8

The human mind operates within a brain that comes in a one-size-fits-all lump of meat. The AI mind operates from vessels as many and various as are the different minds they contain. The basic Golem mind is stored in a ‘brain’ that is a fist-sized lozenge of crystal laced with s-con nanofilaments and micro-optics, semi-conducting laminates in their billions, power feeds and cooling tubes. It is roughly equivalent to a human mind, but eidetic and functioning ten times as fast, though limited by anthropomorphic emulation programs. Going by the old IQ system, the Golem comes in at about 150. But such methods of measurement are now almost irrelevant, as Golem can be upgraded and, with augs and gridlinks, even that lump of meat can transcend the limits imposed on it by evolution. Also, human minds can be loaded to silicon—become AI—and, if the rumours are true, AI minds can be loaded to human brains. And, in the end, it is difficult to know what to measure.

- Excerpt from a speech by Jobsworth

Completion . . . the symmetry . . . aesthetically pleasing.

Cormac swung his legs out of his bed and, swearing, stood up. ‘Jack, take us out of U-space and set up a communication link through the runcible network.’

The AI did not question the order, and Cormac immediately felt the lurch; the displacement as the Jack Ketch surfaced into realspace. For a second he thought that somewhere on the ship there was a fault in the shielding, for what he had just felt had been almost painful. Then he realized that might not be the true explanation; the feeling was probably all his own. Perhaps, like someone subjected to allergens for too long, he was becoming overly sensitized? He dismissed the thought—for the present.

‘Right, run a trace through the net and locate the Sparkind Golem called Cento.’

‘Bearing on our present mission?’ asked Jack’s voice, sounding leaden.

‘Symmetry—don’t you see? When she said it, I assumed she was talking metaphorically, vaguely, but what she was actually saying referred to something specific. To complete Mr Crane, to make him symmetrical and aesthetically pleasing, Skellor needs what Cento has.’

‘Skellor . . . technical ability? He could easily build an arm to mirror the one Crane already possesses.’

‘Yes, he could but, underneath all that ugly Jain technology and his crystal matrix AI, there is one thing about Skellor that must not be forgotten.’

‘What one thing must not be forgotten?’

‘That he is a complete bastard.’

‘Query: weakness?’

‘It was before—couldn’t resist the urge to gloat. Now, what are Thorn and Gant doing right now, and why the fuck am I talking to one of your subminds, anyway?’

After a long pause, Jack’s more familiar voice replied, ‘Sorry about that—otherwise occupied. Gant is waiting outside Medical. Unfortunately, while you were sleeping Thorn collapsed and is now undergoing surgery to remove his mycelium.’

Cormac began pulling on his clothes. ‘Why wasn’t I told?’

‘I didn’t tell you because to do so would achieve nothing of value. I suspect Gant had other concerns to occupy him—like resuscitating his friend, then carrying him to Medical.’

No need to get tetchy, Cormac replied over his gridlink, as he stepped to his cabin door. Then, as he headed for the dropshaft, he accessed Jack at a lower level, to try for a visual link to wherever the surgery was taking place.

Ah, I was apprised of this new ability of yours.

Cormac grunted, as almost with physical force the AI rebuffed his attempt.

I just want to know what’s going on.

Over the intercom, Jack replied, ‘ Patran Thorn has shown some need for privacy in this matter and he shall have it. If security was of any concern, or this procedure had any bearing on the mission in hand, you would be given full access.’

Reaching the dropshaft, Cormac hesitated over the control. It surprised him just how worried he was about Thorn, and with what urgency he wanted to be at the man’s side. But he clamped down on that. In truth, he was in the best hands—if hands they were.

Out loud, Cormac said, ‘Okay, keep me apprised, but tell Gant I want him on the bridge. Now, are you running that trace?’

‘I am. It will probably be some minutes before we receive a reply.’

‘Instantaneous communication?’

‘Only when you instantly know precisely what to say.’

Cormac snorted and set the control of the shaft to take him to the bridge. When he finally stepped out of the shaft, it was below a sky only lightly dusted with stars, and with Gant charging along behind him.

‘What is it?’ Gant asked.

Cormac studied him. The soldier’s mind was human, but directly recorded into a crystal matrix inside a Golem body, and Cormac wondered just how real was the worry evident in his expression. But then the same doubt could be applied to any genuine living human’s expression of emotion. In all cases it was what you did that counted, not what was going on in your mind.

