Evil UnLtd Vol 3: EVIL UTD

By Simon Forward

The Farce Of The Dark Side.

Villains are the new Heroes in this epic Sci-Fi series.

War! What is it good for? A great many things, according to Dexter Snide. But the current interstellar conflict threatens to divert public attention from his plans to plunge the universe into economic ruin.

To make matters worse, rival broadcaster, the PHUX Corporation, has exclusive coverage rights for the war between the ultra-bureaucratic System and the cute but belligerent Bunnymen. The ratings war is on.

Sentient planet, Alphaterre Metroplaisir – or Alph to his friends – faces devastation and an end to his cheerful theme-park ambience as his capital city is torn apart by Evil’s latest TV phenomenon,The Minion Factor. Alph turns to PHUX for help and, in a primetime advertising slot, the call goes out for heroes.

Even with a war on and heroes in short supply, there are some who will always find time to tackle Evil UnLtd. Especially those with old personal scores to settle.

Once they’re done with the System, the Bunnymen are coming for Evil UnLtd too.

The odds are stacked and the Evil gang need to be more united than ever.

A tall order, when they are divided and scattered. And perhaps the most serious threats of all come from within...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Simon Forward
• Release date: Feb 11, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311815873

Simon Forward

Born in Penzance in 1967. From the age of about three I was probably dreaming of writing for Doctor Who. Certainly it wasn't a case of just watching it: I'd go to bed with all sorts of adventures and story possibilities buzzing around in my head. From the age of eleven, I knew, whenever any aunts and uncles asked the "What do you want to do when you grow up?" question, the stock replies of jet pilot, train driver, astronaut were never going to be good enough for me. "I want to be a writer", I always said. And, what do you know, I am.Author of several works of licensed fiction, including Doctor Who novels, and novelisations for the BBC's Merlin series, I'm now primarily focused on promoting and developing my own original works, ranging from adult sf, through kids' and Young Adult fiction, as well as books that are downright Evil...

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VOL 3

EVIL UTD

by

Simon A Forward

Published by Galaxy Six Broadcasting

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © 2013 Simon A Forward

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

3.1 The Minion Factor

Prologue

SUPERPOWER SUMMIT

Little Timmy Entwhistle tugged at his mum’s coat-sleeve and pointed, gawping at the unidentified flying object that had just blasted by within inches of his right ear.

Nothing much disturbed the uniformly clipped strands of his pudding-basin haircut, but the sudden passage of whatever-it-was had done a serious amount of tousling. Meanwhile, his mum must have caught his reflection in the shoe-shop window.

Look at the state of you! Timmy fought to fend her off as she flattened the rebellious hairs with licked fingers.

No! Mum! Look!

By now, the thing was half a mile down the high street, still at ten-year-old-ear-level, zipping between traffic. Angry taxi drivers shook their fists out of cab windows.

D’ you think it’s a plane, Mum? Or a cruise missile?

He’d heard about those in history class. The Empire had been in the habit of sending them in wherever there were worlds without democracy. In some way he had yet to fully grasp, the missiles delivered free elections to oppressed populaces – who then voted in leaders who swore allegiance to the Empress. Only in the last month, the Empire had been on the TV, threatening to send in more missiles unless New Yorkshire gave up its adherence to antiquated imperial measurements. Timmy was a bit foggy on why Imperial forces should be so insistent on the metric system, and it was one of many reasons he didn’t tend to watch the news.

Anyway, Timmy’s mum fetched him a wallop across the ear. Don’t be so bloody daft, she scolded. When have you ever seen a cruise missile wearing a leotard?

Timmy frowned. He hadn’t noticed that. He’d assumed the missile had simply been painted caramel brown and custard yellow. But now that he focused on the rapidly receding object, it did look significantly more muscly than most high-tech munitions.

His mum had good eyes, he had to give her that.

HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELLLLLLPPPP!

