Tuan Wong paced the conference room nervously. He paused in front of the massive window, looking out into the storm. Then his eyes flicked to the vidscreen beside the door, and then to Teibi tied to the chair at that end of the table. He walked to the drinks cabinet and poured himself a brandy. Suvlov sat forward to ask for one himself, but a warning glance from Gemmel caught his eye and put him off the idea.

 Tuan resumed his pacing.

 Suvlov was sitting at the far corner of the table, to the right of Teibi, covering the young man with his pistol and picking his yellowed teeth. Gemmel had brought Doctor Hu in a few minutes earlier, and was holding his own gun over the geneticist on the opposite side of the table.

 The vidscreen changed colour. The revolving logo of Agsohi-Cantara-Siemens appeared, followed by an announcement that a communication had been established with Tokyo, on Earth.

 Tuan composed himself, brushing down his suit and adopting his most commanding pose. He bowed swiftly as a man appeared on the screen. The man wore a white and gold kimono, white trousers, and gold slippers and sash. Tall with broad shoulders, high cheekbones, a flat face and wide, round eyes, his features seemed Japanese with a hint of Polynesian. His head was shaved and his eyebrows were plucked and arched. A sword was slung from his belt and he gripped the hilt firmly. Men and women in yellow and blue were practising martial arts on an impeccable lawn behind him, and beyond were great white ships moored in a sun-drenched harbour.

 "Wong!" he shouted. "Report!"

 "Tetsuo san, we have two of the main terrorist operators in our custody. They are, I regret, employees of the company. I have no idea how our profiling failed to eliminate them during recruitment. I can only offer my deepest apologies, and my resignation."

 "We do not want your resignation yet. We want a resolution to this issue."

 "I assure you, we have it sir."

 "How will you deal with these two?"

 "I... I shall show you." Wong walked to the drinks cabinet and took an unsheathed ceremonial sword from the wall above. He stood behind Teibi and faced the screen. "This one was our biggest traitor, a member of the board. His disgrace and outrageous betrayal of the company's values deserves only one punishment." He turned his back on the screen, ran the long, curved blade along the blonde nape of Teibi's neck, drew his arms back across his abdomen and plunged the sword into the young man's back. It pierced between the shoulder blades and came out in the middle of Teibi's chest. Teibi screamed briefly, then blood gurgled in his throat as he slumped forward in his chair, more of his blood running down the blade onto the polished surface of the table. Wong arched the sword back and out of the young man's body.

 "The other one, a member of our Genetics department, will provide us upon interrogation with all the information we need," Wong continued to his boss, wiping the blade on a cloth in the drinks cabinet and remounting it. He turned to the vidscreen and bowed again.

 "Very well, Wong. Where is Parris?"

 "He is... otherwise occupied at the moment. But, I assure you everything is completely under control. Now, I've prepared a presentation on our current situation. You should have received the slides, if I could just talk you through them."

 The door exploded inwards, sending everyone in the room ducking for cover.

 "No! We must go on." Doyle turned away and examined her reflection in the mirrored walls of the lift. "We must finish this. None of us will ever be free otherwise."

 "You should never have even come," said Li. He touched Doyle's cheek. "You shouldn't be risking your life for me."

 "Don't be silly," she said, turning away again.

 "But the professor is right. This is far too dangerous. We can leave together, go far away..."

 "But if she's right, and you won't be free until Branson is stopped."

 Caramel leant against Li's shoulder. "What choice do we have?"

 "What are we going to do, kill every single employee?"

 "If necessary," said Doyle seriously. She looked at Benny and Li Duc. "But we only need to stop the board of directors. It's been their project. Whoever replaces them will just want to hush the whole thing up and move on, as long as we disappear, what with the means of cloning removed. It will be easy. They might even be grateful, I'm going to give them the keys to the executive lavatory."

 "You're taking us upstairs to assassinate the directors of this company."

 "We don't have any choice."

 "I don't want to be a part of cold-blooded murder."

 "They deserve it!"

 "There was this. garden," said David absently. Doyle and Benny stopped arguing and looked at him. "And a beautiful woman. I'd like to go back there now."

 Everybody looked at him. He was gazing into the mirrored wall. Benny reached over and rubbed his shoulder. He seemed not to notice. She turned back to face Doyle.

 "Haven't you killed enough people?"

 "You think I'm enjoying this?"

 "I'm starting to wonder."

 "I want to be free. I want the boss of this monstrous industry to see what he has done to me."