‘How is he?’ he asked.

Gant shook his head. ‘Alive—but he’ll be going into cold sleep soon.’

‘You’ll get him back.’

Now expressionless, Gant said, ‘Why have we dropped out of U-space?’

‘Symmetry,’ said Cormac tersely. ‘Skellor has gone after Crane’s missing arm—the arm Cento now possesses.’

‘Arrogant. . . and stupid.’

‘He would perhaps consider himself as being utterly capable and in control.’ Cormac turned to scan the bridge. As if in response to this, Jack’s automaton stood up from its chair with that cog-grinding clockwork sound and its eyes glittering. ‘Jack, I’d like to talk to Aphran again.’

The AI didn’t reply. Instead, the automaton just slumped, its eyes going out. A line then cut down beside Cormac, and the young Aphran folded out of the air.

‘Does Skellor know you’re still... existing?’ he asked her bluntly.

‘I told him about the light—when it was too late.’

‘So he does?’

Aphran just hung there, not reacting to that.

Cormac bit back his frustration. ‘Okay, leave that. Was he aware just how much you know of his plans?’

‘He did not know how close I was to him, and when he ejected the bridge pod of the Occam Razor, he thought to leave me behind. I hid from him, but stayed close. Close in the dark.’

Cormac turned to Gant, who was staring off to one side of the drawing room where something new had appeared. Glancing over, Cormac saw that Jack had now added an electric chair to his collection here. He grimaced. ‘Let’s try to ignore the distractions.’

‘Sorry,’ said Gant, pulling his attention back.

Cormac paused, then went on, ‘Assume Skellor doesn’t know about her. When he departed on the Vulture, he would have known we would find the bridge pod and realize he was still alive. But to his mind we’d have no idea of his destination or intentions, and our chances of finding him would be minimal. He will think that all he has to avoid is a general search for him across a massive and ever-increasing volume of space.’

Gant said, ‘He probably thinks that we’ll assume he’s fled.’

‘Quite. So he’ll believe he’s got plenty of time on his hands, and much room in which to manoeuvre—that’s why he feels he can play. In his own estimation he is a very powerful being who can travel at will, without risk of discovery, inside and outside the Polity. He’ll never consider himself the subject of direct pursuit.’

‘And we don’t want him to learn that, because then he might run and hide.’

‘I have now received information concerning Cento,’ Jack suddenly piped up.

‘Let’s hear it,’ said Cormac, eyeing Aphran who now appeared as if just this brief interrogation had worn her down to the bone.

‘The Golem was sent on a simple mission to confirm the discovery of an ancient artefact, and has been out of contact ever since—though this is not unusual, as no provision was made for a communication link to be maintained. The sector AI has since failed to establish contact with the carrier shell.’

‘Carrier shell?’ said Gant.

Jack continued, ‘A landing vessel inside a U-space carrier was sent out to the location of the artefact. Both are the private property of an archaeological foundation; both are over two hundred years old and sub-AI. The landing vessel, as well as not possessing U-space engines, does not possess a U-space transmitter.’

‘Jack,’ said Cormac, ‘forget Viridian and take us there. I think that’s where we’ll find a fresher trail.’ Now he looked across at the electric chair: ‘And, Jack, you need to get out more.’

* * * *

Streaks of magma, across the hull of the survey ship, radiated in vacuum as they cooled. The carrier shell, hanging in space before it like a huge iron nut—with the hole through its centre shaped to the wedge of the survey ship rather than threaded for some giant bolt—had cooled already. Cento supposed he had expected something like this, and analytically he studied the hole punched through the side of the shell, and the radial splashes of molten metal all around it. Either Skellor’s ship carried kinetic weapons, or the man had grappled some piece of debris in this system and flung it at the shell. How he had achieved this did not matter. The result was all that was important right now: all its systems were down and it seemed likely that the craft would never again be used to transport ships through U-space. Nevertheless, Cento steered the little ship into the docking hole. Three of the ten automatic clamps engaged, and the ship was then lined up to the airlock and the fuelling and recharging systems, but the ship’s arrival initiated no further activity. Cento unstrapped and propelled himself into the back of the vessel. At least now he did not have gravity to fight.