Airman was sure his cries were subject to pronounced Doppler effect and that was why they were going unheeded as he screamed on by.

In fairness to the innocent members of the New Yorkshire public, he rarely flew through this city and so bystanders wasted precious seconds doing exactly what their title implied. Frequently with wide-open mouths, bulging eyes and pointing fingers. Sophisticated as the human brain was, it still required time to adjust to the concept of a man flying at high speed through rush-hour traffic. Shoppers could process the implications of an unbelievable bargain at the drop of a price tag. Men in near-supersonic nap-of-the-earth flight, not so fast. It was just the way of the world.

Even if any had heard his desperate calls they would probably need a few more minutes to get their heads around the idea of a superhero in danger. To ordinary eyes, his ultra-swift darting past wing-mirrors might seem like evidence of mega-heightened reflexes born of all his years of conquering gravity.

The sad, terrifying fact was, he wasn’t remotely in control.

Young Dexter’s thumb was getting a bit sore and growing more opposed to its current activity by the second.

Working the stick in swift jerks and violent nudges – left, right, left, right-left-right-right-left – was taking its toll on the controller as well.

After a dangerous rush down a tight gap between a bus and a fish-and-chip van, one gentle push on the stick guided his missile into a smooth climb, levelling at a smidge over rooftop altitude. The worst in the way of obstacles were aerials and satellite dishes, liable to scrape and bruise the hijacked hero but unlikely to impede his flight too much.

Good.

Dexter had flown the fellow for long enough under the local radar. He was closing in on the designated target and in any case the indigenous defence forces would probably shy away from shooting down one of their own citizens. Least of all one who had, until today, taken an active role in crime-fighting, mercy missions, disaster relief and all sorts of other noxious endeavours.

Dexter set the man on autopilot and tossed the controller aside. He lounged back on the couch and cracked his knuckles, flexing life back into his overworked fingers.

The room was in darkness, the way he preferred. The shadows were conducive to scheming and helped disguise the less salubrious features of the converted maintenance space above the school Science Department. On the plus side, if anyone happened to come barging in they were guaranteed to bang their head on one of the dusty beams, rusty cables or creaky pipes that criss-crossed this hideaway.

On screen, the hero in his ridiculous banoffee-pie livery, topped off with shiny flying helmet and goggles, provided the illumination, vividly rendered in state-of-the-art graphics as he skimmed over a digitised urban landscape. The way the figure frantically scrunched into a ball or threw up his arms every time he clipped a brick chimney was impressively lifelike and, Dexter trusted, an accurate representation of what was occurring light-years away on New Yorkshire.

It had taken a considerable amount of setup but so far his plan was going beautifully.

Dexter regretted the thought as soon as the door burst open, admitting a flood of light and ruining his shadowy ambience.

Found you, Snide! The voice was that of a lad who had swallowed a sugared Damson plum, served on a silver spoon that had lodged itself securely in the chap’s oesophagus. Miltongomery Piebald Shaftsworth The Third.

The lower echelons of Cringemyre pupils practised the amusing custom of dropping the ‘h’ when verbalising the fellow’s numeral appendage. It was beneath Dexter, which was why, on this occasion, he decided to do likewise: Well, if it isn’t Shaftsworth The Turd.

I’m jolly well putting a stop to you right now!

DONK!

Airman soared up, up and away above the town just as the urban sprawl below met the steep foothills and winding cobbled lanes of the Old Quarter. The streets were free of traffic, strictly pedestrianised, to the extent that deliveries of basic groceries like bread had to be done on foot, but the twists and turns would have finished him.

Relief at finding himself at a safer altitude was tempered by the sight of the tower looming large on his twelve o’clock.

Tentatively, he fumbled with the complex series of locks and fasteners securing the bomb to his chest. The device was heavy and obscured his boldly emblazoned ‘A’ with its sporty winged serifs.