 "This is insane."

 The lift beeped as it reached the zenith of the tower.

 "We're here. It's too late to turn back. Stay behind me and keep your heads down." Doyle stepped through the doors as they shuddered apart. She swept her pistol around the outer office. The leather sofas and the security/receptionist's desk were deserted. The door to the conference room was closed, a red neon sign above announcing that there was a meeting in progress and the room was locked.

 Doyle strode to the door, taking a red pen from inside her jacket. She twisted the top and put the pen beside the handles in the centre of the doors. The pen had magnetised, and a red light was flashing on the top. Doyle stuck her hand into the hip pocket of her trousers, pulling out the same pen she had handled whilst hiding in the ventilation duct above the lobby. She pulled a sofa from the side of the space and stuck it six feet from the door. Then she signalled for Benny and Li to put the coffee table on top of it. They did, and the five people crouched behind the barricade.

 "Ready?" Doyle clicked the end of the pen in her hand, and the one on the door exploded, showering the room with shards of wood and metal.

 Doyle leapt from the shelter and ran into the smoking hole.

 Gemmel darted into the breach, his pistol drawn. He brought it up to aim at Doyle as she charged him, but she fired first. The shot caught him in the shoulder, spinning him round. Hu tripped his captor, and Doyle fired a second shot, catching Gemmel straight through the neck. He lay behind Teibi's chair, coughing his last breaths. Suvlov raised his hands, but kept a tight hold on his pistol.

 "Wong! What is happening there?" shouted Tetsuo from the vidscreen. The vidphone control on the wall sparked as the flames from the door licked at it, the image of Tetsuo and the bright shore behind him ghosting and crackling. Then the vidphone unit exploded, and the screen shattered over Suvlov, and the corpses of Teibi's and Gemmel. In the confusion, Suvlov stole to the other end of the room, firing wildly behind him. He caught his foot on a chair half way down and sprawled onto the floor as his gun skittered across the conference table.

 Doyle waggled her gun, signalling Suvlov and Tuan Wong to the far end of the table.

 Benny, Li Duc, Caramel and David Chisholm followed Doyle into the room, none of them especially happy to be there. David made a direct beeline past Hu to a chair half way down the table, and collapsed into it. He smiled at Hu, who was looking around confusedly.

 Li and Benny walked uncomfortably past the body of Teibi, standing near the drinks cabinet at Doyle's indication.

 David watched them. Then he seemed to notice his jacket for the first time. He looked through the pockets, pulling out various items. His attention was particularly caught by a red pen, which he turned over again and again in his hands, clicking the top in and out.

 "Doyle! What the hell are you...wait. Now it makes sense. This was never about rights for clones. Genetic manipulation was just a red herring. You're still ticked off because we fired you. It's been a year, surely you've found another job in this time."

 "Don't be foolish. This has nothing to do with my job. It's about clones. It's about Li Duc."

 "Wait," said Benny. "Doyle, I thought you said you were fired ten years ago."

 Doyle ignored her, stepping closer into Wong, looming over his prone form. "This is about justice. About an end to your dealings in murder and mutations."

 "All I have ever done is try to serve the public and the company. We made the Adored what they were. When they tried to bite the hand feeding them, we re-made them. It was perfectly just, and completely upheld by Hanari law."

 "Why did you try to have me killed at the concert?" asked Li Duc. "I hadn't argued with your career plans. Did you know I spoke to Doyle?"

 "Of course. But we didn't try to kill you then, not until we knew how much she'd told you. That was nothing to do with us. We assumed it was these rights-for-clones nuts. These people are not your friends, Li Duc. The company has your best interests at heart."

 Benny sighed. "He's right. About not trying to kill you, anyway. It... it was Caramel." She turned to the girl. "I'm sorry."

 "It's not true," said Caramel, staggering back slightly. "It's just not true."

 "Benny, perhaps you should tell us exactly what happened," said Doyle.

 "I was at the concert. The tickets were free, I decided to go along. I got bored after a while." She paused, turned to Li Duc. "Sorry. Anyway, as I was leaving I saw a figure in the balcony. It was holding what looked like a gun, pointing it in the direction of the front row. I assumed whoever it was was going to shoot into the audience, and I tried to tell the security guards. They wouldn't listen, and when I looked again, the figure was gone. Then... then Caramel pulled a pistol out of her jacket and shot me. Shot Li Duc, I just got in the way."

 "It's not true!" shouted Caramel. She was holding back tears, and Benny turned away.

