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marching along the road bordering defence department land towards the gates of the Whitley Sands research base. Rachel Macarthur had organised it well. There was a good media contingent - radio journalists, local newspaper reporters, photographers, a TV crew - and a low-profile police presence. But where was Rachel herself? Her fellow organisers had decided not to wait for her. They started the march on schedule and hoped she’d arrive in time for the sit-down demo and rallying speeches in front of the gates.
    The chanting and placard-waving intensified as the marchers converged on the base entrance. The police called for backup as groups of protesters sat down, blocking the road, while others began massing at the gates and pressing against them, urged on by an activist with a megaphone. That’s when the chains and bolt-cutters suddenly appeared. Anti-war militants and eco-warriors in the crowd weren’t content to listen to speeches. Already they were cutting holes in the perimeter fence. Others were chaining themselves to the gates. From within the base, squads of military police came charging towards the breaches in the fence, ready to tackle the intruders. Placards were being hurled. It was on the verge of turning into a riot when the violence was cut short by a piercing scream.
    Everyone stopped. Police. Protesters. Even the cameras swung around to where the scream had come from on the far side of the road. All they could see at first was a woman on her knees, sobbing, her knuckles clutched against her mouth, her face staring upwards at a pylon that stood directly opposite the gates. As they followed the direction of her gaze there was a collective gasp. On a spike projecting from the metal leg of the pylon was a severed head. A woman’s head. Her dead eyes were staring at the base.

7
Freddy Hopper sat in the airless heat of the police interrogation room, perspiring freely and feeling in need of serious narcotics. It was two hours since his dead girlfriend’s head had been retrieved from where it had been skewered on an electricity pylon. His relationship with Rachel Macarthur was at times volatile, they’d rowed in public and his jail-time for creating the Edge of Chaos virus had given him a bad reputation and bad friends. More than once he’d stormed out of their rented house and taken a prolonged break from her disapproval. But Freddy resented being a suspect in Rachel’s murder. His emotions shuffled between anger and grief as Detective Sergeant Jarrett questioned him, recording his answers on an interview tape.
    ‘So you can’t think of anyone who’d want to hurt Rachel?’
    asked Jarrett.
    ‘No one specifically,’ answered Freddy, ‘apart from the police, the government and the research base.’
    ‘Why are you sweating so much, Freddy?’
    ‘Because it’s bloody hot in here.’
    ‘You’re wriggling like a lizard in a tin, so I know you’re lying about something.’
    ‘I didn’t touch Rachel,’ he insisted. ‘I didn’t even see her last night. I couldn’t have. Just ask the monks.’
    ‘An officer is on the phone to them now,’ said Jarrett. ‘But tell me, for the record, what you were doing?’
    ‘I got a call from St Cedd’s yesterday afternoon.’
    ‘What time?’
    ‘About four. The monastery’s computers had crashed, the website was offline, their programs were corrupted and they wanted me to come to their rescue.’
    ‘Why you?’ asked Jarrett.
    ‘Because I helped set up their system.’
    Jarrett couldn’t help laughing. ‘The holy brothers got a depraved hacker like you to put them on the net? That’s priceless.’
    ‘One of them was an altar boy at our church when we were kids,’ retorted Freddy.
    ‘What time did you go there?’
    ‘I drove up straightaway to catch the tide. I must’ve crossed the causeway to the island by five but it took hours of work to get them up and running again. A virus had attacked their software.’
    ‘One of yours?’
    ‘When are you