‘No! I was going to say we’re dead.’

‘Dead? What . . . dead? Like, actually dead?’

‘Yeah.’

‘What kind of being dead is this?’

‘I don’t know. I’ve never been dead before.’

‘It’s a shit afterlife if we’re dead.’

‘Harry died in Norway and you died in Holborn and I must have died in Downing Street . . .’

‘Yeah but we aren’t actually dead.’

‘How do you know?’

‘Well, like, we got in a massive punch-up for one thing. And I don’t see any angels flying about or pearly gates or devils with pitchforks or clouds or the baby Jesus singing hymns with Moses while explaining how his mother was a virgin. And my face hurts from being punched repeatedly. And although I haven’t actually read the Bible or any other religious book I don’t think it mentions anything about being punched repeatedly . . .’

‘Vikings?’ Harry adds helpfully.

‘But . . .’ Ben stammers. ‘No . . . bloody no . . . just bloody no . . .’

‘You don’t think we’re dead then?’ Safa asks.

‘Oh my God! What kind of copper are you? We wake up drugged and you instantly think we’re all dead?’

‘Well,’ she says defensively. ‘What, then?’

‘I just said it . . .’

‘Time travel?’

‘Well yeah.’ Ben shrugs, but feels instantly stupid. ‘Or kidnapped and drugged and, like, brainwashed so we actually believe who we think we are.’

‘That’s a better one,’ she says quickly.

‘Yeah? Better than being dead too?’

‘It’s more likely,’ Safa says. ‘The brainwashing thing, I mean.’

‘No it’s not,’ Ben says, hardly believing their reactions. ‘It’s least bloody likely . . . I’d choose the being dead afterlife shitty dream before I chose that one.’

‘Why?’ she asks. ‘Time travel is made-up. It’s fiction . . . like zombies or . . . or vampires or . . .’

‘You can’t drug someone and then make them believe completely and wholly that they’re someone else . . . with that person’s memories and feelings and . . . and knowledge and . . . and stuff . . . you couldn’t do it once, let alone twice.’

‘Schizophrenics?’ Safa asks.

‘Seriously?’ Ben says, shaking his head slowly. ‘No, that’s not . . . just no. I am me. Do you believe you are you?’

‘Yes.’ She nods instantly.

‘Harry?’

‘Been through this.’

‘So who is drugged and brainwashed? I know I’m not . . . so that can only mean you two are . . .’

‘Well—’ she goes to say.

‘And,’ Ben cuts her off, ‘we’re not talking about two normal people either but two people with exceptional memories and knowledge . . . you’d have to be already vulnerable and susceptible to even remotely suggest anything like planting a memory . . .’

‘People get false memories all the time,’ Safa says. Silence again as she reflects on a lifetime of memories and experiences. ‘Okay,’ she says. ‘I’m not brainwashed.’

‘Nor me,’ Ben says.

‘But it’s not time travel,’ she says.