Age of Aztec

TWENTY-FIVE

Same Day

Colonel Lanextic unshouldered, primed and levelled his lightning gun, all in one swift, practised movement.

“You heard him,” he said. “Let’s not make it difficult, eh? Just stand there in a row, all nice and tidy, like three erect pricks. It’ll be quick. You won’t feel a thing.”

“Colonel…” said Mal.

With a pained expression: “What?”

“Don’t. You don’t have to do this.”

“If the Great Speaker decrees that you’re to be killed, then you’re to be killed.”

“Why? We’re not going to be any sort of trouble. We’re on the same team as you. Me and Aaronson are, at any rate.”

“I know, and it’s a shame because I like you, Vaughn. You’re my kind of woman. And your swishy friend there seems all right too, for one of his sort. Under other circumstances I could see us sitting down together and getting blind roaring drunk and having a fucking good laugh. But orders are orders. You understand that. Especially when they come from a god, no less. So chin up, take your medicine, be a good servant of the Empire. And you…”

He swung towards Reston.

“Where d’you think you’re going? I saw. Sidling over towards those chairs. Don’t think I don’t know what you’re up to. Crafty little shit. You I’m saving until last. Those two are a chore. You, you bastard, are going to be a pleasure.”

“Colonel, I’m begging you,” said Mal.

“It’s no use, boss,” said Aaronson. “He’s not listening. It’s all that fat between his ears. Stops the sound getting in.”

“Ooh, meow,” sneered Tlanextic. “If I had feelings, they’d be hurt.”

“Is there a Mrs Tlanextic?” Aaronson asked.

“None of your business.”

“I’ll take that as a no. Doesn’t surprise me. You don’t strike me as the marrying kind. I’ll bet when anyone asks, you say you’re wedded to the job. Say being a Serpent doesn’t leave room in your life for anything else, wife included. But the truth is, you don’t actually like women. Pretend to, but deep down, though you’d never admit it, your tendencies go the other way. I can tell. I’ve met your sort before.”

“Oh do shut up.”

“The gruffer they are, the more macho they act, the more they’re kidding themselves. Then there’s all your talk about pricks and arseholes…”

“I have an l-gun here, remember? Pointing right at you.”

“And you do so love your big gun, don’t you? Compensating much?”

“Right, that does it. I was going to shoot her first, out of respect. Order of seniority and all that. But you, faggot, just lost the few extra seconds of life you were going to have.”

“Bring it on, closet case.”

Tlanextic took careful aim at Aaronson. But while Aaronson had been taunting the Serpent Warrior and providing a distraction, Reston had made the most of it and begun inching sideways again. Now he sprang, hurling himself towards the nearest cluster of chairs. He snatched one up. It was a well-made wooden thing, solid but not too heavy.

He spun towards Tlanextic. Tlanextic turned to face him, a fraction too late. Reston flung the chair. It sailed straight at Tlanextic, hitting him and the gun. Tlanextic staggered backwards, colliding with a parasol and toppling it; the parasol collapsed as it fell, closing like an anemone around Tlanextic, and he fell too, engulfed in billows of canvas.

“Hurry!” Reston yelled. “Let’s go!”

He sprinted for the edge of the terrace. Mal was rooted to the spot, unsure what to do. Her understanding was that you should stand and take your punishment, not flee from it. That was the Jaguar way. Though she had pleaded with Tlanextic and tried to talk him round, she had done so in the knowledge that it was futile. All she had in fact been trying to do was buy time for herself, a few precious moments in which to make sense of the gross, arbitrary injustice about to befall her. It was galling to think that, for once, she had done nothing wrong, just happened to have been witness to something she wasn’t supposed to see. How did that warrant her death?

“Boss,” said Aaronson. He gripped her arm, and the physical contact broke the spell she was under. “We have to get out of here.”

Tlanextic was fighting his way out of the fallen parasol, struggling to emerge like a chick from an egg. He was swearing his head off.

“Do you want to die for no good reason?” Aaronson urged.

No, Mal decided. No she did not.

She set off with Aaronson towards the parapet. Reston had already clambered up onto it and was surveying the drop to the next tier of the palace.

“Great thing about ziggurats,” he said. “Makes for a handy escape route, if you haven’t got an abseiling rope on you.”

He propelled himself off. Mal glanced over the edge. It wasn’t more than twelve feet to the terrace. She stepped up onto the parapet, as did Aaronson.