 "Bernice," said Doyle, reaching into her jacket with her left hand while keeping the assembled covered with the pistol in her right. "Was this the device that the, ah, 'figure' on the balcony was holding?" She pulled out a chrome tube, bent roughly into the shape of a gun and topped with a series of coloured buttons.

 Benny let her arms flag by her side. She reached for the brandy decanter, poured herself a large measure and sat down sipping at it.

 "Yes," she said at last. She turned to Hu. "Ever get the feeling you've been used?"

 "You shouldn't be too put out," Doyle said softly. "It was easy to shift my plans to include you. You had no way of knowing."

 "Why me?"

 "You saved his life. And ruined the first gambit in my plans to end this nightmare. The first time you saw him, you saved him. Besides, I did some digging. I told you I have friends. Friends in the security field throughout human space. I know about what happened to you recently. I thought you might understand. I wanted to tell you everything. I thought you'd sympathise, help me destroy this abomination. Hu helped me to produce a vacant clone of your husband, based on what I could find out about his appearance and personality. I thought it might prompt you into action. Help you to sympathise with my true plight. Maybe it wasn't real enough, without the requisite personality engrams."

 "Actually, it was surprisingly accurate."

 "I could tell you still wouldn't understand. You're the same as Li, and I have to kill you like I have to kill him. You don't think the fact that they're clones makes any real difference, do you?"

 "Not in itself, no. Clones aren't the problem. What's been done with them, what they were used for, that's the problem."

 "All scientific discoveries are like that," said David.

 "You should try living close to one, year after year. Li has never been the same."

 "He was never a full clone of the Li Duc you loved. The company made specific choices about his personality. Wait, what do you mean, I'm the same as Li Duc?" Benny asked. "You said you want to kill him? I thought we were here to save him, so you two could be together again."

 "You don't understand. I gave him the choice. Do you think, in a decade of this hell, that he's the first one I've approached? Well, he isn't. And he chose to keep on going. Like all the others before him, like every other fucker on this planet, he didn't care that he was a clone. Didn't think it made a difference. He said he was glad that I told him, said he was going to play the system, find a way to strike out on his own that would stop Branson SA killing him. Well that's not good enough. I can't watch the man I loved, walking around, not aged a day, no idea who I really am, what I really mean to him. And I can't watch him die at their hands again. Branson SA would have killed him, one way or the other. I brought it forward. I decided to end it all, starting with Li's life and ending with this sick fucking planet. No more clones."

 "You're completely mad," said Hu.

 "Is it any wonder? A decade of therapy over him and I've resolved nothing. I need closure."

 "So move to New York. You don't need to kill thousands of people just because you're living beyond your emotional means."

 "They did this to me. This world did this to me. They deserve to die. I know," Doyle shook her head sadly. "You think I've gone mad because of my loneliness."

 "No, I think you've gone mad because of your plan to kill us all."

 "And what about you," said Wong, turning to Caramel. "What turned you against us, and against your hero?"

 "I don't know what any of you are talking about," Caramel sobbed.

 "She truly doesn't," said Doyle, grinning. "She's just another pawn in my game. Another of the pieces I've controlled, like all of you."

 "You think you're in control?" said Benny.

 "I implanted a bespoke engram in her mind, some time ago actually," Doyle continued, ignoring Benny. "It makes her susceptible to suggestion, and a subroutine is hardwired in giving her a compulsion to kill Li Duc. And activated with this device. Watch."

 Doyle pointed the tube at Caramel. The girl was terrified, pushing back against the wall. Doyle pushed a button on the tube, and Caramel suddenly tensed. Her expression blanked, and she stepped forward.

 "Doyle, you can't hope to get away with this," said Tuan Wong, attempting to regain his composure. "Security will have already been alerted to the breach of this room." He tried to stand but Doyle forced him back into his chair, pushing her gun into his temple. "They will be coming up as I speak."

 "You forget, before you fired me last year, I was head of corporate security. I was on the board until that wrinkled old monument Gemmel replaced me. I still have friends in the security force here. They've ensured we won't be interrupted. Besides, I don't intend to escape. You must be aware of the tragedy in ch'Rihan. I took a quick trip over there last night, whilst you were sleeping Bernice. I have friends in security there, as well. And, just as I did there, I have set your temporal accelerator in motion. I removed the safety protocols in the software, and inputted parameters ensuring that there will be a complete dimensional collapse. The tarranium core will subsequently go nutronic. The dimensional disruption will tear this city apart. And we're right above the epicentre. Caramel!"

