Arran exploded.

“I thought I told you to get up on the roof!”

“Yes, but—”

“Get up there now! I’m going out. If it gets bad, use a bomb.”

“A bomb? They’re for emergencies.”

“And what does this look like to you?”

“Okay, okay.”

Callum turned and ran off.

“Ollie?” Arran called out. “Where’s Ollie?”

“Here.”

“Clear the balcony and get out there with your sling— take anyone else who’s a halfway decent shot. I need covering fire.”

“Okay.”

“Achilleus?”

“Here.”

“Get a war party together—our five best fighters—and get some weapons. Maxie, I need a back-up team. Anyone else who can fight. Bernie and Ben on the doors.”

“No way, Arran,” said Ben. “You can’t open them. You don’t know how many grown-ups are on the street. If they get inside . . .”

“If I say we open them, we open them. There’s a kid out there.”

“You can’t let him in. We don’t know who he is. What if we lose more of our own?”

“Every kid in London is one of our own, Ben. Okay? Now stop questioning me.”

“Sorry.”

Arran strode across the canteen, now crowded with little kids. They moved around in a frightened pack, like a flock of chicks. As Arran and the other fighters moved through them, they hurried to get out of the way, shrieking.

“For God’s sake, somebody get this lot to the storage room!” Arran shouted. The storage room was the safest place in the supermarket, and it was where most of the kids slept.

Arran took a side staircase that came out near the main entrance.

Bernie and Ben were waiting to wind up the steel shutters.

Arran nodded to them and went over to the weapons rack. Achilleus was already there with five others, including Josh, their eyes glinting in the half-light.

There was a bang from the front of the shop. A cracking sound. Arran grabbed his club and went over to the windows. He pulled aside a steel shelving unit that had been jammed up against them for safety. At first it was too dark to see anything through the filth and grime. He leaned forward, pressing his face against the cool glass. Suddenly he jumped back as a body flung itself at the window with a loud thud.

It was a grown-up. A father. Arran watched as he smeared his ruined face along the glass, like some grotesque child’s prank. It left a long snail’s trail of pus and snot and saliva as it continued to the side and downward before flopping to the ground. It looked dead.

The windows were made of reinforced glass, but if someone really wanted to they could probably break their way through.

Achilleus had followed Arran over.

“You really going out there, man?”

“Yes.”

“I hope you know what you’re doing.”

Arran looked at Achilleus, but said nothing.

When he got back to the entrance, the shutters were nearly up and Maxie was speaking to Callum on the roof through the speaking tube. Arran pushed her aside and barked into the mouthpiece.