David levelled his ba lance, training it on Wilkins's back.

''Who are you really, Colonel Wilkins?'' he demanded softly.

'''Home by midnight','' said Wilkins. ''That's your abort code. Mission compromised. Right?''

The paratroopers closed in on him and his men.

''I'll ask again,'' said David. ''You're not Cobra Force. You're not even Americans. Are you Nephthysians? Setics?''

''The answer to that is fuck you, Dave.''

''Brave talk, but you're surrounded and outnumbered. You have twenty fully charged god rods aimed at you. I suggest you try and be co-operative.''

''What was it?'' Wilkins said. ''Where did I slip up? How did you rumble me?''

''The accent's pretty good,'' said David, ''but you pronounced the name of your base 'Ky-ro', not 'Kay-ro' as the Yanks do. And you said the Osirisiac Hegemony, when most Horusites call it the Parent Hegemony. Either of those, on its own, I'd have passed off as harmless. An idiosyncrasy. But together…'' He shrugged.

''Well, don't I just feel like the big shit-eating idiot. All those years at the Baghdad Special Ops Academy watching crappy Hollywood movies, and I blew it with a couple of careless mistakes. Thing is, Dave, I'm not the only one who's been careless.''

''What?'' said David.

''Look up,'' said Wilkins, adding, ''sucker.''

The rim of the valley was fringed with soldiers. They stood silhouetted against the stars. David could make out the distinctive jutting rectangle-and-semicircle insignia on their helmets and the baboon heads that capped their lances. Well, that settled that. Nephthysians. They were all fucking Nephthysians.

Wilkins's grin was bright and sickle-shaped in the gloom.

''You're surrounded and outnumbered,'' he said in a passable imitation of David's English accent. ''You have forty fully charged god rods aimed at you. I suggest you try and be co-operative, or else we'll zap you all to the Field of Reeds.''