 Caramel's gaze flickered away from the empty middle distance, and wandered over to Doyle.

 "Take that pistol. Kill this man," said Doyle, one hand resting hard on Wong's shoulder the other pointing at Suvlov's pistol on the conference table.

 Caramel walked to the side of the table, picked up the pistol. She fired. Wong's head split open and his body fell to the floor. Benny looked away fthe Wong's corpse to the far end of the conference table. Caramel's knuckles were white, squeezed around the fat man's gun. Benny looked away sadly. Her eyes met David Chisholm's.

 Chisholm winked painfully at Benny. She frowned back, then noticed that he was looking pointedly at the brandy decanter. She quietly pushed it over the table, reaching until it was far enough across and he was able to pick it up. She smiled reassuringly at him. Doyle glanced at him, and he swigged from the bottle.

 "Doyle, this is absolute insanity," said Li Duc, running to her side. "You can't do this, you can't kill all those people."

 "I'm doing this for you," she replied as if explaining the meaning of life to a child.

 "No!" Li Duc grabbed her by the shoulders. "I can't let you, you mustn't!"

 Doyle brought her pistol sharply up and across Li Duc's head. He stumbled to the floor.

 "Now, I think we should all wait quietly for the end," said Doyle. "Li, I hope you understand why I am doing this. I hope you can forgive me."

 As Doyle looked down at the prone form of Ng Li Duc, Chisholm clicked the red pen and dropped it into the brandy, tore a strip from the sheet around his waist and poked it into the opening of the decanter. He flicked Caramel's lighter against the rag, gripping it with his broken fingers, and sent flame running up the cut glass neck. He leapt from his chair, tottering bloodily against the table, and threw the bottle against the far window.

 The bottle fractured, alcohol exploding across the diamond pane. The flames seemed to freeze for a moment, before erupting across the alcohol into a spider-shape. The pen danced in the flames, and then burst into a blue-orange ball that gusted the entire window out into the storm.

 The room decompressed, shuddering violently, and everyone grabbed for something to hold onto. Suvlov was sucked straight out through the gaping hole, his squeals unheard above the thunder and the rushing air. Tuan Wong's corpse followed him, as did several chairs. As the sucking subsided, the pressure equalised and rain started to flood in, David hauled himself over the table and grabbed Doyle. He pulled her off balance and towards the window. She punched him, and pushed him away as they approached the shattered wall. He staggered back a couple of steps, then charged into her again. Doyle caught the edge of the hole, David hanging on to her shoulders, and they both teetered on the brink.

 "It's too late, Doctor Chisholm. The time-accelerator is already in operation, it will activate in less than ten minutes. We just have to sit and wait."

 "Someone will know how to stop it."

 "But I'll make sure nobody finds out until it's too late. I've come too far to be killed by you. Dying in the middle of a temporal whirlwind will be a glorious, instant death. Stop struggling, or you'll spend your last moments of life screaming as you hurtle towards the ground." Doyle pointed out into the storm, arced her arm up and down to illustrate her point. "I don't want you to suffer an agonising fall, when we can all die in a civilised dimensional disharmonisation. You know this planet deserves to be destroyed. Stand by my side, embrace the righteousness of its destruction, let us..." Doyle was cut off as lightning lashed against the tower.

 Without the window, without the microde conductor grid contained in the glass, the lightning shoot into the building and wrapped itself around Doyle and David, scorching them and filling the room with static. David's hands flew backwards as Doyle was wrenched from his grip. Her powersuit channelled the energy of the storm around her body, while he was rooted to the floor by the current running through him. The air flashed blue and yellow between them, popping and roaring, an arc of white running from Doyle's outstretched hand into David's exposed chest.

 David's body shivered violently, wracked by thousands of volts, and Doyle let out a laugh as she saw his eyes popping and his skin start to boil. Her suit prevented her body from conducting the energy, channelled it into her attacker. But the suit's own power was merging with that of the lightning bolt. Energy welled up around and inside Doyle, lifting her off the floor: a fork of electric brilliance whipped her sideways, her body twisting and engulfed in flames.

 "It wasn't about a clone, or about Ng Li Duc!" shouted David. "It was about you!" He pushed her out into the clouds. She zigzagged upwards before disappearing in the black sky, her scream echoing around the conference room. David collapsed backwards, his body smoking and black.

 Benny knelt beside his body, and Li cradled his head.