For a time, he had been Amazing Airman, but he had dropped the adjective after too many of those he saved empathised with his condition and asked where they could sign up for his twelve-step program. City administrations often still insisted on toasting his heroic deeds with soft drinks.

The lock bleeped irritably at him. He lifted his hands away until it calmed down.

They wouldn’t be toasting him after this.

Sometimes you were the star of the ball. Sometimes you were just the ball.

And the tower, the hundred-metre-tall gilt-trimmed white-stone torch clasped in a giant marble hand thrusting out of a mount at the heart of New Yorkshire’s recently completed Olympic Village, that was the bat.

From the metallic timbre of the impact, the first blow in their mighty struggle may have been struck by a gas pipe. Head down for his second attempt, Shaftsworth charged at Dexter like a bull, complete with a single budding horn on one side of his brow.

Positively seething and lightly concussed, he was easy to sidestep.

Shaftsworth staggered on and drove his head through the monitor, obliterating the view of the human missile in a shower of sparks.

Now you’ve done it, complained Dexter. We’ll have to wait for the news to see how this turns out.

You’re despicable! My pop will figure a way out!

Ah, how deliciously naive. You do realise he doesn’t have superpowers? It’s all in the suit. Anti-grav fabric plus neutrino thrusters. He’s just a boffin who likes to dress up. And look ridiculous.

I don’t give a rat’s duodenum! Shaftsworth prised the monitor off his head. He swung it high and hurled it at Dexter. You’re dead!

Dexter ducked.

Shaftsworth lunged and enveloped him in a wrestling hold, pulling them both over.

The room exploded.

The fireball roasting Dexter’s back was a fiercely persuasive indicator that Shaftsworth had discovered an uncanny gift for hitting gas pipes.

Airman had a brief stabbing headache. A sharp, tingly jab, then it was over.

He’d experienced something similar when that odious young Snide had fired his needle gun. Except that time he’d passed out and woken to find himself zooming along not very far above his beloved New Yorkshire landscape with an in-flight movie – a video message from the Snide lad – playing directly into his optic nerve.

This is your captain speaking, he’d said. If you’re watching this message, you’re awake. I appreciate that’s stating the obvious, but consider it payback for that patronising lecture on morality we were all forced to sit through. That had come as a slap in the face. His son had invited him as part of the school’s My Famous Parent show-and-tell and he had felt his talk had gone down rather well. Cringemyre was, after all, an Educatory Reform Habitoid For Wayward Boys, and a few paper aeroplanes, rulers and the occasional bullet of spent gum were to be expected. Plus the schoolmaster had promised hearty canings for the perpetrators and Airman was confident the punishments would help drive his message home. Apparently, this Snide boy had resisted. It’s no use protesting, by the way. I can’t hear you. I am controlling you remotely via a chip that has been duplicated with a Quantum Entanglement Duplicate Generator Engine. We’ll skip the science bit, since we’re short on time. Suffice to say, commands issued to the chip in my games console are simultaneously mimicked in the chip embedded in your ludicrous get-up. Thank you for flying Snide Airlines. Please don’t attempt to unfasten your complimentary explosive device prior to reaching your destination as a premature airburst over a densely populated area isn’t something a costumed do-gooder like yourself will want on his CV.

Like all those bystanders on the ground he’d passed, he had needed some time to process what he had seen and heard. Similarly, now, he was a short while catching on to the idea that the control chip may have malfunctioned and he might actually be free at last.

Unfortunately, at his current velocity he needed to have realised it 1.29 seconds earlier for any hope of affecting an emergency course adjustment.

More unfortunately, he had just enough time to calculate that before he detonated on impact.

Gripped in their deadly struggle, Dexter and Shaftsworth crashed through the Science Department ceiling.

Dexter wrestled his way around to be on top just before the blast slammed them down on the laboratory maze. Shaftsworth took the brunt of the landing, crushing and splintering the elaborate multi-storey construction that had been the product of many a carpentry class. Survivors scampered frantically around the scene of devastation, squeaking and squealing, and one blind and hopelessly disoriented specimen scurried into Shaftsworth’s gaping mouth.

