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was hard and metallic, with a slight feminine edge. ‘If you wish blood-lock to be assigned to another individual, they must handle me within the next thirty seconds. Blood-lock may only be assigned once, to one individual. I am now initiating the thirty-second countdown. You will be alerted when blood-lock is established.’
    ‘I guess that’s you,’ Fray said to Quillon, with a sly smile on his face, as if he was enjoying every moment of this.
    ‘Or maybe it should be me,’ Meroka said. ‘After all, I’m the one doing the protecting around here.’
    Quillon held on to the weapon, although part of his mind was screaming at him to release it. ‘There’s intelligence in this thing,’ he said. ‘That shouldn’t be possible. Machines can’t think down here.’
    Fray shrugged. ‘Things keep working for a while.’
    ‘Not when they’ve been taken apart and put back together again,’ Quillon said.
    ‘Give me the gun,’ Meroka said.
    ‘It’s Cutter’s toy now.’ Fray looked up at her, daring Meroka to contradict him. ‘The angel meant it for him.’
    The gun said, ‘Blood-lock has now been established. Please be advised that ambient conditions are such that my operational effectiveness in energy-discharge mode is now eighty-one per cent and falling.’
    ‘What?’ Fray said.
    ‘Assuming that present conditions remain stable, I will become inoperable in energy-discharge mode in five hours, twenty-two minutes, with an estimated error margin of plus or minus eight minutes. Functionality will be severely compromised within three hours, forty-five minutes.’
    ‘It’s already failing,’ Quillon said, turning the barrel to face the wall, making sure his finger was nowhere near the trigger.
    ‘Five hours and change,’ Fray said. ‘What time is it?’
    ‘I got nine,’ Meroka said, lifting up her sleeve to examine her watches. ‘Last downbound train’s ten-fifteen.’
    ‘Still doable, wouldn’t you say?’ asked Fray.
    ‘If we move now,’ Meroka said.
    ‘Slow down,’ Quillon said, feeling like a man on a moving sidewalk that was accelerating ever faster. ‘I came here to discuss the possibility of leaving, that’s all. I thought we might make arrangements for tomorrow, or the day after ... not start the journey right now, with no preparation.’
    ‘Things have moved up a notch,’ Fray said. ‘Besides, the angel told you not to stick around. Tomorrow might already be too late.’
    ‘Meroka and I don’t know each other. How can I be sure she’s any good?’ Quickly he added: ‘No disrespect.’
    ‘None taken,’ Meroka said.
    ‘Meroka works for me. That’s all the recommendation you need.’ Fray looked expectantly at Meroka. ‘May be a silly question, but I take it you came equipped?’
    She screwed up her face. ‘Shit, I forgot.’
    ‘Meroka,’ Fray said warningly.
    She allowed her coat to hang open. Stitched to the inside seam was an array of armaments and equipment, each item in a little pouch or hoop of its own. There was a sub-machine gun, a revolver, an automatic, some kind of blunderbuss, something like a pistol-sized crossbow and a vicious assortment of edged weapons, some of which were evidently for throwing and some for close combat.
    There were also bullets, magazines, powder boxes and an apothecary’s wet-dream of colour-coded vials and stoppered bottles.
    ‘I didn’t forget.’
    ‘Told you she was good,’ Fray said, pushing back his chair so that he could stand up. ‘And now it’s time to let you in on a little operational secret, Cutter. I guess it never occurred to you that it wouldn’t be very smart for a man in my position to allow himself to be cornered in a room like this?’
    ‘Now that you mention it ...’
    Fray produced a bunch of heavy iron keys from his pocket, then pushed a shoe against a section of the wall behind him. What had appeared to be a part of the panelling hinged inwards, into darkness.
    ‘What’s that?’ Quillon asked.
    ‘What it