 "Of course," said David, "the important thing about copied clones, the type of clone that comes fully grown and with the requisite memories wired in from the start, is that they can remember the scars they no longer have. It's not really cloning, you see. It's a body transplant. Only nobody has to die, and you get all the bits you're used to. She probably knew that. The problem was never the clones. It was the business. Mind you, I quite liked Chrysanthemum Heart." David Chisholm stopped breathing.

 Hu knelt too, and checked the man's pulse.

 "He's gone," he said softly.

 Benny and Hu stood, looking at each other.

 "The time-accelerator," they said in unison, and turned for the door.

 They rushed across the room, past Teibi's body still tied to the chair, past the suitcase and the ruined furniture and the bloodstains and the dying flames, and through the bombed-out doorway.

 Benny paused in the breach, looking back at Caramel. The girl had walked over to David's body. Her clothes and hair were being whipped by the wind, but she didn't seem to notice. She seemed catatonic. Benny called out to her, shouted her name, but the girl did not respond.

 "No time," said Hu, pulling Benny out of the office and towards the lift.

 Caramel pushed Li out of the way. She fell to her knees, took David's head in her hands and started to cry. Li stood sadly, went to speak but bit his lip. He rubbed his hand over Caramel's head. She looked at him, her eyes sore and distant.

 "I want to be alone with him, please," she sobbed quietly.

 Li nodded and left the room, dashing into the lift with Benny and Hu just as the doors closed.

 There were more bodies, about ten technicians and scientists who had been working late. Doyle had killed them all, the corpses slumped over workstations and sprawled defensively. They had died silently, before any of them even knew what was going on.

 "They're all dead," said Li. "How do we shut it off?"

 "Branson has very strict rules on documentation. There will be an instruction manual."

 The three of them spread out around the office, looking through the piles of papers and files on each desk.

 "I've got it," shouted Benny after thirty seconds of frantic searching.

 She opened a large folder on the desk nearest the accelerator, and Hu and Li poured over it with her.

 "There, 'Activation and deactivation of accelerator functions', chapter 4."

 Benny flicked past the sections on basic keyboard operation, interface with the accelerator software and the correct seating position for technicians. She reached the relevant chapter, and scanned through paragraphs on how to initiate acceleration. Finally, she reached the right bit.

 "Is says simply choose the cancel operation on the acceleration application."

 She, Hu and Li Duc exchanged smiles. Then she reached forward and moved the cursor, the cursor hovering over the cancel button in the window replicating the countdown above the tube. She clicked the left mouse button.

 Nothing happened to the countdown. A small, grey window with an exclamation mark in a red circle to one side, popped up: 'Error. Network communication interrupted'.

 She clicked it again, then three more times. Hu put his hand over hers and clicked the button. Still nothing happened.

 Hu leapt around the desk and looked at the rear of the computer. Then he examined some of the wires in front of the accelerator.

 "My god, she's shot out the network connection. We have no control over the accelerator."

 "Shouldn't the thing automatically shut down if that happens?"

 "Well. yes... I..."

 "Look at this," said Li from the next desk. "It's a fault report. Seems the machine continues to run, even if contact with the system is lost. They're waiting for an official change request before they deal with that bug."

 "Great," said Hu. "Maybe we could ring the Help Desk, get them to restore the connection."

 "We've got three minutes, not three years," said Benny.

 "Oh, you've worked in an office as well," said Hu. "There must be something we can do."

 "Here," said Benny. "It says that in there's a manual override inside the accelerator."

 "Makes sense," said Hu. "Let's go."

 "Wait," said Benny. "Look at the screen." She pointed to a small, red square beneath the countdown: 'Intrusion Countermeasures - Security system active'. She pulled a yellow pen from her hip pocket, handed it to Li Duc and continued, "Li, stay here, find out what that security thing means exactly, and use this pen to guide us through the shutdown."

 "Pen?"

 "Just think of it as a particularly slim and stylish microphone."

 "But I always use hands-free ones."

 Benny and Hu ran up the steps of the podium and wrenched open the clamps on the right side of the silver tube. Steam exploded all along that edge.

 "I should warn you," said Hu. "The accelerator is a very special device. It's... well, the most accurate description would be that it is metadimensionally existential."

 "Do you mean it's bigger on the inside?"

 "Exactly."

 "Should be a walk in the park, then."

 Once inside, Benny took another yellow pen from her hip and clicked it on. She clipped it over the top pocket of her tunic.

