Lee yelled fiercely and lunged at him, but the chains stopped his fists flying. It took all four guards to restrain him.
“Touch me again and you’re dead, Baxter!” the boy raged, kicking out.
“What is your problem?” Martin shouted. “From the minute we met you’ve done nothing but antagonise and undermine me. So you’ve had it rough. Big deal. There’s not one of us who hasn’t. What makes you different, what makes you so special?”
Lee raised his hands and rattled the chains, almost proudly. “Is you dumb or what, Mr Maths Teacher?” he sneered. “These make me special. I’m the Castle Creeper – I’m the most special and coolest thing there is.”
A slow, mocking grin appeared on his face. “Yeah,” he said. “That’s what this is about, ain’t it? You can’t stand that you’re just another nobody now. All that TV you used to do, telling the world how bad that book is, all them shrill blogs and runnin’ from country to country, tweetin’ and preachin’ – pushin’ your own brand of panic an’ drama at anyone who’d listen. Thinkin’ you’re the leader of some sort of resistance, what a joke!”
“Oh, you really are a piece of work,” Martin growled in disgust. “You make me sick. And to think, at first, I couldn’t wait to meet you. You were going to be the answer to this madness. I honestly believed you were going to turn it around. Well, more fool me!”
Lee laughed at him. “Don’t feed me that. You’re the one who thought he was somethin’. Austerly Fellows’ great nemesis, the badass Martin Baxter, the saviour from Suffolk who tried to save humanity single-handed. You got hooked on bein’ famous, dintcha? Man, that is pathetic. While the rest of them out there got addicted to the book, you became a fame junkie – just another media ho. ‘Loser’ don’t even start to cover it.”
“Shut up. You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“I know them Generals all laugh at you. You got nuthin’ worth sayin’ to them at their meetings, you deludenoid. You ain’t no leader, no hero, just another sad reject what got caught up in this at the start an’ don’t know when it’s over.”
“And what are you? Council-estate scum! I’ve taught hundreds of identical no-marks, who can’t even spell ‘GCSE’. They drift their way through school and can’t wait for it to be over so they can start claiming benefits and sponge off the rest of us.”
“Yeah, the likes of me is what your taxes kept in flat-screens and Nikes. Real generous of you, thanks. And guess what, soon as this place gets Jaxed, I’m headed to Mooncaster to live it up as a prince.”
Martin stepped back. “You’d really do that, wouldn’t you?” he said in disbelief. “Kill the Bad Shepherd, even knowing who that is. You’d sell out everyone, just so you could get back with your girlfriend.”
“Hell, yes! If you hadn’t grassed me up and got me cuffed, I could’ve gotten there months ago. And don’t tell me you wouldn’t do exactly the same to get your old lady and her kid back – even though the Ismus has been bangin’ her this whole time and got her knocked up.”
Martin flew at him. Before the guards could intervene, he punched the boy in the stomach and cracked him across the chin. Lee crumpled to the floor, but he was laughing, knowing his words had hurt the man far more.
Martin would have waded in again, but the rifles came jabbing at his chest and Gerald’s hands were pulling him away.
“Leave it,” the old man said. “Grow up, the pair of you. I could knock your heads together, squabbling like toddlers. Martin, you go get some fresh air and you, Lee, go cool off somewhere else.”
Lee looked up at him. He had a wary respect for Gerald. That old guy had seen it all and had faced more discrimination, suffered more hate and prejudice from society than anyone he knew. Back in Peckham, Lee’s gang never messed with people like Gerald. They couldn’t be intimidated and fought vicious and dirty.
Rising, he was about to give Martin a parting snarl when a military ambulance braked at the end of the corridor and Doctor Choe stepped out, yapping instructions and slapping the vehicle’s side. Two soldiers jumped from the back and together they hauled down a stretcher bearing the body of Marshal Tark Hyun-ki.
The children had crowded out of the refectory to watch Lee and Martin’s fight and the few in the dorms had come to their doors to do the same. Now they watched in silence as the Shark was carried past. A blanket had been thrown over him. Doctor Choe guided the bearers down the corridor. They passed the guard stationed beyond Lee’s room and disappeared round the corner, into the prohibited area. When they had gone, the teenagers noticed a trail of blood dotting the concrete floor.
They stared at it in thoughtful silence. Lee was right: the power of the book had infiltrated the base and the clock was ticking. They weren’t safe here any longer.
“Never saw Doctor Frankensoo so stoked,” Lee observed dryly. “Like she got a whole new set of sticky toys to play with.”
“I wonder who the Shark thought he was in Mooncaster,” Spencer mused aloud.
“Hope it was the dung guy,” Lee said. “Nobody’s gonna waste no tears over him. That piece of crud wanted to turn me into a suicide bomber. Sizzle in Hell, you sorry-assed douche.”
The others began filing back into the refectory and the girls from the dorms hurried across to join them to find out what had been going on. Maggie went in search of a mop and bucket.
“So here it is, merry Christmas,” she muttered under her breath with heavy sarcasm. “Everybody’s having fun. Look to the future now, it’s only just begun… not.”
Little Nabi wanted to take a closer look at the blood, but Gerald led her back inside instead. There was something he wanted to ask her. Doctor Choe had just used the same word he had noted earlier in the meeting.
“Nabi,” he began with a friendly, coaxing smile.
“Itsy bitsy!” she demanded, pouting because he had denied her young bloodlust. For a little girl whose name meant ‘butterfly’ she took great delight in the gruesome.
“Later,” he promised. “I want to know, what does pookum mean?”
“Itsy bitsy!” she said, stubbornly folding her arms and glowering.
The old man realised he’d get nothing out of her until he complied. It was one of the nursery rhymes he had taught her. She enjoyed it because there were actions. She loved making spider legs with her fingers and miming raindrops and sunshine. Gerald spoke the rhyme with her and then she insisted he do it a second time.
“She’s got you well trained,” Spencer commented.
“Now pookum,” Gerald asked her again. “What does it mean?”
The six-year-old laughed and shook her head. “Nabi no no,” she gurgled.
“Maybe you’re not pronouncing it right,” Spencer suggested.
Gerald tried again, using the same inflection he had heard in the meeting earlier and just now in the corridor. Nabi put her head to one side attentively, but smiled ever wider.
“No!” she declared.
“Never mind,” Gerald sighed. “You’re probably too young to know anyway.”
“What do you think it means?” Spencer asked.
The man shrugged. “Probably just me fretting over nothing as usual. Evelyn’s always telling me—” He broke off, startled at himself. He tried not to talk about ‘Evelyn’, having suppressed her since leaving Felixstowe with Martin a year ago. But her name had been on his lips more and more recently. It was as if she refused to be forgotten. That was so like