‘What the hell, James?’ said Lana. ‘You are being so irritating right now.’

‘Excellent. Rugby rage. Just psyching out the opponents,’ said James.

‘James is right,’ said Soldier John, coming out of the Big House. He looked tired, and there were more lines around his eyes than normal. ‘Everybody stand up, and let’s get started. Today we’re gonna play rugby – though no scoring. Then we’re gonna fish for a while, and then we’re gonna ’ave choir practice. We’ll reassess the situation and discuss it again tonight.’

‘Oh,’ said Kate. ‘Excuse me, sir. But if we’re doing everything as normal, shouldn’t me, Lana, James and Martha have school this morning?’

‘Ah, yes,’ said Dr Jones, standing up whilst Lana narrowed her eyes at Kate. ‘I think we’ll cancel school for this morning, love. You can have an extra session tomorrow instead.’

‘So you’re telling us that we have to play rugby, or we’ll probably die?’ said Lana.

‘Umm . . . yes,’ said James.

‘Well that’s a pretty flippin’ convenient theory, considering you love rugby and you always want to play it,’ said Lana.

James shrugged in a well, what can I do? sort of way, but almost all of us remaining people were now standing around by the Big House, and, although reluctant, everybody looked like they were getting ready to play.

‘Fine,’ said Lana. ‘But it’s going to be more like a rubbish game of catch rather than rugby, isn’t it? If we can’t actually score. I want Martha and Kate on my team.’

‘Well that sounds like you’re planning to do a lot of standing around and chatting rather than playing rugby,’ said James.

‘No. We can take your side on, whoever’s on it, and defeat them,’ said Lana. ‘If we want.’

‘And we can do dancing too,’ said Kate. ‘We might be better than your side at dancing.’

‘No!’ said James. ‘Rugby is not, not, not about dancing. We need to get started right now. Immediately.’

‘Do you remember that dance we made . . . you do the three spins and then you waggle your arms?’ said Kate. She demonstrated superbly.

‘Oh, the Tentacle Twist!’ I reminded her.

‘Yes, yes! The Tentacle Twist. Who’s going to join me?’ A few other people started to join in with her arm movements, and there was some laughter. There’s nothing funnier, when you’re facing impending death, and standing metres above the putrefying bodies of your old friends, than waving your hands in the air in the pretence of being a jellyfish.

‘No. That is absolutely not what I meant,’ said James. ‘No.’

‘Oh, come on, James,’ said Kate. ‘the Jellyfish can’t tell what we’re doing. Can’t we play rugby and do a dance? That way everybody will be happy.’

‘No, everybody won’t be happy,’ said James. ‘If you’re dancing, then you’re not playing rugby properly.’