'No no no no no.' Domecq fluttered his arms about dismissively, and when they settled again Peron found his eyes clear and keen. He was a different man from the one she'd been speaking to only moments before. 'No time like the present, so they say.'

Pryce looked decidedly relieved, leading Domecq to the door and ushering him through with far too much eagerness. When the door sliced shut, Peron checked the girl. The accelerators were nearing the end of their task, and the deep brain activity was now only slightly erratic, due apparently to the jury-rigged skullcap that Domecq had suggested. He had said he was a man who thrived on improvisation. Peron was beginning to warm to him, despite the fact that he could yet prove to be an enemy spy. If that were the case, she thought, it could prove an exhilarating challenge to take this man down.

Shivering from the noticeable temperature drop when they entered the storerooms, Pryce led Domecq to the bolted door at the end of the short stretch of corridor.

'The mothers checked out perfectly,' Pryce was saying. 'No family history. No nothing. But the things they gave birth to. . . well, you'll see for yourself.'

'These creatures are babies babies?' Domecq asked incredulously. Pryce gave him a dark look. 'These creatures are creatures creatures. Can't you feel the atmosphere as soon as you come in here?'

'I can certainly feel the cold,' Domecq observed.

Pryce unbolted the door and waved Domecq through. The room beyond contained metal shelves stacked with detergents and a whole a.r.s.enal of cleaning equipment. Domecq looked bewildered, and Pryce indicated the floor-to-ceiling stack of swiftcloths at the back of the room. Domecq still looked blank, until Pryce grasped one of the rolls of cloth and tugged open the disguised door that led to the second, hidden door beyond.

Domecq was abruptly fascinated.

Pryce opened the door to reveal a further short corridor with six doors off to each side. This section was even colder, and Pryce sensed the danger here as soon as he stepped inside. It was a most tangible malice, even though the cells 67.were entirely silent. Opening up the door to cell two, Pryce waved Domecq into the darkness. Obviously puzzled at first, and perhaps a little mistrusting, Domecq gave him a furtive look.

'Over there.' Pryce pointed. 'Behind the toilet.'

Peering into the shadow, Domecq finally saw the creature cowering in the corner of the cell, watching them with wide, terrified eyes.

'Careful,' Pryce warned, as Domecq stepped over the cell to crouch near the creature.

Watching from the door, alert for the sounds of the others, Pryce saw Domecq trying to offer his hand. The creature stared fretfully and Domecq edged closer, dropping to his knees in an attempt to shrink himself to the same size as the thing.

'h.e.l.lo,' Domecq cooed. 'What's your your name?' name?'

'This is Number Two,' Pryce responded, stepping over to hunch beside Domecq.

The creature shrank back, and Domecq fixed Pryce with a peculiar look, his eyes twin fires in the darkness.

'They don't have names?'

Pryce shook his head. 'Why should they?'

Ignoring the question, Domecq returned to the creature, raising his hand again in a coaxing gesture. The creature simply gawked out of its great black eyes, completely unresponsive.

'I'm the Doctor,' Domecq said softly. I'm here to help you.'

'They won't speak,' Pryce told him.

'Quiet,' Domecq snapped. The creature flung up its arms in an automatic, useless gesture of defence.

'I'm sorry,' soothed Domecq. 'I'm not going to hurt you. . . '

Extending his hand towards the creature, Domecq positioned his fingers only centimetres from the thing. It gazed at his hand and, to Pryce's surprise, actually began to reach out to touch.

'That's better,' Domecq whispered. 'Are you going to come out of there?'

Wrapping its three spindly fingers around Domecq's outstretched hand, the creature allowed itself to be lured out from behind the toilet, but it remained wary. Domecq sat cross-legged on the floor so that his face was level with the creature's, and Pryce watched as he gazed at the slim pale thing as if he were under some enchanted spell.

'Now, Mr Number Two,' Domecq said, his voice trickling into the cold dark air like liquid compa.s.sion, 'would you mind very much if I take a closer look at 68you?'

The creature allowed itself to be turned for inspection, finally gazing back at Domecq with only the slightest trace of anxiety remaining in its huge eyes.

Domecq fumbled in his pocket, and a moment later Pryce saw a small white ball had appeared in Domecq's fingers. Clasping the ball in his other hand, Domecq left the clenched fist momentarily in the air while the creature watched in silent fascination. Slowly, Domecq's fingers spread to reveal an empty hand.

The creature looked instantly at Domecq's other hand, only to find that empty as well. Baffled, Pryce watched as Domecq opened his mouth to reveal the ball. It fell into his open hand and he grinned at the creature. Pryce was amazed to see the small dark line that was the creature's mouth stretch into a tiny smile. The last vestiges of mistrust seemed to ebb from its eyes, and it extended slender fingers to touch Domecq's lips in wonder.

