The End

  She couldn’t believe it. He’d knocked her over. The bastard. Typical male way to win an argument – with violence. Then Nicola realized that there was a noise ringing in her ears. There had been a sharp crack. A bang. And she couldn’t move her legs. A terrible cold pain was spreading across her back and deep into her chest. She managed to twist round far enough to see David standing there, white-faced, utterly shocked, his mouth hanging open. The rifle in his hands pointed at her.

  No. Not that. She couldn’t believe it. Had he shot her? Had he really shot her? There was blood in her mouth and in her throat. She was struggling to breathe. She wanted to say something, but felt a clamp round her head, crushing it tighter and tighter, her sight blurring and fizzing.

  She couldn’t believe it. It made no sense at all.

  Of all the things she thought might happen when she came here, this wasn’t one. To be shot like this. Tears came into her eyes. She closed them, laid her head down on the grass and in a few moments her tears were the only part of her moving.

  Her heart had stopped.

  64

  ‘We have to surrender,’ said Justin, dusty morning light shining down on him from the high windows in the museum. ‘We can’t beat them. I’ve spoken to everyone who was there. All that will happen is our best fighters will get killed. We have to change our tactics. Let David take control. What difference does it make? We pull back into our buildings if we have to, make the museum secure. If the sickos try to get in we kill them. But it’s crazy to be trying to fight a battle up there in the park. I’m going to get Nicola. We’ll go up there together and see Jordan, talk to him. Talk to David. They’ve both got to stop this before it’s too late.’

  ‘Is already too late.’ Achilleus’s voice rang down from the upper gallery. Sam looked up to see him leaning over the balcony.

  Sam and all the other kids in the museum were gathered round the diplodocus. Justin hadn’t had time to call an official meeting in the Hall of Gods, so he was talking to them from halfway up the steps by the statue of Charles Darwin.

  ‘We have to fight.’ Achilleus came striding along the gallery and everyone watched in silence as he got to the end, came down and stood next to Justin. He was wearing his battle gear.

  ‘We have not run out of time,’ said Justin. ‘Most of our fighters are still alive.’

  ‘Can they fight airborne spores?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Can they fight viruses? Bacteria? Parasites? With swords and spears and clubs?’

  ‘What’s that got to do with anything?’ said Justin. ‘We’re talking about an army of sickos.’

  ‘You don’t get it, do you?’ said Achilleus. ‘It’s not about fighting people, it’s about fighting disease. The sickos are carriers. We gotta stop them before they infect us. Before they turn us into them.’ He scanned the faces in the crowd until he saw who he was looking for.

  ‘Yo, Einstein,’ he shouted. ‘Get up here.’

  Einstein came out of the crowd and sauntered up the steps to Achilleus, trying to look casual, but you could tell he was scared, wondering what Achilleus was going to do to him. Sam remembered their horrible argument yesterday.

  ‘I don’t like you one bit,’ said Achilleus. ‘Never have. Never will. But I guess you’re smart and you know what you’re doing. So tell it like it is, from what you know – tell these people what’ll happen if we don’t stop that army out there. Right now. If we don’t kill every last one of them.’

  ‘OK,’ said Einstein. ‘Basically Achilleus is right. They’re gathered here together because they want to spawn. Disperse. Broadcast. Whatever you want to call it. They want to send their spores out. They want to spread the disease.’

  ‘So why are they fighting us?’ called out Wiki. ‘Why are they killing us, if we’re supposed to be the new hosts?’

  ‘I don’t know. Something’s gone wrong. Maybe because we attacked them they’ve gone into automatic fight mode. Maybe it’s St George. Maybe he’s strong enough to beat the disease’s programming. His human will is overriding his genetic impulse to multiply. That and David’s influence. Getting Paul up there to communicate with them. Or maybe we’re a threat. Us. Specifically. I mean, we know they want to kill Small Sam because they’re aware that he carries the antidote. His blood is the one thing that can destroy the disease.’

  ‘So we got to kill them,’ said Achilleus. ‘And we gotta kill them fast. No two ways about it. We gotta stop them before they’re ready to pass the parasites on and create a whole new generation of sickos.’

