All those friends of his from school he’d never see again. Some hadn’t even got as far as the coach. He’d lost one of his best friends, Malik, walking out of town. Bang. Just like that. One moment they’d been talking and the next …

Gone.

He sighed. Brooke had changed a lot since then. Grown up. Chilled out. Something had come over her since she’d joined this expedition, though. She was in the back row of the bus again, being mouthy. He couldn’t blame her. Macca was an arsehole at the best of times. It was crazy, though, crazy and stupid. Here they were, driving off into God knows what – probably a world of pain and terror if the past was anything to go by – and the two of them were behaving like a couple of ten-year-olds. Getting on each other’s nerves. Oblivious to what was outside the car.

Maybe that’s why they did it. So as not to think about where they were going. Also he knew Brooke was uncomfortable. Unsure of herself among these kids, half of whom she didn’t really know. She’d always held to the philosophy that attack was the best form of defence.

And Macca? He was one of those boys who was unsure of himself around girls and the only way he knew to flirt with them was to be rude.

Ed smiled to himself. God help Macca if he secretly fancied Brooke.

Lewis was driving at a calm, steady speed, showing nothing, eyes on the road, half closed, but not missing a thing. Cool. Not even listening to the chaos in the back. Behind them were the middle seats, like two big armchairs. Kyle and Trinity had these, as they were the biggest. Kyle wasn’t helping. Every now and then he’d lob a comment back like a grenade and enjoy the reaction. Brooke and Macca yelling. Ebenezer getting angry and righteous.

For the fiftieth time Ed looked at his big road map, trying to shut out the noise, pretending to read it, but not able to concentrate. He hardly needed it any more. They’d eventually made it on to the motorway after a few detours. There was one tricky bit that Ebenezer had warned them about where the whole elevated section that carried the road had collapsed. So they’d had to avoid that. But Lewis had kept his cool and Ed had consulted his maps and between them they’d managed to get on to the M4 further along, and now it was easy going. Ed was keeping an eye on the milometer; as soon as it showed that they’d gone twenty miles, they were going to leave the motorway. That was when it was going to get interesting. That was when they had to seriously start looking for Ella and Maeve and the others.