‘Yeah, get out of New London,’ said Alex, as Salter’s legs woke up and slid off the table towards the floor. ‘And quick, before you throw up again.’

Salter obeyed. He tucked the two clone radios into his pockets, double-checked that he still held his own, and left Office 35 to flee for his life.

With the enemy no longer watching, Ewan’s emotions ran straight to the front of his mind. He stared at McCormick, finally coming to terms with the fact that they were separating.

He must have looked openly afraid. There was fear in McCormick’s eyes too. Fear and love.

‘Take care, my boys,’ McCormick said with a smile on his face and in his voice. At the door, Ewan smiled back like he had once done to his father.

‘You too, sir,’ Ewan answered. ‘Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.’

‘There’s nothing you wouldn’t do for the British people, Ewan. So I can assure you I won’t.’

Alex walked further down the corridor, blank-faced and confident once again. It hurried Ewan and McCormick’s goodbye, and Ewan briefly hated him for it.

Nonetheless, Alex’s haste was necessary. And all being well, Ewan would see his mentor again at the end of the night anyway.

All being well? He thought to himself as he left McCormick and Kate to chase Alex down the corridor. We’ve got to avoid losing a war tonight. All being well is a bloody tall order.

Chapter 17

‘We’re taking the lift?’ said Alex. ‘Seriously?’

Ewan stood up straight, self-assured and confident. It was an act and he knew it, but it was what non-autistic people did all the time in moments of self-doubt.

‘We’ll be fine,’ he said. ‘If we were going to be caught, we’d have been caught in the vehicle port when everyone was looking. Besides, it’s half eight. Time’s a factor here.’

The lift arrived and Ewan marched inside. As Alex joined him he pressed the button for Floor F: the highest available button, and the floor where their first targets lay. Ewan could not be bothered to work out how many floors lay between F and X, but—

Ewan’s heart was thrown into his stomach. After a year without using an elevator, he was unprepared for the seasickness when the lift rose at the speed of an accelerating car. To his side, Alex gripped the side rail with tightening fingers. Twenty seconds later the lift slowed to a halt as if a driver had slammed on the brakes. The two young men, supposedly toughened through a year of battle, glanced at one another and shared a nervous laugh.

They fell silent as the doors slid open. It was time to become clones again.