“Stay put, English fuckers!” roared Tlanextic. He had finally extricated himself from the parasol and was rising to his feet.

Together, Mal and Aaronson flung themselves off. In the nick of time, too, as a lightning gun discharge struck the exact spot where they’d been perched.

Mal landed on all fours. Aaronson came down more heavily next to her, cracking one knee on the terrace’s flagstones, but he was up again in a trice and limping for the next parapet. Mal ran after him.

Reston, ahead, was preparing to make the jump. He glanced round, just in time to see Tlanextic appear at the edge of the upper terrace.

“Move!” Reston yelled out to the two Jaguars.

Tlanextic drew a bead on Mal.

“Quick!” Reston grabbed her hand.

Mal was about to bark at him to let her go. How dare he touch her! But next thing she knew, Reston had plunged over the side, dragging her helplessly with him. They crashed in a heap together on the next terrace down, Reston taking most of the impact with his own body. Aaronson followed, hurdling the parapet. He landed even more badly than last time, his ankle twisting under him with an audible crunch.

“Oww! Fucking shit!”

He rolled onto his back, clutching his leg, grimacing.

Reston and Mal, meanwhile, quickly disentangled themselves from each other. Mal scurried over to her sergeant’s side.

“Is it broken?”

“Don’t think so,” Aaronson gasped. “Hurts like a bitch, but I think I only sprained it.”

“Then you can walk on it. Get up.”

Aaronson staggered to a standing position. “I’m sorry, I’m crap with heights, you know that. It’s throwing me off. I’m not thinking straight.”

“Let’s just keep going.”

Mal helped Aaronson to the next parapet, taking his weight while he hobble-hopped alongside her.

“One more jump and we should be out of range,” Reston said. “Tlanextic’s already got a poor shooting angle, and it’ll only get worse. Unless he follows us down, that is.”

As if in response, an l-gun bolt struck the terrace a few feet from where they stood. The impact left a smeary blue afterimage in their vision and a black sunburst of charring on the flagstones.

“See? What did I say? His accuracy’s compromised.”

“You ever get tired of being a smartarse, Reston?” Mal said.

“Sometimes. But then things get interesting again and I remember who I am.”

Aaronson made an even bigger hash of his third jump than he had the previous two. Hoping to take the impact solely on his good leg in order to protect his injured one, he ended up sprawling awkwardly onto his side. He gamely got up again and made for the next parapet, but it was clear he was in no state to carry on descending the terraces in leaps and bounds like this.

“Fuck it, boss. You go on ahead. I’ll find another way out of here.”

“Don’t be a dickhead, sergeant. We can do this. Just don’t think about it too hard.”

“How many more levels are there? Another twenty at least. I’m never going to manage it. I’m only holding you up.”

“What’re you going to do instead? Fly?”

“Go indoors and through the building. Find that lift.”

“Not a good idea,” said Reston. “There’ll be Serpents all over the place.”

“So? I act all innocent. They don’t know yet that we’ve got a kill order hanging over us.”

“Hey!” came a cry from above. “Forget about me?”

Tlanextic had sprung down from the topmost terrace to the one below, and now the three of them were squarely in his sights once more. The only reason he hadn’t fired yet was because the lightning gun was still powering up for its next shot.

“Listen, you two,” Reston said to Mal and Aaronson. “There isn’t time for this. If we don’t put distance between him and us, we’re dead, don’t you get it?”

“I can’t,” Aaronson said.

“You can,” Mal insisted.

“No, you can, boss. And you will.”

“What?”

“Go.” He said it softly, but in a way that brooked no argument.

“No,” Mal said, equally adamant.

“Yes. I can look after myself. Your best chance is Reston. You want to live? Go with him.”

“He’s got a point, Vaughn,” Reston said.

“Shut the fuck up. This has nothing to do with you.”

The l-gun’s whine reached its highest pitch, a constant shrill note signalling readiness. Tlanextic aimed carefully, determined not to miss a third time.

Reston straddled the parapet. Over Mal’s shoulder, Aaronson gave him the nod, and Reston wrapped his arms around her waist and kicked off backwards.

“No!” Mal screamed as they plunged together.

A table broke their fall, shattering to pieces under them. A servant who had been busy laying out lunchtime cutlery, yelped in fright and scuttled away.