Apart from the continuous rumbling of the city's progress, Pryce realised abruptly just how quiet the holding bay was tonight. No restless shuffling in the cells, no agitated rattling of the doors. Pryce had never been able to enter this area without feeling threatened, but suddenly he sensed a new tranquillity in the hold. It seemed to Pryce that Domecq had accomplished in seconds what Pryce had failed to do in two months. He'd made contact with these things.

But Pryce knew what they were capable of.

'I'd be very wary,' he warned. 'They can be unexpectedly vicious.'

Domecq looked doubtful. 'Vicious?'

'They use telepathy. Get into your head. They're like wild animals sometimes.'

'Mr Number Two here seems harmless enough to me,' Domecq observed. He was doing the trick again, this time making the ball vanish completely as the creature observed in amazement. It touched his lips and Domecq opened his mouth to show it was empty.

'Don't let them fool you. They change so suddenly. They're evil.'

'Evil? That's an odd word to use.'

Pryce nodded knowingly, watching the huge black eyes of the creature gleaming in the shadow. They watched him right back, entirely empty of human emotion of any kind.

'Oh, they're evil all right,' Pryce a.s.sured him. 'They've got the Devil in their genes.'

'Perhaps they're just cold and hungry,' Domecq suggested, eyes flashing around the desolate cell. 'How long have they been in here?'

'Eight weeks now, since they were born.'

69.Domecq appeared amazed, scrutinising the creature with renewed fascination.

'They're only eight weeks old?'

'How much did they tell you in the reports?'

'Very little,' Domecq admitted, reaching out unexpectedly to pluck the ball from behind the creature's ear.

'They wouldn't want too much information out in the open,' Pryce supposed.

'Daren't risk the wrong people getting to know too much.'

Domecq nodded, pa.s.sing the ball for the creature to inspect. 'That's understandable.'

'We've got twelve of them,' Pryce told him, rising from the floor to squat on the edge of the creature's bunk. 'All born at the same time. The strangest thing was, they were spread right over the six continents. Pretty evenly distributed across the entire world. The med comps picked up abnormalities in foetal development so we knew there was something strange about them long before they arrived. They were all exactly the same, same developmental problems, same natal aberrations. Have you seen their hands?'

Domecq observed the creature as it turned the ball repeatedly in front of its face. 'Three fingers. . . '

'They were born two months premature,' Pryce informed him. 'Same cranial bloating. Big wide heads and those enormous, weird eyes. And they have some kind of telepathic link with one another. If you hurt one, they all feel the pain.'

Domecq looked appalled. 'You've been inflicting pain on them?'

'Of course. We've carried out exhaustive research. We've prepared detailed reports. I'm sure you'll find them fascinating.'

Domecq was on his feet, pacing up and down the cell, plunging his fingers through his wild hair. He was talking fast and low, words spilling into the room like shards of shattered metal.

'You're torturing sentient beings to test their telepathic abilities? And you call them them creatures? You label creatures? You label them them evil? It never fails to amaze me just how conceited, egotistical and downright thoughtless human beings can be. You have such an unparalleled capacity for. . . evil? It never fails to amaze me just how conceited, egotistical and downright thoughtless human beings can be. You have such an unparalleled capacity for. . . caring caring. . . yet you seem totally inept at putting it into practice. . . '

' Doctor! Doctor! ' Pryce cut across his flow, and found Domecq glaring at him out of a deep dark shadow backed by the light from the corridor. The man appeared to Pryce for a moment like some kind of angel with a protective radiance. ' Pryce cut across his flow, and found Domecq glaring at him out of a deep dark shadow backed by the light from the corridor. The man appeared to Pryce for a moment like some kind of angel with a protective radiance.

There was a long, outraged silence, then Pryce filled the cold air with consoling words.

70.

'We were operating under strict instructions from Earth Central. From your From your own people! own people! These things were developing much faster than anybody antic.i.p.ated, racing through weeks' worth of growth in days. You were These things were developing much faster than anybody antic.i.p.ated, racing through weeks' worth of growth in days. You were two months two months away. We couldn't just wait. . . ' away. We couldn't just wait. . . '

Domecq shook his head.

'These children are not lab rats,' he said despondently. 'You can't treat them like this.'

'They're not children,' Pryce reminded him plaintively. 'They're creatures.

Not human. Don't be taken in by a superficial similarity.'

Domecq plunged to his knees to take the ball form the creature, swiftly repeated his trick, produced the ball magically from his mouth, and the creature slapped its hands together and awarded him a grin of delight. Domecq handed over the ball and Pryce was stunned into silence by the look he received from Domecq.

'If that's not a child,' Domecq said, obviously struggling to keep his feelings under control, 'then I don't know what your definition is.'

Pryce abruptly saw something in the creature's eyes. As the creature inspected the ball clutched delicately between its three slender fingers, head tilted slightly and eyes completely engrossed in the magic of such an ordinary thing, Pryce recognised suddenly a childlike wonder at the world.

At that moment Mij Peron appeared at the door, watching them curiously.

