised what I can shoot my way out of. I hear you, though. As long as they�re not actually trying to rip you apart, I promise to be good.�

I take her hand. �Thanks, Nasha. I think this is a good sign, right?�

�Maybe,� she says. �Or maybe they just like it better when their meat carries itself to the kitchen.�

�THINK HE�S COMING back?�

I shrug. We�re sitting on the cold stone floor now, against the wall near the opening where we entered the chamber. I�m leaning against my pack. Nasha�s leaning back against me. She lifts her rebreather long enough to take a bite of a protein bar, then holds it up to me over her left shoulder. I bite off half of what�s left, chew and swallow. It�s been over an hour now since the big creeper has stirred.

�What do we do if he doesn�t?�

�I don�t know,� I say. �I guess I could try to ping them. Seemed like we were in contact that way before Speaker showed up.�

�Try.�

�What, now?�

�Yeah,� Nasha says. �I don�t want to spend the night down here.�

�Unless they�re willing to help us out, I�m pretty sure the ship has sailed on that one. It�s a hell of a long way back to the surface from here if we go back the way we came�and even if we could find a shorter route, it�s already dark topside, and depending on where we come out, we have to be at least a couple of hours� walk from the dome.�

She leans her head back until her cheek rests against mine.

�Ping them,� she says. �Please?�

Fine. I blink to a text window.

<Mickey7>: Hello?

<Mickey7>: Are you there?

<Mickey7>: We really need to discuss those packs.

<Mickey7>: Hello?

I�m about to tell Nasha that they�ve apparently gone radio-silent when I get a ping-back.

<Speaker1>: We hear you.

<Speaker1>: We are not ready to speak.

�Sorry,� I say. �I guess they�re still thinking.�

She groans, leans forward, and presses her fists against her forehead.

�This was a bad idea, Mickey. We shouldn�t have come down here.�

I wrap my arms around her and pull her back against me. �Maybe. We�re here, though. Nothing to do now but wait and see what happens.�

We�ve spent a surprising amount of time like this, Nasha and I�hanging around some shitty place, wrapped around one another, waiting for something awful to happen. Usually the thing we were waiting for was for me to die in some horrible way, but there have been a few times when it�s been Nasha anticipating the call.

When that rock hit our forward shield during transit, while the original Mickey Barnes was getting absolutely fried while repairing the damage, Nasha was stuck in the carousel. It wasn�t the worst place she could have been. A quarter of the internal volume of the Drakkar was exposed to dangerous-to-lethal radiation levels, and a half dozen people unlucky enough to be in the right parts of the forward compartments wound up dying in more or less the same way I did, only slower and more painfully. The carousel girdled the waist of the ship about midway between the nose cone and the engines, and roughly a quarter of its volume was exposed as well. Which quarter of its volume was exposed was constantly changing with the carousel�s rotation, though, and Nasha was swept through the unshielded zone twice in the forty-five seconds that it took her to evacuate. Best guess is that she wound up absorbing about a hundred and fifty millisieverts all told�enough to throw off your digestion and thin out your hair a bit, but not enough to kill you.

Not right away, anyway.

Four years later, give or take, she started getting headaches.

I may not have mentioned this before, but Nasha is fierce. She wouldn�t even take an NSAID until the pain was blinding, let alone report to medical. By the time I finally dragged her down to talk to someone, she was having balance problems and could barely tolerate normal shipboard lighting. The tech on duty took a look at her, asked a few questions, and stuck her head in a scanner. Ten minutes later, he was using a tablet and stylus to show us the extent of the mass in her left temporal lobe.

Union medical science is pretty amazing in a lot of ways. We can bio-print new, genetically matched organs at will. Nobody dies from liver failure or atherosclerosis or pulmonary disease or any of a hundred other things that used to mow humans down back in the pre-Diaspora dark ages. It�s not magic, though�and the one organ we can�t just replace is the brain.

They took her away then, and stuck her into another, bigger scanner for what they called a digital biopsy. The question, apparently, was whether the mass was a benign glioma, which they could cure with nanosurgery, or a malignant glioblastoma, which despite well over a thousand years of head-banging-against-the-wall frustration in medical research facilities from Earth to Eden to Midgard, they could not.

I hung in a harness with her for two hours in the medical bay while we waited to find out if Nasha was going to live or die. We didn�t talk. We just drifted there with my arms around her waist and her head on my shoulder. When the tech came back out, tablet in hand, she lifted her mouth to my ear and whispered, �If it�s bad news, you don�t have to stay with me.�

She couldn�t see the tech�s face. I could. He was smiling.

�It�s not bad news,� I said, and kissed her. �But it wouldn�t have mattered if it was.�

I said it. Was it true?

Nasha�s stayed with me through far worse.

I guess I�m glad that I never got the chance to find out.

IT�S AN HOUR later, and we�ve gone through two more tubes of slurry, another pack of protein bars, and most of the rest of our water when Speaker returns. We didn�t pack for a days-long expedition. If this doesn�t end soon, things are going to start getting even more uncomfortable down here than they already are.

�We have come to a decision,� he says when he reaches us.

I wait a beat for him to go on, then shoot Nasha a quick look and say, �And?�

�And,� Speaker says, �we do not accept responsibility for your bomb falling into our friends� possession. You left it in a hole. This was a very stupid thing to do. The fact that we were the ones to find it was only chance. Our friends could conceivably have found it themselves. Anyone could have. So, your current situation is entirely your own fault.�

Nasha�s eyes narrow and her shoulders tense under my arm. I put my hand over hers, mostly to keep her from reaching for a weapon, as he continues.

�We do not accept responsibility for the loss of your bomb. However, we do accept blood-debt for the killing of your not-ancillaries. We gave this great consideration, as we had no reasonable way of knowing that your kind are structured so strangely, but in the final analysis, we acknowledge that we did kill several of you. Because of this, we have determined that we are obligated to provide you what help we can in recovering your bomb from our friends, despite our feeling that this is not a wise course.�

Nasha had already taken a breath to say something awful. She lets it out now, and I can feel her relax.

�Okay,� she says. �Okay. Thank you. That�s what we wanted to hear. You go talk to your friends, let them know we need that thing back immediately, and bring it to the dome. We�ll take it from there, right?�

Speaker�s head bobs, and his mandibles clatter together.

�Bring it to you? No. No, that is not what we meant. That is not on offer. We will give what help we can, but only within reason. We will offer advice. We will offer guidance. We will not go to war for you.�

I glance over at Nasha. Her eyes have narrowed again.

�Right,� she says. �Advice. Guidance. That sounds very helpful.�

�Yes,� Speaker says. �It will be.�

�Two years of eavesdropping on Mickey and Berto, and you didn�t pick up sarcasm, huh?�

Speaker�s head swings over to me, then back to Nasha.

�Sarcasm?�

�Not important,� I say. �The point is, we need more than advice and guidance, and I would think the fact that you killed six individuals would entitle us to more than that.�

Speaker scoots back a meter or so, and his head dips almost to the floor.

�You wish to negotiate,� he says. �This is fair. What do you feel you deserve from us?�

�More than advice,� I say. �Material support.�

I should have known what would happen now, but I still can�t suppress a groan when Speaker says, �We need to consider,� and scuttles away.

<Black Hornet>: Mickey?

<Mickey7>: I�m right beside you, Nasha. Why are you texting?

<Black Hornet>: Can Speaker see this?

I GLANCE BEHIND us. Speaker trundles along a half dozen or so meters back, legs rippling in a viscerally disturbing way as he moves. We�re crossing a steep, sunny, fern-covered hillside, still at least an hour�s walk out from the perimeter.

<Mickey7>: I don�t think so, but I guess I�m not sure. Depends on how thoroughly they�ve penetrated our communication protocols.

<Black Hornet>: Is there any way to find out?

<Mickey7>: Maybe. Let me try an old ComSec trick.

<Mickey7>: Hey, Speaker, are you seeing this?

<Speaker1>: Yes, I am.

<Mickey7>: There ya go.

Nasha bumps me with her shoulder. �Nobody likes a smart-ass, Mickey.�

I grin behind my rebreather. �Found out what you needed to know, didn�t I?�

She glances back. �Speaker? Any way you could give us a little privacy?�

�Privacy?� Speaker says. �I do not know this word.�

�I need to say things to Mickey that I do not necessarily want you to overhear. Understand?�

�These things you wish to say�they are secrets?�

�Sure,� Nasha says. �Private secrets.�

�You wish to tell these secrets to Mickey, but not to me?�

�Yeah,� Nasha says. �That�s the gist of it.�

His mandibles spread wide, then snap together. �Allies do not keep secrets from one another, Nasha.�

She stops and turns to face him, arms folded across her chest. �Look, we�re not talking about military intel here, okay? I just have some things that I need to discuss with Mickey before we get to the dome. These things do not involve you. That�s what private means�things that involve us, but don�t involve you.�

Speaker stops just short of Nasha and rises up to head level. �What private things will you discuss?�

�If I told you,� Nasha says slowly, �they wouldn�t be private, would they?�

�No,� Speaker says. �I suppose not.�

Nasha glances over at me. I shrug. She sighs. �So?�

Speaker�s mandibles clatter together rapidly in a way I�m starting to associate with confusion. �So, what?�

�So,� Nasha says. �Will you please give us some privacy?�

�Oh,� Speaker says. �Yes. Of course.�

He drops to the ground, curls back on himself, and retreats down the hillside.

�I must say,� he says as he goes, �this does not seem very friendly.�

He stops when he�s fifty meters or so off, turns, and looks back at us.

�Think that�s far enough?� Nasha says, her voice now just above a whisper.

