Gavin frowned. “Actually, no.”

Friday first pointed at the letter, then indicated the pistol. “You’ve got the wrong destiny. You actually turn out to be a murderous thug, a lackey of Goliath and complicit in the destruction of the planet.”

Gavin looked at the summary again. “This isn’t me?”

Friday shook his head.

Gavin’s lower lip trembled as the realization of his impending fate sank in.

“You can’t kill me for something I haven’t yet done!” he said, his voice rising.

“But I will,” replied Friday, his voice now with a mild tremor. “It is my function.”

He spoke to me next, but without taking his eye off Gavin.

“As soon as I pull this trigger, the eventline will change, Mum. The whole future will be remapped. I won’t know why I did this. You won’t know why I did this.”

“But we know why right now,” I said. “Better to have discovered your purpose even for the most fleeting of moments than never having one at all. In an odd kind of way, I’m proud of you. It’s just—”

“Just what?”

“You’re better than this.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that this is a blunt way to change the eventline. I’m thinking perhaps you can do this better. Somehow where you won’t have the burden of guilt for the rest of your life. Sure you save a planet, but killing someone in cold blood isn’t what your future self would have wanted. And besides . . .”

“Besides what?”

“You’re a Next. And we don’t murder people. Not even for future crimes.”

“Mum, I have to kill him to be certain!”

He was confused now, and I shouldn’t have raised any doubts, but I couldn’t see my son become a murderer. It was too late. We were out of time. I saw a tear well up in Friday’s eye, and as Gavin’s clock clicked over to 14 02 and four seconds, Friday pulled the trigger.

40. Monday: End

40.

Monday: End

When the Asteroid Strike Likelihood Index was solely mathematically derived, there was a 73 percent chance that HR-6984 would strike the earth. Once the six Letters of Destiny were received in 2004 from the now-defunct ChronoGuard, the likelihood dropped to 1.3 percent, where it has remained ever since. Of the sixteen ex-ChronoGuard listed in the summaries, seven survived beyond 2041, some by as much as twenty-six years.

Dr A. Chowdry, Asteroid Collision Risk Calculation