'Mr Tyran is ready to see Dr Domecq now,' she informed them briskly.

As she ushered them out of the cell Domecq paused at the door, gazing back to see the small creature standing alone in front of the toilet, ball in hand, shoulders hunched in sadness. It regarded Domecq with big, dejected eyes.

And then the door slammed shut.

Wallowing alone in a pool of pain and darkness, Danyal Bains had reached his second momentous decision this night. Badly injuring a military operative by blasting him with chopper jets was a capital offence, Bains decided. It wasn't written up as such, oh no, but he knew for sure that he wasn't going to get out of Military One tonight with his life. They were going to make him pay for his insolence. They were going to put him through h.e.l.l, then send him there.

Bains was now a prisoner of war, and the codes governing his safe conduct were about to be violated in the name of a greater cause. It would be extremely convenient for Gaskill Tyran if Bains never made it back from his daring and highly risky attempt to make off with a military chopper. Bains had proved a 71.very irritating itch now for far too long, and the information inside Bains's head was the most dangerous knowledge in the universe.

So, tonight, here in the cells of Military One, Danyal Bains was going, for his sins, to cop it. They could, of course, kill him and take him to medicare to be revived. But he doubted medicare figured in their plans. They'd probably kill him, leave him dead, and fake the circ.u.mstances of his demise to suit their purposes. Nice and tidy. Get rid of Bains and and his discoveries all in the s.p.a.ce of a day or so. Easy. his discoveries all in the s.p.a.ce of a day or so. Easy.

And that was why, when the door opened to admit the sour-faced woman from earlier, along with a rough-featured man who reminded Bains of Tyran's personal guard in appearance and in att.i.tude, Bains felt he had absolutely nothing to lose.

The woman still wore her sidearm, and Bains was gratified to see that the holster was still unclipped. The gun was intended as a threat, but it was going to prove just the opposite.

They didn't waste any time. The woman sat stiff-backed on the seat facing Bains, while the man grasped his arms from behind and tugged them up so that Bains cried out in pain from his smashed ribs. He recognised a glint of satisfaction in the woman's eyes as she cupped her hands on the desk.

'Did I tell you how serious your offences were, Professor Bains?'

Bains couldn't get a reply out through his gritted teeth. The thug yanked his arms again, and he was forced to gasp ' Yes Yes.'

'And did I mention that you were going to regret ever setting foot on Ceres Alpha?'

' Yes Yes,' he replied before the next explosion of agonies ripped through him.

The woman's eyes flicked up briefly, and Bains felt the pressure on his arms suddenly released. The woman fixed him with her little black stones-for-eyes.

He was reminded fleetingly of the image of a grotesque pig. A filthy beast used for its meat before synthogens replaced the need for animal tissue completely.

She watched him squirming in pain on the desk for a while before pushing herself back on her seat. It sc.r.a.ped across the floor with a thunderous growling sound.

The desk cracked suddenly as she slammed a truncheon down on it only a centimetre from Bains's face. The recoil from the desk slapped him in the jaw and he wondered if he now had a perforated eardrum on top of all his other troubles.

'I have a man down because of you,' the woman hissed. 'Get on your feet.'

72.

But Bains remained where he was, biding his time, playing lame, saving every sc.r.a.p of energy he had left in his battered body. The seat vanished from under him, presumably wrenched out by the bruiser at his back, and he crashed to the floor at the side of the desk.

'Get up!' yelled the woman.

She tried to encourage him with a fresh kick to his already shattered ribs.

The agony filled his head to the exclusion of all else. When he regained his senses he realised he was being yanked up by the hair. Grasping the edge of the desk, Bains found the woman standing directly at his side, truncheon slapping impatiently into the palm of her hand.

That was when he made his move. The gun came out of its holster in a fluid motion and swung in the air until he saw the man behind him. He let out a single shot that exploded like a bomb going off in the enclosed s.p.a.ce. The man collapsed to the deck with a blast of air and a sound like an animal cry, scrabbling in a pool of spreading blood as he clutched his knee.

The gun continued through the air and a split second later Bains was pressing it against the woman's forehead. Her piggy eyes froze and the truncheon clattered to the floor at her feet.

'Com,' Bains barked.

Removing her com instantly, she handed it over without a word. He left the gun exactly where it was and she floundered in uncertainty and approaching doom.

'Cuffs,' he demanded.

She handed them over and he nodded to the seat. She got the message loud and clear and let him fix her to the chair.

Bains knelt by the thug and yanked the com from his tunic. There was blood pooled around him and he grasped his knee in paroxysms of pain, spreading the dark liquid across the floor with his writhing. Bains unclipped the cuffs from the man's belt and trained the gun on him. The man offered one arm while he used the other to try to stem the flow of blood from his leg. Finally Bains clipped the second wrist into the cuffs and the man lay there blasting rapid breaths through clenched teeth.

Rushing back to the woman, Bains scrutinised the pouches that covered her tunic.

'You have tranquilliser pellets,' he said.