The airlock of the little vessel mated with that of the carrier shell but the shell door, even though running on an independent power supply, would not open. Whatever system it ran on was intelligent enough to recognize that the ship contained no air, yet not bright enough to figure that its only occupant had no need to breathe. Restraining what emulation of frustration he could achieve, Cento returned to the cockpit and switched the computer back on. Through its screen it obligingly informed him that there was no air in the ship, but that a number of options were available to him.

‘Stupid machine,’ he mouthed in vacuum, and instructed the computer to repressurize the vessel. Then he returned to the airlock, to wait out the long minutes before the carrier lock opened. He swore aloud when the door still refused to open, this time because there was no air inside the carrier shell itself, and went to find what tools he might require. Three hours later, he finally got through the door.

Fire had scoured the inside of the shell, blasted around the ring-shaped transit tubes by the explosive impact. Propelling himself three quarters of the way round, he eventually found where the object had struck, and peered into the well the impact had drilled through the station. Skellor’s shooting had been admirably accurate. Whatever the object, it had cut right through one of the three balanced U-space engines and taken out the main fusion generator. In one respect, Cento considered himself lucky: at least the generator had merely failed rather than detonated—had that been the case there would be no shell here at all. He propelled himself across the cavity and into the transit tube beyond. Coming at last to the place he was seeking—a simple sliding door—he drove the blade of his hand with such force at the thin lamination of metal and insulation that it punched through without any reaction propelling him away. In a minute, he had torn a hole large enough to climb through.

The room contained a console, holojector and camera, as well as optic feeds leading to the outside of the shell. Nothing seemed damaged here, though he had no idea what condition the exterior emitter was in. Reaching down, he tore away the tattered remains of his hotsuit, then his similarly damaged syntheskin. Groping inside his gut, he found a shielded power cable, tracked it up into his chest and unplugged it. His vision dimmed and his movements slowed, but not enough to prevent him plugging the cable into the universal adaptor underneath the console. Immediately the device’s displays lit.

With slow precision, he pressed the touch sequence for a diagnostic check, and soon found the U-space transmitter to be in perfect working order. Using the keyboard, he typed out the message he wanted to send, and the all-important coordinates. Now it was time to send—and to sleep. He instructed the device to transmit continuously until it received an acknowledgement. He had time only to reach out and clamp his hand shut on the handle beside the console before his artificial consciousness left him—the transmitter using up the bulk of his own power output.

* * * *

The quarantine pod Mika had occupied, along with all its equipment, had been destroyed in one of Jerusalem’s fusion furnaces, then the surrounding area had been scanned down to the molecular level and classified at ‘contamination level 5’. She already knew that anything coming into contact with Jain technology could never be classified as clean. She now occupied a work station where she studied, by proxy, the mycelium on the bridge pod, which the AI was holding at not much above absolute zero.

‘There is stuff here,’ she gazed at a screen, ‘that could probably be called picotech. In fact much of it can only be extrapolated, as we haven’t the instruments to study it directly.’

‘That is not so unfeasible—my own etched-atom processors come under that classification,’ replied the disembodied voice of Jerusalem.

Mika nodded, then walked over to the partial VR immersion frame, which was her main tool of study. She backed into the frame and it closed about her arms and legs, gloved her hands and closed its cowl down over her face. The immersion here was partial because it did not engage all her senses, only her sight, her hearing and the touch of her hands. She would go to total immersion if she ever needed to smell Jain-tech—or have sex with it.

In VR, she suddenly occupied a vast plenum below a flat white sky. Beside her floated the multicoloured cubes, tetrahedrons, spheres and other Euclidian solids of her main controls. She reached out, touched one face of a heptahedron, and broke it into a rainbow of pyramids. Taking hold of the blue one, she said, ‘Image.’

Immediately the nanoscope view she had been earlier studying on a screen spread out before her like a mountain range. Manipulating the icon she held, then a sphere she selected out of the air, she transplanted a single large molecule and expanded it hugely before her, whilst wiping out the original view. ‘Just on the molecular level this alone will take me days of processing time to work out, and having done that I’ll only know what it can do by itself, not how it interacts with the billions of others that make up this mycelium.’

‘Yes, it’s like studying DNA.’

Mika glanced at the silver eyeless head which Jerusalem favoured as a representation of itself. She continued, ‘Worse than that. At least with DNA you know that its function remains at the molecular level -nothing smaller than that.’

