This is my world, too. It’s in my head.

He looked up at the big screen.

All of them. They’re all there, waiting. In bedrooms and lounges around the world. In between watching Cobbers and doing their homework.

All waiting with their fingers on the Fire buttons, and each one thinking that they’re the only one . . .

All there, in front of me . . .

‘I wasn’t expecting to do this,’ said Kirsty, behind him. ‘I wasn’t expecting to be bandaging aliens. Put a claw on this knot, will you? What’s your pulse level?’

‘I don’t think we have them,’ said the Captain.

The ship thumped.

The distant background rumble of the engines was suddenly a roar.

The seats had bits sticking up where humans didn’t expect bits to stick up. Johnny was sitting cross-legged on one, both hands on the controls, face multi-coloured in the light of the screen.

Kirsty tapped him on the shoulder. ‘What are you doing?’

‘Flying,’ said Johnny, without turning his head.

‘He said it’s too late to turn round.’

‘I’m not turning round.’

‘You don’t know how to fly one of these!’

‘I’m not flying one of these. I’m flying the whole fleet.’

‘You can’t understand the controls!’

Green and red light made patterns on his face as he turned to her.

‘You know, everyone tells me things. All the time,’ he said. ‘Well, I’m not listening now. I can read the controls. Why not? They’re in my head. Now sit down. I shall need you to do some things. And stop talking to me as if I’m stupid.’

She sat down, almost hypnotized by his tone of voice.

‘But how—’

‘There’s a control that lets this ship steer all the others as well. It’s used on long voyages.’ He moved a lever. ‘And I’m flying them as fast as I can. I don’t think they can go any faster. All the dials have gone into the – that’s ScreeWee for red.’

‘But you’re heading straight for the players!’

‘I’ve got to. There isn’t time to turn round . . .’

Wobbler had a pin-up over his bed. It was a close-up photograph of the Intel 8O586–75 microprocessor, taken through a microscope; it looked like a street map of a very complicated modern city. His grandfather complained that it was unhealthy and why didn’t he have a double page spread from Giggles and Garters instead, but Wobbler had a vision: one day, if he could master GCSE maths and reliably pick up a soldering iron by the end that wasn’t hot, he was going to be a Big Man in computers. A Number One programmer, with his hair in a ponytail at the back like they all wore. Never mind about Yo-less saying it was all run by men in suits these days. One day, the world would hear from Wobbler Johnson – probably via a phone-line it didn’t know was connected to its computer.