“The deterrence fleet is being deployed,” the Conservative Faction said.

“I’m surprised it took this long. People are getting nervous about the Ocisens, and they don’t even know about the Primes yet.”

“We believe the whole deployment was orchestrated by the Accelerators.”

“Why? What could they possibly gain from that?”

“They would finally know the nature of the deterrence fleet.”

“Okay, so how does that help them?”

“We don’t know. But it has to be crucial to their plans; they have risked almost everything on manipulating this one event.”

“The game is changing,” the Delivery Man said faintly. “That’s what Marius told me: The game is changing. I thought he was talking about Hanko.”

“Apparently not.”

“So we really are entering a critical phase, then.”

“It would seem so.”

Immediately suspicious, he said, “I’m not undertaking anything else for you. Not now.”

“We know. That is why we called. We thought you deserved to know. We understand how much your family means to you and that you want to be with them.”

“Ah. Thank you.”

“If you do wish to return to a more active status-”

“I’ll let you know. Has my replacement taken over following Marius?”

“Operational information is kept isolated.”

“Of course, sorry.”

“Thank you again for your assistance.”

The Delivery Man sat upright as the call ended. “Damnit.” The deterrence fleet! This was getting serious, not to mention potentially lethal. He ordered the cab to fly direct to the spaceport, and to hell with procedure. The flight he was booked to depart on wasn’t due to leave for another two hours. His u-shadow immediately tracked down the first ship bound for a Central world: a PanCephei Line flight to Gralmond, leaving in thirty-five minutes. It managed to reserve him a seat, paying a huge premium to secure the last first class lounge cubicle, but the flight would take twenty hours. Add another twenty minutes to that to reach Earth through the connecting wormholes, and he’d be back in London in just over twenty-one hours.