Superior Saturday(39)

Both chains moved at the same rate – about as fast as Arthur could run, he gauged. As soon as he saw them, he knew that this was how the grease monkeys were going to get higher up in the tower.

Alyse stopped and gestured, and the line of grease monkeys spread out to gather around her.

‘You know the drill,’ she said. ‘But we’ve got two washed-between-the-ears folk with us today, so we’ll go over it again. This is the north-east Big Chain, which provides the main motivation power for all the north-east Little Chains. Because it’s the Big Chain, we can travel two per link. We get on together, and we leave together. If you see the link looks oily or has a problem, you shout “Wait” before your partner gets aboard it, and you take the next. Now, let’s see—’

She took a piece of paper out of a pocket and unfolded it, at the same time hopping to the right to avoid a sudden downsplash.

‘We’re helping the automatons do a move today. There’s someone going up from Level 6995 to Level 61012, and across forty-two offices on the diagonal chain. We’ll do the vertical first and make it as quick as we can – we don’t want to give this lucky chap’s neighbours time to cause trouble. So we get off at 6995. Everyone got that? Suze and Ray?’

‘Yes,’ said Arthur. Suzy nodded.

‘Good,’ said Alyse. ‘Ray, come over here. You’ll jump on the first link with me, and Suze, you jump on the second with Vithan.’

Arthur splashed over to Alyse’s side. She held out her hand commandingly and took his, almost dragging him toward the rising chain before he caught up.

‘The trick is not to jump, because you’ll probably fall,’ Alyse cautioned. ‘You just sidle up close and then step onto the rising link as it comes up.’

‘Whatever you say,’ said Arthur.

It wouldn’t be so bad if only the chain wasn’t going so fast, he thought. I could get my leg torn off here . . .

‘Come right up to it,’ Alyse instructed. They walked closer to the chain, moving around so they faced the open link and were only a step away. Arthur could feel the rush of the chain’s movement, too close for comfort if a link swayed out of line. It still looked to be going too fast to simply step on.

‘You ready?’ asked Alyse.

‘Yes,’ said Arthur, and he was – until a huge shower of water landed on top of him, so much water that the peak of his cap collapsed into his face and he leant back and almost went down on one knee. In the middle of it all, he heard Part Six of the Will.

Arthur! You have to come and get me in the –

With a jerk, Alyse pulled him forward. Blinded by his collapsed cap and all the water in his eyes, Arthur had no choice but to step out, not knowing whether he was with her or had fallen that deadly half a step behind that would mean he would miss the inside of the link and instead fall into the grate and be mashed to bits by the next massive piece of the monster chain.

He stretched out and his foot went down . . .





THIRTEEN





LEAF’S EYES NARROWED and she blinked hard several times. Arthur had vanished. One second he was there, and then he wasn’t.

She looked around and scowled. Not only had Arthur disappeared but everyone else had become frozen –

The army is going to fire nukes at somewhere very close by, Leaf suddenly remembered. At one minute past midnight. So why I am standing here with my mouth open like some stupid goldfish?

‘Arthur!’ she shouted again. Then she started running, out through the ward with its frozen statues of sleepers. ‘Arthur!’

No one answered her. Leaf stopped at the end of the ward and looked around. Not only was everyone frozen, but there was also a kind of weird red light around them. Like a faint aura that she could only see when she looked out of the corner of her eyes. That same red glow was around the ward clock, high on the wall, which was stuck at three minutes to twelve.

Or not stuck. As Leaf looked, the red haze vanished. The minute hand sprang forward, and simultaneously the ward came alive with shuffling sleepers. Leaf heard someone call out from the office. Not Arthur – a woman’s voice. Probably Vess or Martine.

Two minutes! thought Leaf in panic. There’s not enough time to do anything. We’re all going to die!

The clock stopped. The sleepers became petrified once more. The red aura effect came back.

But Leaf could still hear the woman’s voice, and it got louder and louder until Martine burst into the ward.

‘What is going on? Where’s Lord Arthur?’

‘I don’t know,’ Leaf said. ‘Is there anything underneath this hospital? I mean underground levels . . . even a bomb shelter?’