Jerusalem paused before replying. ‘There are those who would disagree with you concerning DNA, but that’s moot. You did manage to ascertain the purpose of a chain of these molecules, and from them create the mycelium that kept Apis Coolant and yourself alive.’

‘Ninety-nine per cent guesstimation of its overall purpose, and in the end I got it wrong anyway.’

‘Nevertheless . . .’

Mika gazed up at the huge edifice: each atom was something she could take in her hand. She turned a small virtual control and revolved the giant molecule. For some people she supposed that the complexity of the task ahead would be intimidating, but despite her words she only felt excitement at the prospect. Already she had spoken to other researchers on the Jerusalem, and discovered that they felt much the same. And there were thousands of them aboard, each studying one small facet of Jain technology, one piece of the 3D jigsaw, while Jerusalem itself put it all together.

Selecting a red coin with an ouroboros on its face, Mika started a program designed by the AI, which ran a virtual analysis of the molecule. Dropping down like a net, a cubic grid of glowing lines now enclosed it. The program selected some cubes and detached the atomic structures they enclosed from the main body, and turned them in mid-air, spitting formulae and reams of data like glyph-written insect wings. Beside her, flat screens rose out of the virtual floor and began displaying the results as they came through. Selecting from an arc of coloured coins bearing Life-coven icons, she began running those results through her own programs, then back again and around. Testing scenarios and a vast range of environmental parameters, she began to plumb the theoretical function of the molecule. Sometimes her theories collapsed under virtual tests, sometimes they survived.

A wizard surrounded by visible spells and conjured jewels, she worked faster and narrowed her focus. She saw that, in an oxidizing atmosphere, part of the atomic structure—in the same manner as a pigment such as haemoglobin—collected oxygen. It then acted as a catalyst, using the oxygen to burn the molecule into any solid substance it touched. Hours later she realized that the metallic atoms in the molecule caused an ionization process in some substances, complementing the burning process. Simply put, a visible quantity of this compound would act like a potent ever-active acid. But even that wasn’t enough, it seemed. Mika started to get excited when she saw what it did to carbon: forming it into buckytubes as it ate its destructive course. This was already familiar to her from Polity nanotechnology.

‘The drilling head, and the cable layer.’ she stated abruptly.

Jerusalem, having silently disappeared from beside her, now reappeared. ‘Part of it, yes. D’nissan, Colver and James are each working on other parts.’ With that, three other greatly enlarged molecules appeared high up, like lumpish moons. ‘The molecule you are studying will not, for example, work in vacuum. D’nissan has discovered a molecule that uses nanoscopic ionization entirely, it being fed electric current from the main body of the Jain structure, whilst Colver has found a metallobuckytube that drills mechanically.’ As the AI spoke, each function it described appeared briefly in VR representation to one side, then faded; Jerusalem thus signifying that her fellows’ research results were available to her should she require them.

‘What about James?’ Mika asked distractedly, then suddenly realizing what she had said, was delighted at how naturally the question had slid from her tongue.

‘Susan James has found a molecular structure similar to yours, but which lays angstrom-width optical tubes inside larger buckytubes of doped carbon, which itself acts as a superconductor.’

‘Hell,’ said Mika, staring with fascination at the view of said molecule in action.

‘Indeed,’ Jerusalem replied. ‘Even so, due to this research, Polity science has probably advanced in just the last hour as much as it would have done in ten years without it.’

‘You know,’ said Mika, realizing she had only ascertained the function of about ten per cent of her molecule, ‘we could learn a lot more, and much quicker, if we could study this in action.’

‘That is a very dangerous course.’

‘Yes, it is, but we can isolate the technology from the media it requires to spread and, if that fails, you’ve got ships out there with imploder missiles . . .’

‘This has already been discussed,’ said Jerusalem.

‘And a conclusion was come to,’ Mika stated.

‘Yes.’

‘Dammit! What was the conclusion?’

Jerusalem replied, ‘That unless we learn quickly, we die quickly.’

* * * *

Gravfields of four gees, the maximum the dropshaft could attain, tried to snatch them from the ladder. Crane closed his hands with enough force to crush the metal rungs, his coat sagging about him and his hat stretching low over his forehead. Skellor gripped hard as each wave swept past them, then continued to climb once it was past, treacly fibres snapping from each hand as he released it from where he had bound himself to the ladder. From below came the screams of those who—not warned through the Dracocorp network—had stepped unthinkingly into the shaft. Further below, impacted human debris accumulated.