�I don�t know,� I say. �Want me to try an old ComSec trick to find out?�

Nasha�s eyes narrow above her rebreather. �You�re a funny guy, Mickey. It�s gonna get you killed someday.�

�It already has,� I say. �Several times.�

Nasha sighs. �Right. Look, what are we doing here? You�re not planning on bringing that thing into the dome, are you?�

�I mean��

�Let me stop you there, Mickey. We cannot bring a three-meter-long creeper into the dome. Totally aside from the fact that some Security goon would definitely kill him before we were through the perimeter, we can�t give him the opportunity to gather intel on us.�

I turn to face her fully and fold my arms across my chest. �Intel? Seriously? What do you expect him to learn, other than that a hundred and seventy humans crammed into a closed environment eventually start to smell like old socks no matter how many chem showers they take?�

�I don�t know,� she says. �We have no real idea of what his capabilities are, do we? I mean, doesn�t it spook you at all, how easily these things have been able to learn how to manipulate our systems? Just as an example, how was he able to tap our text feed? Nobody in the dome could have done that other than Marshall and Amundsen. If we let him into the dome, would he be able to get into the general feed? Would he be able to pull specs for our weapons systems? For our life support? For the reactor? Come on, Mickey. Use your head.�

I glance downslope toward Speaker. He raises two segments and waves a foreleg.

�Fine. You make some good points. So what do you suggest?�

Her eyes lose focus as her attention shifts from my face to her ocular�s heads-up display. �Looks like we�re three klicks out here, give or take, and we�ve got one more ridge that�s blocking any line-of-sight transmissions. I�m not getting any comm signals from the dome at all right now. We should be safe to leave him here. We can pick him up again once we�re ready to head south.�

�That could take a while. A few days, maybe, depending on how much of a pain in the ass Marshall decides to be about this. You think he�ll be okay just hanging around out here?�

�This is Speaker�s planet,� Nasha says. �His natural environment, right? I�m sure he�ll be fine.�

<Black Hornet>: Okay, Speaker. You can come back now.

<Speaker1>: You are finished telling secrets?

<Black Hornet>: For the moment, anyway.

We wait as he scuttles back up the slope.

�So,� he says when he reaches us. �We can continue now?�

�Not exactly,� Nasha says. �Mickey and I can continue now. You can wait here. We�ll come back for you once we�ve gathered what we need.�

�But�� Speaker says, his mandibles clattering. �But I wish to see your nest.�

�I�m sure you do,� Nasha says. �Wait here. We�ll be back in a day or two.�

�This seems unfair. You have seen our nest. You have seen it several times.�

�And you�ve killed six of us, when all we did was roast a few ancillaries,� Nasha says. �Life isn�t fair. Two days max. Maybe three.� She turns and starts walking. �Four at the outside.�

Speaker turns to me. �You agree with this?�

�Sorry,� I say. �We�ll be back as quickly as possible. You�ll be okay here?�

�I wish to see your nest.�

�You will,� I say. �Eventually. Right now, things are a little tense�because of all the killing, you know? If we brought you into the dome right now, things might not go well. Once we recover the bomb, everyone will be happier. You can come for a visit then, okay?�

He rises up to head-height, wavers, then drops back to the ground. �Fine. I will wait here. Try not to be too long. I do not like the outside.�

I start to reach out, to give his carapace a farewell pat, but at the last second I remember what those mandibles can do. �Okay, then. See you soon.�

Nasha�s already cresting the hill. I give Speaker one last backward glance, then hurry to catch up.

�SO,� NASHA SAYS. �Are you gonna tell them, or am I?�

�Tell us what?� Jamie asks from the cockpit.

I sigh. �You�re gonna want to stop just past the crest of this hill.�

�Really?� Cat says, and reaches for her rebreather. �Are we there already?�

�Not quite. We�re just stopping to pick up a passenger.�

�It�s a creeper,� Nasha says. �We�re picking up a creeper.�

Lucas leans forward and turns to look back at her. �What?�

�We�re picking up a creeper,� Nasha says again. �It�s a kind of�� liaison, I guess? They made it just for us, so try not to be a total ass about it.�

�Uh-huh,� Lucas says. �And where, exactly, are you expecting this thing to ride?�

�Curled up in your lap,� Nasha says. �This is happening, Lucas. Get over it.�

We should be in comm range by now. I blink to a chat window.

<Mickey7>: Speaker? You still out here?

<Mickey7>: Hello?

<Mickey7>: We�re ready to go now. Please respond.

<Speaker1>: Hello, Mickey.

<Speaker1>: Where are you? I have been very unhappy waiting here.

<Mickey7>: Should be near your position now.

<Speaker1>: A large metal thing is moving toward me. Should I be alarmed?

<Mickey7>: Nope. That�s us. I�ll be out in a minute.

�Jamie,� I say. �Hold here.�

The rover slows, then comes to a gentle stop. I pull on my rebreather and get to my feet. The passenger compartment is a tube maybe six meters long, with benches running along both sides, storage lockers above, and just enough headroom in the center for me to stand. It doesn�t have a proper air lock, but it does have an atmospheric trap at the rear, just in front of the hatch. I move to the back, wait for the trap to close behind me, and then punch the exit button. The hatch opens, and I climb out into knee-high ferns at the crest of the hill.

<Mickey7>: Where are you?

The ground erupts a dozen or so meters down the slope, and Speaker�s head emerges from the hole.

�Hello,� he says. �Thank you for coming back for me. Is that a weapon?�

I look back. The turret on the top of the rover has come to life. As I watch, it rotates around to orient on Speaker, and the focusing crystal at its tip goes from flat black to a dull, angry red.

�Hey!� I wave my arms over my head and step between Speaker and the rover. �Stand down!�

Jamie�s voice comes from a spot just below the turret. �Move aside, Mickey! You said we were picking up a creeper. What the hell is that thing?�

Right. They�ve only ever seen the little ones. Should have been a bit more clear on this, I guess. �This is what we came here for, Jamie. Stand down.�

�No,� Jamie says. �For shit�s sake, Mickey. That thing�s the size of a�Ow! What the hell, Nasha?�

I don�t hear Nasha�s answer, but after a brief delay the turret rotates back to its original position.

�Great,� Jamie says. �Why not? Bring it aboard if you want. I�m sealing the cockpit.�

�Come on,� I say as Speaker pulls the rest of his body out of the ground. �Let me introduce you to your new allies.�

�THIS IS BAD,� Berto mutters as he snaps the last spar in place. �This is seriously bad.�

�No shit,� Nasha says. �So why don�t you hurry up and get out of here while you�ve still got the chance?�

We�re clinging to the top of the rover as it bounces along the crest of a rocky ridge at what feels like breakneck speed, but is actually probably barely faster than I could run. As Berto works, I�m having trouble not picturing him trying to take off, then smacking straight into the ground and getting crushed under our wheels.

�I�m not talking about those things,� Berto says. �I�m talking about my prospects of actually getting airborne. You feel that? We�re slowing down. Think we could get Jamie to turn into the wind?�

�I don�t think there�s much of a breeze going right now,� Nasha says. �Hard to say which way he should turn.�

�I�m screwed,� Berto says. �Screwed, screwed, screwed.� He�s got the fabric out of the pack now. As he lays it across the skeletal frame, a sudden gust from the side billows it up until it almost covers him. �Help me,� he says as he presses it back down and starts stretching fabric over the frame. �This thing is gonna start pulling.�

Nasha grabs a wingtip in one hand and the rim of the burner turret with the other. I take the other wing and anchor myself to the open hatch at the rear.

�This isn�t gonna work,� Berto says. �There�s no fucking headwind. We�re not going fast enough. Those things are gonna tear me apart.� He doesn�t stop working, though. Thirty seconds more, and he�s finished with the last connections. The glider really is bucking now, catching the air and trying to haul itself out of our hands. Berto steps through the harness and grasps the control bar. �I�m serious,� he says. �This is suicide. You know that, don�t you?�

�Yeah,� I say. �I know a bit about suicide, Berto.�

I glance around. There must be at least a hundred of the things out there now. They look like six-legged spiders with the creeper�s cutting mandibles jutting from their faces. They range from a meter or so across the legs to a few that could be half the size of the rover. They�re mostly scattered along our flanks maybe fifty meters off to either side, running with us, holding pace as others move to surround us in front and behind.

�Okay,� Berto says. �This isn�t getting any better, is it? If we�re gonna do it, now�s the time.�

Nasha and I move in closer to him, hand over hand along the wings, until we can rotate the frame around to face the front of the rover. The wind kicks up again, from the direction we�re traveling this time, and the glider nearly pulls itself out of my hands.

�Shit,� Nasha says. �There�s the headwind you were looking for. You gotta go, Berto. I don�t think I can hold this thing much longer.�

�Just a sec,� Berto says, and runs a finger along his control bar. The thrusters under the wings begin to hum. �Okay. Ready?� He takes a deep breath, holds it, then lets it out slowly. �Let go.�

As soon as he�s free of us, Berto runs for his life. In three strides he�s barely touching the rover. He leaps, kicks hard off of the burner turret, and takes flight.

Well, �takes flight� might be a bit generous.

As soon as he�s past the nose of the rover, Berto begins a slow, steady descent. He�s pulling away from us, so he must be accelerating, but over the course of five seconds or so he goes from an altitude of three meters, to two, to barely avoiding dragging his toes in the turf.

�He�s not gonna make it,� Nasha says.

�He will,� I say. �He has to.�

I�ve given him enough shit over the past two years for killing me. I really don�t want our friendship to end with me killing him in turn.

As he accelerates away from us, Berto�s gaining ground on the things ahead. He�s not sinking anymore, but he�s not rising either, and the distance between him and them is dropping precipitously. Thirty meters. Twenty meters. Ten. At that point, they seem to notice him. The two running directly in front of him peel off to either side as he sweeps toward them, seemingly confused as to whether he represents a threat or an opportunity.

That�s all the opening Berto needs. He cuts through their line, wingtips nearly brushing the spiders on either side. After a moment�s hesitation the things give chase, but it�s too late. Apparently he�s managed to build up enough speed now, because he abruptly leaps away from the ground in a steep, sweeping climb.

�Holy shit,� he says over the comm. �Holy goddamn fucking shit. Did you see that? Did you see how close that was?�

�We saw,� I say. �I�m glad you made it.�

�Yeah,� he says. �Thanks. Me too. So what now?�

�Now?� I say. �Now you stay up there and watch what happens to us. If we get through this, we�ll pick you up again when we�re clear. If not, you haul ass back to the dome and let them know what happened. They�ll need to put together another expedition. Maybe this time Marshall will authorize a lifter, huh?�

�Maybe,� Berto says. �Hopefully it doesn�t come to that, though. You gonna fire up the burner now?�

�No,� I say. �I don�t think so. I�m pretty sure there are too many of them to fight. I�m hoping they eventually give up the chase.�

�I don�t know, buddy. They look pretty determined from up here. They�re closing the noose on you, you know.�

I glance around. He�s right. They�re closer on the sides now, and the ranks in front of us are filling in.