 "Li, can you hear me? Click the top of the pen to talk."

 "Yes, I can hear you fine," came Li's voice after a moment. "The security devices are motion-sensitive lasers in the ceiling, protecting the walkway."

 A red bolt shot past Benny's shoulder and hit the door. "Thanks for the warning. We'll stay still till you tell us what to do."

 "Right. Oh, also the floor in the centre of the chamber is electrified. Keep to the sides, behind the bars where the operations units are, you should be fine. Except there are a couple of sections of wall that slam out into the railings to bar intruders access about half way across. Just be careful, OK?"

 "Got it. How do we turn this thing off?"

 "According to this, there are three acceleration nodes, each slaved to a primary control terminal inside and then to the external operation machine out here. One of the terminals is directly opposite the door, and the two others are half way along either side. On each terminal, you need to enter a cancel command into the three terminals to completely deactivate the accelerator and the security measures."

 "I can see the one opposite," Benny said, pointing to a bright red screen directly opposite. Hu followed her indication.

 "And there's a similar display on my side."

 "Yes, and that's the third. Let's go. Quickly, watch out for the lasers."

 Benny and Hu dove along the walkway, she to the left he to the right, while dozens of red shafts rained down, sparking the metal of the walls and the floor. Hu got to the terminal on his side with only a few burns and a couple of tears in the flesh on his arms and back. Benny faired less well, the material of her tunic and the top of her skin burnt away across her right forearm, and a livid slash running down her right thigh. She stumbled at the workstation, trying to block-out the pain.

 They hunched over the keyboards on either side, drawing breath and trying to keep perfectly still. The lasers stopped.

 Benny and Hu both pressed the escape key on their respective terminals, and the screens turned blue.

 "What now?" Benny stammered into her microphone.

 "A prompt should appear in a couple of seconds," Li answered over the airwaves. The prompt did appear, the word 'COMMAND' followed by a colon.

 "Simply type in 'cancel acceleration' and press enter. Hurry, there's less than a minute left."

 Benny and Hu typed the words quickly. Another laser bolt caught Benny in the shoulder as she reached for the return key, and then one burnt across her hand as she punched the key. She raised her hand and looked at the burn as the blinking cursor turned into an egg timer. After a couple of seconds, the words 'Acceleration Cancelled. Please enter new parameters for operation'.

 "It worked," Benny and Hu said in unison. They both turned to go to the final terminal.

 "Watch out for the walls." Li shouted.

 But too late. Two-foot thick sections of wall on either side shoot out beside the terminals. The one on Benny's side caught her left shoulder, spinning her round and crushing her arm against the railings.

 Hu was a fraction in front of her, and when the section of wall on his side sprang out. it sent him sprawling over the railings. His feet were crushed between the crossbar and the new wall, and then he tumbled free and landed on the central floor. He hit the floor and screamed, his body wracking up and down on the electrified grille. He pulled himself onto the walkway as more lasers stuttered around him, catcing him across his shoulder blades and the backs of his legs. He lay still.

 Benny pulled herself free, screwing her face and body against the pressure, and collapsed with her back against the new wall as more lasers thudded into the metal around her. She called over to Hu, but he didn't answer.

 "Benny? Benny, what's happened," shouted Li. He sounded very distant.

 "The. the walls got us." Benny couldn't focus her vision, and there was a dull thumping heart in her ears.

 "Benny, there's only thirty seconds left, you have to get that third terminal."

 "I... Hu's hurt. I..."

 "Benny, don't talk, just get going."

 "OK," Benny said breathlessly. She pushed herself up against the wall, then ducked back down as lasers hit above her. "Got to think about this."

 "No time to think, just go."

 "Fuck it," Benny whispered. She leapt from the walkway, vaulted over the railings and onto a dog-sized cage insulated from the floor. She jumped from that to the table in the centre, crushing the petri dishes under foot, then across a couple of tables covered in small cages. She was unsteady on her feet, but pushed forward too fast to lose balance, every stumble turning into a purposeful leap. The cages skittered onto the floor, jumping around as the electricity hit them. She climbed up the side of a large cage and across the top. Lasers sliced down her back as she scrambled over the barrier and onto the walkway on the far side.

 She heard Li's voice, "ten seconds. Hurry."

 Benny hit the terminal on the far side, lasers pricking her back and sparking at her heels. One caught her across the cheek and she tasted blood in her mouth. She screwed her eyes into focus and typed the cancellation command immediately, the screen changing colour and the letters appearing as she hit the enter key. The cursor flickered as a red line of pain shot into the side of Benny's neck, burning away the flesh to the right of her jugular.

