When he got to the front, Jordan stopped. Standing there for a long while, not saying anything. Keeping very still. There was dead silence. The local kids watching him, waiting, wondering. Will remembered how some teachers could keep order in a classroom without seeming to do a lot. Others would shout and throw out threats and still nobody listened.
Finally Jordan spoke. Didn’t have to shout. Everyone was listening.
‘My name is General Jordan Hordern,’ he said. ‘And I’ve come to help. If you accept my help I will lead your army and we will kill every sicko in London. If you don’t accept my help I will turn round and march back to the Tower and leave you all to die. If you speak for your people come forward and talk.’
Will waited. There was a moment’s hesitation while this sunk in. And then Justin came over, nodded at Jordan, told him who he was. They hadn’t met in a long while. It had been over a year since they’d split up during the battle of Lambeth Bridge. They exchanged some words. Then Maxie and Blue joined them, Nicola close behind. Ryan sauntered over, not wanting to be left out. Only David hung back. Too proud. But, when he saw that he was in danger of being left out altogether, he walked over with Jester and Pod. Some agreements must have been made because the next thing they were all shaking hands and nodding. Again the only one who didn’t instantly join in was David. He was still keeping his distance from the main group, muttering to Jester and Pod.
Will had been expecting this, and he’d warned Jordan that David was going to be trouble. This whole show would let him know that Jordan wasn’t to be messed with, but there was a big danger it would scare him and make him less keen to accept Jordan as the boss. Finally Jordan turned to David and gave him the stare. This was the moment. Jordan hardly ever looked at you square on, and when he did it freaked you out. It was time for David to make up his mind. He tried to return Jordan’s look, but only lasted a few seconds before turning away and walking off. Jordan cut him out, barked a couple of commands and his kids reformed into a column and marched on. Nicola, Justin, Blue and Maxie fell in. Part of the army now. Enjoying it.
Will glanced over at David as they marched past him. He didn’t look happy. His eyes darted about. Was he trying to count the number of kids in the army? Will smiled. David would probably be feeling pretty foolish now. Jordan had outplayed him.
This part had gone well. The easy part. What next? Were they really going to face up to a whole army of sickos?
Will didn’t want to think that far ahead.
24
Maxie turned to smile at Blue. This felt good – like they had a chance. Blue wasn’t showing anything, though. They’d all just been through a macho, bullshit ritual. It had been all about ‘face’, and Blue had kept his blank. He was marching in step, though. Maxie had been in the football team at school and remembered what it had been like when the other schools turned up to play. That wariness. Checking each other out. Sizing each other up. Which team was likely to win? Who were the players to watch out for? They were all on the same side here, but it had still been awkward. Quite frankly, she wasn’t that bothered who was going to lead the army in the coming battle. Blue would have been as good as anyone else, Achilleus even, or Jackson. It was going to be a messy scrap whatever. A brutal hand-to-hand with a load of diseased grown-ups.
Hardly Waterloo.
It wouldn’t need the planning of, say, the D-Day landings.
Maxie had no interest in doing it herself, mind you. She’d never really even wanted to lead the Holloway kids. It had just sort of happened after Arran had died and nobody else wanted the responsibility. Achilleus was a better fighter, but he didn’t want to be in charge. He liked doing his own thing and sneering from the back. Now she sort of shared the job with Blue. The two rival Holloway gangs had merged into a single unit on their way to the palace. Blue had that male pride thing going on. Stuff like that was more important to him than it was to her. All Maxie really cared about was surviving, and making sure her friends survived. She didn’t mind how, and she didn’t much care how she looked, what other people thought of her. Blue was different. He’d grown up in a tough world where the impression you made was the most important thing. A world where status mattered. She’d talked to him, though, and deep down he was happy to let someone else take overall charge, so long as he kept control of his own troops.
She knew that Justin was cool about it too. He was happy to let Jordan be general. Justin was a thinker, an organizer, not a fighter. Nicola too. She wasn’t a military type. She got power in other ways.
David, though. David was an arse. If he didn’t want to play ball then he was going to be on the sidelines. Were his troops even that important? This new lot from the Tower looked like proper fighters. Maxie had never been convinced by David’s gang in their posh red blazers. She’d smiled at the way David had backed off, slunk away. They’d marched past him standing by the side of the road, sulking. He knew he was beaten.
She was impressed by how well drilled the Tower kids were, how well organized, but she was most impressed by the weapons they’d brought. They had guns and proper spears and swords and armour, not the home-made, improvised stuff the Holloway kids had scavenged off the streets. And then there was Jordan Hordern. He was properly hard. It was funny – boys who tried to look tough, to act deadly, usually ended up just looking silly, like they were playing a part. Kids like Jordan didn’t have to put on an act because they were sure of their power. Nobody was going to argue with Jordan.
Maxie really thought they could do it now. Take on the grown-ups and win. It was such an abstract concept, though. She found it hard to believe that there really was an army of them out there. It had been so quiet lately. If there was going to be a battle, then when? How long were they going to have to wait?