�We�ll see what happens,� I say. �Whatever it is, though, make sure you stay out of it, right? I need you to make it home safe.�

�You got it,� he says. �Good luck, Mickey.�

�Yeah,� I say. �Thanks.�

Nasha�s already swinging herself back through the hatch. I give one more look around, then follow her down.

�SO HERE�S SOMETHING I don�t understand,� Nasha says, breaking a silence that�s lasted almost two hours but has felt more like a month. �This planet is kind of a shithole, right? No offense, Speaker, but this place isn�t really super-friendly to life, is it?�

�I do not have a point of comparison,� Speaker says. �It seems friendly enough to me.�

�Take my word for it,� Nasha says. �It�s not. That�s not my point, though. My point is that the Union has explored a whole lot of planets over the past thousand years, most of them more habitable than this one, and in all that time we�ve run across, what, one other intelligent species?�

�Two,� I say. �Roanoke and Long Shot. Three, if you count the system that ate Eden�s first colony ship.�

�And Acadia�s,� Lucas says. �Did they ever figure out what was going on there?�

I shake my head. �Not really. All we know is that something makes ships vanish without a trace as soon as they hit the system�s Oort cloud, and that anything that can pull that trick is probably not something we want to mess with.�

�Didn�t you say there were sentients on New Hope?� Cat says. �That�s at least four, right?�

�Whatever,� Nasha says. �Point is, most habitable planets don�t host technological intelligence, right? What are the odds that there would be two of them here?�

�The universe is a weird place,� I say. �It�s a good question, though. I guess our base expectation is that the emergence of one intelligent species on a planet suppresses the emergence of any others. That�s what happened on old Earth, anyway. There were a half dozen hominids that could have made the jump, but as soon as we crossed the Rubicon, the rest of them mysteriously disappeared. Who knows, though? Maybe this is just a kinder, gentler place?�

�How about it, Speaker?� Nasha asks. �Any insights here?�

�I�m sorry,� Speaker says. �I do not think I understand. You believe there are two thinking species on this planet?�

That gets him a long moment of silence.

�You told us you�ve been negotiating with those things,� Nasha says finally. �Are you telling us that they�re not even sentient?�

�As I have tried to explain, this is a complicated question. The creatures outside are primarily ancillaries. By your definition, many of these may not be sentient. However, there seems to be at least one Prime present as well.�

�I�m not talking about the individuals,� Nasha says. �The species, though�they�re sentient?�

�Again, I think I fail to understand. We have agreed that we are sentient, have we not? Do you not acknowledge that I am sentient?�

Nasha opens her mouth to reply, hesitates, then closes it again.

�So,� I say. �Are you saying those things out there are creepers?�

�Please clarify: Am I a creeper?�

�Yeah,� Lucas says. �You�re a creeper.�

�Then yes, the creatures outside now are also creepers. We are the same. I told you that they are vassals of our friends to the south, did I not?�

�But�� Nasha begins.

�You�re a worm,� Lucas says. �They�re spiders. You�re not the same.�

�Apologies,� Speaker says. �I thought we were clear on this point. This shell is not biological. It is a construct. How else could we have mimicked your vocal apparatus in such a short time? This gives us great flexibility. We can take on many forms.�

�Really?� Lucas says. �You�re a mech?�

I shake my head. �Not really. Creepers aren�t mechs, exactly. They�re some kind of hybrid�or at least the specimen we captured was.�

�Correct,� Speaker says. �We are hybrid. Part biological, part mechanical. This is why we put such value on obtaining metal. Availability of various metallic elements is the most important limit on our reproduction.�

�Huh,� Nasha says. �I�m even less eager to hand over the rover now. How many of those things will they be able to make with what they scavenge from this?�

�Hundreds,� Speaker says. �Depending on exactly what materials it is made of, possibly many hundreds. This machine is a great resource.�

�Uh-huh,� Lucas says. �I�m suddenly very curious about exactly what went down in those negotiations.�

�Damn straight,� Cat says.

�What are you thinking?� Nasha asks.

Lucas shrugs. �Pretty obvious, isn�t it? Wormy just admitted that his bunch is just as desperate for metals as those things outside are, didn�t he? It�s logical to assume, then, that he wants a chunk of this rover just as badly as the spiders do. So, he goes out there and tells them that he can talk us into surrendering without a fight if his nest gets a share of the spoils. It�s a pretty straightforward scam.�

Speaker rises up from the deck and twists to face Lucas. �Scam? I do not know this word. Do you accuse me of betrayal?�

Lucas doesn�t quite bring his accelerator to bear, but his finger finds the trigger guard. �I�m not accusing you of anything, Wormy. I�m just calling it like I see it.�

This is bad. I need to end it now. I get to my feet.

�No,� I say. �We�re not doing this. Lucas, stand down. Speaker, you too. We�re all friends here, remember?�

�Speak for yourself,� Lucas says. �Friends don�t feed friends to spiders.�

�They would not eat him,� Speaker says. �We have no interest in you as a food source. Your proteins are not digestible.�

�Really?� Lucas asks. �And how would you know that?�

�They know because they dissected me two years ago,� I say. �They took Six, and they pulled him apart to see what made him tick.�

�So is that what they�re gonna do to me?� Jamie asks. �Take me apart?�

�Most likely, yes,� Speaker says. �Your people are a new thing in this world. This alone makes you worthy of study. Moreover, you have proven to be dangerous. It is understandable that we feel a need to examine your inner workings, is it not?�

�I�m getting a serious urge to examine your inner workings, Wormy,� Lucas growls.

�Hey!� I say. �I said that�s enough, Lucas! Put a cork in it, would you? We are not doing this. We are not going to kill each other right now. We�ve got enough problems with those things outside. Speaker�tell me truly: Did you agree to take a share of the metal if we let those things pull the rover apart?�

�Yes,� Speaker says. �I did.�

�Oooooooh shit,� Nasha says into the stunned silence.

�Speaker?� I say, careful to keep my tone neutral. �Did you sell us out?�

�No,� he says. �I did not sell you out, if I understand the term correctly. I obtained the best bargain for all of us that I could. Understand, please: They were adamant that they would take the rover. If they were to take all of it, they would be able to create hundreds more of themselves. They are already stronger than my nest by some measures. Perhaps this would allow them to create enough additional ancillaries to enable them to overwhelm and displace my Prime. I have told you that this is their goal.�

�And we told you, that�s not our problem,� Cat says.

�Think, please. We are your allies. If we are displaced, your position is worsened, even if you do not believe that our friends would be able to destroy you. If we take a portion of the metal from this machine, we will be more likely to be able to keep our place. This benefits us both, no?�

�That�s it,� Lucas says. �Mickey, are you hearing this? You cannot seriously still be considering following through on this deal. I�m not gonna pop him now. I get that we need him to find the bomb, and we need the bomb to live. From here on out, though, he�s got to be considered a hostile, and we cannot trust a goddamned word he�s said about those things out there. I know the creepers can cut through man-portable armor, and I know they cut through the decking in the main hatch, but this rover is built to military specifications. It�s designed to withstand a fusion blast at a thousand meters. If they can cut into it, then I guess we�re screwed, but if we walk out of that hatch into the middle of those things, I will guarantee you that they don�t let us walk away.�

I look to Jamie. He won�t meet my eyes. Cat is looking up at Lucas and nodding. I turn to Nasha. She shrugs. �The man�s not wrong, Mickey.�

It�s then that we hear the tick tick tick of claws on the roof of the rover.

�Whatever you choose,� Speaker says, �choose now. I believe that our friends have come knocking.�

WE CATCH UP to Berto just after sunset on a flat, open stretch of rocky ground in the hollow between two ridges. He�s already got the glider broken down and packed when we roll to a stop beside him. Jamie pops the hatch, and I walk out to meet him.

�Hey,� he says. �How�s Nasha?�

I shake my head. �Not great. She�s alive, but she�s not responsive. She needs a real medical suite.�

He grimaces. �Sorry, Mick. You want to turn back?�

I close my eyes and breathe in, breathe out. When I open them again, Berto�s face is an even mix of pity and concern. �Yeah,� I say. �I want to turn back. Of course I want to turn back. But we can�t turn back, because if we don�t recover that bomb we�re all screwed anyway, including Nasha. So instead my plan is to do my best to keep it together until we do what we need to do here, and then to completely lose my shit unless and until she wakes up.�

�Sounds like a solid plan,� he says. �Think you�ll be able to pull it off?�

I sigh. �I don�t know. I�m not used to being on this end of things, you know? I�m supposed to be the one bleeding out, not her. Do you think�� is this how it was for her? Do you think she felt like this every time I went down?�

�I don�t have to think,� Berto says. �I saw it.�

I don�t have any answer to that. We stand in silence for a moment, until finally Berto shoulders his pack and starts toward the rover. He stops, though, just as he reaches the ramp, and turns back to look at me.

�Hey,� he says. �I�m sorry, Mickey. I didn�t mean to drop that first round quite so close to you, and I should have given you more warning. It�s just�� He runs his hand along a three-centimeter-deep gouge in the armor next to the hatch. �Things looked pretty desperate down there, you know? I wanted to��

�Yeah, I know,� I say. �You�re a hero, Berto. You wanted to save the day.�

The words are already out of my mouth before I realize how bitter they sound. Berto�s face looks like he�s just been punched.

�And you did,� I quickly add. �You got there in the nick of time, and you totally saved our asses. If you�d gotten there five minutes later�hell, probably thirty seconds later�we�d all be dead by now. You didn�t have time to do anything more than what you did. I don�t blame you for what happened to Nasha.�

He looks down, one hand braced on the top of the hatch. �Thanks, Mickey.� He ducks through and into the cabin. As he does, he mutters something else that I can�t quite catch. It�s not until I�m back in the cabin and the hatch is swinging down behind me that I realize it was �I do.�

WHEN I GET back into the cabin, Nasha is sitting up, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees and cradling her head in her hands. The relief that floods through me leaves me almost giddy. If she hadn�t come around��

Best not to think about that.

