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over.’

    ‘We are both drones.’ She rattled off details of her identity and work assignment.

    ‘You must stay in your cell. In the morning you will be summoned for new details. If you encounter the Port Sol crew—’

    ‘I will report them.’

    There was shouting in the corridor; the Coalition trooper, distracted, hurried away.

    Pash murmured, ‘Lethe. Look.’

    Beyond the window, in the reddening sky, a Spline ship was hovering, a great meaty ball pocked with weapons emplacements. But this was no Qax vessel; a green tetrahedral sigil, a human symbol, had been crudely carved in its flank.

    ‘Things have changed,’ Rala said dryly.

    Pash asked, ‘Why did you shelter me?’

    ‘Because I have had enough of rulers,’ she snapped. ‘We must be ready. You will have to shave your head. Perhaps one of my robes will fit you.’

     
    The Coalition had its own, different theory about how to run a Conurbation.

    They were all evicted from the city. The people stood in sullen ranks - mostly Conurbation drones, but with at least one trader, Pash, camouflaged among the rest. They had been given tools, simple hoes and spades. The walls of the Conurbation loomed above them all, scorched by fire.

    The sun was hot, the air dry, and insects buzzed. These were city folk; they didn’t like being out here. There were even children; the new rulers of the Conurbation had closed down the schools, which even the traders had kept running.

    A woman stood on a platform before them. She wore a green uniform, clean but shabby, and she had the green sigil tattooed on her forehead - the symbol, as Rala had now learned, of free humanity. At her side were soldiers, not in uniform, though they all wore green armbands, and had the sigil marked on their faces.

    ‘My name is Cilo Mora,’ said the woman. ‘The Green Army has restored order to the Earth, overthrowing the bandit traders. But the Qax may return - or if not them, another foe. We must always be prepared. You are the advance troops of a moral revolution. The work you will begin today will fortify your will and clarify your vision. But remember - now you are all free!’

    One man near the front raised his hoe dubiously. ‘Free to scrape at the dirt?’

    One of the green-armbands clubbed him to the ground.

    Nobody else moved. Cilo Mora smiled, as if the unpleasantness had never happened. The man in the dirt lay where he had fallen, unattended.

    Fields were marked out using rubble from fallen Conurbation domes. Seeds were supplied, from precious stores preserved off-world. All around the city people toiled in the dirt, but there were machines too, hastily adapted and improvised.

    For many, it went hard. There hadn’t been farmers on Earth for centuries, and the people of the Conurbation had all been office workers. Some fell ill, some died. But as the survivors’ hands hardened, so did their spirit, it seemed to Rala.

    The crops began to grow. But the vegetables were sparse and thin. Rala thought she understood why - the poisoning of the soil was a legacy of the Qax - but nobody seemed to have any idea what to do about it.

    The staple food continued to be the pale yellow ration tablets from the food holes. But just as under the old regime there was never enough to eat.

    In the rest times they would gather, swapping bits of information.

    Pash said, ‘The Coalition’s Green Army really does seem to be putting down the warlords.’ He seemed fascinated by developments, apparently forgetting he was one of those ‘warlords’ himself. ‘Of course having a Spline ship is a big help. But those clowns who follow Cilo around aren’t Army but another agency called the Green Guard. Amateurs, with a mission to cement the revolution.’

    Rala whispered, ‘What this “revolution” comes down to is scratching at the dirt for food.’

    ‘We can’t use Qax technology any more,’ Ingre said. ‘It would be counter-progressive.’ Ingre was always mouthing phrases like