Blacgh! Blacgh! Shaftsworth coughed and spat furrily. He thrashed and rolled, throwing Dexter off.

Dexter belly-flopped to the floor – and splashed down in a sizzling pool. He yelled in pain and leaped onto the adjacent bench, where he sucked at burnt fingers, beat at a blazer that had become a smoking jacket and watched his shoes melt.

All around the lab, broken flasks, jars, beakers and whole cabinets spilled their contents, adding to the toxic cocktail brewing on deck. Shattered aquarium tanks had diluted the mixture, but either the H2O or the colourful marine specimens swimming about in agitated fashion were causing a violent chemical reaction. The concoction fizzed, chucking up fumes to mingle with the smoke coming off the wrecked rodent maze. Burning debris had rained down, setting the wood ablaze, with Shaftsworth managing to trample the rest as he stumbled about, clutching at his throat. Mice dived from their ruined homes like lemmings into a poison green sea.

Most sank without trace under the increasingly soupy goo. A few resurfaced as smouldering remains.

Dexter delved into his pocket for the needle gun he’d used on Shaftsworth Senior, but his stinging fingers were slow to close around the weapon’s grip.

Shaftsworth emitted a troubling Ulp. Then a hoarse roar - as he dived on top of Dexter. With snot the consistency of toffee and a habit of avoiding gym class to rival Dexter’s own, he nonetheless had a set of muscles pumped up by rage - minus the disadvantage of Dexter’s aversion to physical contact with lesser mortals.

They grappled back and forth on the bench. Dexter struggled to bring the gun out of his pocket. So far, so not.

Shaftsworth grabbed his head and hammered it against the bench-top. He drew back a fist, nice and high.

Dexter drove his knee up and connected with the Shaftsworth family jewels. Shaftsworth yowled and pitched forward, over Dexter’s head. He slid like a slickly served sarsaparilla along a Western saloon bar until he bashed into something.

Dexter flipped himself over.

Shaftsworth was bathed in a searing cone of energy bleeding from the shattered bulb of the QuEDGE. The dazzling magnesium ray – with the faintest tint of purple - illuminated his skull a treat before he reeled away, clasping both palms over his face.

Dexter whipped out his gun and aimed. But his target divided into multiple Shaftsworths, careering about all over the bench.

The bench tipped to one side like a stricken ship. All three Shaftsworths toppled into the rising goo.

Dexter’s shot pinged a lock, springing the doors of a wall-mounted cupboard.

The Shaftsworths started to merge, the three splashing figures becoming one again, now with a viscous outer layer decorated with bits of dead fish and mice. A grievously aggravated squid burst from the swampy liquid and wrapped its tentacles around Shaftsworth’s head in an attempt to drag itself out of the mire. It only managed to drag Shaftsworth under.

The bench dipped again.

Uh oh, thought Dexter.

He scrambled to his feet and sprinted up the length of the sinking bench.

Just as the noxious gloop ate through the floor, he launched himself at the wall cupboard, digging and kicking stationery and supplies of litmus paper out behind him in an effort to scrabble onto the top.

He hung there as the science lab collapsed beneath him. Benches, goo, Shaftsworth The Third and all fell into the school kitchens. Paper fluttered down like confetti over the whole mess.

Dexter began clambering, keen to reach safety before the acidic concoction melted its way through the school’s outer hull. At least with everything neatly evacuated into space there would be scant evidence and all being well he could quietly slip back and pretend he’d never been absent from the annual Sports Day currently taking place up in the Campus Gardens.

The last Dexter saw of Shaftsworth, he was a snot-lagged soggy-wallpapered figure churning around in an industrial catering-sized bowl acquiring a generous coating of flour and golden breadcrumbs.

