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Epilogue - Epilogue

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Epilogue

In June 1914, Archduke Ferdinand, the heir to the Austrian throne, was assassinated by Gavrilo Prinzip, a Serbian terrorist, while parading through Sarajevo. That city was the capital of Bosnia, then under Austrian control. The Serbians also claimed Bosnia.

The Austrians, angered by the killing and seeing an excuse to invade and conquer Serbia, sent the Serbians a list of demands. Some of these demands being completely unreasonable, the Serbians declined to meet them, offering instead to take the matter to the International Court at the Hague. Austria refused, and made preparations to invade Serbia.

Russia was allied to Serbia. It started mustering men on its borders. The great nations, bound by treaty, saw their rivals arming. Germany, allied to the Austrians, knew that France was allied to the Serbians. And the French wanted the German-held provinces of Alsace-Lorraine back. Therefore the Germans attacked France first. To do that, they marched through Luxemburg and Belgium.

And Britain had a treaty to protect Belgium.

Which is how the Ninth battalion of the Norfolk Regiment ended up on the Somme in July 1916, Captain Richard Hadleman with them. He had in his pocket some letters from Alexander, who, to his delight, had been spared his great decision by being judged too old and unfit to go. His life back in Farringham was much the same, bar the blackout at night and the very occasional sight of a zeppelin.

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Richard had spoken up at a Labour Group meeting in October 1914, declaring, for some reason, that it was the duty of every good Socialist to enlist and protect the workers of Belgium. He'd seen the effect that battle had had on those children huddling about the fire - though that whole time seemed like a dream now - but he'd thought that he was a man, that he could make a sober decision to go to war and fight to his own specifications. Alexander had seemed very wise on the matter, in bed that evening. He'd said that, though Richard might be killed, it was his life to risk, just as it was a conscientious objector's right to risk hatred and ignorance at home. The government didn't possess the soul of either man, he'd said. Only that of the man who found himself forced or jollied into joining up because it was the only thing he could imagine doing.

Even then, Richard hadn't been comfortable with that.

Now he looked up at the absolute darkness above him and tried to scream, but it came out as a long, rattling choke.

Next time he'd stay home. Next time. As if there were wars in Heaven or Hell, as if there was another battlefield he'd find himself on. The letters he held would have been enough, at any point, to have had him sent home. In disgrace, yes, but home, and what was disgrace compared to that? But he'd never shown them to anyone.

It was 14 July, just past eleven o'clock at night, and Richard had been lying in the cornfield since the early hours of that morning, coughing up blood and liquids of other colours that disturbed him far more. It was taking him a long time to die. He had, oddly, been part of one of the few successful military actions of the war.

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At 3.25 that morning, 20,000 British troops had rushed across no-man's land in the first-ever night attack, following only five minutes' bombardment. The Germans, used to the regular pattern of meaningless daylight sorties and endless night barrages, had actually been surprised. Five miles of their frontline had been overrun, the Norfolks firing as they ran along German trenches, bayoneting men as they woke from sleep. It had felt like a great victory, a breakthrough that might have brought this all to an end.

After the day looked won, towards late afternoon, Hadleman and his platoon had been sent to support a group of engineers running a telephone line from the Norfolks' incredibly advanced position all along this new frontline. They'd formed a marching group, making their way through the overgrown fields between the trenches as the engineers spun their big reel of wire on a cart behind them, looking around them warily. They had to take cover and creep on some occasions when it became clear that they were in sight of the new German frontline.

