Double Eagle by Dan Abnett Page A

to smell caffeine and spun sugar. Viltry had never been this far out from dry land. He’d never walked over an ocean.
    The cafe was huge, a testament, perhaps, to former glory days, when pleasure seekers had packed Theda’s seafront and come in search of sea views and refreshments. Tables formed rings inside the great circuit of lattice windows. Some of them were occupied: old men and women in mumbling groups, a couple of Commonwealth troopers looking tired and wan. Music was playing from the kitchen area. A handsome Thracian waltz.
    Viltry took a seat at a window table, and watched the sea some more. “What will you have?”
    He looked up. The girl in the blue-striped dress and apron had appeared from nowhere. He picked up the table-card hastily. “A… a pot of caffeine.”
    “Anything to eat?”
    He was still studying the card. Very few things made sense. “A smoked ham sa—”
    “No ham,” the girl said. “Sorry. No poultry, either.”
    “I am hungry,” Viltry realised.
    “The lorix is good. With bread.”
    “Then that’s what I’ll have.”
    She disappeared. He looked back at the sea. Grey, mobile, immense. He’d seen skies like that. The weather was turning.
    The girl returned with a tray. She unloaded the caffeine pot, cup, sugar-bowl, and a plate with bread slices and a dish of something. He poured the caffeine as she departed, then examined the food. It smelled savoury, quite nice, but he wasn’t sure what it was. Or how to eat it. He tried some, but found it was salty and far too meaty for his liking. He swallowed anyway, but left the rest. The bread was all right. He ate that instead.
    “There’s a funny bloke over at sixteen,” announced Letrice. “Offworlder, I’d say.”
    Beqa looked and stopped wiping the counter. “I’ll deal with him. You’re off now anyway, aren’t you?”
    “I got a date,” Letrice grinned. “Fancy flyboy from the PDF. His name’s Edry. He’s nicely handsome.”
    “Have fun. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”
    “No thanks. That wouldn’t leave me much,” Letrice giggled, and began taking off her apron.
    Beqa cleared a few tables and then walked over to the window table.
    It was him. The sad-faced offworlder she’d seen at the templum the day before. The one who’d been talking to himself.
    She hoped he was stable now. Her shift was coming to an end, and that gave her just over an hour to nap before the night-shift.
    “Everything all right, sir?” she asked.
    “Yes, yes. Fine.” He didn’t look up. Throne, but his expression was so miserable.
    “The lorix? Not to your liking?” she asked, lifting the uneaten dish onto her tray.
    He looked up, then said, “Um? No, I’m sure it was fine. It was fish, wasn’t it?”
    “Shellfish.”
    He nodded. “I’m afraid I… I’ve never eaten fish before. Or shellfish, whatever that is. It’s a bit… funny tasting.”
    “You’ve never eaten fish?”
    “I… I mean, my world… No seas, you see…”
    “Oh. So, you must be hungry?”
    “No, I ate the bread. I’m fine.”
    “Well, okay,” she said and cleared his table.
    He still sat looking out at the sea when her shift ended and Pollya came on for the night. The sun had set. The sea was as dark as oil.
    He’d ordered another cup, and was sipping it while he stared at the rolling waters as they crashed against the shore.
     
    Over the Lida Valley, 15.29
    Guns live, Jagdea turned and rolled in on them, her Thunderbolt trembling with power. Six Locust-pattern bats, the lightest and most nimble of the Archenemy’s vector-planes, all painted crimson or mauve, were harrying the heels of the Cyclone pack.
    They were all over them. To her left, she saw another Cyclone explode, and another pitch left, trailing tarry smoke as it foundered down in a wide sweep towards the ground.
    Two Locusts slipped under her, but she had the third, braking back to trim over on another Cyclone. In the hairs, pipper blinking.
    Jagdea thumbed the gun-stud.
    Serial