'Relax, Manuel. Cover the kids. Do you think you can manage that?'

Manuel rested the gla.s.ses on the bridge of a nose that had been broken so often it was almost flat. 'Yes, Madam President. I got the kids.'

Faustino kicked off her sandals, bouncing like a boxer.

'Well, Stefan, do you have one more round left in you?'

Spasms wracked Stefan's chest. 'I'm not going to fight you, Professor.'

'Really? Oh come on. I'm the one responsible for your mother's death, remember?'

Stefan did not rise to the bait. "There's a better way to get you.'

Faustino stopped bouncing, her smug grin faltered. 'And what's that?'

'Fight from the inside,' said Stefan, his voice barely audible. 'Attack from the rear.

Remember?'

Stefan's hands were moving, hidden in the folds of his coat.'What are you doing? What have you got there?'

'Nothing dangerous. Just my phone. Nothing to worry President Ellen Faustino.'

'A phone? Who can you ask for help?'

'n.o.body. I'm not asking anybody for help. Just sending some mail.'

Faustino stepped closer. 'Mail?'

'I got a friend with V News who would sell a couple of limbs to see the video I'm shooting right now. He's going to owe me big time.'

It took Faustino a moment to realize what was happening, but when she did her face twisted into a Hallowe'en version of itself.

'He's sending video! If the press get hold of footage of our reactor before we're ready, it's over.' She dived at the injured Russian, claw-like hands digging beneath his torso. She pulled Stefan's hands out. They were empty.

'Surprise,' he said, wrapping his arms around Faustino in a bear hug. She beat his chest with her fists. With no result.

'Dead man's grip,' grunted Stefan, sweat collecting in his eyebrows. 'The last thing I'll ever do.'

Anyone with police training knew about the dead man's grip. If a suspect was dying, and knew it, stay well out of reach, because the last thing they caught on to often went to the grave with them. It was amazing how someone with only seconds to live could find the strength to bend metal and snap bones.

The sniper in the rafters transferred the laser dot to Stefan's head.

Manuel spoke into a mike hidden in his sleeve. 'No. Hold your fire. Repeat. Hold your fire. I'll handle this.'

'I'm not the one shooting video,' Stefan whispered. 'It's Ditto.'

'Get the kid!' screeched Faustino. 'The blond one.'

Manuel pointed his lightning rod at Ditto. 'You got a phone, kid? Hand it over.'

'Sure, I have a phone. Take it easy, Manuel. I'm just going to reach into my pocket and get it.'

Manuel nodded. 'OK. You do that. Real slow. Don't make me wrap you.'

Ditto kept one hand in the air, reaching into his pocket with the other. He took the phone out with two fingers.

'Look, here it is. No problem. I'm bringing it over.'

'No. Stay where you are. Toss the phone.'Ditto nodded almost imperceptibly at Cosmo. 'You want me to toss it?'

'That's what I said. What are you? Short and stupid?'

'OK, Manuel, don't panic. Here it comes.'

Ditto tossed the phone high. Much higher than necessary. One set of eyes followed its arc. Manuel's. Cosmo and Mona pulled lightning rods out of their belts and hit the bodyguard with at least four cellophane slugs. The virus spread across his frame, wrapping him completely in seconds.

Ditto smiled. 'A thing of beauty,' he said, retrieving the phone.

'Idiot,' screamed Faustino, her voice m.u.f.fled by Stefan's bulk. 'Halfwit.'

'You're running out of options, Professor,' said Stefan weakly.

Faustino squirmed to face him. 'Don't kid yourself, Stefan. I still have my sniper.

He can keep your Super-naturalists off the plasti-gla.s.s until you die. That shouldn't be long now.'

The sniper's laser dot hopped from target to target. The man in the rafters was uncertain who to cover.

'Give it up, Stefan. There's no way to win.'

The red dot strayed on to the plasti-gla.s.s. Cosmo, Mona and Ditto ducked behind a string of monorail coaches.

Stefan smiled. There was blood on his lips. 'They're safe now. It's just you and me.'

'Nothing has changed. It's still a waiting game.'

Ditto's voice pierced the hum of the generator. 'Don't do it, Stefan. There must be another way.'

'What's he talking about?' asked Faustino.

Stefan ignored her. 'Sorry, Ditto. All of you. You're on your own now.'

Cosmo grabbed Ditto's shoulder. 'What does he mean?'

Ditto dropped his head into his hands. 'Stefan is dying. That bullet was too close to the heart. He wants his death to mean something.'

'Mean something?' said Mona. 'Mean what?'

Ditto poked his head over the top of the coach. 'An end to pain.'

With the absolute last ounce of strength in his legs, Stefan struggled to his knees, bringing the pinioned Faustino with him.The laser dot flashed across his vision, settling on his forehead.

'I'm going to kill her,' he shouted at the rafters. 'She killed my mother.'

Faustino tried to call out, but her face was smothered in Stefan's chest.

'I mean it. I'll kill her.'

The dot jittered. The sniper was uncertain.

'She's a dead woman.'

The hidden gunman made his decision. A muzzle flashed high in the shadows, propelling a subsonic bullet from the rod's barrel, spinning along the length of the laser beam, shedding its coat of gel as it travelled.