Flanked by two tall girls, Shaftsworth stood dripping on the carpet in front of a desk like the one in the headmaster’s office at Cringemyre.

This room was similarly gloomy, the air clotted with dust and the solid wood furniture lightly stained with the tears and nosebleeds of all the pupils who’d bent over them to receive their damn good thrashings.

From across the desk, a woman – Miss Callowcale, according to her plaque – peered at him over horn-rimmed spectacles and a nose as cruel as any cane. Her black hair was pulled back into a Victorian bun so severe it could have been a rock wrapped in a ball of wool.

Head bowed, he addressed the woman with due humility. Madam, I am deeply – profoundly – sorry for the loss of that poor girl. I assure you, none of it is my fault.

Indeed? She poured on the scepticism the way the Cringemyre dinner ladies ladled on the vilest of stews.

Honestly, madam, I assure you, I was forcefully expelled from my school by – well, it’s a long story. But anyway I drifted in orbit and the next I knew I was being kindly helped aboard your airlock by the young lady in question.

Miss Callowcale stood and sniffed. And you say she has, in some fashion, become a part of you?

Shaftsworth shrugged. As far as I can tell. Frankly, I’m new to this. I am afraid this horrible muck in which I find myself caked cursed me with an ability to absorb organic materials. Had I been fully cognisant at the time I would have politely declined the offer of assistance.

I see. More stewed scepticism.

The good news is, the absorption effect appears to have worn off. So if you could see your way to transporting me back to Cringemyre, I will have the matter properly investigated and the true culprit punished.

Oh, I am afraid that is quite out of the question. Contact between the schools is strictly forbidden.

But – but – what am I supposed to do?

Miss Callowcale patrolled around in front of her desk. You must remain here.

But – I –

Trust me, Master Shaftsworth, I am not happy with the arrangement, but we must make the best of a bad situation. You must remain. And since a male student undermines the very foundation of the Cringemyre Educatory Reform Habitoid For Wayward Girls, you must take the place of our missing Good Samaritan.

I told you, that was an accident! I can’t live out my school years here!

You survived in a vacuum. I am confident you can survive our curriculum. Now, you will please get yourself cleaned up, do what you can to assume a more feminine shape – those sideburns will have to go. My prefects will escort you to Miss Greybody’s dormitory and you’ll find a healthy stock of spare uniforms and PE kit in her footlocker. Thank you. That will be all.

But –

That will be all.

Seething inside, Shaftsworth turned and exited, prodded along by the prefects with their not-so-jolly hockey sticks. They looked attractive, albeit a tad prim and stuffy in their uniforms, but they failed to disguise their revulsion. He doubted their opinions would improve when they saw him in a gym skirt.

This really was the absolute limit.

Well, regardless of what the headmistress had planned, he would be out of here within the day – two at most. And he would be gunning for one thing only.

Dexter Snide, he vowed, you are a dead man.

Act One

CURRENT AFFAIRS

"They’re saying it’s urgent."

"Of course they are. Which is another reason to keep them waiting. The other being, as I distinctly recall telling you four seconds ago, I am busy."

Dexter was flat on his back at the core of the station and buried in bundles of cables and the amber spaghetti of monoplasm fibres. He welcomed Tanith’s voice on the comm like the proverbial spanner in the works. So naturally she had more to say.

"Honestly, I don’t know why you don’t assign some lackey to do that job. I’m sure a master criminal like yourself has better things to be getting on with."

Normally, if a thing was worth doing well, it was worth forcing someone skilled to do it. At gunpoint if necessary. But Evil UnLtd were short on qualified manpower and Dexter didn’t trust any of the Galaxy Six technicians to attend to this fiddly and potentially apocalyptic task.

As, I am sure, do you, Ms Troy.

"Well, yes, as it happens. Would you like me to take care of them? I’ve dealt with plenty of lawyers in my time."

