The tele-door hung in the air by the roadside on an expanse of cracked tarmac. The light of the amber street lamp only extended a few yards into the 138 night. On the other side of a steel wire fence lay the shadows of a building site. In the rubble, something furry slithered. Rats.

In one direction, the road disappeared into fog. In the other, it plunged into a tunnel illuminated by neon tubes, each surrounded by a blurry halo. Night wind blasted out of the tunnel. The fence shivered in response, creating a ringing, jangling rustle. It wasn't the only one shivering.

Dittero closed the tele-door and pocketed the handle, and led the group into the gloom. Fitz didn't want to lose them. As he walked, his new shoes scrunched on broken gla.s.s.

n.o.body spoke. Fitz could hear distant traffic, an ever-present background rumble.

Beyond the wire fence, the building site became a playground of scaffolding. Fitz glanced up, and his stomach twisted with vertigo. Looming over the street were tower blocks impossibly high, sheer edifices of concrete.

Glancing back the way they had come, Fitz could see the windows of the high-rise apartments were boarded up. The paintwork was streaked and scarred.

Due to the fog, they didn't notice the wreck until they had stumbled into it. A car had veered off the road and smashed into the crash barrier, lodging itself against the fence, its body tilted at forty-five degrees. The windshield had shattered inwards, forming a spider's web of glimmering fractures, and the headlights had been knocked out. The bonnet was dented, a twisted, deformed snarl of chromium.

Despite himself, Fitz peered inside. The interior had been consumed by flame, the seats reduced to clumps of padding.

Wedged into the driver's seat was a corpse. A skeleton, or near enough, it was coated in a glistening tarlike substance. It clutched the steering wheel in its talons and stared ahead with eyeless sockets. It turned to Fitz and smiled in delight.

Fitz stared, jumping back, banging his head on the door frame. He gulped in horror as the skeleton collapsed on to its front. Its back was nothing more than a ribcage protruding through the charred remains of its clothes.

Fitz put a hand over his mouth. Poozle and Question Intonation floated away and Vors.h.a.gg hissed, creating a cloud of displeasure.

'What is it?' said Fitz. 'What happened here?'

Before anyone could answer, there was a rattling, grinding roar. A stark white light flashed over the delegates, casting long shadows over the wasteground beyond the fence.

Fitz shielded his eyes as two brilliant beams of light emerged from the tunnel. The creature gave another roar and its tyres squealed.

Dittero coughed and backed away from the wreck. The others followed suit.

139.

The car crunched down the gears and halted beside the burnt-out wreck.

Its lamps illuminated the broken remains, the frosted windows, the leering corpse. It was almost as if it was examining it.

Fitz jumped out of the way as the new car smashed into the broken car, jamming it against the fence. The fence protested with a loud clatter.

Tyres squealed again, and the car backed away. Again it shunted forward, nudging at the wreck, rocking it back and forth, sc.r.a.ping along its side.

Fitz watched in horror. He couldn't make out anything apart from the glare of the headlamps. He couldn't see any driver.

There was another roar, and another pair of lamps emerged from the tunnel.

And another.

The first car finished investigating the wreck and screeched backwards in frustration. Its two companions handbraked in the road. Then, in unison, they revved themselves into a frenzy, slipped their clutches and charged.

All of their lights were shining on Fitz. They were heading straight for him.

They were going to kill him.

Half blinded, Fitz turned. The fence had been torn apart by the wrecked car, and a hole of blackness offered a way through to the wasteground. Fitz dived for it, his jacket snagging on the mesh, and he tripped through, stumbling across the rocky ground.

Six copies of his shadow slithered over the rubble in front of him. The shadows cast by the cars' headlights. Fitz turned. Their six slanted eyes watched him. Then, with a shriek of anger, they shoved at the fence.

'Down!'

Fitz tried to work out where the female voice had come from, but all he could make out were the nightmares of buildings. As he looked around, his feet twisted beneath him and he tripped knee-first on to the ground.

From behind him, from the cars, he heard the fence collapse with a crash.

The cars' engines whined. Tyres screeched.

And then there was a long, heavy boom. A flash of firelight lit up the waste ground. The ground shuddered.

Ignoring the pain in his hands, Fitz dragged himself to his feet, staggering forward as he looked back.

The three cars were alight. Thick plumes of smoke billowed out of their collapsed windscreens. Flames crackled across the chromium surfaces like a ma.s.s of cobras. The sizzling air lifted fluttering pieces of plastic. Their headlights died.

Debris began to rain on Fitz and he tugged his jacket collar upwards and over his head. He picked his way forward, hobbling over uneven bricks that see-sawed under his feet.

140.

He wasn't alone. Three figures ran towards him, their boots thumping.

Fitz's sight was still streaked with after-images, but as they cleared, he could make out faces frightened, pale faces with long, tangled blonde hair.

They could see him. He must have slipped outside the indiscernability field.

'I think,' said Fitz, 'you've just saved my life.'

There was always a bunch of rebels, thought Fitz. He clasped the plastic beaker in his hands and sipped at the brackish liquid. At least it was warm, which was more than could be said for the warehouse they used as a hideout.