�Hey,� Lucas says. �What�s the situation up there?�

�They�re pacing us,� Cat says. �Keeping their distance for the moment.�

�For the moment,� I say, �but that�s not likely to last. Nasha�how do you feel?�

She looks up slowly, her eyes narrowed. �What? Are you fucking kidding me?�

�Sorry,� I say. �I know. I know. You feel like shit. What I mean is, can you function? Can you stand? Can you walk?�

She sighs, then gets to her feet, one hand braced on the back of the bench. Once she�s up, she takes her hand away. She wobbles a bit, then steadies.

�Well, I can stand,� she says, then lifts first one foot, then the other. �I can probably walk, I guess. Don�t think I�d want to try to run. Why?�

�You don�t need to run,� I say. �I don�t think so, anyway. I just need you mobile. We�re abandoning ship.�

That gets me a solid five seconds of silence.

�What?� Lucas says finally.

�We�re abandoning the rover. Speaker has made it pretty clear that the metal in this vehicle is what they really want. They asked for one of us too, but I�m betting that was a distant second on their priority list. If we leave the rover undefended, their choice is to get ninety-five percent of what they wanted with no risk, versus getting five percent of what they wanted and losing half their ancillaries in the process. Speaker says they�re intelligent. I�m taking him at his word, and assuming they�ll make the right call.�

�And if they don�t?� Cat says. �We killed a whole lot of them earlier today, you know. If the situation were reversed, I�d be pretty pissed off. They could track us down and kill us first, then come back for the rover.�

�They could,� I say, �but I don�t think they will. We killed ancillaries. If what Speaker has told us is remotely true, they won�t have the sort of reaction to that that we would if they�d killed half of us. They won�t be thinking vengeance. They�ll be thinking spoils. They�ll prioritize the rover. Taking it apart will take them a fair amount of time. By the time they�re done, we�ll be long gone and not worth tracking.�

The looks on the faces of the other people in the cabin range from dubious to borderline hostile. Lucas nudges Speaker with one boot. �What about it, Wormy? Is he right?�

Speaker doesn�t react at first. When Lucas prods him again, though, he rises slowly to eye level and turns to face him. �Mickey is almost certainly correct that they will focus on the rover. Depending on how many ancillaries they have with them now, they may delegate some to pursue you. Then again, they may not. This is difficult to predict.�

�You?� Lucas says. �Don�t you mean us?�

�No,� Speaker says. �I do not mean us. I will not be accompanying you.�

That is not what I expected to hear. I open my mouth, realize I have no idea what to say, and close it again. I look to Nasha. Her face is twisted into a scowl, but I can�t tell if it�s meant for Speaker or for me.

�Yeah,� Berto says finally. �You will be accompanying us, Speaker. You definitely will.�

�I will not,� Speaker says. �I apologize for leaving you in difficult circumstances, but if I abandon this machine, the others will take all of it, and my nest will get none. This cannot be permitted. If I stay with the rover after you have abandoned it, there is some small possibility that I may be able to enforce my claim to a portion of the spoils.�

I stare at him, openmouthed. �You actually think that agreement you made still holds? We�ve killed a shit-ton of spiders in the meantime, remember? They may not be vengeful, but I�m betting they�ll at a minimum consider any concessions they made earlier to be null and void.�

�You may be correct,� Speaker says. �It is very possible that if I do not flee with you, they will disassemble me along with the rover. However, I am obligated to try to convince them to abide by our agreement. As I told you previously, if they are able to make use of all the materials in this rover, there is a strong possibility that they will become strong enough to displace my nest. For both of our sakes, this cannot be allowed to happen.�

I shake my head. �Sorry, Speaker, but this isn�t negotiable. We need you. Without you, we have no way of even finding your friends to the south, let alone talking to them. You have to come with us.�

�I appreciate your position,� Speaker says. �Please, appreciate mine. You ask me to put my own nest in great danger in order to protect yours. If our positions were reversed, what would you do?�

�Just so we�re clear,� Berto says, �we�re not actually asking you. We are telling you. You will come with us when we abandon the rover.�

�You threaten me?�

Berto hefts his accelerator. It�s not quite aimed at Speaker, but it�s not entirely not aimed at him either.

�It�s not a threat,� Berto says. �It�s just a statement of fact. We will not leave you behind�not in one piece, anyway.�

Speaker rises to face Berto, mandibles spread wide. �I am not helpless.�

�You�re not,� Berto says. �You are outnumbered, though, and you are outgunned. You might be able to take one of us down before we shot you, but definitely not two.�

�Look,� I say, far too late. �Back off, Berto. Nobody is shooting anybody. Speaker�we need you. We need you as an ally, not as a prisoner. We need your willing help. Berto is right that we can�t afford to leave you behind, but I understand your concern about how what happens here might impact your people. We don�t want your nest to be displaced by these things any more than you do. So�� I glance around the cabin. Everyone is watching me. I might be about to make the worst mistake yet in a life filled with some pretty awful ones, but I don�t know what else to do at this point. �So, I will promise you now that if we succeed in recovering the bomb and then make it back home alive, we will not permit your nest to be displaced. You see the kinds of weapons we have. There are a lot more of them back at the dome, and others as well that make these ones look like toys. If we are able to recover the bomb and get home safely, we will commit to defending your people if you are attacked. That�s what allies do, right?�

Speaker�s mandibles close, and he gradually settles back down toward the deck.

�You have the authority to make this commitment?�

No, not remotely.

�Yes, I do. If I tell our people that we�ve made this agreement, I promise you that they will honor it.�

�To say this is not a trivial matter, Mickey. I have told you how we view agreements.�

�You have, and I understand that. We also take our agreements seriously. Now, do we have a bargain?�

After a long, strained silence, Speaker drops fully back to the deck and says, �Yes. Yes, under these conditions, we have a bargain. I will admit that I am relieved to not have to face the spiders alone. Understand, though, that if your people do not do as you say they will, there will be serious consequences. If we are attacked and you do not come to our aid, all prior understandings will be void. If we manage to defend ourselves, your dome will provide us the metals we need to recoup our losses, voluntarily or not�and if our nest falls, I promise you that yours will not be far behind.�

Berto shoots me a hard look, but I�m not in a place to worry about what might happen six hours from now, let alone six months. For the moment, this is good enough.

�Thank you, Speaker.� I look around the cabin. Cat and Lucas are back by the hatch. Neither of them will make eye contact. Nasha is sitting again, cradling her head in her hands. Berto raises one eyebrow. I nod. �Everybody else, pack up, but pack light. We�re bailing soon, and I think we�ve probably got a long walk ahead of us.�

BACK ON MIDGARD, back when I was just Mickey Barnes and the worst thing I had to worry about was running out of credits in between subsidy payments, I loved backpacking. There was a trail that ran almost eight hundred kilometers along the crest of the Ullr Mountains just south of Kiruna, and over the course of five years I solo-hiked the length of it four times. I loved the solitude. I loved the feeling that my life was entirely self-contained. I loved the ache in my muscles after a thirty-klick day. I loved planting myself on an overlook somewhere and knowing that if I slipped and fell there was a fair chance that nobody would ever find my body.

I do not love what we�re doing now.

Start with the rebreather. By any objective standard, it�s fantastic tech. It allows us to survive more or less forever in an atmosphere that would kill us in under five minutes if we were unprotected. The way it does that, though, is by filtering out the components of the atmosphere that we don�t want and concentrating the ones that we do. The upshot of that is that our lungs need to constantly pull twice as much gas through the mask as we�re actually getting to breathe, which means that hiking with this thing on is like hiking underwater while breathing through a straw that smells like halitosis. Add in the fact that I�ve been awake for twenty hours and counting. Top it off with the understanding that we�re probably being hunted, and that if we wind up getting run down it most likely means the death of every human on the planet.

Yeah, not loving it.

I haven�t checked my chronometer in a while, partially because I�m too tired to bother but mostly because it makes me sad, but it must be close to dawn now. Over the past several hours we�ve made our way down off the last ridge and well out into the flatlands, all the while listening to Speaker tell us over and over again that it�s just a little bit farther, a little bit farther. We�re hiking toward the mountains in the distance through what seems like an endless field of knee-high ferns when Jamie falls in next to me.

�We have to rest,� he says. �I know you guys caught some sleep on the ride yesterday, but I�ve been awake for almost a full day now.� He glances back. When he speaks again, his voice is lower. �More to the point, Nasha is about to drop. She won�t admit it, so just blame it on me, right? Call a halt.�

I turn to look back at Nasha. She�s at the rear of the line, ten meters or more back from Cat. Her eyes are half-closed, and as I watch she stumbles over nothing and nearly goes down before catching herself.

Jamie shouldn�t have been the one to notice that.

�Speaker,� I say. �How much farther?�

�Not far,� he says without slowing. �Half the next day. Maybe more. Not far at all.�

I need to have a talk with him about what �not far� means.

�Okay,� I say, and stop walking. �We�ll hold here. Six hours to rest and eat, and then we push on. That should get us there before sunset, right, Speaker?�

�Not wise,� Speaker says. �Not wise to stop here. We are exposed. The spiders may yet be following.�

�Sorry,� I say. �Not wise to keep walking until we drop either. We�ll hold here.�

�Don�t have to tell me twice,� Lucas says, then shrugs out of his pack and starts stomping a circle of ferns flat to the ground.

�Don�t get too comfortable,� I say. �You�ve got first watch.�

He scowls, but doesn�t complain. I drop my pack as well, then go back to meet Nasha. When I�m close, she squints up at me and says, �If this is for me��

�It�s not,� I say. �It�s for everybody. It doesn�t help us to get where we�re going if we can�t function when we get there. Jamie�s been up since we left the dome, and the rest of us aren�t doing much better.�

�Fine.� She walks into me, wraps her arms around my shoulders, and sags against me. �I�m dying, Mickey,� she says, her voice barely more than a whisper now. �My head feels like there�s a rat in there, gnawing at the inside of my skull, trying to get out. My vision is fading in and out, and I�m starting to hallucinate. I almost fell just now, because I thought for a second that there was a creeper coming up out of the ground in front of me. I might make it to where we�re going, but there�s no way in hell I�m walking all the way back to the dome.�

�One step at a time,� I say. �Rest now. You might feel better when we�re ready to move again.�

�Maybe,� she says. I hold her arm as she drops to her knees, then settles back into a sit.

