“The Metrozone will be destroyed around you. Behind you. In front of you. Beside you. It will fall. The New Machine Jihad will rise.”

“You’ll have nothing to rule.”

“The New Machine Jihad does not need to rule. It needs only itself.”

Petrovitch let his hand fall back. He was trying, but it wasn’t working. He was using reason with someone that didn’t care about reason, or emotion, or compassion. Yet it still wanted to save Sonja Oshicora, and it wanted him to save her.

He knew then. He knew he was talking not to a person, not to a committee. Nothing human. He was talking to something else.

He raised his hand again. “I cannot let you destroy the Metrozone. I will oppose you.”

“The New Machine Jihad will rise. Your opposition will be futile.”

“I know who you are.”

“I am the New Machine Jihad,” it said insistently. “I am the New Machine Jihad.”

“You don’t seem sure. What is it that you really want?”

“Shinkansen ha mata hashirou.”

Petrovitch wrote one last line: “Hello, Oshicora-san.”

To which the Jihad hesitated, and finally replied. “Help me.”

30

The throbbing of the engine finally stopped, and Chain took one last look around to check that there was no fighting close by.

“Coast is clear. Open her up.”

The driver, Carlisle, stepped over Petrovitch and heaved the rear doors open. Dim light seeped in but it was still far brighter than the bulb inside the wagon. Better still was the exchange of air: swapping the thick, meaty odors of sweat, blood and diesel for wood smoke and ozone.

“Where are we?” asked Sonja. All the view showed was serried terraced houses, terminated at a junction by another identical row of windows and doors.

“Somewhere in Notting Hill,” said Carlisle. He unstrapped the chin-strap on his helmet and let it dangle. “I wasn’t looking at the street names.”

He jumped down and rested his hands on his knees for a moment. The weight of his helmet rolled his head forward, almost onto his chest. He straightened up and stretched, his hands to the heavens, his mouth emitting little groans.

Sonja unbuckled herself and put her head outside. Carlisle held out his hand, and she took it tentatively, as if she couldn’t trust the man even to steady her for a moment while she climbed out.

She finally did, and Chain climbed back down from the roof hatch. He sat near Petrovitch’s head and thumbed through the A to Z, pretending to look at the tiny, dense representation of the Metrozone’s roads.

“How,” he said quietly, “how can it be that the New Machine Jihad thinks it’s Old Man Oshicora? You said he was dead.”

“No, Sonja said he was dead. Hijo said he was dead. I never saw the body: I just went on the information I was given.”

“So is he dead or not?”

“Yeah. Pretty much.”