  ‘Yeah? And where were you yesterday?’

  Sam was amazed. It was Jibber-jabber. Calling Achilleus out. His voice full of hurt and hate. How was he brave enough to stand up to him? Was it just that he’d been a good friend of Paddy?

  Achilleus looked at him and nodded slowly.

  ‘You’re right, younger,’ he said. ‘Where was I yesterday? Not where I should of been.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jibber-jabber. ‘Paddy wanted to do your fighting for you – he was ashamed of you. If you’d been out fighting it wouldn’t have happened; and they wouldn’t be dead, Paddy and the others, they wouldn’t all be dead.’

  Achilleus was still staring at Jibber-jabber.

  ‘Come with me,’ he said. ‘All you lot – what did Paddy call you? The Youngbloods – you come with me, yeah? The rest of you. Wait here.’

  Sam looked at The Kid who was sitting cross-legged on the floor next to him. The Kid shrugged.

  ‘Where he goes my rosemary grows,’ said The Kid and he stood up.

  Two minutes later Sam and the smaller kids were all clustered round the sequoia at the top of the museum. Achilleus’s spear was still sticking out of the centre.

  ‘I can’t undo what I did,’ said Achilleus. ‘Can’t put things right. But I will fight today. And I will beat the enemy – for Paddy. And for you guys. His death will mean something – it’ll mean victory for us kids. And you guys will keep his name alive. He’ll be a hero. You’ll talk him up. A bigger hero even than me. Paddy’s gonna win this battle for all of us. OK?’

  The Youngbloods nodded. Achilleus gripped the spear.

  ‘What did Paddy say?’ he asked. ‘About this spear?’

  ‘Whoever pulls it out is, like, king of the world,’ said Jibber-jabber.

  ‘For Paddy,’ said Achilleus, and he pulled the spear out as easily as if it had been stuck in a cushion.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said Jibber-jabber. ‘For what I said.’

  ‘Don’t be sorry,’ said Achilleus. ‘You were right. I was wrong. Remember this – heroes are usually dicks.’

  Jibber-jabber laughed and Achilleus cuffed him round the head.

  ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Let’s get all those other dicks up and doing some good.’

  Achilleus walked fast down the stairs, shouting all the way.

  ‘Anyone who can fight!’ he yelled. ‘Not the little ones, not the scientists, but any of you wasters that trained in the park and are supposed to be up there now. Any of you who, like me, spent yesterday sitting on your arses, you’re coming with me. We’re going to the fight.’

  ‘All right,’ someone shouted back. There was a rumble of chatter around the hall as Achilleus marched down the final run of steps and headed towards the doors. Kids started to cheer and clap, slapping him on the back. He pulled the doors wide and waited there as the other kids streamed out past him.

  Sam went over to him.

  ‘I wish I was big enough to fight,’ he said.

  ‘You fighting them in your own way, cuz,’ said Achilleus, squatting down to Sam’s level. ‘We doing this for you. We giving you a future.’

  ‘And for Paddy,’ said Sam. ‘Like you said. Make it so that his death wasn’t just a pointless thing.’

  ‘I can’t do that,’ said Achilleus. ‘Not really. See, death is always pointless. And death is the only point. We all end up there sooner or later. I know about death. It don’t scare me. I’m taking it to the enemy.’
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  He pushed his way through the rest of the crowd and went out into the white morning light.

  65

  Skinner had slept badly. Too many voices in his head creeping into his dreams. Fish-Face broadcasting her endless, mind-blowing SOS call, not even aware she was doing it. Some part of her brain sending it out even as she slept. And behind it, sneaking through the shadows, the whispers from the sicko army, squeaking and chattering to each other like a swarm of insects. And the louder voice of St George. Not words from him as such, just feelings coming through, bad feelings of blood and violence. Occasionally another voice probing. Skinner thought that one must be Paul, the boy from the museum who’d gone mad.