�Sit tight,� I say. I go back to my pack, then return with my emergency blanket and a stuff sack that holds my change of clothes. I wrap the blanket around her shoulders, fluff the sack into a pillow as well as I can, and then ease her down on her side. The soil here is thick and black and soft, and the ferns form a bower around her. �Try to get some sleep, huh?�

She closes her eyes. �I�ll see what I can do. If I don�t wake up when it�s time to move, just leave me.�

I crouch down to kiss her forehead. �Right. Whatever you say, boss.�

She catches my hand and squeezes, then lets me go. I get back to my feet. Looks like everyone else has pretty much dropped where they were standing. Lucas is sitting on his pack with his accelerator lying across his knees. Cat�s on her knees, using her teeth to tear the wrapper off of a protein bar. Berto and Jamie both look like they�re already asleep, sitting half-up with their packs still strapped to their shoulders.

�Mickey,� Speaker says, and scuttles over to crouch next to me. �I say again, we should not stay here.�

�I hear you,� I say, �but as I said before, we don�t have a choice. I don�t know how your metabolism works, but we cannot function indefinitely without rest. If the spiders find us here, then we�ll fight them. This is the best we can do.�

He follows along beside me as I walk back to my pack. After a moment�s consideration, I decide that I�m more tired than hungry. I kneel, then sit, then settle back against the pack and close my eyes.

�If we are caught here,� Speaker says, �they will disassemble me.�

�I�m sure they�ll disassemble all of us if they can,� I say. �We certainly disassembled plenty of them.�

�I do not wish to be disassembled.�

�Yeah,� I say. �Join the club.�

�It is not only the spiders,� Speaker says, and presses one foreleg into the ground. �You see this soil? Soft and moist. Good for diggers. You understand?�

I�m not sure I do, but I�m not sure I care. �Diggers. Got it. We�ll watch out for those too.�

He keeps talking, but I�m not listening anymore. My chin sinks down to my chest, and my breathing slows. The last thing I hear is a rhythmic scratching sound, like razor-sharp claws being dragged across bone.

�HE�S GONNA DIE,� Cat says. �He�s gonna slip and fall, and then we�re gonna have to watch him splatter right in front of us like a rotten tomato. You know that, don�t you?�

We�re standing shoulder to shoulder at the base of the cliff, heads tilted back, watching Berto climb. Nasha�s still on her back, eyes covered, either sleeping or pretending to. Jamie�s sitting cross-legged on the ground with one of Nasha�s burners across his lap, staring at the mouth of the creepers� labyrinth.

�Maybe,� I say. �I guess we all have to die eventually, right?�

�True,� she says. �Berto�s not going to die eventually, though. He�s going to die soon. Like, in the next ten minutes.�

I sigh. �The way things have been going, I wouldn�t be surprised if we are too, Cat. The thing is, though, Berto is actually the least likely of any of us to die today. If and when the creepers decide to come back for us, we�re finished. He�ll watch them take us apart, then take off in his homemade flitter and be back at the dome in a couple of hours. Just like always, everything works out for Berto.�

Cat shakes her head. �Not gonna happen. There�s no way in hell he makes it to the top.�

I turn to look at her. �Care to make a wager on that?�

She laughs. �Gamble over whether our friend lives or dies? Sure, why not? I guess that�s who we are by now. What are the stakes?�

I have to think about that for a minute.

�Dinner when we get back to the dome? Not potatoes and slurry, either. This meal has to include at least one rabbit haunch and two tomatoes. Loser pays.�

Cat squints up at me. �That�s a pretty low-risk bet, considering that the odds of us ever making it back to the dome are probably even lower than the odds of Berto making it to the top of the cliff.�

I shrug. �Take it or leave it.�

She turns her attention back to Berto as he wedges one boot into a vertical crack and stretches up for a handhold. �You seem suspiciously confident. Why?�

I smile, though she can�t see it behind my rebreather. �Did I ever tell you how I wound up on this mission?�

She tilts her head to one side. �I don�t think so. We talked about it, didn�t we? That night in the gym, right? You told me you weren�t a prisoner, and that you weren�t conscripted. I didn�t believe you.�

I laugh. �Well, it�s true. I was not a prisoner, and I was not conscripted. I actually volunteered for this gig. It wasn�t an entirely voluntary volunteering, though. I was in a shit-ton of trouble�and the reason I was in a shit-ton of trouble, aside from the general fact that I�m an idiot, was that I bet against Berto being able to do something that no human being should have been able to do, and then sat there and watched him do it. I promised myself then that I wouldn�t ever make that mistake again.�

We fall silent for a while then, and just watch. Berto is maybe a third of the way up the face at the moment. He moves like a spider, unhurried, hands moving from one hold to the next, toes finding near-invisible irregularities in the rock face.

�He looks like he knows what he�s doing, anyway,� Cat says. �Was he a pro climber or something back on Midgard?�

I shake my head. �Nope. Not so far as I know, anyway, and I�m pretty sure he would have let me know if there was yet another thing that he was great at.�

�Okay. Dedicated amateur, then?�

�Don�t think so.�

�Dilettante?�

�Not really.�

�So as far as you know, he�s got no serious climbing experience of any kind.�

I shrug. �Yeah, pretty much.�

�And yet you knew he�d be able to pull this off because��

�Two reasons. First, Berto is a physical savant. You know he was the top-ranked pog-ball player on Midgard, right?�

�I did not. Is that a big deal? I was never much into sports.�

�Yeah,� I say. �It�s a big deal. He beat guys who had dedicated their lives to the sport, one after another, barely breaking a sweat, and he accomplished it basically as a goof. People were calling him the greatest natural talent the planet had ever seen, and then he walked away after three years because he was bored.�

�Okay,� she says. �And?�

I turn to look at her. �Huh?�

She rolls her eyes. �You said there were two reasons. That�s only one.�

I look up again. Berto is balanced on his toes on what looks like a two-centimeter ledge, one hand stretched above him and gripping a tiny nub, the other pressed flat against the rock beside him.

�Look at that,� I say. �You see where he is now?�

�Yeah,� she says. �About to fall.�

�Your heart�s racing just thinking about being up there right now, isn�t it?�

She shrugs. �Maybe.�

�Right. That�s the other reason. I guarantee you that his is thumping away at a steady sixty beats per minute right now. The thing about Berto is that the part of our brains that makes most of us panic when, just for example, we realize that we�re two hundred meters up a sheer rock face with nothing but two toes on a stray nub of rock between us and a quick and painful death�that part just isn�t there for Berto. You remember that stunt he pulled with the flitter a couple of years ago, right?�

�Yeah,� she says. �I remember. I put a hundred kcal into the pool that he took from us.�

�Well, a guy who would do something like that for a couple of dinners isn�t going to flinch at a little rock climbing.�

�Maybe,� she says. �Look, though. He�s stuck.�

I push my ocular to max magnification. She�s right. He looks like he�s in an okay place at the moment, with both feet on a narrow ledge a few meters higher than where he�d been before and his right hand wrapped around a gnarled knob of granite. His left hand, though, is about a half meter short of the next solid hold. As I watch, he stretches and leans, his right hand almost coming free of its grip, but unless he�s got a limb extender in there it�s not going to work.

�You�re right,� I say. �Doesn�t matter, though. He�s just gonna have to back down, try to find another��

He jumps.

Two hundred meters up a sheer granite cliff face, with no safety equipment and a fifteen-kilo pack on his back, Berto Gomez gathers himself, and jumps.

Cat sucks in air and takes a half step back.

Needless to say, Berto makes the catch.

The new hold is a deep horizontal crack in the rock. Berto gets both hands into it, swings briefly, and then finds a hold with his right foot, steadies, and stands.

�Holy God,� Cat says.

�Yeah,� I say. �You see what I mean?�

After a brief pause to wipe the sweat from first one hand, then the other, Berto keeps climbing.

<RedHawk>: That was fun. Can I do it again?

<Mickey7>: You�re the goddamned worst.

<RedHawk>: Did you see the jump?

<Mickey7>: Yeah, Berto. We saw the jump.

<RedHawk>: Pretty sweet, right?

<Mickey7>: The god. Damned. Worst.

<RedHawk>: Anyway, it�s nice up here. The view is unbelievable. I can see all the way back to the ridgeline.

<Mickey7>: Great. Let us know if anything is sneaking up on us, huh?

<RedHawk>: Will do. Speaking of which, I�m kind of wishing I�d brought a weapon with me. If anything catches me here, I�m pretty much defenseless.

<Mickey7>: Yeah, well. We�re all taking our chances at the moment.

<RedHawk>: Truth. What�s your plan down there, by the way?

<Mickey7>: Honestly? I don�t really have one. I�m just kind of letting events carry me, at this point. Hopefully Speaker comes back, or the local creepers send a Prime up to talk to me.

<RedHawk>: And if neither of those things happens?

<Mickey7>: I don�t know, man. My best guess would be that we sit here until something kills us or we all die of thirst, but I�m definitely open to suggestions.

<RedHawk>: I�ll let you know if anything comes to me.

<Mickey7>: Unrelated, and I know I probably should have asked you this before, but do you have enough charge in your thrusters to get back to the dome from here?

<RedHawk>: An excellent question.

<Mickey7>: Thanks. Got an excellent answer?

<RedHawk>: I do not.

<Mickey7>: And if you don�t?

<RedHawk>: Even without the thrusters, this thing still works as a glider. I guess I�ll need to figure out how to ride a thermal.

<Mickey7>: Either that or how to walk home.

<RedHawk>: Right. That.

Right around sunset, Nasha groans, rolls onto her side, and pushes herself up into a sitting position. I kneel down next to her and touch her shoulder.

