The attackers’ leader, the man with one black glove—save that she saw the specifications: not a glove, a prosthesis from another world—was by Khan now. He had grabbed her wrist, cuffing her savagely when she fought. He was yelling for backup, but his colleagues were terrified. The world was going mad around them and their shots were going wide. Alison decided to make their fears justified: here was a crack she could widen until it bit into the world she knew. And—there!—one shooter vanished into a place of claw-bristling crawling things and radioactive ruins. That was enough for the other aggressor, who ran off into the museum. Probably one of the exhibits would eat the fucker, but she really didn’t care about that right now.

Julian took two steps towards Khan’s captor, newfound pistol levelled. He shouted a warning; of course he did. Julian Sabreur was nothing if not law-abiding, even here in this mess. He was shouting at the man to surrender.

The man with the artificial hand shot him even as he was speaking. The bullet ploughed into Julian’s gut and he sat down hard, his own gun spinning away across the floor. And Alison felt her connection to the great Icenet snap shut as she screamed. She lunged for her friend. He had a baffled expression on his face, as though he couldn’t remember where he’d put his keys.

The rats she had delayed arrived then: abruptly the corners of the room were seething with them. They coursed within the substance of the walls, a wave of them washing back and forth. They were hunched, half the size of a man, wearing rubbery black uniforms with gas masks and goggles and wielding ugly-looking weapons designed for use up close against crowds, because that was their entire life where they came from. They pressed and fought the bounds of reality until something tore and they spilled out into Alison’s world. They seemed desperate and shaking, some of them dead from the shock. The Plug-uglies were on them quickly, utilizing weapons that unleashed silent shockwaves of sound and vibration to pulp the rodent bodies. They were all monsters, Alison decided. None of them should be here.