"It ain't finished," Collingswood said, in a dead voice.

"Look," Billy said to the Architeuthis Architeuthis. It wriggled its wrist-thick arms. "You sorted it. Made us safe."

A squelch answered him. Collingswood was breathing deep and looking at him with some kind of ragged expression. Saira was frowning. Billy heard the wet sound again.

It was the fattest pile of fish-flesh he had noticed. He saw its glowering eyes. Something switched one side to the other. It was a ceratioid enormity, a huge anglerfish beached and collapsing under its own weight. It struggled to open the snaggled split of its mouth. It watched him come and swung again the organic spit before it-its lure, a still-glowing snare on a limb-long spur from its forehead. It wagged it side to side. Was it trying to fool him into its mouth, even now as it drowned in air?

No. The motion of its bait-flesh had none of the fitful jerk of little swimming life that it would mimic to hunt. It tick-tocked the lure in what was not a fish motion at all, but a human one. Speaking his language. The motion of its lure was the wag of a correcting finger. He had said to the Architeuthis Architeuthis specimen, specimen, You made us safe You made us safe, and the sea said no, no, no, no, no.

"What the hell?" Billy whispered.

"What does it mean?" Saira said. "What's happening?"

"It is not not finished," Collingswood said. "Oh shitting fuck." She was bleeding. Her eyes, her nose, her lips. She spat the cigarette and blood away. "It just got a bloodyfuck sight closer." finished," Collingswood said. "Oh shitting fuck." She was bleeding. Her eyes, her nose, her lips. She spat the cigarette and blood away. "It just got a bloodyfuck sight closer."

Billy closed his eyes. He was trembling, a preemptive allergy to whatever was to happen.

"It's still ..." he said. To his shock, he felt his hands yanked behind him. Baron had cuffed him. "Are you out of your mind?" mind?" he said. "It's all about to he said. "It's all about to burn." burn."

"Shut your cakehole, you," Baron said. He indicated one of his men to cuff Saira too.

"Oh, something's very fucking up," Collingswood said. "Boss, don't be a prick." Sensitives all across the heresiopolis must be praying to be wrong, for something other than the burnt nothing they felt fast coming.

"Let me go," Billy said.

"Baron, wait," Collingswood said.

"It never never made any sense," Saira said to Billy. They stared at each other. "No matter how powerful kraken ink is, there was no way it could have ... let him end made any sense," Saira said to Billy. They stared at each other. "No matter how powerful kraken ink is, there was no way it could have ... let him end everything everything. In fire. Even if he wanted to, which why ...?"

"Boss," said Collingswood. "Give them a said Collingswood. "Give them a second." second."

"What makes everything stop?" Saira said. "Fire, the squid, the ..."

Billy stared, and thought, and remembered. Things he had heard and seen, moments, from weeks and weeks before.

"You end to start again," he said. "From the beginning. So you burn backward. This isn't an end ... This is a rebooting."

"Get out," Baron said. "Shift, Harrow."

"How?" said Saira to Billy.

"Burn out whatever set us in the wrong direction. If you want to run a different program. Oh my God, this was never about the poor squid ... it was a bystander bystander. We started this. You did. Fitch kept saying it got closer, the harder you lot tried to protect it. You brought it to attention." There was a straining sound. Everyone looked up. That was the sky stretching, ready to break into flames.

"How far to the Darwin Centre?" Billy said. "How far to the museum?" "How far to the museum?"

"Four, five miles," Collingswood said.

"Get out," Baron, uselessly, said.

"It's too far ... Baron, can you send a message to ... You need to get someone ..."

"Shut up or I will pepper-spray you," Baron said. "I'm sick of this."

"Boss, shut up," up," Collingswood said. She shook her head. Pointed, and Baron blinked in outrage, suddenly unable to speak. "What you saying, Harrow?" Collingswood said. She shook her head. Pointed, and Baron blinked in outrage, suddenly unable to speak. "What you saying, Harrow?"

Something new had walked when the Londonmancers had learnt of Grisamentum's plan, when Al Adler had indulged the traditions and respect his boss had taught him and gone for a supposedly useless reading. The new thing had grown stronger into itself when the kraken was taken and the alternatives narrowed. But it was after after that that the memory angels had gone for it, that its sentience, its meta-selfhood, had become great enough. that that the memory angels had gone for it, that its sentience, its meta-selfhood, had become great enough.

"Why's the angel of memory not here?" Billy said. "It's supposed to be my guardian angel, right? It wants to protect me, right, and to beat this bloody prophecy, right? So why isn't it here? why isn't it here? What's it got to do that's more important?" What's it got to do that's more important?"