Mal rose, groaning, from the splintered debris of the table, looking up just in time to see Tlanextic open fire at Aaronson. Aaronson darted to one side. It was a valiant but vain effort. The bolt of plasma found its target. A glancing blow, but a hit all the same, thumping into Aaronson’s shoulder and spinning him sideways. He fetched up against the parapet, sprawled half over it. A hole had been burned through his shirt, through which Mal could see blackened skin, fat white blisters, and raw red weeping patches. Worst of all was the smell that reached her, the stench of grilled meat, human meat, her friend and colleague’s.

Aaronson’s eyes rolled. Mal could scarcely imagine the pain he was in. She called to him, but he didn’t respond. His jaw was slack. Shock was setting in. If the parapet hadn’t been propping him up, he would have sunk to the floor.

And now Tlanextic came down a level, nimbly, l-gun singing in his hands. He strode to a vantage point directly overlooking Aaronson, moving with complete assurance, the air of a hunter who knew his prey was injured and helpless and going nowhere. His eyes were narrowed but deadly calm, not unlike the eyes of the moulded golden snake crowning his helmet.

Mal snatched up a leg of the table, the only throwing weapon she could find. She launched it at Tlanextic, but gravity and the angle of elevation were against her and she missed. He pretended not even to notice.

“I’m not what you said I am,” he told Aaronson. “Not at all.”

Aaronson, to his credit, managed to splutter out a reply. “Denial.”

Tlanextic pulled the trigger.

Aaronson’s body rocked as tremendous, searing heat pulsed through it. A hand convulsed into a claw, clutching the parapet, skin fusing to stone. Eyeballs erupted from their sockets like two boiled eggs bursting. Legs kicked.

Then it was over. Aaronson shuddered and lay still, a smoking, twisted wreckage of himself.

What Mal said next came from her gut, a howl of pure rage. “Tlanextic, you cocksucking, motherfucking cunt bastard!” She used her mother tongue. Nahuatl didn’t have as many swear words as English, and none of them was as truly satisfying.

In return, the Serpent colonel offered her a gloating grin. “I have no idea what you just said, Inspector Vaughn, but that’s your pal sorted. And guess what? You’re next.”

“I’ll fucking kill you.” She part drew her macuahitl. “Come down here. I’ll fucking have you, I will.”

“I’ve a better idea. I stay here, you stay there. Soon as my gun’s recharged, I’ll put you out of your misery.”

“Coward. Come down and fight.” Hot, angry tears were flooding down Mal’s cheeks, and she wasn’t ashamed of them. She didn’t care.

“I’d rather just stick where I am, if you don’t mind. High ground. Tactical advantage. Be patient. Couple of seconds from now, this’ll all be over.”

Reston tugged her arm. “Not like this,” he said. “We can’t win against him like this. He’s right, he’s holding all the aces. Let’s run. We can still get away.”

“Leave me the fuck alone, Reston.”

“We run now, we can get him later. It’s the only course of action that makes any sense. Otherwise you’re just going to die, and there’ll be no chance of payback for what he did to your sergeant.”

“Ah, here we go,” said Tlanextic. Yet again, the gun was ready. “Why don’t you two stay standing next to each other like that? Nice and convenient. I can probably get you both with the one shot.”

“Vaughn,” Reston hissed. “Think logically. Don’t just throw everything away.”

Mal wasn’t conscious of making the choice. All she knew was that, suddenly, she was making a dash for the parapet. An l-gun bolt exploded somewhere just behind her, close enough that she could feel the blast impact in her heels.

For the next five minutes, she jumped and ran, jumped and ran, keeping pace with Reston. Her knees began to throb from the repeated jarring of twelve-foot drop after twelve-foot drop. Tier by tier they descended the ziggurat palace, with Tlanextic still tenaciously giving chase. Now and then a lightning gun bolt came their way, but the shots were always wild, Tlanextic taking them on the hoof, hoping for rather than expecting a hit. The benefit from this was that, however briefly he paused to fire, each time it put that little bit more distance between them and him. When they finally made the last jump down to ground level, he was a full five tiers behind.

They were on an open plaza, with nothing to take cover behind other than a couple of ornamental fig trees in cubic urns. Tlanextic would have a clear line of fire once he had reached the plaza himself, which would be in mere moments.

Reston didn’t hesitate. He had spied something across the plaza. Without a word he shepherded Mal towards it. She went uncomplainingly, her own survival instincts telling her she was best off deferring to his survival instincts.

