There is something in the swell of darkness around him that seeps into his mind. Like oil soaking into earth, making it sticky and heavy. Like piss running down his leg as he stands naked in the baking sun, his wrists cut open by the sharp edges of the cable ties. He can see his hands, yanked up above his head, purplish red and puffed up from lack of circulation. There is blood trickling down his arms. Nine, someone says behind him. A voice made of dust, lifeless and indifferent. His shoulderjoints hurt as if they've been wrenched from their sockets, and he can feel his skin blister as he is roasting in the dead heat of summer. But when he looks down at himself, as if the wall he is facing was made of glass, he can see it's not piss but blood running from his groin. The world starts fogging up, black and red, and the ground feels like hot steel under the soles of his feet. He wants to throw up but there is nothing in his stomach. His knees are too weak to support his weight any longer. It is taken instead by his wrists. His head lolls back, and he can feel his eyes bulge as he watches the plastic straps cut deeper, severing flesh and tendons, exposing the white bone beneath. He tries to scream. but his mouth is too dry, his tongue a lump of sticky flesh that clogs his throat, and all he hears is a panicked, guttural grunt. Breathe, his mind howls, run, run, run, but he can't move at all, pinned into place, his sliced flesh bleeding away until his feet are in a puddle of bloody mud...

Katze jolts awake and yells as his ribs protest against his jerky sitting up. Gasping for breath, he sags against the headboard. He struggles against he urge to vomit as he shakily covers his middle with his hand. There is a patch of sticky dampness on his jeans. His watch tells him it's too early to get up, and he is too exhausted to bother with work yet. He takes a few moments to grasp for composure, then peels off his clothes. His fingers tremble as he touches his middle. It's still sensitive, and he rubs at the nub of flesh, hating the feeling of scars and of the wet nightmare drying between his fingers.

The shadow by the window is gone.

xxx

Katze tells himself he has no time to spare. Not a moment, not a heartbeat, to see Raoul and get the laptop back. Instead, Katze buys a new one, hunts down his data in the maelstroem of the internet where it's hidden in plain sight, and for a while he pretends that's all there's to it.

He sinks himself into work, and it both revives and drains him. Refreshing old contacts, reminding them he is still around. Bringing himself up to speed on gossip and business news, facts and rumours, vibes and moods, all combining to a dark, intense, heaving patchwork, a blanket that stifles the flames that have flared up in Ceres before they can turn into a ring of fire around the city. He is not afraid of what he is doing. He is not lying to himself, either. With ruthless efficiency, he chokes the skirmishes that have sprung up, until the invisible territories are redrawn, the divisions clear and respected once more. It is dirty business, and he has no illusions about his job.

And still, Katze thinks, the heart of the city is there, in the dirty outskirts. It pumps and endless stream of filth and life into the arteries of the shiny centre, a flood of money and energy, electrifying, startling.

He waits for the best moment to clear up misunderstandings, and he finds an opportunity to set the balance straight with the manager of the club where Kiri used to dance. Going behind my back, Katze tells the man, it's stupid, and cosying up with Guy to snuff me, that's unacceptable... There are no third chances. By the rules of the game they are all playing, he's been patient allowing a second one, but it's been wasted, mistaken for weakness. Katze doesn't hesitate wiping the slate clean. He is still generous, sharing a cigarette with his ex-business partner, and he watches as the aromatic Black Moon turns into bitter ash and the man's eyes glaze over. There are always people lining up to work for Katze, and the new manager, one of Katze's lieutenants, has been carefully vetted. He will be compliant for some time to come.

Until I'm past my prime, or he thinks he's got one up on me, and then it starts all over. That's people for you. Katze doesn't resent it. It pays, he thinks, to live for the day and ignore tomorrow until it comes knocking on the door. But he can't quite escape it because he needs plans, strategies and cunning to keep his business going, the sprawling web of firms and names, connections and safeguards. He translates it all into figures. Profit, loss, turnover, write-offs, percentages and shares. Numbers are certain. Clearly defined, malleable into statistics that are devoid of anything he doesn't want to acknowledge. Numbers are his toys, and for him it's a welcome distraction from more practical aspects of his work when he sits down to scan his books.

The SWAT men stand by. There is less fighting in the streets, and the controls ease off. By day, the air smells of hot dust, fuel fumes and hope. Dusk falls sooner, and at night the first chill of autum cools the nights. A couple of times Katze thinks he's caught a glimpse of Kiri, looking thin and sober, but each time it turns out that his mind has fooled him - the first man is washing cars at a fuel station and from across the road looks older than Kiri, the second time the semblance is startling, merging with another memory, closer, sharper, still aching, but it's too quick, the dark haired youth turning a corner into a filthy side street before Katze can pull up his roadster and chase after him.

xxx

He tries to sleep as little as possible. Once, he drives out to the ruined station in an attempt to show a dirty finger to his ghosts. It's early morning, a cool, still dawn where even the city seems to slide into a gentle lull. Katze parks his car and gets out. Groping for his cigarettes, he lets the chill of autumn seep into his bones. When he lights up, his hands are shaking. Slowly, he walks on, searching for the spot. Strange, it drifts through his mind, shouldn't I find this fucking place in my sleep? Don't I, every damned night? That's the idea, isn't it?

Instead, he finds himself wandering across sloping, broken ground towards the steel gate that sealed Iason's fate. The monumental plates, thick enough to withstand the fire of Elite tanks for a week, have been wrenched apart by the explosion that destroyed the bowels of the building, its roots, several storeys deep. They've crashed and grown into the ground, where sand and weeds pile up against the rusting surface. The roof of the old station has caved in and the entire area is slowly collapsing into a rugged crater, overgrown with pale grass and small shrubs. Soon it will be covered, fading from sight and from memory.

A tomb, Katze thinks, that's what this is. I can't feel you anymore, Iason. I've lost you... Is this how it ends with us?

He shivers. And then he catches sight of the anchor, the welded ring, cemented into the wall that frames the gate on one side. It's a corner sheltered by an overhanging slab of concrete, held only by pitted steel rebar. He recognises the broken bottle nearby, a rock, shards of glass and a few cigarette butts, all thickly covered in dust. For a moment he stands still, frozen in place, and then he bends over and throws up, retching until he spits bile.

xxx

That evening, he goes to the club to get drunk and laid. He picks one of the dancers and they do it in one of the small rooms at the back of the bar that are rented out by the half hour. The man is young, trim and shorter than Katze, his dark hair falling thick and glossy over jaded brown eyes. When he takes off his kit, he is pale under a fake tan, and his smile is tired, but he tries to make small talk anyway. Katze tells him to turn around, to stay that way and shut up. And while the young bloke is on his stomach on the cot that's the only piece of furniture and Katze has his way with him, the redhead forgets his nightmares for a while and delves into his memories instead.

xxx