Another big bad company story.  Not too memorable.

Jono has a place under the Pythagoras Dome, in the mild humidity of an eternal, artificial summer.  Sun lights floated over the gardens of the low houses, their tethers glinting occasionally.  Flowers grew under the pearly sky: big pink hydrangeas, blue and yellow trumpetflowers, even a native clzz-wzz tree covered in tiny, silver blossoms.  The buildings in the dome were reconfigurable, made up from plug-in cubical units in various floral colours: Jono had her house stacked up at the moment, a mini-skyscraper with the porch and front door on top, accessible only by heli, or, if you were brave, a rope ladder hanging down into the upper branches of a small tree in the front garden.  Anton directed the helicab to the roof, jumped down on to the fake wood of the porch.  The security system inspected him, bleeped, let him in.

He found Jono in the climbing room, slouched on a dry branch of the indoor candabdab tree she used to keep her claws and muscles in trim.  Her tail twitched when he came in, then after a moment her eyes opened and she yawned, revealing her five rows of serrated teeth and a long, pink tongue.

'Hello, human playmate; she said sleepily, then swung off the branch and brachiated across the room to land at his feet and enclose him in a hot quasi-feline hug.  She licked his face a couple of times, her fur prickling against his cheek, then met his eyes.  'What's up?'

Anton stepped back out of her embrace.

'Come on,'  She winked.  '"I can tell by the smell."  What's the problem?  Ybrik bothering you again?'

Anton swallowed.  Now he was here, he had no idea what to tell Jono.  Perhaps he should just forget it, have a drink, spend the evening here.

No.  She'd talked him into this dreamstone business.  She ought to wnow what happened as a result.

And he needed her help.

'I had a bad dream.'

'And you've come to tell me about it?'  She stepped back, pulled a green robe from its hook near the door, slipped it on, then began combing her mane with her claws, dragging out fragments of leaf and tangles with a crackling sound.

Anton swallowed again.  His mouth felt as if it was full of glue.

But it was no good.  He had to tell her.

'I had a bad dream and then I killed someone and now I'm afraid to go home.'

She froze, for a full second, utterly motionless with her hands on the belt of the robe, which she'd been in the middle of tying.  The pupils of her eyes narrowed to slits, then widened again.

Finally she finished tying her robe, then began combing her mane again.

'How can I help?' she asked.

Anton felt as if a huge weight had been lifted from his back.  He knew it was an illusion: he had still killed the Zmm-Zmm, and he was still going to have to face the consequences of that.  But at least Jono - practical, confident Jono - was going to stay on his side.

He thought of the questions she hadn't asked before deciding to side with him - who was it? why did you do it? did they deserve it? - and felt his eyes filling with tears.

Jono stepped forward, gently licked his cheek with the tip of her tongue.

'You need a drink,' she said.


The five nightmare stones seemed oddly at home in Jono's room, amid the elaborately wrought hunting masks and wooden models of primitive Zmm-Zmm hives that filled most of available space.

'Are you sure you want to do this?'