One of the monorail trains had just pulled in at the plaza. Its passengers were a janitorial crew toting mops, buckets and brooms. Reston barged past them up the platform steps, scattering them and their cleaning implements, and leapt into the carriage behind the driver.

“Tell me how this thing works,” he ordered the startled man. “Now!”

“Who the hell are — ”

“Oh, sod it.” Reston yanked the man out of his seat by his tunic and tossed him out onto the platform. “How hard can it be? Vaughn. Get in.”

Mal stepped aboard while Reston slipped into the newly vacated driving seat.

“Hey,” the driver said hotly, springing to his feet. “You can’t do that. That’s my train.”

He tried to climb back in. Mal decked him with a single punch, knocking him cold.

At the same time, Tlanextic’s voice rang out across the plaza. “Halt! You fucking stop right there!”

Reston was still studying the control console.

“Reston…” Mal said.

“Give me a moment.”

“We don’t have a moment. Tlanextic’s coming.”

“I know. I’m just trying to figure out which lever’s the brake and which is the throttle.”

“Oh for — !” Mal leaned over and thrust forwards the lever that was marked in increments from 1 to 8. The train gave a jerk and began to move.

“How did you know that was the right one?”

“It couldn’t be more obvious. And I was paying attention on the way over here. I watched what the driver did.”

Reston made a face. “Ah. At that point I wasn’t really bothered about much.” He pushed the throttle lever further forwards as the train drew away from the platform. There was a clear, straight stretch of track ahead and the train eagerly gathered speed.

Tlanextic charged to the very tip of the platform and launched yet another plasma bolt at them. It fell well short of its target, and his subsequent loud grunt of exasperation told them that the shot had finally drained the battery pack. The l-gun was now dead. Enraged, he hurled it impotently after them. It bounced and clattered along the track and fell off, fetching up at the foot of the support pylon below.

Mal allowed herself a smile. They had escaped the bastard. He stood no chance of catching up with them now.

She said as much to Reston.

He glanced over his shoulder, past her. “Don’t speak too soon,” he said.

A second train was arriving at the plaza, transporting a quartet of Serpent Warriors. Tlanextic commandeered it, flagging the driver down and telling him not to stop. Taking up position beside the driver, he instructed him to pour on speed. “Those two in front are criminals — enemies of the state. The Great Speaker wants them dead. Get us as near to them as you can.”

The driver gunned the engine. Meanwhile, Tlanextic ordered all four Serpent Warriors to draw and prime their l-guns. Not antipersonnel; full charge, kinetic component. They were to blow that train to hell.

“Well, this just got a whole lot fucking better,” Mal muttered.

Reston pushed the throttle all the way to 8. The train thrummed hard, accelerating.

“There’s six of them and only two of us,” Mal said, eyeing their pursuers. “Our train’s lighter so we can go faster, right?”

“Negative mass is negative mass,” Reston replied. “The greater the weight, the more charge you need to counteract it, but once that’s achieved, the amount of energy required to generate impetus is much the same. We may have a slight edge over them in terms of power drain, but you can measure the difference in micro-wattage.”

“But they can’t actually gain ground on us.”

“Not as long as we keep going flat out. The question is, are we out of firing range?”

A bolt zapped the track a few metres to the rear of the train.

“And there’s the answer,” Reston said. “Only just.”

“Only just is good enough.”

“Yes. Problem is, at some point we’ll come to a corner and have to slow down. We’ll decelerate before they do, and there’s our lead gone. They’ll have a window of opportunity.”

“Then we don’t slow down.”

“I don’t know much about trains but I’m pretty sure that wouldn’t be wise.”

“Let’s put it to the test, shall we?” said Mal, pointing ahead.

Roughly two hundred metres from where they were, the track began describing a long, gentle curve to the right, winding between the bases of two buildings. Reston clamped his lips grimly together, clearly having to resist the urge to pull the throttle lever back from 8. The train was travelling at a fair lick, perhaps fifty miles per hour, levitating effortlessly along the broad silvery rail. As it hit the start of the turn it began to shimmy, and as the curve deepened the motion became a seasickly sway. The train’s apron scraped against the rail’s outer edge. There were stuttering, burping squeals of metal on metal. Sparks flew. The centrifugal force was tremendous and Mal bent hard to the side to counteract it. Looking back, she saw the Serpent train falling behind. The driver had automatically curbed speed when approaching the bend. Tlanextic berated him, cuffing him round the head and telling him not to be such a fucking wimp.