Be my guest, Dexter told her. Only, he added quickly, do keep them waiting. It’s the least we can do, seeing as it’s urgent.

She sighed. Thanks, what a terrific notion. And afterwards, maybe I’ll put through a call to your grandmother and you can teach her how to suck eggs.

She did her usual and broke contact before he could retort.

Dexter made an incision in another cable, re-imagining it as Tanith’s neck. He stripped it back to expose the wires within and pictured them as vocal chords he could cheerfully sever. Laser cutter clenched in his teeth, he carefully separated out the requisite data fibres. He had no wish to cut a TV feed – an interruption to any of Galaxy Six’s gazillion channels might momentarily deprive the universe of its full quota of shit. As it was, his peripheral vision was being subjected to most of the station’s execrable output as he laboured on his pet project.

Situated at the heart of the habitoid, the chamber served as the interface between Tree and TV station. Tessellating hexagonal screens covered the wall space and lent the place the aesthetic of an inside-out pine cone crossed with an electronic goods store. With an intruding arboretum.

A section of trunk made for a formidable central column and the previous owners of Galaxy Six had hooked up the forty or fifty small branches in a veritable cat’s-cradle of cables. Stringy monoplasm fibres had threaded their way into the web like malignant cable ties intent on complicating the tangle further.

Wires and their ilk always impressed Dexter with their ability to knot and intertwine if left alone for a few minutes. Disentangling them could shorten an ordinary mortal’s life expectancy as well as consume what scant time they had left in frustrating and ultimately pointless activity. Marvellous.

There wasn’t a maze or web devised that Dexter’s genius couldn’t unravel, although this one might have proven a bit of a chore. Fortunately, Dexter’s efforts had only contributed to the tangle, as he’d nested the Pocket Universe in the lower branches and attached electrodes to the sphere’s fluid silver surface. Now all that remained was to splice some of those freshly-added dangling wires into the network.

With the Tree safe, the station re-modelling in good hands – well, Tanith’s anyway – and the contest to find the best minions into its first week on the famous leisure resort planet of Alphaterre Metroplaisir, the time was ripe for addressing the bigger picture.

And by picture he meant the universal economy and by addressing he, of course, meant flushing down the toilet.

It was one of the prime reasons he’d originally availed himself of the Pocket Universe from the Imperial Mint and subsequently taken over the Galaxy Six broadcasting facility. And if all that sounded like a recap, it was because he deemed the time ripe for one of those too.

Now, as he closed in on the finishing touches, images on the damned TV screens arrested his attention. It wasn’t the constant kaleidoscope as a whole, but rather the import of the major story steadily beginning to dominate the main news channels.

One word flared up like an old wound. Posted behind the newscasters as part of the studio graphics, plastered across the base of the screen as a bold caption. Everywhere. Frequently in red.

Dexter sat up too fast and bumped his head on a branch. He ignored it and watched the word flashing up again and again on different screens.

WAR!

WAR!

WAR!

WAR!

Shit, he thought. Not now.

Not just yet, said Tanith, waving her entourage aside.

Until relatively recently she had been used to having a small army trailing around after her; now she was down to just Six. Doomladen’s injection-moulded cyborg sex toy could do the job of all of her helpers and hangers-on put together and with unfailing efficiency. So Tanith had commandeered her as her personal assistant. She was still free to serve the Prof, as long as she showed up promptly for duty, thoroughly cleansed of what Tanith euphemistically referred to as ‘laboratory stench’. The general thrust of her role in the Prof’s employ was no secret, but Tanith insisted on being spared the details. She also required Six to don glasses and wear her hair up in the time-honoured movie-world fashion of lending obviously hot babes an illusion of plainness. Even dowdied up in an off-the-rack secretarial twin-set, the woman managed to stand out.

Of course, she wasn’t any real competition, but she did have the annoying capacity for pulling focus when it came to dealing with the male maintenance staff Tanith had to marshal to get the station in some sort of order.

