She watched him. She was getting woozier, and her eyes were starting to go out of focus. All he had to do was wait a few seconds, until all the fight had gone out of her.

‘The bastards,’ she muttered.

She moved so quickly he was caught off guard. He hesitated for no more than half a second, but it was enough time for her to reach out and lift a wide-mouthed beaker from a shelf in front of her and with a flick of the wrist – he thought for an instant of the Girl – fling the contents of it into his face. The liquid was colourless, and had a familiar, slightly tarry smell. He dodged aside, but he wasn’t quick enough, and the stuff splashed on his jaw and the side of his neck.

At first, he felt only the wetness, and a coolness that rapidly turned warm. He staggered forward, with the clipboard lifted like a blade. He drew back his arm, ready to slice at her. She stepped behind the table and put her hands against the edge of it and pushed it at him across the rubber-tiled floor.

A drop of the stuff she had flung at him had landed on the soft flesh just below his left eye. That was where the pain started. Then his jaw and the side of his neck seemed to catch fire. He gave a scream that surprised even himself.

His eye. Had the stuff got into his eye? For as long as he could remember he had been terrified of going blind. He often dreamed about it, and always woke in a sweat, shivering.

She was crouched behind the table, her hands still braced on the edge of it, watching him like a wild animal. Why wasn’t the dope doing its work?

He dropped the clipboard and put his hands to his face and felt the terrible heat against his palms. The acid was eating into his skin. He aimed a wild punch at her but she reared back, out of his reach.

Christ, the pain.

He swore at her, and turned and ran to the door and wrenched it open.

Water.

He stumbled along the corridor. He could smell his own flesh scorching. What was the acid? Not sulphuric, not as bad as that. Phenol, he thought. Yes, that was the stink he had recognised.