 "Benny!" shouted Li.

 "I'm still not sure what it was all about." The last thing Bernice saw as she blacked out was an egg timer, turning itself over on the shifting blue screen.

 "I've come home now. So cold."

 "Benny?" said Li, leaning forward in his hard chair beside the bed.

 Benny opened her eyes and looked at Li.

 "Heathcliffe? Oh, it's you. Where am I?"

 "Hospital. You've spent most of the day in surgery. You saved the planet. You saved everybody's life. You saved me."

 "Hospital, you say? Anything permanent?"

 "They said you had a concussion, some broken ribs, several serious burns and assorted flesh wounds. It's all been taken care of. Apart from a few scars, you're as healthy as before."

 "Oh well, can't expect miracles, I suppose. I don't imagine those trousers I was wearing came through unscathed, did they? They were such a comfortable fit."

 "I'm afraid not."

 "What about Hu?"

 "He didn't make it." Li's tone was flat.

 "And the rest of your band?"

 "They're all fine. As fine as they can be, I suppose."

 "And what about the girl?"

 "Nobody could find her. We don't know where she went." He looked away. "She must have just run away."

 They didn't speak for a few moments.

 "Well," Benny broke the silence, put her hand on Li Duc's cheek and smiled. "Look at us."

 "A right pair of clones."

 She snatched her hand back and exaggerated a frown. "Bad jokes will only make me wish I'd let Doyle kill you."

 "We've just vanquished the evil capitalists and the insane terrorist. I'm a true rock rebel."

 "I'll send you some punk tracks when I get back to Dellah. Which reminds me, have I missed my flight?"

 "It's tomorrow lunchtime."

 "I'll need to go to the hotel, get my things. Oh, and I'll have to sign for the bill."

 "Ah, yes, bills." Li's gaze drifted uncomfortably to the window.

 "It's OK, the university will take care of it," said Benny confidently. "Oh, hang on, will I be charged for the surgery?"

 "I'm afraid it was quite extensive."

 "And no doubt very costly."

 "Rather. Health care can be astronomical on Hanari."

 "And there's that huge vidphone bill."

 "And your hotel has attempted to contact you about a rather frightening bar bill. Apparently, it's not covered by your expenses."

 "The amount I've cost the Uni lately seems to have blotted my copy book somewhat. I wonder if they'd be willing to give me an advance on next decade's earnings."

 "Don't worry." Li leaned forward, conspiratorially. "I've got plenty of money. My royalties are all I have got. I'd be grateful if you allowed me to share them."

 "Well, if you're sure."

 "Absolutely. I'll take care of everything. So, what will you do now?"

 "I've still got a night to kill before my flight."

 "I'm sure another adventure will be along in a minute. Fancy a drink in the meantime?"

 "Well, if you're going to twist my arm like this, I guess I have no choice. You couldn't lend me some clothes, could you? Something in blue, perhaps?"

 "What?" asked the cab driver.

 "Nothing," said the girl.

 Caramel sat back in the overheated cab, fanning herself with her hand and tugging at the top of her shirt. She saw David Chisholm's face floating outside of the tinted windows, obscuring the faces of the Adored that were displayed on billboards and tee-shirts, in shop windows and holovid displays.

 She felt inside her, brushed against the little bit of David that was in her head, and felt better. She knew it would fade with time, but it would comfort her for now.

 Caramel had had dozens of people through her head. They had left footprints, tracks she would one day pay plenty to have wiped clean. Scars inside her that would never heal - scars not in her emotions or memories, but in her mind, in the cells and glands of her brain. But these people had left nothing of themselves, nothing that would last, nothing that would blossom or glow, nothing for Caramel.

 David had. She knew that, somehow. Just as somehow, when she patted her tummy, she could feel that part of David becoming a part of something else, a new life weaving together, something that would blossom and glow inside her. David had left her the only thing she would really care about. That made her feel better. That, and the large red suitcase, filled with unimaginable wealth, sitting beside her on the seat.

 Caramel closed her eyes.

 Maria Neidermeyer opened them, and smiled. She lit another mint fag. Pregnant and rich, she was getting out.

 Walking through the rain, through the night, through Kinnerston trying to hail a taxi and looking forward to spending the next morning in the duty free shops of Hanari Central's waiting lounge.