Skellor and Crane reached the next floor and stepped out into an arboretum. The foliage of chestnuts, towering nettlelms and oaks concealed the far wall. Where they stood, the floor was slabbed granite in a semicircle, with paths of the same leading to the right and left alongside the near wall. Between this path and the trees was a strip of grass ten metres wide, nibbled, between pink and blue crocuses, by miniature beetle-mowers. In the forest, an interference field blurred scan, but Skellor picked up enough to know that Nalen’s people were bringing weapons to bear. He nodded to Crane, then, initiating his chameleonware, followed the path to his left. Moving away from him, towards the trees, Crane crossed the grass, kicking up huge clods with each loping stride and slowed only a little by the softness of the ground. A flashing in the trees: autogun. Skellor put out his own interference field, to foil any tracking of Crane. Lavender explosions stitched along the ground towards Crane, but kept going when he veered. Behind Skellor, a section of wall erupted into molten plasteel and incandescent gas. A glasshouse now ahead; the nexus—Nalen—retreating back beyond. Shots tracked manually along the wall behind as Skellor ran into a pane of chainglass, his hands issuing a decoder molecule. The glass collapsed into dust; he went through just as the screaming, and the firing of hand weapons, came from the trees.

* * * *

- retroact 9 -

Alston carefully opened the box on his desk and spilled out a glittering pile of etched sapphires, then with a shaking hand he spread them out across the oak surface. He deliberately didn’t look at Chaldor, not that there was much recognizable about her: perhaps the clawed hand caught in the curtain, that length of bare thigh that was the largest part of her remaining, or a scrap of bloody clothing.

‘I know you can understand me. I know that behind that plastic face is a brain probably more sophisticated than both Angelina’s and Arian’s put together.’

The sapphires had definitely caught its attention, this thing that had shut down, one after another, the comunit transmissions from every single person on the island. Alston stared at the giant, raggedy, blood-soaked scarecrow as it tilted its head to one side, birdlike.

‘You must be a free Golem who, for whatever reason, Arian has managed to employ. That bullshit about a “broken” Golem is for scaring the children—it’s the sort of story he likes circulating to try to frighten his people. It doesn’t have that effect on me, because you’ve stopped, which means that something more than a simple kill order must be functioning.’

The Golem took a step into the room and looked around, obviously curious about the otter-bone sculptures, the imported antiques, the general decor. Then its attention swung back to Alston and his sapphires. Alston could feel sweat trickling down his back.

‘These?’ he waved a hand at the jewels’ scattered before him. ‘These are nothing. Pelter thinks he’s in control here, but his organization is located in only three of the main cities. To control this planet you have to control the papyrus harvest and the seas. I’ve got so many crop managers in my pocket, I can’t count them, and I run all of the otter-bone smuggling. Pelter’s annual turnover wouldn’t even reach ten per cent of the interest on mine.’

Alston leant forward. There was something in that plastic face—he was getting through! He knew it: you could always make a deal with anything that had a mind.

‘Think! Working for me you could have anything. I’ll give you Pelter’s entire organization. You could come in with me. Anything, anything you want.’

Alston felt his mouth suddenly go dry. What to offer a Golem android?

‘Any upgrade you want. You could load the best software, add memory crystal, get yourself Cybercorp syntheskin.’

The Golem reached up with one gory hand and touched its face.

‘That’s right, the best!’ Alston slid the jewels across towards the Golem. ‘Take these as a down payment. Go and get me Arian’s head, and that of his damned sister.’ He slid his chair back and stood. ‘Then we can begin. You can bring in other free Golem, buy up the contracts of any still indentured. Together we could have this world. And all our enemies ...’ Alston flicked his fingers.

The Golem now stepped up until it was directly opposite Alston, looming over the desk. It reached down, picked up one of the sapphires and held the stone up to its eye.

‘They’re the best—one hundred thousand New Carth shillings each.’

The other hand snapped out so fast Alston had no time to react. Gripping the front of his jacket it pulled him close, then with bloodied fingers opened Alston’s mouth and shoved the sapphire inside, before picking up another. At four million shillings Alston finally died. He never yelled or screamed—was too full.