The soldiers of Hadleman's unit had been taken, as was the policy, from neighbouring towns and villages, and their associated OTCs, so it was hardly a surprise that he'd found himself commanding one Lieutenant Hutchinson. The young man was a good soldier, as Hadleman quickly found, having had a lot of the bile knocked out of him in his first actions. He still occasionally seemed to look upon Hadleman with contempt, but he never showed it to the men, who seemed to understand his distance and coolness more than Hadleman's own frustrated efforts to muster or befriend them. There were few others of those boys who'd been at Rocastle's academy. Perhaps it was because they were all to be officers, and were thus with other units, or perhaps, Hadleman liked to think, their experiences really had changed them. There had been some stink about Merryweather refusing to embark his platoon at the rail station, and them being forced on to the troop train at gunpoint. Alexander had reported a fine letter from Anand, now back home in his father's kingdom. A troop of his father's infantry had been sent to secure British supplies in the Gulf, but otherwise the war had not touched him and he remained wary of it.

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So, it was thus that, towards the end of the day, Hadleman finally found the point that he'd evaded forced upon him, in circumstances where he thought he'd finally won.

There had been no great surge of relieved soldiers running past them up to the new positions. They'd passed a few reconnaissance patrols, who all indicated that some swift new offensive was about to happen. The sound of occasional battle was far ahead of them now, as the sun sank towards the horizon. They'd complete their work in an hour, the engineers assured him. Surely they wouldn't be asked to go forward again then? Whatever attack was being organized to dive into the break in the German line and open it up wide enough for a conclusive push, it was already overdue. Surely, the mass march would be on before they'd got back?

Then on the horizon to the west, silhouetted against the sun, Hadleman saw the cavalry. Three divisions of them, tiredly organising themselves into formation squares on the other side of the great fields of corn that were growing wild out here in the wastes. The engineers laughed and made expressions of amazement. Hadleman's own troops started to speculate that this must be some kind of diversion, until Hutchinson quietened them. He and Hadleman realised the truth at once, that this was the crucial attack they'd been waiting for. It had taken all day to bring the horsemen up to the line. This offensive had been seen as the one opportunity this war had offered for an old-fashioned set-piece action, and those in charge had leapt at it.

There came the sound of a distant bugle and the horses formed up. A sabre was raised, then dropped, and they accelerated forward.

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The Norfolks watched in awe as the hundreds of horsemen raced through the corn, a great cry erupting from them. 'They must think that they've got a chance,' Hutchinson whispered. 'Maybe they can see something we can't.'

The noise made them all wince as it started up, the regular clatter of machine-guns. At first, it seemed that maybe it was only an isolated post, that perhaps the German line ahead that the cavalry were supposed to overrun contained an isolated weapon.

But then the rattle became a great roar and the air around the cavalry darkened with metal.

The first line of horses crumpled, their riders flying off their backs as they fell, some of them riding them down into a crumbling mass of man, animal and corn. The second, third, fourth, line fell as the guns scythed back and forth across the field. The momentum of the charge continued, hundreds of men spinning off the backs of their mounts, the bodies of those in front tripping and hindering the ones who came behind until the whole field was a mist of noise and metal and flying blood.

'Retreat, for Christ's sake,' Hutchinson was whispering. 'Why does nobody give the order? Why don't they - '

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The first whistle sounded overhead and the soldiers threw themselves to the ground, their hands grabbing their metal helmets.

'Christ!' screamed Hutchinson. 'This is the one! This is the one Dean - Christ!'

The shell landed noiselessly, for Hadleman, the sound too loud and close for him to hear. At least, that was his memory of it.

Hutchinson died instantly.

When the noise ended, Hadleman was lying in a pile of dead people, his head ringing from something distant.

He pushed his way out, shouldering corpses off of him, and immediately choked on the air, his eyes streaming. He slapped for the gasmask at his neck, and found that, along with half his pack, it had been dragged off him.

So, under nothing but instinct, he burrowed down into the men again, pulling their warmth back around him, until he was concealed in a dark burrow of flesh, with a little air.

He stayed that way for maybe ten minutes, then had to surface.

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He lay there amongst the limbs of those he knew, for some time, taking one full breath in three and coughing, aware that he was getting the end of the gas as it drifted away. That, and there was some bleeding in his jacket, a wound the pain of which rose and fell with his lungs.

