Yeah, Max thought. Which leaves me. No grand backstory. No tales of incredible courage. I’m an orphan, sure, but there’s nothing special about me. No wonder I didn’t pass selection, if that was what the Watchers were looking for.

– Maybe I should have told you this before, Max. I knew your dad.

Max suddenly felt disconnected from everything that was happening around him. He couldn’t hear the crying of the kids. He barely saw the terrorists, or even felt the danger he was in. He was aware of nothing but Hector’s voice. ‘What?’ he whispered, not even bothering to hide the movement of his lips. T6 looked at him sharply, but then lost interest.

– He was a soldier, Max. A damn good one. Probably the best I ever met. I served with him in Afghanistan. Before that in Iraq. He was always the first man in and the last man out. Brave to a fault. Like his son, from what I’ve seen. And you know what I’m wondering now? I’m wondering, what would he think if he knew that his boy was doubting himself? What would he think if he knew that you were considering giving up now, when so many people’s lives are at risk, and they all depend on you? Because, make no mistake, if you four fail, this siege will end only one way: in innocent people being killed. You may be killed. It’s you, or it’s them.

Max was stunned into stillness. He had a thousand questions, but he couldn’t ask a single one. In his mind’s eye he saw a soldier, tired and dirty, in the battlegrounds of Afghanistan. The soldier was older than him, but looked like him. He was, Max realised, the person whose photograph he had seen on the wall in Valley House. In Max’s imagination, the soldier looked back at him with a calm, confident expression. An expression that said, you can do this …

Max’s attention cut back to the real world. The Chinese girl was shouting at a young boy to be quiet. The kid had lost it and was shouting out in panic.

‘I want to go home! Let me go home!’

T3 and T11 strode up to him. One pulled the kid up by his collar. The other cuffed him round the side of the head. A few children started crying again. The Chinese girl looked on with her familiar smug expression.

Something snapped inside Max. He looked across the hall at the others. They looked back. Hector’s pep talk appeared to have done the trick. Lukas, Abby and Sami were looking at the Chinese girl with undisguised contempt. Their demeanour had changed. They were no longer cowed. They were steely and confident. Max locked gazes with each one in turn. Almost imperceptibly, Sami, Abby and Lukas nodded back at him.