Their testimonies will help bring him to justice.’
‘By which you mean crucifixion.’
‘I detect faint disapproval, Dexia,’ Martinez said.
‘You’re right. It’s barbaric.’
‘It’s how we’ve always done things. The Haussmann way, if you like.’
Sky Haussmann: the man who gave this world its name, and who sparked off the two-hundred-and-fifty-year war we’ve only just learned to stop fighting. When they crucified Sky they thought they were putting an early end to the violence. They couldn’t have been more wrong. Ever since, crucifixion has been the preferred method of execution.
‘Is Kessler the reason you asked me here, sir? Were you expecting me to add to the case file against him?’
Martinez paused at a heavy wooden door. ‘Not Kessler, no. I’ve every expectation of seeing him nailed to Bridgetop by the end of the year. But it does concern the man for whom Kessler was an instrument.’
I thought about that for a moment. ‘Kessler worked for Colonel Jax, didn’t he?’
Martinez opened the door and ushered me through, into the windowless room beyond. By now we must have been back into the canyon wall. The air had the inert stillness of a crypt. ‘Yes, Kessler was Jax’s man,’ Martinez said. ‘I’m glad you made the connection: it saves me explaining why Jax ought to be brought to justice.’
‘I agree completely. Half the population would agree with you. But I’m afraid you’re a bit late: Jax died years ago.’
Two other people were already waiting in the room, sitting on settees either side of a low, black table set with tea, coffee and pisco sours.
‘Jax didn’t die,’ Martinez said. ‘He just disappeared, and now I know where he is. Have a seat, please.’
He knew I was interested; knew I wouldn’t be able to walk out of that room until I’d heard the rest of the story about Colonel Brandon Jax. But there was more to it than that: there was something effortlessly commanding about his voice that made it very difficult not to obey him. During my time in the Southland Militia I’d learned that some people have that authority and some people don’t. It can’t be taught; can’t be learned; can’t be faked. You’re either born with it or you’re not.
‘Dexia Scarrow, allow me to introduce you to my other two guests,’ Martinez said, when I’d taken my place at the table. ‘The gentleman opposite you is Salvatore Nicolosi, a veteran of one of the Northern Coalition’s freeze/thaw units. The woman on your right is Ingrid Sollis, a personal-security expert with a particular interest in counter-intrusion systems. Ingrid saw early combat experience with the Southland, but she soon left the military to pursue private interests.’
I bit my tongue, then turned my attention away from the woman before I said something I might regret. The man — Nicolosi — looked more like an actor than a soldier. He didn’t have a scar on him. His beard was so neatly groomed, so sharp-edged, that it looked sprayed on through a stencil. Freeze/thaw operatives rubbed me up the wrong way, no matter which side they’d been on. They’d always seen themselves as superior to the common soldier, which is why they didn’t feel the need for the kind of excessive musculature Norbert carried around.
‘Allow me to introduce Dexia Scarrow,’ Martinez continued, nodding at me. ‘Dexia was a distinguished soldier in the Southland Militia for fifteen years, until the armistice. Her service record is excellent. I believe she will be a valuable addition to the team.’
‘Maybe we should back up a step,’ I said. ‘I haven’t agreed to be part of anyone’s team.’
‘We’re going after Jax,’ Nicolosi said placidly. ‘Doesn’t that excite you?’
‘He was on your side,’ I said. ‘What makes you so keen to see him crucified?’
Nicolosi looked momentarily pained. ‘He was a war criminal, Dexia. I’m as anxious to see monsters like Jax brought to justice as I am to see the same fate visited on their scum-ridden Southland counterparts.’
‘Nicolosi’s right,’ said Ingrid Sollis. ‘If we’re going to learn to live together on this planet, we have to put the law above all else, regardless of former allegiances.’
‘Easy coming from a deserter,’ I said. ‘Allegiance clearly didn’t mean very much to you back then, so I’m not surprised it doesn’t mean much to you now.’
Martinez, still standing at the head of the table, smiled tolerantly, as if he’d expected nothing less.
‘That’s an understandable misapprehension, Dexia, but Ingrid was no deserter. She was wounded in the line of duty: severely, I might add. After her recuperation, she was commended for bravery under fire and given the choice of an honourable discharge or a return to the front line. You cannot blame her for choosing the former, especially given all she had been through.’
‘Okay, my mistake,’ I said. ‘It’s just that I never heard of many people making it out alive, before the war was over.’
Sollis looked at me icily. ‘Some of us did.’
‘No one here has anything but an impeccable service record,’ Martinez said. ‘I should know: I’ve been through your individual biographies with a fine-tooth comb. You’re just the people for the job.’
‘I don’t think so,’ I said, moving to stand up. ‘I’m just a retired soldier with a grudge against deserters. I wasn’t in some shit-hot freeze/thaw unit, and I didn’t do anything that resulted in any commendations for bravery. Sorry, folks, but I think—’
‘Remain seated.’
I did what the man said.
Martinez continued speaking, his voice as measured and patient as ever. ‘You participated in at least three high-risk extraction operations, Dexia: three dangerous forays behind enemy lines, to retrieve two deep-penetration Southland spies and one trump-card NC defector. Or do you deny this?’
I shook my head, the reality of what he was proposing still not sinking in. ‘I can’t help you. I don’t know anything about Jax—’
‘You don’t need to. That’s my problem.’
‘How are you so sure he’s still alive, anyway?’
‘I’d like to know that, too,’ Nicolosi said, stroking an elegant finger along the border of his beard.
Martinez sat down on his own stool at the head of the table, so that he was higher than the three of us. He removed his glasses and fiddled with them in his lap. ‘It is necessary that you take a certain amount of what I am about to tell you on faith. I’ve been gathering intelligence on men like Jax for years, and in doing so I’ve come to rely on a web of contacts, many of whom have conveyed information to me at great personal risk. If I were to tell you the whole story, and if some of that story were to leak beyond this office, lives might well be endangered. And that is to say nothing of how my chances of bringing other fugitives to justice might be undermined.’
‘We understand,’ Sollis said.
I bridled at the way she presumed to speak for all of us. Perhaps she felt she owed Martinez for the way he’d just stood up for her.
Again I bit my lip and said nothing.
‘For a long time, I’ve received titbits of intelligence concerning Colonel Jax: rumours that he did not, in fact, die at all, but is still at large.’
‘Where?’ Sollis asked. ‘On Sky’s Edge?’
‘It would seem not. There were, of course, many rumours and false trails that suggested Jax had gone to ground somewhere on this planet. But one by one I discounted them all. Slowly the truth became apparent: Jax is still alive; still within this system.’
I felt it was about time I made a positive contribution. ‘Wouldn’t a piece of dirt like Jax try to get out of the system at the first opportunity?’
Martinez favoured my observation by pointing his glasses at me. ‘I had my fears that he might have, but as the evidence came in, a different truth presented itself.’
He set about pouring himself some tea. The pisco sours were going unwanted. I doubted that any of us had the stomach for drink at that time of the day.
‘Where is he, then?’ asked Nicolosi. ‘Plenty of criminal elements might have the means to shelter a man like Jax, but given the price on his head, the temptation to turn him in—’
‘He is not being sheltered,’ Martinez said, sipping delicately at his tea before continuing, ‘He is alone, aboard a ship. The ship was believed lost, destroyed in the final stages of the war, when things escalated into space. But I have evidence that the ship is still essentially intact, with a functioning life-support system. There is every reason to