Billy knew exactly where he had been when that last phase had begun, and what he had been showing to whom. He knew what was the concatenate development that had made the sea, that soup of life, what it was, and why it had sensed it was under threat. He knew what was happening, and why, and at whose hand, and he could not get anyone else where they needed to be, and he could not explain fast enough.

He needed to be at the Darwin Centre, now. "Oh, God," he breathed, and slumped, then stood up straight. The anglerfish had stopped moving. Billy silently said good-bye to everything.

"Simon," he said. "Simon," he ordered. "You know the bearings of the Darwin Centre. The heart of it. Get me there, now. Now."

Simon hesitated. Baron strained and failed to speak. "But you know what that means. That's how I ..."

"Put. Me. There." Simon would not disobey that voice. Billy tried quickly to catch everyone's eye. Saira half understanding, stricken. Simon, miserable at committing murder again. Baron actually shouting, quite unheard. Collingswood nodded at him, like a soldier saying good-bye. Simon would not disobey that voice. Billy tried quickly to catch everyone's eye. Saira half understanding, stricken. Simon, miserable at committing murder again. Baron actually shouting, quite unheard. Collingswood nodded at him, like a soldier saying good-bye.

There was the shimmered static sound, a muffled cry as Billy made a noise, the last thing he would ever do, as light enveloped him from the inside, faded out and he was gone, and Baron was tugging at nothing.

Chapter Eighty

AND THE SMELL OF THE SEA (SEEMED TO) EBB, SUDDENLY replaced with chemical. Light shimmied in front of Billy's eyes, different from how it had (not) been in his eyes a moment before. He knew he remembered nothing, that these were rather images he was born with. But he would not think about that now. replaced with chemical. Light shimmied in front of Billy's eyes, different from how it had (not) been in his eyes a moment before. He knew he remembered nothing, that these were rather images he was born with. But he would not think about that now.

He was inside of the tank room, in the Darwin Centre. Across from him, beyond two rows of steel tanks, was Vardy. Who turned.

Billy had time to see that the work surface in front of Vardy was littered with vials, tubes and beakers, liquids bubbling, electric cells. He had time to see that Vardy was aiming a pistol at him, and he dropped. The bullet went above him, bursting a thigh-high bottle of long-preserved monkeys. They slumped as reeking preservative sprayed. Billy strained against the handcuffs that still (so to speak) constrained him. He stayed below the level of the steel and crawled. Another shot. Glass and Formalin littered the floor ahead of him, and an eviscerated dolphin baby flopped in his path.

"Billy," said Vardy, his voice grim, terse, as ever, just the same. It could be a statement, a greeting, a curse. When Billy tried to creep closer another bullet ruined another specimen. "I'll kill you," said Vardy. "The angel of memory couldn't stop me, you're certainly not going to."

There was a jabbering, a tiny high-pitched mouthing-off. Through cracks between furniture, Billy saw on the side a tiny raging figure. It was the mnemophylax-a bottle-of-Formalin body, bone arms and claws, a skull head, snapping like a guard dog. It was under a bell jar. Vardy had not even bothered to kill it. It had come and gone so many times, had emerged and been dissipated so often, it was tiny. A finger-sized glass tube that might have been used to contain one insect, and its limbs must have been, what, mouse legs? The skull that topped it was from some pygmy marmoset or something. It was a joke, a little animate failure like a cartoon.

"What did you do with the pyro?" Billy called.

Vardy said. "Cole's right as rain. Did exactly as I asked-wouldn't you, if you had it patiently explained that your daughter was in my protective custody?"

"So you got what you needed. Time-fire."

"Between the two of them, I did." Vardy fired again and ruined an eighty-year-old dwarf crocodile. "Been trying versions out and I think we're good. Stay where you are, Billy, I can hear every move you make."

"Kata ..."

"Katachronophlogiston. Shut up, Billy. It'll be finished soon."

Billy huddled. It was him who had given Vardy the idea. The prophecy had given rise to itself. It had snared him and Dane and his friends because they had paid it attention like it was a disease, a pathological machine. He cursed it without sound. That was what the angel of memory had been fighting, that certitude, struggling for the fact of itself. So long as it fated, fate didn't care what it fated. There was a clink as the phylax jumped up and down and banged its tiny skull head on the underside of the jar that jailed it.

The noise of porting came again. The shadows and reflections shifted. The Architeuthis Architeuthis in its tank had returned to the place from where it had been stolen. Billy stared at it. Again, the eyeless thing seemed to try to look at him. It wriggled its coiling zombie arms. in its tank had returned to the place from where it had been stolen. Billy stared at it. Again, the eyeless thing seemed to try to look at him. It wriggled its coiling zombie arms. What the fuck? What the fuck? Billy thought. Billy thought.