- retroact ends -

* * * *

Tabrouth kissed the lion’s tooth he wore suspended from a chain around his neck, and sensed the growing fear in the network. They all knew what had happened on B-deck, and what was happening in the arboretum. The android was so damned fast that no way was it some primitive metalskin—it had to be a military-spec Golem, and that meant ECS must be on to Nalen. The APW autogun should have been enough to take it out, but just when they got a fix on it, the tracking system packed up and they missed. Now they were dying.

Tabrouth was frightened, but also relieved that Nalen’s control seemed not so firm. Yes, it had been great in the beginning, taking control of the station syndicate and being part of so superior an aug network. But gradually Nalen’s orders began to carry more weight until his merest whim became an order, and his orders became impossible to disobey. And there was that other thing: Nalen had been a small-time crime boss, stealing tech and information to sell under the nose of Ruby Eye, though all but ignored by her. Now he was manufacturing arms and using the sun-surveyors to run them to black ships arriving from out-Polity to the other side of the sun. That was something the station AI could not ignore for long. Anyone caught doing so would receive an automatic death sentence; consequently, that wouldn’t be something in which Tabrouth would involve himself. But Nalen’s control gave him no choice—Nalen who no longer really looked like a man.

Movement to his right. Tabrouth whirled and aimed his pulse-rifle—not that it would do him a lot of good if the Golem was coming for him. But it was only Paulson and Shroder shoving through the briars and simnel bushes growing below a line of nettlelms. Tabrouth stopped and waited for them. He noticed they were both blood-spattered.

‘What happened?’ he asked.

‘Tore the fucking autogun in half, then did the same to Alain and Solnek,’ said the hermaphrodite Shroder.

‘We got away when others opened up on it with the second gun. It went after that,’ Paulson explained. The man looked sick—and very tired. ‘It’s going. Nalen’s grip is slipping,’ he added.

‘So it feels,’ said Tabrouth. ‘Maybe it’s time for us to get the hell out of here.’

Tabrouth waited for some response to that, but noticed the two were staring past him, their faces white with fear. Tabrouth had heard nothing, but then that didn’t surprise him.

‘It’s standing right behind me, isn’t it?’ he said.

Paulson and Shroder both gave the same slow nod as if invisible rods joined their heads. Tabrouth sighed and turned.

The Golem loomed before him, its coat neatly buttoned, undamaged and clear of any unpleasant stains. This made no sense, after many had hit it with pulse weapons; though its adamantine body might itself remain undamaged, its clothing should at least be ripped and burnt. And where was the blood, and the other fluids and tissues? You did not do to a human being what this Golem had been doing without getting in a horrible mess. But then, he thought, what did it matter about such inconsistencies? The Golem’s eyes were obsidian in its brass face; its massive hands were capable of tearing a man like tissue paper. And now Tabrouth was about to die.

‘You are one big ugly murderous bastard, aren’t you?’ he said, deciding that to beg would be futile. He raised his pulse-rifle and aimed it at the Golem’s chest. Just as he did this, Paulson and Shroder opened up with their own weapons, both also pulse-rifles. Bluish fire and metallic smoke flared and exploded all down the front of the Golem. Seemingly oblivious to this, it stepped forward, then reached out and gripped the barrel of Tabrouth’s weapon in its big hand, so that he was now firing directly into its palm. Tabrouth stared down disbelievingly at the sun glare reflected in that hand as he continued holding down the trigger. His weapon heated rapidly, then molten metal sputtered out of its side as its coils blew. Tabrouth released his hold and staggered back, his hands seared. After-images occluded his vision, and only subliminally did he see his weapon spiralling away. Other firing ceased. He supposed Paulson and Shroder had run away, and didn’t blame them in the least.

The same big hand closed on his neck, its brassy metal not even warm, and hauled him into the air, choking. Then something snapped and tore and, gasping for breath, Tabrouth hit the ground on his feet and fell over backwards. He groped at his neck, sure the Golem had crushed it and that he was yet to feel the killing pain, but found only that his lion’s tooth, his good-luck charm, was gone. Through shadowed vision, he saw the big Golem striding off after the other two. When he finally recovered his breath, he ran just as fast as he could for the nearest exit. The only time he looked back was when the blast from an ECS riot gun spun him off his feet, and even then he did not see Paulson and Shroder hot on his heels, relieved respectively of a ring with a pre-runcible coin set in it and a cheap scent bottle.

* * * *