 She had been in a bar, the name of which escaped her, enjoying cocktails and farewells with Li Duc and the rest of the Adored. They'd introduced her to the Hanari Storm. It was an interesting drink: dark rum, bitters and Kahlua stirred together, a dash of lime and a white float - an alien liquor she'd never heard. The float streaked thinly through the cloudy chocolate-brown beneath, hence the name (or, perhaps, the name came first and the ingredients were fitted in around it).

 She took a wrong turn somewhere, stumbled down a deserted blind alley in the rain, closed her eyes as she leant against the wall at the end. Then she felt the wall give, heard the creak of unoiled hinges, and suddenly sunlight was drying the raindrops on her face.

 She would have thought it an alcoholic hallucination, but as soon as she squinted into the sunshine and smelt the hazy, thick summer air, she sobered up in a most unpleasant way.

 The flowers were in full bloom, the air spiced and pleasantly warm. Though it was thick, it refreshed her after the muggy pressure of Hanari's air.

 And there was a man there, kneeling by one of the flowerbeds. He wore black boots and a battered fedora, his trenchcoat slung over the bench and his khaki cotton shirt damp around the armpits. He had been planting, and there was dirt on his hands.

 He looked up and smiled when Benny entered, pushing his hat up as he wiped his forehead with a handkerchief. Benny recognised traces of Simon and Jason in the Mystery Man; and echoes of the Doctor she loved, and the one she had slept with.

 The man stood, and followed Benny's gaze around the garden. Birds were singing, and the colours were vibrant, a fantasy shaded by Monet.

 Benny remembered it, of course. The season was new, and so was the man. And there was a stone statue beside the fountain. That had not been there before.

 Benny walked past the man, not making eye contact. Her attention was fixed on the statue. It seemed so lifelike: the proud expression, the raised eyebrow and the tailored suit. It was an unusual composition.

 Benny draped her raincoat over the edge of the bench, then put her arm around the statue. She followed his mildly annoyed gaze to the apple in his hand. A chunk had been bitten out of it. Inside, approximately half a worm was caught mid wriggle.

 "He's not actually a statue, is he?" said Benny.

 The Mystery Man shook his head.

 "Is he frozen?"

 "Sort of." He smiled at the stature. "Cemented in time. I think he'd be pleased."

 "This is a Garden of Archetypes, right? Why am I here?"

 "I don't think you want me to answer that."

 "But why were you helping me?"

 "Out of the kindness of my heart, perhaps. You became embroiled in a war between an obsessed woman and a ruthless institution."

 "Hardly the first time."

 "There was a man, David. He said something about a garden. He'd been here, hadn't he?"

 "Yes, I met him. I've been watching events here."

 "Why?"

 "Because I can. I'm not usually granted such wide an avenue of involvement. Something to do with those temporal experiments, I imagine."

 "So, you helped me."

 "Yes," the man smiled.

 "And the others came here?"

 "Some of them."

 "David. What about Doyle?"

 "No. The journey would have been too far for her to manage." He turned his attention to the statue. "And like my new ornament, she would not have been able to leave."

 "And the girl?"

 "Ah. Poor, sweet Caramel. Anybody who experiences the Beautiful Garden as a ruined tenement block has real problems. She's spent most of her short life being used. And all she's learnt from that is how to use other people. She learned to use to her own ends the body others had given her. So very sad. Maybe her new freedom, and her new responsibilities, will teach her otherwise. As for you," he wagged his finger at Benny. "You must stop blundering into other people's battles. You have a more important conflict ahead of you."

 "Where does all this insight come from?" asked Benny with a touch of sarcasm.

 "Well, usually I would say feminine intuition, but your subconscious rather cocked that one up. So to speak."

 "If I hadn't become involved, I'd be dead by now."

 "Perhaps."

 "Doyle would have gone ahead, and this city would have been destroyed."

 She paused, and looked round the garden. "But you could have done something, couldn't you?"

 The man turned away.

 "You've got the power. You could have brought Doyle here, like this one." She thumped the statue.

 "I'm sorry, but I could not interfere so casually. The people and events here are meaningless compared to the path that you are on. You must learn to keep off the grass."

 "You could have saved all those people. Hu, and that young man, and David and even Doyle. But you're only here because of me, aren't you?"

 "Bernice Summerfield, you have a destiny. You will make a stand where day meets night, where the future faces its sunset. You will..."

 "Oh, fuck off," said Benny and walked out of the Garden.

 THE END.