Stop ogling my assistant’s tits and look me in the eye. The man avoided her gaze as though afraid of being turned to stone. And glanced past her at Six, presumably expressing a preference for wood. He was squatting in the doorway on the edge of the en suite excavation site that adjoined her quarters and she was tempted to propel him into the pit with a good kick. When can I expect to see anything resembling the distant cousin of a bathroom?

He dug a hand down the back of his pants and scratched. Miss –

She glowered.

"Ms Troy. I’ve had to call workers away from other areas to sort this out. They’re finishing up on their current jobs and they should be here any – "

Day, week, year – Tanith didn’t wait to find out. Get them here now! I’m not asking for much.

It’s the scale of the operation, Ms.

What? I’m not asking for an Olympic-sized pool. The man’s roving eye was clearly contemplating the mixed doubles breast-stroke. Just a tub large enough to allow for nine parts suds to one part me. And possibly, if you could manage it, a washbasin, a loo and a few tiles.

Her bathroom specifications were a tad more elaborate than that, but she trusted the plumber to get the message. He finally managed to peel his eyes off Six’s bosom and aimed them at the floor between his feet. Tanith left him to steep in his own shame and turned to Six.

Perhaps it’s time I took that call.

If I may, said Six, in her faintly haughty manner that always suggested she was going to proceed with or without permission, I am not certain that the renovation of personal quarters should be prioritised over the remainder of the station.

You may not. Tanith gave her a smile like sugared bitter almonds. Now, are those people still on hold or what?

They are. Putting them through now. Would you like visual?

Tanith sighed. Go on then. She moved to block the plumber’s line of sight.

Six’s chest was like a dead man’s, in that you could easily get fifteen men on it, yo ho ho, with shelf-space to spare for a bottle of rum. What was more, she didn’t need to carry around a lot of gadgetry or accessories as the Prof had crammed a great many devices – like communicators – into that bod of hers. She didn’t want to think of everything he’d crammed into her. Anyway, she could also call up video onto the fabric of her outfit. So now there were several men and women on her chest, none of whom appeared to be deceased but two or three of them were well on their way. All of them looked bent out of shape.

Ms Troy, one craggy old stuffed-shirt began, fixing her with a stern glare from the summit of Six’s left breast, we do not appreciate being kept waiting.

What can I say? I’m a busy woman. Whereas you lot seem to have nothing better to do than to sit around posing for group photos in front of a web cam.

"Ms Troy, I must remind you that you are addressing Horace Quentin Crawleigh of Crawleigh, Bumlic and Fawn. This is a serious matter."

Tanith snorted. She clapped a hand over her mouth. Sorry, she spoke through her improvised muffle, do go on. I’m just – in shock.

Naturally. Permit me to hand you over to my esteemed colleague, Grigoriy Bumlic, who will apprise you of the essentials.

A stiff young fellow who’d been folded into the curve of Six’s cleavage leaned over his senior partner’s shoulder. Our client, one Alphaterre Metroplaisir, will be seeking a settlement to the tune of an eleven-figure sum in respect of your organisation’s grievous abuse of his hospitality.

Excuse me?

Come now, Ms Troy. There is no need to play coy. Our client received Evil UnLimited in good faith and provided a venue for a series of recruitment interviews. Those interviewees have since been commissioned to engage in territorial disputes on our client’s surface, recklessly endangering the lives and property of citizens as well as damaging our client’s reputation as a safe and cheerful resort environment.

Tanith shrugged. Nothing to do with me.

You may drop the pretence. This firm is aware of your altered status. You may indeed have been a hostage at some point, but you are an active and key member of this criminal organisation and there is no use claiming otherwise.

Ha. Whatever you have on me, none of you will stand up in court.

"None of it, I am sure you mean. His smarmy grin showed how much he delighted in correcting people. But let me assure you – "

I know what I mean.

Six’s outfit was wrinkle-free, so Tanith had to