�Hey,� I say. �How�re you feeling?�

She blinks, rubs her face with both hands, and then rolls her head around in a slow, lazy circle. �Honestly? Better, I think.�

I let out a breath I hadn�t realized I�d been holding. �Oh God. That�s fantastic. You scared the hell out of me.�

Her eyes narrow. �What are you talking about, Mickey? We�re still all going to die here. Does it really matter if it�s from a brain bleed, or creepers, or just waiting around until we all dry up and blow away?�

�No,� I say. �I don�t think we�re going down here. I�ve actually been feeling more optimistic as the day has worn on. If the creepers were planning to kill us, they would have done it by now, right?�

She shakes her head. �I don�t know, babe. I gave up trying to figure out what these things are thinking a while ago. Anyway, even if they don�t, we still die of thirst.�

�I�ve got a plan for that. Berto�s making an emergency supply run back to the dome tomorrow.�

�Okay,� she says. �That gets us, what, four or five liters? Enough for another day?�

I shrug. �Then I send him again.�

She laughs. �You�ve got this all figured out, huh?�

�Absolutely. All part of the master plan.�

After a few moments of silence, Nasha says, �I�m not so sure I trust that the creepers are going to leave us alone here.�

�We don�t want them to leave us alone. We want them to come out here and talk to us. We want them to give us our bomb back, remember?�

�Sure,� Nasha says. �That�s the stretch goal. In the meantime, I�d be happy if they just didn�t eat us�and I have to say, they haven�t done anything so far to give me much confidence. I mean, what was that with Speaker? They killed him, right?�

I shrug. �Did they? Or did they just drag him away?�

�They bit through the back of his neck.�

�Yeah, that�s true, but you�re making a lot of assumptions about what kills a creeper, aren�t you? I mean, does he even have a spine to sever? Where is his brain? For all we know, it�s in his tail.�

She sighs. �He went completely limp, Mickey. He looked awfully damn dead to me.�

I�d like to argue, but she makes a good point.

�You could be right,� I say. �The thing is, though�they didn�t kill us. They could have, but they didn�t. That�s got to mean something.�

�True,� she says. �Doesn�t matter, though. Without Speaker, we can�t talk to them. If we can�t talk to them, we can�t ask for the bomb. If we can�t get the bomb back from them, we�re all dead when winter comes, whether they kill us here or not.�

�No,� I say. �That�s not gonna happen. Just watch. This is all going to work itself out.�

�You got a plan?�

I grin and cup her cheek in one hand. �Don�t need a plan, homie. I�ve got you.�

She punches me, hard enough to knock me onto my backside.

�You�re an idiot,� she says. �You know that, right?�

I scoot closer to her, lean forward, and rest my forehead against hers. �Maybe. I�m your idiot, though.�

She lifts both of our rebreathers just long enough to kiss me.

�You are,� she says. �You really, really are.�

THE CREEPER RETURNS less than an hour later, just as I�m starting to think maybe I should send Berto on a water run. The sun is over the horizon now, and the air has warmed enough that even half-starved, I�m not shivering anymore. I get to my feet as it scuttles toward us.

�We have considered,� it says. �We know what you want. We do not wish to give it to you.�

�Listen�� Nasha begins, but I stop her with a look.

�This thing,� I say. �I know it appears benign, but it is not. It�s dangerous�much more so than you can probably imagine. If you won�t return it to us, the most likely outcome is that you accidentally kill yourselves with it.�

�Interesting,� the creeper says. �You came here out of concern for our well-being?�

�No,� I say. �Clearly not.�

�Clearly,� it says. �Thank you for not attempting to mislead us on this point.�

�However,� I say, �that doesn�t change the fact that if you refuse to return our property to us, it will eventually kill you.�

The creeper raises its first segment and wags it back and forth in a gruesome parody of a head shake. �We do not believe you. We believe that you are attempting to convince us that your device is dangerous in order to enhance your bargaining position. We have studied this object. We do not understand the things that it contains, but we do not believe that they are dangerous.�

And with that, it untucks its feeder arms and releases a bubble.

It takes a long moment for any of us to react. I�ve never seen a magnetic monopole bubble before. I doubt there�s a living human anywhere in the Union who has. These are the things that nearly ended us as a species. The feeling of visceral dread that seizes me when I realize what I�m seeing is impossible to convey. Even without the emotional response, though, it�s hard to look at it. I try, but my eyes can�t seem to focus. Every time I think I�ve got it, they slide away. It�s small, I can tell that much�a twisted knot of shiny blackness that drifts up and away from the creeper like a negative image of a will-o�-the-wisp.

�Holy shit,� Nasha whispers, and takes an involuntary step back. �Is it armed?�

�Can�t be,� Cat says. �Can it, Mickey?�

I don�t answer at first. I�m racking my brain for the twenty minutes of training I had on antimatter fuel elements eleven years ago on Himmel Station. A magnetic monopole bubble is technically unstable, but in its base energy state the median time to decay is something like half a billion years. Which is to say that the bubble drifting in front of me could pop at any moment, but probably won�t anytime soon. The triggering device uses high-energy photons to raise the bubble�s energy state and speed up the process a bit.

If this bubble has been triggered, we�re all already dead.

�I think�� I begin, then have to pause to moisten my suddenly bone-dry mouth. �I think it�s not armed. I mean, it can�t be. The triggering device would have armed every bubble in the pack, and I don�t think the fuse was set to more than a minute or two.�

The bubble drifts higher, then catches a breeze and floats off along the cliff face. Another thirty seconds, and it�s gone.

�You appear to be frightened,� the creeper says. �This is what you came here to retrieve, is it not?�

�That thing,� I say. �Have you removed more of them from the device?�

�No,� it says. �We took great care to extract only one. We were interested to see your reaction. Having seen it now, we must consider.�

As it turns to go, Jamie says, �Hey. We need water.�

Good man. I can�t believe he had the presence of mind to think of that. The creeper pauses. �Water?�

�Yeah,� he says. �If you want us to still be here when you come back, you need to give us water.�

It hesitates, and a ripple runs the length of its body before it continues on. �Acceptable,� it says, then disappears back into the labyrinth.

MARSHALL IS WAITING for us in the hangar when we land. �Well?� he says, while I�m still halfway through the lifter�s hatch. �Where is the device?�

�We don�t have it,� I say. �We�ve got a deal to get it back, but they�re still holding on to it for the moment.�

His jaw sets and his face darkens. �Gomez told me you had the device. I would not have authorized a lifter otherwise. Do you have any idea how much energy the gravitic grids in this machine draw?�

�Well,� I say, �if you hadn�t authorized the lifter we would probably have died out there, and you would never have gotten your bomb back. Count your blessings, I guess.�

�Barnes,� Marshall says, his voice low and even. �Where is the device?�

�It�s complicated,� I say as Nasha steps down from the lifter beside me. �There�s a lot going on, and we�re not going to talk about it now. No disrespect, sir, but Nasha needs medical attention, and we all need to eat and sleep. When that�s done, I�ll give you a complete rundown.�

He tries to grab my arm as I walk past him, but I shrug him off and keep moving.

�Do not walk away from me,� he says to my back. He starts to say something else as I step into the main corridor, but the door sliding shut behind me cuts him off mid-syllable.

�That was bold,� Nasha says. �Hieronymus Marshall doesn�t like being ignored.�

I shrug. �I don�t much care what Marshall thinks at this point. I don�t expect to be alive long enough to worry about the blowback.�

�YOU READY?�

I take a deep breath in, let it out slowly, and nod. Berto touches the control panel. The hangar bay door slides open above us. His right hand engages the gravitics, and we ascend.

The human army of Niflheim is not an impressive thing. They�re filing out of the main lock as we rise up over the dome. First come nine of our eleven remaining Security officers kitted out in full armor. I try to pick Cat out of the line, but honestly they all look the same from here. After them come a dozen reserves�folks from Agriculture and Physics and Engineering who were cross-trained in weapons and tactics back on Himmel Station eleven years ago. They�re not armored, and most of them are carrying burners, not accelerators. That�s probably for the best, because the odds that any of them have touched a weapon since we boosted out are probably close to nil. I don�t know what orders Amundsen gave them, but if it�s anything other than stay out of the way and try not to get hurt, someone should hold him criminally liable.

So that�s it. Twenty-one foot soldiers, maybe half of them actually semi-competent, and me and Berto hovering above them in a fully loaded lifter that will be completely useless once they�re down in the tunnels.

�Is this what you promised them?� Berto asks as we rise up to a thousand meters and slow to a hover. �Tomato tenders with hand weapons? I�d say our people are cannon fodder down there, but that�s probably an insult to cannon fodder.�

I shrug. I sat through Amundsen�s briefing to the Security people with Cat. His advice was to advance down the tunnels in a three-deep phalanx, using staggered fire to make up for the accelerators� slow repeat rate and trying to avoid getting swarmed from more than one direction at a time. It�s basically the approach that the Spartans used at Thermopylae.

That worked out great, right?

Snark aside, it should probably keep them alive as long as their ammunition holds out, and as long as they don�t get themselves caught in an open space.

They�re each carrying four hundred kinetic energy rounds. I remember the image of the cr�che that Eight sent me right before he died. Their ammunition is not going to hold out.

I guess the only real question is whether they kill enough creepers before they go down to satisfy the collective.

Once everyone is clear of the lock, they start off into the hills in a single-file line. They�re aiming for the same entrance that Nasha and I used, the same one that Speaker�s Prime used to set me free when I fell into the labyrinth two years ago.

Best not to think about that now.

�I�m gonna scout ahead,� Berto says over the general comm.

�You do that,� Cat replies. �I assume there�s going to be some kind of coordination with those things before the rounds start flying, right?�

�That�s Mickey�s job. Right, buddy?�

�Yeah,� I say. �Right. I�ll see what I can do.�

Berto engages the thrusters, and we surge ahead. We pass over the tunnel entrance, then over the ridge beyond.

�Well,� Berto says. �There ya go.�

The slope leading up to the far side of the ridge is carpeted in creepers.

Berto brings us back down to five hundred meters and swings out over them in a slow, broad turn. They�re advancing in neat rows in a formation at least two hundred meters wide. The first ranks are made up of smaller ones, packed in so tightly that I can barely see ground between them. Behind them come what looks to be at least a thousand that are more the size of Speaker. They�re spread out a little better, with a meter or two between each row. The formation is flanked by thirty or forty spiders on either side.