Some of Matt’s green troops peeled off. He’d insisted that he take his most hardcore religious fanatics to rough it in Westminster Abbey, which was right behind the Houses of Parliament. The rest of his group, the younger ones, the less devout, the fighters who wanted to join in the training, had chosen the relative comfort and safety of the museums. The new arrivals would be staying in the Victoria and Albert, where there was a lot of free space. Maxie and Blue had spent the last three days working with a crew, dragging beds and bedding in there from nearby houses. It looked like the new arrivals had brought supplies with them, but how long would they last before food began to run out?
There had been talk of drawing the sicko army out into the open somewhere. Choosing a battlefield. David had had some thoughts. Not great ones. But he wasn’t part of it any more. So what would he do now? He could stay in the palace and miss out on all the glory, but could he do anything to upset the other kids’ plans? To make life difficult for them? Not in any way Maxie could think of.
No. He was just going to make himself an outsider. If he wasn’t a part of this, then he was going to be ignored when it was all over. Insignificant. She knew the battle was going to be one of those things – if you weren’t there, then …
Well. You weren’t there.
25
He was singing at the sky and the sky sang back. A blue song. He smiled. That was a new thought. And an old thought. Yesterday he hadn’t had the word – blue. Didn’t know that all that up there was the sky. The words were coming back to him. Filling him up. The thoughts becoming clear and straight in his mind. Blue. Sky. New. Thoughts. Words. Mind …
He remembered things from his life – that was new as well – memories, coming back to him. He could list them all. A long string of them. Starting up there in the sky. In the blue. On a far-distant star. That’s where it had all begun, his life. Yes, he was sure of that. And then he’d come here. To the green. To the jungle. And, my God, that had been a long time ago. More than a hundred years. Thousands of years even. Longer. Dear Lord, he’d lived for a long time. He must have done, to remember all that so clearly. The blue, the green, the jungle, the trees, the bats and the birds and the fleas. And the people …
He
’d been one of them. He’d been pretty sure of that. Living in the jungle. And then he’d come here. To … what was the name?
London!
Yes.
And then … How did that work? How did that fit together? This was where it all got confusing. He somehow must have lived two lives. His life up there, in space, and then in the jungle, and his other life here, as a butcher. His life with his boy. His Liam. His little boy. Taking him to watch the Arsenal play at Highbury. The old stadium. The new stadium. Near home. It had burned down, hadn’t it? And Liam … Someone had killed Liam. Someone bad. He knew it. A bad man. With a big head and a cross on his front. He knew him so well. What was his name? No. He couldn’t remember everything – give me a break – not all in one go. It was too much, too fast.
Liam was dead, though. He was sure. He remembered that. And he had to make it right for him. Yes, it was all coming back. Working hard. Visiting the farms to see the animals with Liam. That was when it had happened. The disease. Yes, he’d forgotten about the disease. That had been bad, hadn’t it? And what had happened to it?
It had got inside him. It was living in there. He had a dirty foreign squatter inside him. You see, that’s where it all got mixed up. He’d been doing so well. Clear blue skies. Not a cloud in his head. And now? Was he a bug or was he not a bug? Was the bug inside him? Was that it? Millions of bugs – all squeaking and twittering at each other – sending him mad. He was the bug and the bug was him. I’m George. I’m me. The butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker …
No! Shut up! I’m Greg.
I’m Greg. That’s who I am.
It was clear to him now and clear what had to be done. It was time for the eggs to hatch, for the bugs to come out and play. But first they had to kill them all. Not the bugs. The children. Kids. They’d caused all the trouble in the world, and they were trying to cause more, trying to stop the eggs from hatching. And if the bugs couldn’t hatch then it would all be over.
He scratched his head. It was hot and tangled in there, full of battery acid. He had to drain it. He had to try to GET THINGS STRAIGHT.
He wanted help. Help to kill the children. Because the children wanted to kill him. Yes, they did. Him and all his kind. And they had the boy, the one with the strong blood. They must not give the children time. Time to make their medicine. He must strike hard and stop them all. And only then would it be time to emerge.
Emerge. That was a good word.
A new birth. That was it. He was sure he had it straight now.
So he needed help. And he was sending out the call. Come to me. Come and finish what we started. All of you who can hear me. Come and we will be an army and I will lead you and we will kill them all.
He was one giant being, as big as London – bigger – with arms stretching out in all directions, hundreds of fingers reaching out, and hundreds of mouths all calling out. Come to me if you can hear me.
He felt so strong now. And peaceful. Not hungry any more. They didn’t need to eat; they had all the energy they needed, stored inside them. They just had to do this one last thing – this great push – and then … peace. Nirvana. Eternity. At one with the universe.
His army was quiet and still. Waiting for the others. When the others came, they would move. They would attack.
First. First things first. They had to take the boy. The small one.
He’d seen the tiddler, the sprat, back at the stadium. All that time ago. He’d seen the boy, but back then he hadn’t known. Hadn’t realized who he was. He knew now. Because the voices had been screaming it in his ear. And he knew what he had to do. Find the boy. Kill the boy.