Stefan saw the flash. He'd been waiting for it. Counting on it. He allowed his knees to buckle, collapsing to the floor a millisecond before the subsonic bullet buzzed past his ear, drilling straight through the twin layers of plasti-gla.s.s.

Faustino saw gel bubble through the holes. 'No,' she cried.

The bullet sped into the reactor's interior, taking a chip out of one of the turbines.

The chip spiralled upwards, scoring the plasti-gla.s.s like a finger through sand. More and more hydro-gel dripped down, scattering any Parasites with the energy to move.

Alarm lights flickered on a dozen consoles, automatically shutting and sealing the reactor's nuclear sections. But the Un-Spec 4 area was irretrievably breached. Cracks raced along the surface, competing with each other to reach the edge. Each crack gave birth to a million more, until there wasn't a square foot of unbroken plasti-gla.s.s left.

Hydro-gel dropped in waves, sparking a dozen fires on the floor beneath. Parasites crawled from its path, but they could not flee without clean energy.

Faustino's cheek rested on the plasti-gla.s.s. 'Let me go,' she pleaded.

Stefan did so. 'It's too late, Professor, he said. 'Don't worry, you won't feel a thing.'

Faustino scrambled to her feet, but before she had taken half a dozen steps, the transparent surface collapsed entirely, plunging them both into the belly of the reactor's central section. Every window in the facility was blown out, hydro-gel dripping from the double-glazed panes.

Stefan landed on his back, but there was no pain. There was no pain because a single Parasite had draped itself across his chest. The agony flowed out of the Supernaturalist into the creature.

'Take it,' said Stefan, the words rustling through his lips. 'Be free.'

The Parasite pulled out the pain in a rope of glistening silver. In seconds its desiccated heart pulsed vibrantly again. The Parasite's round soulful eyes stared into Stefan's own.

'I understand now,' said Stefan. And one more word after that. A word or a last breath. 'Mother.'

The Parasite reached out a four-fingered hand, laying it on the shoulder of a suffering brother. A burst of energy flowed through one to the other, liberating the second. And so Stefan's pain spread, rationed between a thousand Parasites, giving each one the energy to escape the nuclear reactor and find the energy to free more Parasites. They scampered up the walls, avoiding globs of hydro-gel, and scattered through the lab like leaves caught in a whirlwind.

Stefan's heart had stopped beating, but he had just had time to watch them go. And in the middle of all that blue, there was something else. Somewhere else. Somewhere different.

Cosmo and Ditto were leaning over the lip of the reactor's central section. Ditto seemed like an actual child, with tears streaming down his face.

'You had to do it, Stefan,' he sobbed. 'You had to be the big stupid hero. Nothing else would do.'

Cosmo, as usual, couldn't believe what was happening.

'You mean he goaded that sniper?'

'Of course. A bullet was the only way through the plasti-gla.s.s. He was waiting for the muzzle flash. Slow bullets, you see.'

Parasites whirled all around them, hunting for energy. Already some had returned through the shattered windows, carrying energy to free the others. A single Parasite hovered by Cosmo's shoulder, its head c.o.c.ked expectantly.

Cosmo stepped back. 'It senses something.' A red dot appeared on his chest.

'Oh no,' said Ditto. 'The sniper is still up there. Don't move. I'll try to negotiate.'

Ditto raised his hands, turning towards the source of the beam.

'Faustino's finished,' he shouted at the shadows. 'You don't have to do this. We have money.'

There was no reaction for a moment, then the familiar whup whup of a cellophane slug being fired and impacting.

Mona stepped from the blackness, high up in the rafters.

'I took advantage of the confusion,' she said. 'It's what Stefan taught me.' She paused for a second, working up the courage to ask. 'Is he gone?'

'Yes,' replied Cosmo. 'He's gone.' And so was the hovering Parasite.Mona was quiet for several moments. Cosmo thought he saw her slender frame shake. After that she pulled herself together. 'Then we better be gone too. There are alarms going off all over the building. The paralegals will be here any minute.'

It was true. Cosmo could already hear sirens in the distance. He took one last look over the edge, then hurried towards the stairwell and freedom.

CHAPTER 10:

FALLOUT.

UTOPIAN ACRES,.

Satellite City Suburb two weeds later INCREDIBLY, Ellen Faustino survived to be brought before the Myishi Chairman.

As soon as her skin grafts had taken, she was choppered out to Mayor Ray Shine's estate in Utopian Acres.

Mayor Ray Shine, who also happened to be Chairman of Myishi Industries in Satellite City, cut short a golf game especially to talk to her. Ray was a flamboyant character who did not believe in dressing down for any occasion. Today's outfit was a yellow and pink chequered sweater with matching peaked hat, tweed breeches and Argyle diamond pattern socks.

The Mayor parked his ma.s.sive girth behind a desk set on ivory legs and poured a gla.s.s of purified water, leaving Faustino to squirm. He drank deeply, belched gently and sighed.

'Ellie, Ellie, Ellie, what have you been getting up to out there in R&D?' His voice was gentle, but Faustino knew him to be the most ruthless man she had ever met.

'Ray . . . Chairman Shine, with respect, you know exactly what was going on. I told you.'