�Guess we didn�t get them all, huh?� Berto says.

�Yeah,� I say. �Guess not.�

We loop around over the rear of the formation, then sweep back up to the top of the ridge.

�So,� Berto says. �I�m guessing the plan is that they send our people down first to soften things up, huh? And then when we�re out of ammo and getting ripped to pieces, the drones go in to do the real fighting, with the big ones coming in at the end to clean up the mess. Does that sound about right?�

I check the comm link. He�s speaking over an open channel. Our people can hear everything he�s saying. He realizes that at almost the same moment I do. �Cat�� he begins, but she cuts him off.

�Save it, Berto. We�re not idiots. You�re not telling us anything we didn�t already know.�

He closes his eyes, and his hands tighten on the controls.

�I know,� he says finally. �I�m sorry.�

He mutes our end. We drop another hundred meters or so and then circle back over the creepers again as they move up the hillside like an incoming tide.

�I make at least twenty-five hundred of them all told,� Berto says. �Gods, Mickey. Why do they even need us?�

I think again of the cr�che.

�I don�t think Speaker�s people have so many of the big ones, but they�ve got a shit-ton of the little guys, and I�d guess the defender has a big advantage in tunnel warfare. Speaker said the collective didn�t have the strength to push them out alone. I think it�s pretty much just like you said. They�re counting on us to attrit Speaker�s people down to the point that they can come in and overwhelm them. They let our folks do as much damage as they can, then sweep in when we finally get overrun and butcher the survivors. Human militaries back on Earth used to pull the same basic move with colonial troops all the time.�

�Right,� Berto says. �So we�re not cannon fodder, exactly. More like shock troops? Berserkers? The bottom line is that our people are definitely gonna end up dead before this is over.� He pauses, does something with the controls that brings us around in another broad pass across the front of the creepers� formation, then looks down at his hands and mutters, �This better be worth it.�

We settle into a hover a few hundred meters above the peak of the ridgeline and watch in silence as the creepers advance. On the other side, our people are gathered in a ragged cluster a hundred meters or so below the tunnel entrance.

�We�re here,� Cat says over the comm. �Are you gonna tell us when it�s time to go?�

I unmute our end of the line.

�Sit tight,� I say. �You should be able to��

�Oh�� shit.�

The first ranks of the creepers have just crested the ridge.

�Mickey?�

�Yeah, Cat.�

�There are a million fucking creepers coming over the hill at us.�

�I make twenty-five hundred,� Berto says. �Three thousand, tops.�

�And with those kind of numbers, they need our help? How many of them are there down in those tunnels, Mickey?�

�I don�t know, Cat. At least as many as there are out here. Probably more. Maybe a lot more.�

After a long moment of silence, Cat says, �This really is a suicide mission, isn�t it? You�re sending us down there to die.�

�No, Cat. It�s not�� I mean�� I�m not the one sending you.�

�Oh. Great. Thanks, Mickey. You�re a real friend.�

I look down. The Security officers are forming themselves into a phalanx. The reserves are milling around in a cluster behind them.

My ocular pings.

<UNKNOWN>: Are we allies?

Cat again: �Mickey? What are we doing here?�

Berto cuts in. �Mickey�s spaced. I think maybe he�s in touch with them now.�

<UNKNOWN>: Are we allies?

Berto nudges me with one hand. �Mick? You need to make a call here.�

<Mickey7>: Yes. We are allies.

�The ones on the hilltop,� I say. �Hit them, Berto. Everything you�ve got.�

He turns to stare at me. �What?�

�Hit them,� I say. �Do it now. Cat�form up and get ready to fire. You�re not going into the tunnels. You�re fighting the ones coming over the ridge. We�ll clear as many of them as we can, but we probably won�t get them all.�

�I�ve only got eight cluster bombs in the tubes,� Berto says. �What do you think we�re gonna accomplish here, Mickey? Those are the ones we�re supposed to be helping down there, right?�

The leading edge of the creepers� formation is descending now, maybe two hundred meters shy of Cat�s position.

�Now, Berto. Before they get too close to our people. Do it!�

�Mickey?� Cat says as Berto swings us down and around and accelerates into a strafing run over the creepers� front ranks. �What the hell are you doing?�

Berto looses his first two missiles. They strike an instant later, erupting first into twin fireballs fifty meters apart and then into hundreds of secondary explosions, fifty or sixty meters behind the leading creepers. The reaction is chaos. The first ranks continue on as if nothing had happened. The ones closer to the explosions, though, look less like disciplined soldiers now and more like panicked animals, scrambling around and over each other to get away from the centers of the blasts. We accelerate again, swing into a tight turn, and drop another fifty meters. Our second pass is farther back, near the first of the bigger creepers. These ones seem to understand the danger before we strike. They try to scatter, but there isn�t either time or space for them to escape. The missiles hit, and the air around us is suddenly thick with smoke and debris and bits of chitin. The ones we missed on the first pass are closing with our people now, but the Security folks have opened up, and I can see individual creepers shattering as the accelerator slugs strike them.

�There are too goddamn many of them,� Berto says as he swings around for a third run. I can see that he�s trying to focus on the largest grouping of the bigger ones this time, but the mass of creepers looks like a kicked anthill at this point and they�re spreading out as quickly as they can, making it more difficult to kill them en masse. The explosions when he launches kick up gouts of rock and soil again, but it�s hard to tell how many creepers he�s getting. We swing around one last time. Berto drops his last two warheads just behind the front ranks, close enough to our people now that Cat lets loose a string of curses over the comm when they hit.

�Sorry,� Berto says. �I was trying to give you some breathing room.�

When the field becomes visible through the smoke again, the creepers are scattered over a swath of hillside at least three hundred meters across. At first they move frantically, chaotically�but as I watch, a wave of order spreads from the back ranks, where the remaining bigger ones are forming back up. The surviving ancillaries stop scrambling, fall back in line, and move forward more or less together.

They�re not focused on the tunnel now. They�re entirely focused on our people.

�We did some damage,� I say. �How long to reload?�

Berto shakes his head. �An hour, minimum. No point, is there?�

He�s right. Those last two warheads bought Cat�s people some time and space, but the remaining creepers are surging through the craters now, converging on the little knot of humans.

�Run,� Berto mutters. �They�ve got to run.�

Apparently someone down there has come to the same conclusion. One of the Security people turns half-around and waves at the reserves. I can�t hear what they�re saying, but from the reaction I can guess. Everyone not wearing combat armor turns and breaks for the dome at a dead sprint.

Not Cat and her people, though. The nine of them stand their ground, covering the retreat.

Nine rounds per second. How many creepers are left?

A thousand at least. Probably more.

Forty meters.

Thirty.

Twenty.

Ten.

One of the small creepers breaks through the wall of projectiles our people are throwing up and gets its mandibles into an armored leg before exploding.

�That was Drake,� Berto says.

The wounded man drops to one knee and keeps firing.

�Mickey?� Cat says. �I hope you�ve got a fucking plan here, because we�re about ten seconds from going under.�

Berto turns to look at me. I open my mouth, close it, then open it again, but nothing comes out. I thought��

Doesn�t matter what I thought. I�ve killed my friend.

No, more than that. I�ve killed the colony.

Cat�s people are trying to fall back now, dragging Drake with them, but it�s hopeless. They have to be able to see that. Berto shoves my shoulder. �Mickey? Mickey!�

Run, I think. Leave Drake and run.

I open my mouth to say it, but before I can get the words out, the ground erupts in a dozen places below us and creepers come boiling out. In no more than a second, our people are forgotten as the ones who had surrounded them and the new ones begin tearing one another apart.

�Cat!� I say. �Go!�

I didn�t need to tell her. Two of the Security officers already have Drake lifted between them. Those three take off at a lumbering run while the others continue to fire. When they�ve gotten fifty or sixty meters of separation, three more break and run. No more than five seconds later, the last three sling their weapons and go.

Berto and I watch the rest of the battle in silence. The collective�s fighters are mostly bigger, but there are a lot more of the locals, and honestly they seem to want it more. It takes ten or twelve of the little ones to take down a spider or one of the Speaker-sized creepers, and they lose a lot of bodies in the process, but over the course of thirty minutes the fight goes from a melee spread over two hundred meters of hillside, to a dozen or so scattered knots of combat, to what looks to be mostly collection of the dead and execution of the wounded.

�Holy shit,� Berto says. �What the hell just happened?�

My ocular pings.

<UNKNOWN>: Thank you. We will not forget.

�I�m not sure,� I say, �but I think we won.�

Berto turns to look at me. �Did we? Where�s the bomb, Mickey?�

I close my eyes and breathe in, breathe out.

�We know where it is,� I say. �So let�s go get it.�

WE START WITH a swing out over the ridge where the battle was fought. The craters from Berto�s bombing runs are still there, but if it weren�t for that you wouldn�t be able to tell that anything had happened here. There�s no sign of creepers anywhere�living, wounded, or dead. After that, we head south in a sinuous search pattern that covers fifteen klicks on either side of the straight-line path to the collective. We�re through the hills and out onto the plains when Berto says, �It�s only been a few hours, Mickey. There�s no way a counterattack could have made it this far by now.�

�Yeah,� I say. �I guess you�re right. Think they�re moving underground?�

He turns to look at me. �You think they�ve got tunnels running through a hundred-plus klicks of bedrock from there to here?�

Sure, it sounds stupid when you put it that way.

Berto swings us around, and we retrace our path back to the battlefield. He sets us down on the ridge, two hundred meters above the entrance to the labyrinth. I pull on a rebreather and climb into the back.

�No accelerator?� Berto says.

I shake my head. �If these guys want to kill me at this point, I guess they can do it. I�m not gonna argue with them.�

The atmospheric trap closes. Thirty seconds later, the bay door slides open and I go.

Hard to believe, but it�s still barely midafternoon. The sun is halfway down in a pale pink sky, and a soft, warm breeze is blowing up from the south. For the thousandth time, I find myself wondering how much longer this weather is going to last, and when it�s over, how long we�ll have to endure the winter that follows.