He didn't even think of trying to get back to the line. He wasn't sure where it was any more, or even in which direction. If it wasn't for Alexander, he would be quite satisfied to die, knowing that the war he was fighting in was utterly futile. It was almost as if he'd proved a point of politics to himself. In this place, upwards of 400,000 British men were going to be killed. They'd lost 20,000 just the other day. He sucked a grim smile. It was like rich countries deliberately killing themselves, leaving their battered remains ready for the revolution that would surely come, for who could return home without wanting to face those who had wasted good men thus?

He raised his hand, and tried to sing 'The Red Flag'. But he was unconscious before he'd got past the bit about cowards.

He woke again in the night to a noise. He tried not to make a noise, though he heard many distant cries, oddly hoping that it wasn't a German come to rob him.

A face appeared over the low ridge above him, a muddied blond lad in a dull grey uniform. 'Good Lord,' he whispered. 'I knew there were some Norfolks out here. Richard Hadleman, isn't it?'

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Hadleman blinked, the face wobbling in and out of vision. He tried to remember the name. 'Timothy? What regiment are you - '

'None, actually. Red Cross. A few of us are having a sniff about out here, because nobody quite knows who owns this bit at the moment, and we kept hearing shouts. Now, if you can move, I don't want to get my arse shot off doing field dressings. Mind taking the hand of a filthy conchie?'

Hadleman reached up and felt everything give as Timothy Dean hauled him out of the pile of bodies. He stifled a shout.

Timothy supported him by his shoulder and the two of them picked their way off towards the British line. Hadleman glimpsed familiar shapes a few hundred yards away. 'Got any jobs going?' he whispered.

'You don't need to worry,' Timothy replied. 'You're going home.'

The bells of Norwich Cathedral rang clear and sharp on an April morning in 1995. Snowflakes were falling steadily. Above the cathedral blew great billows of them, whipping around the comers of the dark building as if to emphasize the structure's harsh lines.

From out of the building trooped a handful of very old men in uniform, supported by their relatives and children. The Norfolks who'd fought in the Great War had a yearly reunion in the city, though their numbers grew smaller every time. This might well be the last one.

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By the door of the cathedral, at some distance from the marching men, another old man sat in a wheelchair, surrounded by his family.

'I don't know why you come here every year, Grandad,' said Richard Dean, leaning on the wheelchair's handles. 'What's there to see?'

'Old friends\x85' the pensioner whispered. 'Not from the war. From before.'

'So why do you never talk to them?' Richard's wife Jane tucked in the blanket that had come loose about his legs once more. She ignored a glare from her husband. 'It might help if you didn't insist on wearing that.' She tapped the white poppy that timothy wore on his coat. 'It's not as if it's even Remembrance Day.'

'I wear it because it stands for what I am. I can't ignore that for their friendship. Besides, I always hoped that I'd meet\x85' His gaze wandered from his words again, lost in time.

'Great-grandad! Don't go to sleep now!' A girl of eleven stood beside the wheelchair. 'Listen to this. I read that they once found a cow in an army cell. A cow! Where they'd had a prisoner! And when they took it off to be slaughtered with the other cows, it kicked and kicked and they had to force it to go in. Isn't that amazing?'

'What have you been reading now?' her father sighed. The girl had become a vegetarian last summer, just in time for Christmas, and seemed to see old Timothy as some kind of role model.

'You let her read what she likes.' The old man came to life again, and put his hand on the girl's arm. 'She's going to be a great scientist. Or an astronaut, or\x85 or all sorts of things.'

'I'm going to be just like you,' the girl told him.

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'Then you'll never kill anybody, even when everyone else is?'

'Never.' The girl was looking up at him, hushed, as if she was receiving a benediction.

'And you will never be cruel or cowardly?'

'Never.'