A portable gas fire threw a glow over their surroundings. Cardboard boxes, food packets and engine parts littered the floor. The ceiling was a confusion of ducts and girders, all coc.o.o.ned in cobwebs.

There were five in the group. All girls. Thin to the point of malnourishment.

He could see the blue veins in the temples of the girl closest to him.

Fitz found her rather attractive. Obviously she was in a bad way her hair had been cropped rather than washed but she had an air of resilience, of determination.

All of the women wore thick padded overalls. For the insulation, Fitz guessed.

Fitz pa.s.sed round the drink and tried to make himself more comfortable on the packing crate. 'So what happened? '

The woman beside Fitz, whose name was Kera, brushed some straggles of hair from her forehead. 'This planet wasn't always like it is now. Once there were no buildings, no motorways. No concrete or steel.'

Fitz listened, his mind half elsewhere. They were all girls. What had happened to all the blokes? Presumably they didn't need men to reproduce. They did it some other way.

'Then something changed,' said Kera.

'Tell him,' urged another of the girls. Fitz squinted at her. She couldn't be much over fifteen. She still had puppy-fat cheeks. Her thick-browed eyes glittered.

'There was a discovery. The internal combustion engine.'

'The what?' said Fitz. He lifted his palms and breathed on them for warmth.

'I forgot,' said Kera. 'You're from another planet. The internal '

'No,' said Fitz. 'I've heard of it. It's the thing inside cars, the engine. Carbu-rettors and spark plugs and stuff.'

'Everything changed. We developed. . . vehicles. Automobiles.'

'I've seen them,' said Fitz. 'Why did you blow them up?'

Kera looked away, her eyes watering. 'We relied upon them. We needed them to commute, to transport our food. . . '

'Right. . .

141.

'As the population of Estebol increased, so did the number of automobiles.

If only we'd known then. . . ' Kera sighed. 'The people needed cities, the automobiles needed roads.'

'Soon,' the fifteen-year-old added, 'there was nothing but cities and roads.'

'The whole planet's surface,' muttered Kera. 'Everywhere, concrete and tarmac. And still the number of automobiles increased. The people who didn't work in the refineries worked on the a.s.sembly lines. . . '

'So you were big on cars, then?' said Fitz.

'It didn't happen overnight.' There was no trace of emotion in Kera's voice.

'The cities and roads took centuries to build. That's why n.o.body noticed until it was too late.'

'Noticed what?'

'The atmosphere of our world had changed. It was no longer suitable for humans. The levels of carbon monoxide and lead. . . we grew sick. Our children were stillborn, or deformed. We were dying out. We were living our lives for for the automobiles. We would spend every waking hour building them, servicing them, the automobiles. We would spend every waking hour building them, servicing them, feeding feeding them. And, as the years pa.s.sed, we would spend more and more time inside the automobiles, driving to and from work. And that's when we realised.' them. And, as the years pa.s.sed, we would spend more and more time inside the automobiles, driving to and from work. And that's when we realised.'

She fell silent. None of the other girls spoke.

Fitz looked around expectantly. The warehouse seemed to have grown suddenly colder and darker. 'Realised what?'

'Estebol was no longer our world,' said Kera. 'It was theirs theirs. The cars had taken over.'

They made their way down the stairwell. The eldest girl led the group, followed by the youngest, then Kera, Fitz and one more.

Fitz paused at a window and looked through the shards that remained in the frame. He could see out across the grim city. Opposite, another high-rise loomed out of the smog. In the distance there were more skysc.r.a.pers, all blank and grey. And below were rivers of red and white.

'You're the only ones left?' said Fitz.

Kera nodded. 'The number of humans. . . it looks like we're reaching the terminal point.'

'The end?'

'As we need the automobiles, so they need us.'

'What, to drive them?'

Kera swiped a hair from her high, pale forehead. 'Not just that. The automobiles depend upon us to build them, to repair them, to fuel them. If we die, they die.'

'You talk about them as though they're alive.'

142.

The whole group looked at him as if he were mad.

'Oh, they're alive, Fitz,' said Kera. 'As alive as anything here.'

'Yes, but they can't think, can they?' Fitz shivered. His jacket wasn't enough to keep out the cold. 'Can they?'

'It's hard to explain,' said Kera. 'When people get behind the wheel. . . '

'They're taken over,' said the fifteen-year-old.

'They become part of the automobile,' agreed Kera. 'They're no longer one of us, but. . . one of them. They forget.'

'Forget what?' Fitz said.

'They forget they were ever human.'

Fitz sat down on the stairs. 'So what you're saying is, they get into the cars, and the cars. . . possess them?'

Kera patted his shoulder. 'That's it. You've got it.'

Fitz rubbed his forehead. He felt nauseous, but then, that could be because of the pollution. 'The people in the cars,' he asked, 'why don't they just get out?'

'Once someone is part of an automobile, they're lost,' said Kera. 'There is no going back.'

'So,' said Fitz, slapping his knees, 'what are you doing about it?'

'We're fighting back,' said Kera. 'The automobiles' fuel. . . it makes excellent explosives. We use it against them!'

Fitz had expected more. 'That's it?'

'That is all we can do. We are trying to save our world.'

'I know.' Fitz looked at Kera, and the other girls, and the hope in their eyes.