Doesn�t matter, I guess. It won�t be my problem.

I pick my way down the slope through a field of broken and mangled ferns. The stems are oozing a pale yellow fluid, and the smell is strong enough that I�m catching hints of it even through the rebreather. It�s sickly sweet and cloying, with an overtone of rotting meat, and for the first time in a long while I�m actually grateful that I�m not breathing unfiltered air right now.

When I reach the tunnel entrance, I find Speaker there waiting for me.

�Greetings,� he says in a perfect imitation of Berto. �It is good to see you.�

�You too,� I say. �We thought you were dead.�

�I was�� captured.� Speaker says. �Present and aware, but unable to act. It was extremely unpleasant.�

�You got through, though. Back at the dome this morning. That was you, right?�

�I tried. That far from their Prime, the collective�s hold on me was badly weakened. It was clear to me that my Prime�s only hope was to remind you of your promise. I did not think that I succeeded.�

�You did,� I say. �You did well.�

�Yes,� he says. �As did you.�

I let that hang between us for a full minute or more before deciding that there�s no point in putting off the unpleasantness.

�I got the bomb back from the collective,� I say.

�This is good,� Speaker says. �I am pleased for you. I hope you remember your promise to dismantle it.�

�I do. I will. I have to tell you, though�in order to recover it, I had to make a promise to them.�

�Yes,� Speaker says. �This does not surprise me.�

�The thing that I promised them was protection.� I wait for Speaker to react, but he just squats there, impassive as a stone. �Protection from you,� I say. �I promised that we would prevent you from destroying them.�

�Well,� Speaker says, �this should be an exceedingly easy promise to keep, since we have no intention of destroying them.�

I open my mouth to respond, hesitate, then close it again.

�But��

�It should be clear to you by now that the thing at the heart of the collective is not of my species, yes?�

I shrug. �I mean, I kind of assumed that, once I saw it. I wasn�t entirely sure, though, after what you told us about the spiders.�

�I tell you now that it is not. In fact, it is not an animal of any type, nor a plant. It is a third kind of life, but I do not know your word for it.�

�A fungus?�

A ripple runs the length of his body. �Perhaps. In any case, we know of its type. It is a parasite, infecting creatures and overtaking their neural systems. It is a plague in particular to the small, crawling things that hunt in the ferns. We have never known it to seize any larger creature.�

�But it seized one of your Primes.�

�Yes,� Speaker says. �It did, and in doing so it seems to have achieved some form of sentience. We would not have thought this possible. We need to study it now, to determine if this was a chance occurrence, or if this represents a new type that poses a true danger to us. So, we will not destroy the collective. We will seal the entrances to their labyrinth, though, and we will watch to ensure that they remain sealed.�

�You intend to bury them alive?�

�This seems to us to be the safest option. We must preserve them for study, but we cannot risk the spread of further contamination. Once we have learned what can be learned, any of us who have had direct contact with the collective will be disassembled and sterilized.�

�Oh. But you��

�Yes,� he says. �You see this correctly. I interfaced directly with the collective. I am surely infected. So I will be isolated and observed. Once the infection takes root and manifests, I will be destroyed. This is hard, but it is necessary. I would not expect you to understand.�

I stare at him.

He stares back at me.

I can�t help myself. I burst out laughing.

�I�m sorry,� I say when I finally wind down. �I�m really sorry.� I crouch down in front of him. His mandibles nearly brush against my face. After a moment, one feeding arm reaches out toward me, claw-tipped tentacles splayed. I raise my right hand and press my palm against it. �I do understand, my brother. You�d be surprised how well I understand.�

We hold that tableau for what feels like a long while, until finally Speaker withdraws his arm. He scuttles back a half meter, and I stand. He rises up to face me.

�Goodbye, Mickey,� he says. �I am pleased to have met you.�

My vision blurs, and I don�t trust my voice to reply. After a long five seconds, Speaker bobs his first segment in my direction, then turns and disappears into the labyrinth.

ONE OF THE first things Jemma Abera drilled into my head all those years ago on Himmel Station was the story of the Ship of Theseus. Theseus sails around the world in a wooden ship, replacing parts as he goes. When he gets home years later, he�s replaced every single board and line. Is it still the same ship?

As I�m walking out of Medical, it occurs to me that I never thought about the pieces that Theseus left behind. That�s what I am now, isn�t it? When my next iteration comes out of the tank, the person I am at this moment won�t be a part of his narrative. Mickey Barnes will still be alive, but me?

I�m already a ghost.

It�s a short walk from Medical to Maggie Ling�s quarters. It�s just past 04:00, so she�s definitely not up right now, but at this point I want this to be over and I don�t much care about her sleep cycle.

As head of Systems Engineering, Maggie is the second-highest-ranking person in leadership behind Marshall. Her rack actually rates a metal door. I stand facing it for what feels like a long while.

Last chance to back out, right?

I close my eyes and breathe in, breathe out.

I raise my hand to knock.

Much to my surprise, the door opens before I�ve touched it. Maggie almost walks into me, then jumps back with a start.

�Barnes? What are you doing here?�

�Hey,� I say. �Sorry, I didn�t�� I mean, I just�� um�� I just finished uploading, so I guess�� I�m ready. I know it�s practically the middle of the night, but I�m tired and I want to get this over with. Let�s do it.�

She stares at me, eyebrows knitted. �Do what, exactly?�

�Um�� do the bomb, Dr. Ling. Isn�t that what I�m supposed to be doing now? Shove the fuel elements back into the reactor? Save the colony?�

She shakes her head. �Go back to bed, Mickey. It�s already done.�

�It�s�� what? How can it�� did you use a drone?�

�No,� she says. �Unfortunately, we did not. That was my suggestion, but I was overruled. My argument was that the failure of our last attempt was a fluke, and that the odds of success with a slightly more heavily armored unit would be good, but Commander Marshall was adamant that the risk was too great.�

I can feel my face harden. �So you pulled another iteration of me out of the tank?�

�Look,� she says, �I�m actually feeling a bit overwhelmed this morning, and I don�t have time to be your psychotherapist. Check your messages. If you still have questions after that, we can set up a meeting.�

With that, she closes the door behind her, brushes past me, and walks away.

Check your messages.

I blink to a chat window, and there it is: a string of unread texts. They must have come through while I was under for the upload.

They�re from Marshall.

I open the thread.

<Command1>: Barnes.

<Command1>: Acknowledge, please.

<Command1>: Very well. I had hoped to engage with you directly on this, but I have neither the time nor the inclination to wait for you to finish your beauty sleep, so:

<Command1>: First, an apology. I have not treated you well over the past eleven years. I have done what I thought was necessary for the success of this mission and for the survival of our colony, but in the process I have used you badly, in ways that are now increasingly clear to me. Understand, please: I would not do anything differently if I had it to do over. I do, however, regret the necessity.

<Command1>: Second, an explanation. I would guess that you went to sleep this evening expecting at any moment to be ordered into the reactor core. You may in fact have wondered why it hadn�t happened yet. I told you when I sent you to retrieve the bomb that I would release you from any such obligation if you succeeded, but given our history together, I wouldn�t blame you if you assumed that this was a lie.

<Command1>: It was not.

<Command1>: You said to me once that despite all evidence, you didn�t believe that I was a villain from a vid drama. It may surprise you to learn that I do not believe myself to be a villain either. In fact, I consider myself to be a person of honor and integrity, one who has at every turn done what was necessary to protect the people placed in my charge.

<Command1>: That is what I am doing tonight.

<Command1>: As I said, I promised you that I would not order you into the reactor. However, for the survival of the colony, those fuel elements must be replaced. Dr. Ling suggests that we use another drone. She states that she believes the probability of failure this time to be less than five percent.

<Command1>: I will not risk the lives of every person on this planet on a one-in-twenty chance.

<Command1>: Her second suggestion was to ask for volunteers.

<Command1>: Here is a fact that you may not have been aware of, Barnes: the median age of colonists on this planet is thirty-six standard years. Our youngest is thirty-two. You are actually among our oldest�or would be, in any case, if you hadn�t been reset so often. There are four of us other than you who are in our forties: Drs. Ling, Burke, Berrigan, and Rausch.

<Command1>: There is only a single human on this planet older than fifty standard years. Can you guess who that is?

<Command1>: I have to go now, Barnes. Dr. Ling will assume command of this colony sometime in the next ten minutes, if what she tells me about the environment in the core is correct. You�re her problem now.

<Command1>: Good luck. I suspect you�ll need it.

I WAKE TO the sound of a lock disengaging. I�d been sleeping with my forehead resting on my knees, propped against the wall next to the door to the surgical recovery room. I look up to see Burke standing over me.

�Get up,� he says. �You can come in now.�

I get to my feet and follow him in. Nasha is there, laid out in a bed that fills ninety percent of the room. Her eyes are closed, but as I watch, her chest rises and then falls.

�Is she��

�Don�t know,� Burke says. �Let�s find out.�

He pulls out a tablet, shows it his ocular, and then taps at the screen. Something green flows through the tube that runs into a vein on the back of Nasha�s hand.

Her eyelids flutter.

�Adjaya?� Burke says. �Can you hear me?�

Her eyes focus on him, then on me. The tip of her tongue runs across her upper lip. I edge around the corner of the bed and take her hand.

�Mickey?� she whispers. �What the actual fuck?�

�She�s good,� I say. �Right, Burke?�

He squints at his tablet, then up at Nasha. �Can you move your toes?�

She sits half-up, grabs the back of my head in one hand, and pulls me down into a kiss.

�Yeah,� Burke says. �I think she�s good.�

Title Page

Copyright Notice

Dedication

Chapter 001

Chapter 002

Chapter 003

Chapter 004

Chapter 005

Chapter 006

Chapter 007

Chapter 008

Chapter 009

Chapter 010

Chapter 011

Chapter 012

Chapter 013

Chapter 014

Chapter 015

Chapter 016

Chapter 017

Chapter 018

Chapter 019

Chapter 020

Chapter 021

Chapter 022

Chapter 023

Chapter 024

Acknowledgments

Also by Edward Ashton

About the Author

Copyright