‘I’m sure you’d both like some tea,’ she said. ‘And—’

‘Yes, mother,’ said Kirsty, and rolled her eyes.

‘—there’s some macaroons. Have you found out your friend’s name now?’

‘John Maxwell,’ said Johnny.

‘And what do your friends call you?’ said Kirsty’s mother sweetly.

‘Sometimes they call me Rubber,’ said Johnny.

‘Do they? Whatever for?’

‘Mother, we were talking,’ said Kirsty.

‘Cobbers is on in a minute,’ said Kirsty’s mother. ‘I, er, shall watch it on the set in the kitchen, shall I?’

‘Goodbye,’ said Kirsty, meaningfully.

‘Um, yes,’ said her mother, and went out.

‘She dithers a lot,’ said Kirsty. ‘Fancy getting married when you’re twenty! A complete lack of ambition.’

She stared at Johnny for a while. He was keeping quiet. He’d been amazed to hear his own thoughts.

Kirsty coughed. She looked a little uncertain, for the first time since Johnny had met her.

‘Well,’ she said. ‘Uh. OK. And . . . we won’t be able to fight all the players when they get back to game space.’

‘No. There’s not enough missiles.’

‘Could we dream a few more?’

‘No. I thought of that. You get the ship you play with. I mean, we know it’s only got six missiles. I’ve tried dreaming more and it doesn’t work.’

‘Hmm. Interesting problem. Sorry,’ she added quickly, when she saw his expression.

Johnny stared at the movie posters. Sigourney! Games everywhere. Bigmac was a tough guy in his head, and this one kept sharp pencils and had to win everything and in her head shot aliens. Everyone had these pictures of themselves in their head, except him . . .

He blinked.

And now his head ached. There was a buzzing in his ears.

Kirsty’s face drifted towards him.

‘Are you all right?’

The headache was really bad now.

‘You’re ill. And you look all thin. When did you last eat?’

‘I dunno. Had something last night, I think.’

‘Last night? What about breakfast and lunch?’

‘Oh, well . . . you know . . . I kept thinking about . . .’

‘You’d better drink that tea and eat that macaroon. Phew. When did you last have a bath?’

‘It’s kind of . . .’

‘Good grief—’

‘Listen! Listen!’ It was important to tell her. He didn’t feel well at all.

‘Yes?’

‘We dream our way in,’ he said.

‘What are you talking about? You’re swaying!’

‘We go on to their ship!’

‘But we agreed we don’t know what it looks like inside!’

‘OK! Good! So we decide what it does look like inside, right?’

She tapped her pad irritably.

‘So what does it look like?’

‘I don’t know! The inside of a spaceship! Corridors and cabins and stuff like that. Nuts and bolts and panels and sliding doors. Scotsmen saying the engines canna tak’ it anymoore. Bright blue lights!’

‘Hmm. That’s what you think is inside spaceships, is it?’

Kirsty glared at him. She generally glared. It was her normal expression.

‘When we go to sleep . . . I mean, when I go to sleep . . . I’ll try and wake up inside the ship,’ he said.