He stared at the sky, still singing in his head, still calling, and all his army calling come to me, come to me, come to me …
And they were coming. He could feel them. Moving closer.
He turned from the sky and looked at his people. All packed in together in a dark and greasy heap, lying on top of each other, spreading out as far as he could see in all directions.
He walked, and as he walked his people got up and made way for him, parting to make a path. They all looked to him. He was in all their brains and they were in his. They were one being. A giant bug colony with only one thought. He loved them. They would do whatever he said. One came over, a mother, threw herself at his feet, her mouth moving, no sound coming out, just a soft call in his brain, his inner ear. He loved her. She was his. Utterly devoted to him. He looked at her. And he put thoughts into her mind and she smiled and put her fingers to her face, hooked the tips into her lower eyelids, and pulled and pulled and scraped until her whole face had come off. He made her do it because he could. How she smiled at him now. You’d never seen such a big grin.
And then he told the others to eat her. Not because they were hungry, but because he could. And she never stopped smiling. She loved him so much.
These people were his. They were his hands, his eyes, his heart.
And here were his soldiers walking towards him, the ones who had been with him from the start. They’d brought what he’d asked for, the tools to finish the job – blades and points and hammers. Sharp things. Hard things. Cold things. Things to do harm, to cut and club and smash. He chose one – a cleaver. The name came back to him. Cleaver. A good word that. He had used that word before; he had used the tool. He’d been a butcher after all, hadn’t he? He’d already established that. The cleaver was a good tool. It cut through meat and bone and fat and gristle and sinew and veins and arteries. Clean.
He held it above his head and showed his people and they understood. They started to move away, to spread out. They were going out into the city to find whatever tools they could. No, not tools. There was a better word. It was there. Waiting for him. It was a word that had made his kind kings of the planet.
He just had to let it come.
Seven.
Weeping.
Wept on.
Slept on.
Went on.
Weapon.
I am St George and I will slay the dragon with my cold weapon.
26
‘So what am I then? What rank?’
‘I don’t know. What rank do you wanna be?’
‘Corporal, no, captain, that sounds good – Captain Achilleus, like Captain America … Colonel? Could I be a colonel? Maybe a lieutenant, not a sergeant or sergeant major. What about major? Is that above captain? What’s one rank below general?’
‘Brigadier maybe?’
‘Nah, sounds crap.’
‘You can be whatever you like,’ said Maxie. ‘Just not a general.’
‘Oh no, not a general. That job goes to the high-and-mighty Jordan Hordern. He is our Führer.’
‘Don’t make this hard, Achilleus.’
‘I ain’t. I told you. I don’t want to be no general. Generals don’t fight. Generals don’t win medals. Nobody used to make films about generals, because generals were boring. Giving out orders all day and sitting on horses and looking at maps. No thanks. I want to be on the frontline, kicking butt, living it, yeah? My spear slippery with their blood. So who do I get to be captain of?’
They were in Hyde Park. Jordan had chosen it as the best place to practise manoeuvres, and if possible he was going to have his battle with the sickos here. He had it all planned. There’d been another big meeting at the Houses of Parliament, with maps and everything, just as Achilleus had described the life of a general.
‘Wellington beat Napoleon and his armies because he was very good at picking battle sites,’ Jordan had explained. ‘Choosing the right site means the battle’s halfway won.’
The meeting had gone on for ages. They’d discussed every aspect of the plans. Everyone had been there except, of course, David. He’d sent Jester with a letter explaining that unless he was general then he wouldn’t be sending any troops. But Jester had stayed all the same and joined in. He wanted to know what was going on. Maxie had taken him aside at one point and had a go at him. He’d tried to defend himself, said that i
f it was down to him he would have accepted Jordan taking charge, no problem, and brought the fighters from the palace with him. But it wasn’t his call. There was no democracy at the palace. What David said went.
‘So why don’t you have a coup?’ Maxie had asked.
‘Don’t think I haven’t dreamt about it,’ said Jester with a sly grin. ‘Imagined David’s head on a pole. But the thing is – David might be a prick, and a pompous jerk, but he holds things together. People feel secure and happy at the palace. I couldn’t rule in the way David does.’
Yeah. Jester was a right-hand man, a lieutenant, not a leader. An ambassador. An adviser. In that he was like Achilleus. Who didn’t want to be in charge.
So what was Maxie?
She was just someone who wanted to make things right.
And now it was down to her to explain to everyone what their duties were.
‘You’re in charge of the right flank infantry,’ she explained.
‘The right?’ Achilleus sounded theatrically indignant. ‘What if I want to be in charge of the left flank?’
‘What if you want to be a douche? It doesn’t make any difference.’
‘Yeah? Would of been nice to have been asked, all the same.’
‘You don’t want to be a captain? Fine. You can be a private if you want?’
‘No. Is cool. I’ll take the right flank infantry.’
‘OK. Ollie’s in charge of artillery.’