Title: Against a Dark Background
Author(s): Iain M. Banks
Publisher(s): Orbit
Pages: 640
Year: 2009
Format: EPUB
Language: English
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As though it was a signal, the woman and two men burst away from the table at the same instant, whirling round to respectively punch, kick and head-butt the three men nearest them; Dloan and Sharrow overpowered the two men who’d taken their guns while they were still trying to get their own rifles to work. Miz made a grab for Lebmellin, but he had pushed himself away from the table and fell back, stumbling across the deck of the red-lit bridge.
Four black-clothed bodies lay on the floor round the chart table; everybody else seemed to be fighting; another man fell to the deck; the aristocrat followed him down, straddling him and punching him and tearing something from his clothing. Lebmellin saw two of his men at the bridge doorway pointing their guns at the melee and shaking the rifles when they didn’t work. Sharrow fired the gun she’d taken back and one of the men at the door fell to the deck, screaming and clutching his thigh; the other threw his gun down and ran.
Lebmellin ran too; he got to the end of the bridge and hauled himself out of the shattered window. Somebody shouted behind him. He fell to the deck aft of the broken window, landing heavily.
Sharrow got up and ran after Lebmellin; she saw him hobbling along the deck outside. She jumped out of the window, landing on something small and hard lying on the metal deck, like a pebble. A big, sleek, jet-engined powerboat was idling by the hull of the ferry. She levelled the HandCannon at Lebmellin, twenty metres away. Somebody shouted a challenge from the far end of the deck; the bulky figure of the Vice-Invigilator skidded and stopped; Lebmellin glanced back at her, hesitated, then threw himself over the rail and fell through the darkness.
Sharrow watched him tumble; he hit the starboard engine nacelle of the powerboat below and bounced slackly into the black water. A second later a door gull-winged open half-way along the craft’s cabin and a figure threw itself out, also splashing into the waves.
‘What’s happening?’ Miz said from the broken bridge window.
Sharrow glanced back at him and shrugged. ‘Lots,’ she said, and looked down at the deck to see what her foot was resting on. It was the Crownstar Addendum. ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Found the piece.’ She picked it up carefully.
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