I nod. I hope it’s not lying if I don’t say that Noon is really Eve but I love secrets. Secrets are about not talking. I’m good at that.

Chapter 16:00: Mind Over Matter

Chapter 16:00

MIND OVER MATTER

E=MC2 is projected on the floor of The Igloo. The floor’s transparent so we can see down into the room below. At first, I’m scared I’ll fall through the floor but when no one does I step inside. It looks like walking on ice but doesn’t feel slippery at all. The letters move when we tread on them.

We haven’t had a workshop in here before. The room’s a replica igloo. Even the bricks are large like blocks of snow and the chairs are not chairs but white blocks arranged in a circle. Big Ben would find it hard to throw one of these. We all sit down in our tracksuits. I feel bad that in the excitement I forgot to tell Eve to wear a tracksuit, but one or two of the others have forgotten too, so she doesn’t stand out so much. The windows are a circle of light high up in the ceiling. I like this room. I’ve always wanted to build an igloo but there was never enough snow. You’d have to go to Scotland to find lots and I’ve never been there.

At exactly 2 o’clock, MC2 appears in the middle of the circle. Some of the pupils cheer but I purse my lips. I know he’s going to start talking in riddles.

‘Here is some chatter,
prattle an’ patter,
’nacular natter:
ice will not shatter,
peeps will learn stratta’ —
mind over matter.’

He clicks his phone and it starts to snow. I don’t think it’s real snow, as the room’s not cold enough. I LOVE snow. Every snowflake’s different, an infinite number of patterns. Eve starts to shiver. In 1924 they hadn’t invented virtual snow. MC2 clicks his phone and it stops snowing. He did it to show off.

‘Some of you came holding hands in a Chrono.

Today, gonna teach you how to leap solo.

Before you leap through time, you gotta learn to leap through space . . .’

He vanishes from the middle of the circle and reappears a split second later outside it.

‘. . . or you’ll throw up all over the place.’

So that’s what I did wrong. I changed the correct order of things.

‘Some of you came by jet without fuel.’

he says, walking back into the middle of the circle,

‘Gonna teach you how to leap old skool.’