"You brought it to life?" Vardy said. "Whatever for?"

"Vardy, please don't," Billy said. "This won't work, this'll never work. It's over, Vardy, and your old god lost."

"It may not," Vardy said. There was the noise of combustion from his workstation. "Work. It may not. But it may. You're right-he did lose, my god, and I cannot forgive the cowardly bastard for that. Nothing bloody ventured, say I."

"You really think they're that powerful? That symbolic?" Billy crept on.

"It's all a matter of persuasion, as perhaps by now you know. It's all all a matter of making an argument. That's why I wasn't too bothered by Griz. Is that where you've been, with him? With a category error like that in his plan ..." He shook his head. Billy wondered how long ago Vardy had insighted what Grisamentum had in mind, and how. "Now, a matter of making an argument. That's why I wasn't too bothered by Griz. Is that where you've been, with him? With a category error like that in his plan ..." He shook his head. Billy wondered how long ago Vardy had insighted what Grisamentum had in mind, and how. "Now, these these things were the start of it. They're where the argument started." things were the start of it. They're where the argument started."

Billy crept close to the real targets of the time-fire, the real subject of the predatory prophecy. Not and never the squid, which had only ever been a bystander, caught up by proximity. Those other occupants of the room, in their nondescript cabinet, like any other specimen, exemplary and paradigmatic. The preserved little animals of Darwin's Beagle Beagle voyage. voyage.

THIS WAS A FIERY REBOOTING. UPLOADING NEW WORLDWARE.

He had remembered Vardy's melancholy, the rage rage in him, and what Collingswood had once said. She was right. Vardy's tragedy was that his faith had been defeated by the evidence, and he could not stop missing that faith. He was not a creationist, not any longer, not for years. And that was unbearable to him. He could only wish that his erstwhile wrongness had been right. in him, and what Collingswood had once said. She was right. Vardy's tragedy was that his faith had been defeated by the evidence, and he could not stop missing that faith. He was not a creationist, not any longer, not for years. And that was unbearable to him. He could only wish that his erstwhile wrongness had been right.

Vardy did not want to eradicate the idea of evolution: he wanted to rewind the fact of it. And with evolution-that key, that wedge, that wellspring-would all those other things follow, the drably vulgar contingent weak godlessness that had absolutely nothing going for it at all except, infuriatingly, its truth.

And he was persuaded, and was trying to persuade the city and history, that it was in these contemplated specimens, these fading animals in their antique preserve, that evolution had come to be. What would evolution be if humans had not noticed it? Nothing. Not even a detail. In seeing it, Darwin had made it be, and always have been. These Beagle Beagle things were bloated. things were bloated.

Vardy would burn them into un-having-been-ness, unwind the threads that Darwin had woven, eradicate the facts. This was Vardy's strategy to help his own unborn god, the stern and loving literalist god he had read in texts. He could not make it win-the battle was lost-but he might make it have won have won. Burn evolution until it never was and the rebooted universe and the people in it might be, instead, created, as it and they should have been.

It only happened that night because Billy and his comrades had made it that night, had provoked the end-war, and this chaos and crisis. So Vardy had known when he had to act.

"It won't work," Billy said again, but he could feel the strain in time and the sky, and it seemed very much as if it would work. The bloody universe was plastic. Vardy held a Molotov cocktail.

"Look," said Vardy. "Bottle magic." Filled with the phlogiston he had coerced Cole to make, with his daughter's untutored help, at threat of his daughter's life. A combusting tachyon flame. It roared with inrushing sound, illumined Vardy's face.

He brought it closer, and its glow lit the pickled frogs within a jar. They shifted. They shrank in the time-blistering warmth, tugged their limbs into their trunks. They became more paltry, ungainly long-tailed legless tadpoles. He held the flame so it licked the glass of their jar, and after a second of warming it burst into sand and sent the tadpoles spraying. They reversed and undid their having been and shrank as they fell, and never were, and nothing hit the floor.

Vardy turned to the shelf of Darwin's specimens and raised his arm.

Billy struggled to his feet. He could think only, Not like this Not like this. He would try to spill the fire. Perhaps it would reverse the life cycle of the heavy-duty floor, rubbers separating, the chemicals racing back to elemental forms. But his hands were behind him and he was far too far away.

"No!" Billy wheezed, bleeding.

The shadows shed by fire danced over labels handwritten by Charles Darwin. Billy sprawled flat like a mudfish. With a bark of religious joy, Vardy threw the time-flaming missile.

IT FLEW AND TURNED AS IT FLEW. BILLY'S ARMS WERE TRAPPED. BUT there were other arms aplenty in that room. there were other arms aplenty in that room.