'Then you'll live to be as old and as happy as my friends Alexander and Richard, who managed to avoid time's attention for\x85' His own gaze wandered off again, but this time it found a focus. Two figures were standing on the comer by the cathedral grounds. Two figures that old Tim recognised from somewhere, maybe from a dream. They met the old man's eyes, then smiled satisfied smiles. Timothy started to laugh. 'For that's the thing about time, you see! That's the thing about time! It's like a big story, and it's never over! I remember, when I was very young, and Mother used to read to me in bed, I'd fall asleep before she'd stop reading. But the next night, she'd know where we'd been. She'd never lose her place.'

And Timothy lay his head back against his grandson's hand, his cheek warm against the man's skin. He breathed deeply, and fell into what would turn out to be his final sleep.

The white poppy had fallen from his lapel in his exertions, and was left, unnoticed, on the pavement as the Dean family went on their way.

Just before they turned the corner, the little girl looked over her shoulder and saw the Doctor bending down to pick the poppy up. She looked at him curiously and he gave her a smile.

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Then she was gone. The Doctor slipped the white poppy into his buttonhole. 'So, where do you want to go?' he asked Bernice, who was shivering in her dufflecoat. Earlier in the day, she'd consulted her Portable History Unit again, and discovered that, inexplicably, the casualty list for the Somme had changed. But then the thing had gone on the blink. The Doctor had refused to mend it again.

'Somewhere that sells hot chocolate and crumpets.'

'After that.'

'Perhaps we could go and do something good. Help somebody.'

'We could go back to Guy.'

'We could go back to Joan.'

They looked at each other, and they might have looked sad.

But instead they smiled.

The Doctor took Bernice's arm. 'There's a place that springs to mind. A planet called Oolis. A few things need sorting out there. But it might be dangerous.'

'Oh, will there be monsters?'

They started to walk away.

'Of course. The Oolians have wings, and beaks, and armoured battlesuits.'

'And will there be villains? And deadly danger?'

'Oh yes. And probably death, with or without a capital D.'

'Then we should go there immediately. Who else is there to sort these things out?'

'Who indeed?'

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Benny shivered again. 'There's only one thing that I wouldn't want to face again in a hurry.'

'What's that?'

'Snow. Does Oolis have any?'

The Doctor glanced up at the snowflakes that sped by, and frowned. 'But if it wasn't for the snow, how could we believe in the immortality of the soul?'

'What on earth do you mean?'

The frown faded from the Doctor's face and he grinned again. 'Do you know, I haven't the slightest idea.'

The two friends wandered off into the city to find tea and crumpets and warmth.

And somewhere in the sky overhead, for an instant before they dissolved into mist, two snowflakes were the same. Long ago in an English spring.

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Smith held out his hand and took the sphere with a sigh. 'Damn it. Why is everything always so complicated?'

Timothy thought for a moment, his posture slumping back into that of a frightened youth. 'That's life?'

Joan was manacled to an upright post in the family's dome. Hoff had sunk a deep bore into the soil and secured it with magnetic pegs before pulling the dart from her skin. The Aubertides had reassembled at the dome a few minutes earlier.

'So it's unlikely she'll get away?' Greeneye murmured. 'Unlike the other two?'

Hoff only grunted in reply.

'I do not see why we didn't just pursue the boy,' Serif hissed. 'He may be fast, but we would have caught him eventually.'

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'Oh yes,' August agreed. 'But consider, if he's starting to be able to leap and hop like a young Time Lord, then the Pod's started to communicate with him. We've seen the information transfer on our scanners. If it's doing that, then it might be - '

'Trying to persuade him to put it to his forehead?!' Greeneye shook his head in frustration. 'Crukking cruk.'

'Exactly. We don't want a little Time Lord on our hands. That would be going back to square one. Therefore, I don't want the boy to feel that he's in danger. Smith will get the Pod from him and bring it to us. Simple.'

'He was quite prepared to, you know.' Joan spoke up. 'Until you captured me. Now I hope that you don't get what you want.'

'Very noble. Any idea what you're being noble about? What this object we're after is?' August plucked a hair from her head and chewed on it thoughtfully.

'I've experienced it. It felt rather terrible and rather wonderful at the same time, like a bottle with a demon in it. It's very powerful.'