Their own train was shaking wildly from side to side now and seemed keen to part company with the track. Then the curve straightened out and the noise and disturbance gradually subsided.

“Yeah!” Mal shouted to their pursuers. “How’s about that, arseholes? You’re never going to get us. Might as well fuck off back home and polish your helmets.”

“What did I tell you about speaking too soon?”

Mal looked back round and saw to her dismay that there was another bend coming up. This one was a full ninety-degree turn, snaking to the left.

“I’ll have to rein it in,” Reston said. “Otherwise we’ll fly clean off.” He drew the throttle down a notch to 7, then for good measure to 6. “We’ll still be going too fast, though. And…”

“And what?”

“Simple geometry. As we hit the apex of the turn, the angle will bring us closer to them.”

“Fuck my luck.”

“Succinctly put. Hang on. This is going to get bumpy.”

It did indeed get bumpy, so much so that Mal had to cling onto the headrest of the driving seat in order to keep her balance. The screeching was deafening. Several times it seemed as though the train was going to tear free of the track. She could feel it twisting against itself, inner torque juddering mightily through it.

And then, halfway through the turn, as Reston had predicted, the Serpents opened fire. Their train was just hitting the bend. They had a chance and they didn’t squander it.

Bolts arced across from their train to the one Mal and Reston were in. The Serpents had time to loose off only one shot apiece, four shots in all.

All four came close, strafing, blitzing, simultaneously, blindingly.

One made contact.

Fortunately, the bolt struck the end of the train, nowhere near the drive mechanism — the power cells and neg-mass exciter — which was located in the middle, beneath the passengers’ feet. Damage was done, but not instantaneously catastrophic damage. The train’s tail end exploded outwards, shards of metal caroming and ricocheting back along the track. Mal was thrown to the floor. She got up to find the train didn’t have a back any more, just a jagged gap that looked as though a shark had chewed a whole section of bodywork off. The rearmost bank of seats was bent up at a crazy angle. Smoke trailed behind them.

But they were still going. The train was making terrible noises, a ragged-edged keen of protest, but it was still moving forwards and didn’t appear to have lost much in the way of momentum. Coming out of the curve, Reston nudged the throttle back up to 7, and the train jerkily responded. He tried 8, and the noises worsened but there was a further hike in speed nonetheless.

They entered another straight section.

“Do you have any idea where we’re going?” Mal said, shouting to make herself heard above the train’s caterwauling.

“Does it matter, as long as it’s away from Tlanextic?”

“I mean, do you have a plan? Or are we just going to tour round Tenochtitlan for the rest of the day until we get bored?”

“South,” said Reston. “We head south. The harbour end of the island. Steal a boat there and make for shore.”

“That’s it?”

“I’m open to other suggestions, inspector.”

She had none.

They hurtled on, the ruined, screeching train drawing curious looks from everyone it passed by. A junction loomed, and a light on the control console flashed and a buzzer beeped.

“It’s asking if we want to switch direction,” Mal said.

“The points are set for straight ahead, but left looks southbound to me. Let’s take it.” Reston jabbed the button beside the light. A segment of the track slid ponderously leftward, and the train, complaining, transferred onto the new course. “Hope that was right decision.”

Tlanextic’s train also made the interchange, much more smoothly, and Mal could see that it was gaining on theirs, incrementally but remorselessly. She could see on the Serpent Warriors’ faces — Tlanextic’s in particular — a growing sense of triumph. They were holding fire with their l-guns, but only because they were waiting for the moment when her and Reston’s train became an unmissable, point-blank target. It wouldn’t be long now.

She had to slow the Serpents down somehow, if possible stop them altogether.

The displaced bank of seats gave her an idea. She made her way along the train to them.

“What are you doing?” Reston wanted to know.

“Trying to help. Just keep driving.”

The seats had been wrenched almost completely free from their mounting. Only a couple of screws still moored them in place. One of the screws was sheared nearly all the way through and Mal was able to snap it with a good, hard kick. The other, however, was more or less intact. She didn’t have a screwdriver on her but she did have her trusty macuahitl. She inserted the edge of the blade under the screw’s head and began levering. She squatted down and gave it all she’d got, heaving on the sword handle, using every ounce of strength in her shoulders and thighs. It seemed that the screw would never budge. Her muscles would give, or her macuahitl would, before it did.

