There had been, said the leading medic, a conflict of priorities which had led to a catastrophic glitch.

In layman’s terms – there were too many programs running on Harmony’s system.

The nanos had tried to do too much, and it had broken her.

Jiannis swore he’d sue the backside off Fullife.

Fullife replied, “You will see that there are strict guidelines on programming and cache limits which you exceed at your own risk and in this case we cannot accept liability for . . . ”

Karen held Harmony’s hand in hers, didn’t seem to care about the cannulas shoved into her veins, the pallor of her skin, the stink of sweat on her warped, crinkled body, and whispered, “If you need to come home, it’d be lovely to have you. I’ll cook pasta . . . ”

“Nonsense!” blurted Jiannis. “Harmony will come home with me, and we’ll get her back to normal in a few weeks. There’s a wedding to plan!”

Harmony lay on the hospital bed, back raised up a little too high, bottom sliding perpetually down towards a little trough in the mattress, and let them talk while the nanos dreamed of electric darkness.

Chapter 19

This is Harmony Meads, aged twenty-nine, as Ibrahim the estate agent lets her cry in his office and gives her more tissues from the little travel pack his wife always makes him carry because she can’t stand his sneezing.

Her backside spills out over the edges of the chair she sits on. When she nods, layers of skin bubble and flow, walrus-like, beneath her chin. When she shakes her head, the soft flesh around her jaw seems to trail a little bit behind the rest of her, like a flag caught in the wind. Her chubby fingers poke, futile, at the screen of her mobile phone. She has to sleep with a hot water bottle beneath her right hip, even in summer, because there’s an ache there that she can’t get rid of but which Fullife assures her is just the side effect of her bone structure changing now she’s no longer being supported by Hale and Hearty and her body is reverting to running things for itself. She has athlete’s foot, the skin peeling in thick white strands. The acne down her back and chest is less individual spots than contours poked with cathedrals and churches of pus, an ordnance survey of rupturing, diseased flesh.

Ibrahim lends her £500 from his own pocket.

She does the sensible thing and pays off what she still owes to her landlady, the outstanding bailiff’s fee from her old place and her water bill. That leaves her £80. She tries to give it to Fullife, but before she can make the transfer, the money is gone, sucked away automatically by the credit card company to cover her outstanding debt.

She doesn’t notice particularly when Fullife tunes down her libido to a dull, grey nothing on continued non-payment. It’s not like she’s going to get much anyway. The nanos shut down her L-cones after three months at the maxed-out debt cap, and the colours red and green vanish from her world.