'Indeed it is. With it, we could multiply endlessly, conquer half the galaxy, start venturing through time, turn almost everything in the cosmos to our advantage.'

'Why? Aren't you happy with what you've got?'

'No,' Greeneye sighed. 'As I've often said, our whole motive in life is to find something to do. And once you've done that, you have to find something better to do next.'

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Joan managed to smile at him. 'I felt like that after Arthur died. But then I found myself involved in teaching. And then I fell in love again. Love really does make you feel satisfied. Have you never known that emotion?'

'I suppose... I keep trying.' Greeneye looked at her seriously. 'Though the others laugh at me for it. I reach out to people, want to touch them, get involved in their reproductive processes. But they always see that as something negative.'

'If you mean what I think you do,' said Joan, 'then I am not surprised. Is that your only definition of love?'

Greeneye shrugged. 'We love each other, us six, us five. Now. That ought to be enough, oughtn't it?'

'If it is, why do you want to multiply so much?'

Greeneye thought for a moment, then shook his head slowly, pulling a sword from his harness. 'If you say anything else to me, anything at all, I'll cut your head off.'

Joan pursed her lips and smiled sadly again, looking almost sorry for the alien.

'We are unused to such discussions,' Serif hissed. 'If Aphasia still lived, then I might.'

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'Look! Greeneye shouted.

Outside the dome, between two trees, stood Bernice Summerfield, a pistol in her hand. The gun was pointed at the dome, but her eyes had just fixed on Greeneye staring at her and her mouth had formed a single dismayed syllable.

She turned and ran.

Greeneye grabbed the nearest member of his family, which happened to be Serif, by the sleeve. 'It's her!' he yelled. 'The one who got away! Come on!'

And he pulled Serif out of the door with him.

'Now, wait -' August found that he was talking to nobody. He sighed and turned to Hoff. 'Do you think that Greeneye would care that that was obviously a trap?'

'No.' Hoff produced his pistol and stuck it under Joan's chin. 'But it's best to be ready. Just in case he can't chop his way out of it.'

Benny ran frantically through the forest, uphill along the track that led up on to the downs. She had intended to fire off a couple of rounds against the dome's surface, but the intended effect had been achieved, they were chasing her anyway.

Great. The good bit was that the shattered forest was full of cover. The bad bit was that it was correspondingly hard to run through, even though Benny had carefully selected her path beforehand.

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Behind her, Greeneye and Serif were crashing through the undergrowth, trying to bring their weapons to bear on her. If they stopped for a minute and thought about why they were pursuing her, then this was all going to fall apart. She glanced back and saw the look on Greeneye's face. No, actually, he seemed to know exactly why he was doing this.

She hurdled the stile that led up on to the hills, the chalky path shining slightly in the moonlight, and, struggling for breath, sprinted uphill. She had to be over the ridge in, oh, two minutes, otherwise they'd get a clear shot.

Laying this out had seemed so simple compared to actually doing it. At least Rocastle seemed to have lost a lot of his bullishness. Alton had come into his own, too, working out the timings. It had come down to which one of them could best achieve them. Rocastle had wanted to, but that was ridiculous, and in all conscience, Bernice couldn't send one of the boys to do this, not even Hutchinson. Even with her beer belly, which she was personally rather fond of and of which Guy had been terribly enamoured, she was going to be faster than any of the other adults.

She made it over the ridge in one minute fifty, and no energy bolts whizzed past her. She was under cover for the next five minutes.

Then it was a sprint up to the monument.

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'Why,' hissed Serif, 'are we doing this?'

'Because of her, because of Aphasia, just because!' Greeneye growled. The two Aubertides were pounding their way uphill, burdened by their heavy weapons.

'Having sexual congress with one more human will not bring Aphasia back!'

'Maybe not, but it will make me feel better!' The aliens skidded down the chalk slopes into the long ridge that led around the lip of the downs, and saw Bernice vanishing around the curve ahead of them in the darkness.

