Wow, Ewan picked the wrong Underdogs to search these rooms, Raj thought. God, if you’re going to bless me with the sudden ability to read, now would be a good time.

A thought struck Raj which made him stand bolt upright. Divine intervention or not, it saved a lot of time.

Raj’s mother had spent most of his childhood calling him ‘my little detective’, since he could see straight to the root of any problem without being distracted by the extra details that got in everyone else’s way. With or without the ability to read, Detective Raj Singh had the perfect brain for this task. He didn’t need to learn the entire dictionary to find the information worth stealing. He just needed to find the documents with the right key words.

We’re here to work out what to do in New London… so those are the two words I need to look for. I just need to find a capital N followed by a capital L. And look for ‘ AME ’ too . Even I can spell that one.

Raj grabbed the first file that came within reach. A quick browse revealed none of the magic words. The next file revealed none of them either. Raj wondered whether this was what browsing foreign language books felt like for the average person.

The third file contained ‘N– L—–‘ and ‘AME’ in the same paragraph. It was hopeful. He opened it up, and smiled at the sight of diagrams.

One of them was a map of the Outer City.

My little detective, said his mother’s voice in his head.

*

Kate poked her face through the smashed window to the office. The dead body of Pete stared back at her, his frightened expression stuck to his face like a horrible waxwork sculpture. There were shuffling sounds from the carpet behind the desk, and Kate shuddered. The man’s hands and knees must have been dragging through his colleague’s blood as he crawled. Perhaps the blood from his lower leg was mixing with it too…

‘Phone, on!’ he called out. On her head teacher’s desk, Kate saw the sudden rectangular shine of a smartphone screen. It let out a little ping, which the man barely waited to hear before shouting again.

‘Call Nathaniel Pearce, speaker!’

Kate sighed. Voice-activated technology meant her enemy would not have to break cover in order to call for reinforcements, or even be close to his phone to communicate.

The phone was answered within one ring.

‘Talk to me, Hargreaves.’

It was definitely Pearce. Kate had heard his voice back in New London, the day they destroyed the clone factory.

‘Pearce!’ Hargreaves screamed. ‘They’re here, and they’ve killed Simmonds!’

‘Is the shield up yet?’

Pete Simmonds. And now Hargreaves. Now I’ m going to have two names burned in my memory through guilt . If I live .