Then there was an abrupt sharp creak of progress. The screw squeezed up a few millimetres from its socket, and the seats jiggled that little bit more freely. Encouraged, Mal redoubled her efforts.

“Get a move on, Vaughn,” Reston said. He could see what she was up to but also how close the Serpents were getting. “Put your back into it.”

“Could you…” Mal gasped through clenched teeth, “kindly… just do your thing… and leave me… the fuck alone… to do mine?”

At last, with a sudden grinding surrender, the screw came out. The bank of seats stood rattling loose on the floor of the train.

Mal had been intending to pick up the seats and lob them at the train behind with as much accuracy as she could manage. At the very least the sight of a bank of seats hurtling towards him would cause the driver to apply the brakes, and if she got lucky the thing might get jammed between train and rail, forcing the Serpents to halt, maybe even causing a crash.

Just then, however, one of the Serpents chose to fire an exploratory shot, to see if the fugitives’ train was near enough yet. It wasn’t. The bolt fell short. But only by a foot or so. A few more seconds and even that slender margin of safety would be eroded.

There wasn’t time for anything elegant. Mal settled for booting the seats off the back of the train.

They cartwheeled down the track towards the oncoming Serpents. Tlanextic yelled out a warning and everybody ducked. The seats failed to become wedged beneath the train; instead, they collided with the windshield, which shattered in a sparkling shower of glass shards that sprayed over the five Serpents and the driver. The seats then spun on past the train, landing behind and careering off, a mangle of tubular steel and plastic padding, through the windows of an adjacent tower.

“Nice try,” Reston commented.

“Worth a shot,” Mal said, as the driver of the other train popped his head up again and so did the Serpent Warriors, all of them shaking glass fragments out of their clothes.

“Uh-oh,” Reston then said.

“Oh, what now?”

“Look.”

“Bugger.”

Dead ahead, there was a third train. It was trundling along at a leisurely pace, empty apart from a driver who seemed in no hurry to get anywhere and was blissfully unaware of the two trains barrelling up from behind. He was just idling along from platform to platform like a cabbie cruising for his next fare.

“Does this thing have a horn?” Reston said.

“Racket we’re making, it’s a wonder he hasn’t heard us already,” said Mal. “Oi!” she shouted at the top of her lungs. “Dickhead! Shift yourself! Unless you want to get rammed.”

The driver in front turned and his eyes went saucer wide. He scrabbled to push the throttle forward, and his train started to speed up.

Their train was still zeroing in on his, though, and fast. Reston didn’t dare ease off, not with the Serpents breathing down their necks. A shunt was unavoidable.

“Brace yourself,” he told Mal.

Their train rear-ended the one in front. At that point, Newtonian physics took over. The front train, boosted from behind, jetted forward at even greater speed. The driver let out a squawk of terror, clinging to his control console for dear life.

Mal and Reston’s train, meanwhile, its nose now a crumpled mess, was brought almost to a standstill by the impact. The Serpent train continued rocketing towards it as rapidly as ever. The driver of the latter hit the brakes, but there wasn’t enough time.

“Jump for it,” said Reston.

Mal was already jumping for it.

Both she and Reston threw themselves clear of the train a heartbeat before the Serpent train ploughed into it. The Serpent train rose off the track and mounted theirs, with a godawful cacophony of metal crunching and men screaming in panic. The two vehicles, conjoined, went scraping on down the track, parts flying off, sparks shooting everywhere like a firework display. One of the Serpent Warriors was jettisoned from his seat and flung like a ragdoll headfirst to the track bed, breaking his neck. The others, and the driver, just hung on helplessly as the violent, slewing ride ran its course. Friction and inertia eventually brought the locked-together trains to a halt some five hundred yards further down the line. They settled at an ungainly angle on the rail, silent and spent, like a pair of old drunkards after an uproarious bender. Everyone still aboard was too shaken up to do much but groan and give thanks that they were alive. The antigrav-particle exciters on these trains were well-reinforced, but even so it was a small miracle that neither one of them had been breached.

By the time Colonel Tlanextic got himself together to clamber out and head back along the track to look for the two English fugitives, they were long gone.

His wrath was terrible to behold. And exceptionally loud. Proceeding on the assumption that Mal and Reston were still within earshot, which they were, he informed them that this was his island, his domain. It was swarming with Serpent Warriors. They could run but they wouldn’t get far.

“You’re mine,” he roared. “I’ll find you. I’ll find you and fucking slaughter you. It’s only a matter of time.”