'These are ancient fortifications,' Serif reported. 'I saw in the notes that this area was the scene of a dramatic slaughter. These are earthen walls built by the Iceni against the Romans.'

'Who?' Greeneye had nothing but red rage in his face. Serif took a deep breath and kept running. 'If you don't learn the lessons of history...' he whispered.

Bernice saw the stone features of Old Meg looming up on the hillock above her and doubled her speed. Her two pursuers would round the end of the channel down below in a minute or so, maybe more if they thought they were about to be fired upon.

Alexander popped up from behind the monument and called to her. 'Turn to your right, don't run ahead!'

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She swerved and took a curving route round to the monument. She dived behind it, panting. 'Wonderful diet. The Pursued By Aliens Plan. I can recommend it.'

'How many did you get?' asked Rocastle. There was no sign of the boys.

'Two.'

'One would have been better for a hostage.'

'I'm terribly sorry. Did you manage to do anything with-'

'Too dangerous. I think we managed to put those wonderful tools of yours to good use, though. Now, off to the flint pit with you two. I'll wait here.' He took his pistol back from Bernice with a wry little smile.

Alexander and Benny dashed down the hillside behind the monument. Ancient flint diggings provided useful cover there. The two of them leapt in, to find the boys lying there, an assortment of rocks and rough wooden stakes in their hands.

'Oh, Bernice!' said Anand. 'Merryweather here has been fretting terribly about you.'

Merryweather glared at him.

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'Maybe we could have dinner when this is all over?' Bernice winked at the embarrassed boy.

'I, ah, beg your pardon?' Merryweather squeaked. Alexander patted him on the head. 'I do believe she's teasing you.'

Greeneye and Serif ran out on to the light slope where the monument stood and looked around. 'Where is she?' Greeneye muttered, pulling both his swords from his harness.

They split up, fanning out in different directions. Rocastle peered out from behind Old Meg and winced. They were supposed to assume that the statue was the obvious cover and run straight for it.

Greeneye indeed was wandering towards him, but Serif was some distance away, slowly turning as if smelling the air.

Rocastle took a deep breath, poked his head out again and shouted. 'Oh my God, they're here!'

Greeneye spun. He ran at the monument.

And fell straight through the ground.

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Before she'd left, Bernice had shown the boys how to use her excavation probe, a gravitic device that could, at its highest setting, create a large pit. Over that pit, they'd put a film of resin created by her ion bonder. Then they'd just thrown a light covering of the soil and grass from the pit back over it.

Greeneye dropped straight through the resin, bellowing as he went. His swords had gone flying as he tripped over the edge.

But Serif stopped just short of the pit's edge, his arms spiralling. He balanced himself and stepped back. 'You did this?' he hissed at Rocastle, who stepped out from behind the monument.

'I did,' Rocastle said. 'And my lads killed your girl.' He jumped back behind the monument as an energy bolt hissed past his head.

Serif glanced down at the pit beneath his feet. Greeneye was staring up at him angrily from about twenty feet below, his face a mass of blood, one eye caked shut. 'Throw both of them down here,' he bellowed, 'and I'll toss you the scraps!'

Serif nodded and stalked towards the monument, firing energy bolts at intervals into the ground in front of him.

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Hutchinson scrambled to climb over the edge of the flint workings, but Alexander grabbed him by the collar and pulled him back.

'Not yet!' Benny whispered. 'If I let any of you get into danger, Rocastle will kill me.'

'But he's -

'He's armed. We're not.'

Serif had reached Old Meg. He stepped slowly around it, anticipating an attack at any second.

Rocastle stepped out behind him and raised his gun. 'Now-'

Serif spun and knocked the gun from his hand. 'You should not have warned me.' He swung his own pistol up.

Rocastle lunged forward and slammed the alien against the stone. 'You destroyed all my dreams, you know,' he told him as they struggled, almost conversationally. 'But, strangely, I feel almost as if I ought to say - '

Serif spun him round, smashing the human against the base of the statue. Rocastle fell, winded, and looked up as Serif aimed his pistol at his head.