  Skinner wished he’d gone back to the museum to sleep in the relative peace of the birds gallery. But Wormwood had insisted they stay here in Jordan’s camp in case anything happened in the night. In case the sickos tried to attack. In case David’s overnight truce had been a bluff. In case Fish-Face started to hear anything coming back.

  Wormwood’s voice stayed out of his head. But whenever Skinner had woken up, which was often, the Green Man had been sitting there, his face catching the moonlight in a way that made it seem to glow. Just sitting and staring, tapping his fingertips together. Fish-Face had cut off his hideous nails, but he hadn’t got out of the habit.

  Jordan’s troops had been mostly sleeping on the ground, huddled together for warmth, but some had brought tents with them, and some had bedded down inside the parks buildings that formed the buttresses along the barricade.

  The stink of the grown-ups had filled the night. The smell of rotting meat and sewage. Jordan had lit a series of fires along the centre of the camp; some kids had had the job of throwing stuff on them to keep them going, keep them smoking in the hope that the smoke and heat would drive the smell away. It didn’t seem to make much difference. There were just too many sickos out there.

  Jordan had been back to the museum in the night. Skinner had watched him being rowed across the lake, and he’d watched him return some time later.

  It had been a restless night. A horrible night.

  He’d woken with the morning light. All around, the kids stirring, cold and tired and damp. Terrified no doubt. As terrified as he was. But he was here. He was among them. One of them. Sleeping out in the open. Sharing the experience. Like at a music festival. The sort of thing he’d read about and watched on TV and dreamt about when he was growing up, shut away from the world in the Promithios laboratories.

  He was alive.

  Wasn’t there a saying? That you were most alive when you faced death. He had seen something of the world. He was here for the final battle.

  Fish-Face was still asleep, her face twitching. He left her alone. Wishing he could have slept longer.

  He stretched, all his joints clicking. He shook himself, went to a fire to try to soak up the last of its warmth. The folds of his skin had trapped moisture from the hazy morning air and he was itchy all over.

  There was a thin mist across the ground, though the sky above looked fairly clear. It was going to be a beautiful day. Sunny and warm. If this had been a film, the director would have made the day match the feelings of the kids. A sense of doom and dread and disaster. A cloudy, stormy sky, the rain lashing down and the ground turned to mud as the two armies desperately fought to the death …

  But nature didn’t care, did it? Nature just happened. Like the disease. It was just a part of nature. You couldn’t really say it was any more evil than the cold virus or the flu virus. In fact, you couldn’t call it evil at all. The disease just did what it did. Nature just did what it did. Some creatures survived and some didn’t. The ones who survived weren’t any better than the ones that died. There was no good and evil in nature. No right and wrong.

  It would be nice to survive, though, Skinner had to admit. It would be nice to see a bit more of the world.

  He went down to the Serpentine and along the bank to the corner where the sickos had got in yesterday. It had been repaired and strengthened and Jordan had stationed one of his strongest units there to defend this potential weak spot. Some of them were on the other side, driving in more stakes, facing outwards.

  Skinner turned and walked back the other way. Kids were getting the boats ready to take the dead and dying and the injured across the water. Some were scrubbing the blood off from yesterday.

  Further along, Ollie was up and about, organizing his troops. In the night Skinner had seen the bravest of these guys sneaking out in small groups to try to retrieve as many arrows, spears and javelins as they could. They had nowhere near as many as yesterday when they’d started, but at least they’d have enough for one last volley. Other kids were returning from forays around the surrounding area, where they’d been pulling up more railings, tearing into the buildings along Kensington Gore, grabbing anything they could use in the battle today.

  And there was Jordan, climbing up on to his platform with Blu-Tack Bill, Bright Eyes sitting patiently at the bottom of the ladder, waiting for him. Poor Paddy. He’d had his dog taken away from him and then his life. Jordan might as well keep the animal now.

  Just past the LookOut was the group of kids all wearing green. Matt’s gang from St Paul’s. They were sitting neatly in a semicircle facing Matt, who appeared to be giving a sermon. Or was it a pep talk? A rallying call.