The undead specimen Architeuthis Architeuthis shot out its long hunting limbs all the way across the room, from far away. A last predation. It caught the bottle. Took it from the air. shot out its long hunting limbs all the way across the room, from far away. A last predation. It caught the bottle. Took it from the air.

Vardy stared. Vardy screamed in rage.

The time-fire was touching the Architeuthis's Architeuthis's skin, and was burning. The zombie squid's second hunting arm whipped Formalin-heavy up, around Vardy's waist with a skin, and was burning. The zombie squid's second hunting arm whipped Formalin-heavy up, around Vardy's waist with a thwack thwack. It coiled him in. It whipped the bottle toward its mouth. Vardy howled as its shorter arms spread to receive him.

Vardy screamed. The time-fire was roaring, and spreading. The squid was shrinking. Vardy's arms and legs were shortening.

The squid looked at Billy. He could never put into precise words what it was in that gaze, those sudden eyes, what the bottled specimen communicated to him, but it was a fellowship. Not servility. It did not obey obey. But it did what it did deliberately, offered it up and looked at him in good-bye.

The time-fire shrank it further, cleared the deadness from its skin, made it smooth. A selfless selfishness. Without evolution, what would it and its siblings be? The deep gods were not this thing's siblings: it let itself be taken for the sake not of kraken but of the exemplae exemplae, all these specimens around them, of all shapes, these bottled science gods.

The tank was roaring with fire. The flesh was burning younger. There was a last flurry of combat. Silhouetted in the glow, Billy saw a baby screaming adult fury at the little arm-length squid that encoiled it. Both were on fire. Then both, still wrestling, were hot embryos, that intertwined and stilled in grotesque protoplasmic detente, and were burning gone.

The sides of the tank fell in, into smouldering crystals of ore and chemical and then atoms before they could even shatter.

Chapter Eighty-One

THE LAST OF THE BURNING EBBED AWAY. THE LIGHT OF FIRE WAS gone. Only the glow of fluorescent bulbs. gone. Only the glow of fluorescent bulbs.

Something a little rucked singed and melted and There was an inrush growth rejig. An imperfect healing but healing. A huge, epochal sealing. London reskinned. Fire scorched and then went out.

And there was Billy in the new skin, there in time. There was a Billy. Billy breathing out from something, and he breathed in, shook with release. He was in a room.

DARWIN'S SPECIMENS WERE SAFE. BILLY TOUCHED THEM, ONE BY one, stretching out his tethered hands behind him. He ran his fingers along the steel surface where no one, stretching out his tethered hands behind him. He ran his fingers along the steel surface where no Architeuthis Architeuthis had ever been. The tiny mnemophylax watched from under its bell jar. Its bone head tracked his movements. had ever been. The tiny mnemophylax watched from under its bell jar. Its bone head tracked his movements.

Nothing had gone. Billy thought that very exactly.

Billy knew with a strange precision that in all his recent adventures, the specificities of which were slightly vague, no giant cryptid animal had ever been here in this room. The angel of memory rolled on its tiny base and shook its skull head. Billy laughed and was not sure why. There was a pyromancer who was alive and waiting for his daughter, because there was no one nor had there ever been who could have blackmailed him with her. Time felt a little raw. The threat that Billy had defeated in this room, and it had been baleful, had neither involved anyone, nor existed. He laughed.

The sky was different. Billy could feel it beyond the roof. Different from how it had not been. The strain was gone. The end of the world, a true finish, was only one very unlikely possibility among many.

There were details missing. Billy was canny enough by now, after everything, to know what that might mean. There was a burn scar in history. There was still a smell of burning. Billy was definitely descended from simians and ultimately from fish in the sea.

He met the gaze of the mnemophylax across the room, eye socket to eye. Though it had no face to crease he would have said it smiled back. It wriggled and wrote with its tiny fingers on the inside of its glass-he could not tell what. It opened and closed its mouth. It was memory. It shook its head. It put its hair's-breadth fingerbone to its nonexistent lips. Its tiny bones fell, its skull settled into nothing, it became a test tube and some specimen rubbish.

Billy sat on the steel where no great mollusc had been. He sat as if he were a specimen. He wondered what searing thing had not been overcome. He waited for whatever would happen, whoever would find him.

It was Baron and Collingswood who came, at last, into the room. They were not missing any colleague, Billy thought, carefully. They'd never had a third in their crew, though they stood often a little close together, a little close to a wall, as if they would be framed with another presence. They recalled enough, and they knew that something had happened, had finished.

Billy stood and waved with his handcuffed arms. The cops picked over the ruins of glass, spilt preservative, scattered specimen remains, scattered by no one.