There was a loud scrabbling sound from the space in front of me. A sickening hush descended in the alleys around the square. The insect played with the light, sketching its own outline for us, in reef-rock gray against the heavens, in sky blue against the rock. The body hanging from its six upturned-V legs was long and segmented; a blunt restless head at each end swiveled curiously, sniffing the air. Four lithe tentacles slithered in and out of sheaths in the carapace, tipped with sharp claws.

I stood swaying in the silence, waiting for something to happen – for someone with a jacket full of plastic explosives to burst out of an alley and run straight at the machine in the hope of a kamikaze embrace … though ve would not have come within ten meters before being blasted back into the crowd to incinerate a dozen friends, instead.

The thing arched its body and raised a pair of limbs, spreading them wide in a gesture of triumph.

Then it lurched toward a gap between the tents, sending people tripping into the walls and frantically clawing at the fabric, trying to tear a way out of its path.

It raced down the alley and disappeared, heading south, back toward the city.

#

Huddled on the ground behind the latrines, not ready to face the demoralized people of the camp, I dispatched the footage of the murder to SeeNet. I tried to compose some narration to go with it, but I was still in shock, I couldn’t concentrate. I thought: War correspondents see much worse, day after day. How long will it be, before I’m inured to this?

I scanned the international coverage. Everyone was still talking about “rival anarchists” – including SeeNet, who’d broadcast nothing I’d sent them.

I spent five minutes trying to calm myself, then called Lydia. It took me half an hour to get through to her in person. All I could hear around me was people sobbing with grief. What would it be like, after the tenth attack? The hundredth? I closed my eyes and fantasized about Cape Town, Sydney, Manchester. Anywhere.

When Lydia answered, I said, “I’m here, I’m covering this – so what’s happening to my footage?” She was not in charge of news, but she was the only person likely to give me a straight answer.

But Lydia was stony-faced, cold with anger. “Your ‘obituary’ of Violet Mosala had a whole scene cooked up out of thin air. And it said nothing about the cult which killed Yasuko Nishide – and now Henry Buzzo. I’ve seen your deposition to the security firm, about the cholera, about the fishing boat. So what are you playing at?”

I clutched at excuses, trying to find the right ones, knowing that Mosala would have died if I hadn’t used you was not good enough. I said, “Everything I faked, she really said. Off the record. Ask her.”