  ‘Blessed are you who stay awake and worship the Lamb. We have kept our vigil, and we will plough the blood of the Nephilim into the fields of the Lord. They are the spawn of Gog and Magog. In number they are like the sand on the seashore. They have marched across the breadth of the earth and surrounded the camp of God’s people. But fire will come down from heaven and devour them. And their leader, Satan himself, will be thrown into a lake of burning sulphur, where he will be tormented day and night forever and ever. They are the spirits of demons, and word has gone out to the kings of the whole world, to gather them here to do battle in the place that is called Armageddon …’

  Skinner moved quickly on, hearing Matt shouting after him, glad he’d got away. Matt seemed to be ranting about him now.

  ‘His voice is like the sound of rushing waters, and out of his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations …’

  This was madness. These kids had made their own crazy mind-castle and were happy within its walls. They felt safe there. It had been the same with the Twisted Kids. They’d lived their lives away from all this, in their own little hothouse world, playing their games. They’d constructed their own universe inside the warehouse. They’d been the normal ones. The rest of the world was weird. Skinner guessed that everyone probably felt the same way.

  He heard a snatch of song in the distance and a movement caught his eye. He looked across the lake.

  And froze.

  Surely not? He must be imagining it.

  No – they were unmistakable. It couldn’t be anyone else. One moment he’d been thinking about the Twisted Kids, back at the warehouse, and the next moment – there they were.

  He could see the Warehouse Queen in her wheelchair throne, being pushed along by Monstar. And there were the others – TV Boy, Flubberguts, Betty Bubble … all of them. And they were singing their song …

  ‘We are the Twisted Kids. Twisted gits, the gifted twits!

  We are the screwed-up, twisted kids,

  Our life’s a joke, our legs are crap,

  We try to walk but slip and slap.

  You wouldn’t want to ask us round for tea …’

  Skinner ran back to where the boats were.

  ‘Can someone row me across?’ he shouted. A girl shrugged and nodded that he should jump into her boat. Two other kids pushed them out into the deeper water and the girl began to pull steadily and surely across the lake, Skinner sitting in the back. Halfway across he couldn’t hold back his excitement and he stood up and started to wave.

  ‘Sit down,’ said the girl. ‘You’ll tip us over. We’re nearly there.’

  Skinner apol
ogized, and when they reached the other side the Twisted Kids were waiting for him. There was a crazy round of hugs and greetings and laughter. A crowd of local kids had formed round them, pointing and staring, amazed.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ said Skinner.

  ‘We got Fish-Face’s message,’ said the Warehouse Queen. Or, at least, she put the words into Skinner’s head.

  ‘We couldn’t sit there in the warehouse and wait for things to be decided without us,’ said TV Boy. ‘We’ve come to do all we can.’

  ‘We’ll get your throne up on to the roof of the LookOut,’ Skinner said to the Warehouse Queen. ‘Near the general. Because you can shout the loudest of us all.’ He laughed, his tiredness and gloom forgotten.

  ‘Between us we can completely block the sickos’ signals,’ he babbled on. ‘They won’t be able to get even halfway organized. They’ll be just a mob. Paul won’t have any effect on them. They’ll be ploughed into the earth!’ He laughed again.

  ‘You’ve come,’ he said. ‘We’re all together again.’

  66

  Ryan’s dog was restless this morning. Being this close to so many sickos was freaking her out. Sickos stank bad enough to Ryan’s nostrils. And he didn’t have much of a sense of smell – thank God. One small advantage in this stinking, rotten world. So what must it be like for the dogs? Being so close to the awful stench and the bad vibes that the sickos gave off.

  Ryan rolled his shoulders and swung his arms. It had been cold in the night and the day hadn’t warmed up yet. He’d have liked to be standing out in the sunlight, but was holding back here in the shadows with Dom, so as not to be seen.

  Where the hell was Nicola?

  They needed to be moving on soon and she’d still not come back. She’d told him that she wasn’t going to be long, but she’d been out all night. He liked Nicola. She’d always been good to him – straight and fair – and they’d had a strong relationship based on helping each other. In quiet moments he thought about her in other ways, but knew she was out of his league.