'Thank you.'

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The force of the explosion threw Hutchinson and Alexander back off the edge of the flint diggings. The others threw their hands over their heads as debris rained down, small lumps of the stone that had made up Old Meg.

Benny peered up over the edge. The monument was a crater in the ground, at its centre a mass of flaming debris that was sparking up into the sky, small detonations still going off.

She climbed out and walked over to the flaming pyre, Alexander and the boys following her.

'He knew that it would explode,' Hutchinson said. 'It was the only way.'

'No it bloody wasn't,' Benny whispered.

There might have been an argument then, but Merryweather had turned to look in the direction of the pit. 'Look!' he yelled.

A hand had gripped the rim of the pit, and was scrambling against the crumbling earth, trying for a solid hold. As they watched, Greeneye slapped another hand after the first and began to haul himself over the edge, his face a mask of rage and sorrow. 'Serif!' he was bellowing. 'You animals! I'll cover this hill with your blood!'

Hutchinson started to say something, but it came out as a roar. He sprinted towards the pit and the other boys followed, yelling shrill cries.

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Hutchinson grabbed one of Greeneye's swords from the ground where it lay and Merryweather grabbed another. The rest of the boys formed a rough circle around the pit as the alien climbed out of it, clutching their rocks and clubs.

Only Anand stayed back, beside Alexander. 'Are you going to help them?' he asked Bernice.

Benny realized that she'd just been staring at the scene, absolutely useless to everybody. She was feeling sick inside. It took her a moment to realise why.

She'd seen this before.

She started forward. 'Wait - '

Greeneye was now fully emerged from the pit. 'Well then?' he shouted. 'Who's first!' He grabbed for his gun.

Hutchinson lashed out and Greeneye clutched at his upper arm, the gun tumbling from his numbed fingers.

Merryweather ran in and struck him across the leg, the ultrasharp blade bursting a line of blood from Greeneye's thigh. He roared and lashed out, knocking Merryweather to the ground. He stumbled forward, felling boys to the left and right with his fists. Hutchinson went flying too, dropping his sword.

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But the boys still closed in, swinging their rocks and clubs.

Benny shoved her way through the crowd, pushing them aside to get to the man.

Lashing out all around him, he was blindly groping to get a hand into his boot.

He pulled out a small black capsule.

Benny leapt through the boys, straight at him. She knocked him over, landing on his chest, blows still falling randomly around her.

'You can't stop us!' Greeneye was roaring. 'I - will - see you all die...'

His fingers squeezed the end of the capsule. It was about to burst.

Benny felt something give inside her, an internal explosion of some vast rage she'd never known. 'Nobody else dies!' she shouted.

And she punched him.

Very hard.

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The body slumped back on to the ground, unconscious.

The capsule fell from his hand. The boys fell back.

Hutchinson swayed into view amongst them, having recovered the sword. He swung it up overhead, about to behead the alien.

But Benny threw herself on to the body, clutching him tightly to her, slamming her head against his. 'Nobody else dies! Do you hear me?' She glared up at Hutchinson. 'Do you understand?'

'She's hysterical.' Alton stepped forward. 'Let's get you-'

'I am not bloody hysterical, I'm not the one trying to kill the hostage!'

There was a general mumble of agreement. The boys started to drop their improvised weapons.

Hutchinson placed the sword on the ground, visibly controlling his anger.

Alexander helped Benny to her feet. She was shivering. 'Busy day.' She flapped her hand, wincing. 'Ow, I think I've broken my knuckle.'

Alton spoke up. He was crouching by Greeneye's neck, his hand on the alien's pulse. 'This man's going to come round soon. Can't we secure him somehow?'

'Schoolboys who don't have any string?' a familiar voice called from behind them. Smith was standing against the burning crater on the skyline, leaning on his umbrella. 'That's unusual.'