A ring of coldness on the back of his neck. Gun barrel.

"Lower your hands. Keep them behind you."

He did, and plastic bindings locked home.

"Now stand"

And that was when the change occurred.

"They're trying to force a cut-in," came from his earbead. "All-channel webcast."

"Stop them."

"I'm sorry, mate. Not this time."

The screens blossomed with new pictures.

Plumes of smoke.

A ruined cityscape.

And a voiceover relating destruction.

"of the San Andreas Fault at dawn this morning, eruptions taking place across California, spreading north. Los Angeles is destroyed, repeat, LA is gone. In Washington State, Angeles is destroyed, repeat, LA is gone. In Washington State, Mount Rainier's eruption is orders of magnitude greater than Mount Rainier's eruption is orders of magnitude greater than predicted by" predicted by"

Great clouds were covering California: a whole string of locations along the Western Seaboard. Grainy footage that might have come from someone's phone showed the moment of Mt Rainier's eruption in a single ma.s.sive fireball.

A blaze of energy that curled down as it grew.

No. They... couldn't have.

Rose and curled to create an iconic image that had not been seen for so long.

A mushroom cloud."from President Brand, who is quoted as saying 'The Sodom and Gomorrah that infested our sacred land are now Sodom and Gomorrah that infested our sacred land are now burned from the Earth. For the moment, we have no more to burned from the Earth. For the moment, we have no more to say.' The whole world will be wondering the exact meaning say.' The whole world will be wondering the exact meaning of those" of those"

Pandemonium encircled the tables. Atop the fighting platforms, the compet.i.tors had put down their knives. Everyone stared at the screens.

Behind Josh, several men and women in suits were gathered, firearms trained on him. One held out ID to the PM's close-protection team.

"Special Branch," she said. "We've got this b.a.s.t.a.r.d."

The CP men glanced up at the unreeling disaster on screen.

"Take him."

"bigger than a hundred Hiroshimas combined, or a hundred Tunguska meteorite strikes. While the immediate hundred Tunguska meteorite strikes. While the immediate death toll must be in the millions, no one knows if further" death toll must be in the millions, no one knows if further"

Rough hands tipped Josh off balance, dragging him away.

It's all gone wrong.

Not just his plan, but the world.

[ THIRTY-ONE ].

The "Special Branch" team had a large, nondescript van parked in the loading bay. They bundled Josh inside, then climbed in themselves: Suzanne first, then Raj and Hannah, while Vikram went up front with Tony and Big Tel, who was driving. Raj undid his tie.

"I hate wearing suits," he said.

"Really? I think you look handsome, all dressed up," said Hannah.

"Well..."

The van swung into motion.

"Did you all see?" Vikram held up a phone, showing aerial views of cloud cover over California, ash falling from the sky. "You saw the mushroom clouds?"

"Not even Brand is that f.u.c.king insane," said Tony.

"Are you sure?"

"Well, no."

Josh opened his mouth, found himself with nothing to say, and just sat there, letting the motion of the van take him where it would. Everything had changed, and whatever would happen, would happen, que sera, sera, que sera, sera, while he no longer had the energy to do anything but watch. while he no longer had the energy to do anything but watch.

His arms, he noticed from a distance, were trembling all by themselves.

"Oh, Josh." Suzanne was holding him. "Oh, my G.o.d."

"You did good," said Hannah. "Amazing."

Josh blinked.

I feel nothing. It's all over.

Both tiredness and energy were gone, leaving him in a state of nothingness, of neither-nor. His brain seemed to be floating.

How very strange.

"The only amazing thing," he said, "was that I didn't get cut."

Hannah and Raj looked at each other.

"What?" said Josh.

"Darling." Suzanne's eyes were wet. "They cut you to pieces. Can't you tell?"

He looked down at himself, soaked through with what he had thought was water.

"Oh, G.o.d."

"Josh, you're going to be all"

Oh, G.o.d.

Blackness grew inside him like a mushroom cloud.

[ THIRTY-TWO ].

Monday, and Richard's first day back at St Michael's. He sat in the back seat for several minutes after the car had stopped outside the gates.

"You sure you're all right?" asked Lexa.

"Yeah. Dad's going to have an interesting day, isn't he?"

"I should think so."

Shareholders to confront, legal coups to make public, revelations that he had already in secret, via proxies regained control of his corporations, even before the nose-dive in Tyndall shares across the globe. It would be a day of triumph, muted by the general geopolitical shock of the ongoing disaster in North America, none of which seemed real.

Here, as Jags and Bentley Electros pulled up at the school, everything was weirdly normal. Perhaps the sky was greyer than you might expect, but that was all.

"See you later," said Richard, climbing out.

"Later." Lexa winked goodbye.

Some of the other boys glanced his way, but no one said anything as he walked through the gates. Ahead were the proud old buildings, and he realised he had missed them.

He thumbed his phone, selecting Opal Opal from his contacts. from his contacts.

"Hey." A bandaged face smiled at him. "Are you OK?"

"First day back. I'm just going in."

"You'll be fine. Call me later?"

"Sure."

Her image winked out.

Boys jostled him, not deliberately but because he was in a bottleneck. He let himself be carried by the flow, into the old corridors where the parquet floors shone with polish. For some reason, the beeswax smell made him smile. He went through into a quadrangle.

Here, some of the boys were on a bench, comparing notes on homework. Others were moaning about the Knifefighter Challenge being ruined, or talking about the rogue fighter who had done so much before bringing the event to an off-kilter end.

"My father says it's the election that's the important thing."

"There was no election, dummy. They cancelled it. Nothing happened."

"That's what I'm talking about."

Richard thumbed his phone again, selectingSuzanne."h.e.l.lo, Richard. You must be at school by now. Feeling good?"

"I'm fine. Really fine."

"I did feel confident on that score."

"How's?"

"Take a look." The image swung to another bandaged figure. "Here's the man himself."

"Hey, Josh."

"Hey, Richie."

Richard grinned at him."Can I ring you again tonight, and talk for longer? I've got to go cla.s.s now."

"Sure you can. We'll talk later, pal."

"Bye."

He put the phone away, still grinning; and that was when the mood changed. The sky above the open quadrangle seemed to darken, but perhaps that was an illusion, caused by the other boy's bulk, and the hardness of his voice when he spoke.

"Well, f.u.c.k it," said Zajac. "Little t.u.r.d's come back, two days after after we was supposed to meet. How about that?" we was supposed to meet. How about that?"

From the far side of the quadrangle, Mal James called: "Leave the poor b.u.g.g.e.r alone, why don't you?"

Richard no, from now on he was Richie looked at Zajac from beneath his eyebrows, his chin lowered and his shoulders hunched. Zajac was sneering and smiling at the same time.

"Think you can get away with it, do you, little t.u.r.d?"