The End (13 page)

They were in the big chamber where the lords used to meet – the clue was in the name, the House of Lords. There were red benches, a huge golden
throne down one end, wood panelling and carved stone everywhere, stained-glass windows, giant paintings and fancy hanging lights. It was like a cross between a cathedral and a throne room.

And a girl called Nicola was sitting on the throne. When Maxie arrived, Nicola had told her that she was the prime minister, which Maxie had thought was a joke. Apparently it wasn’t, even though
Maxie didn’t remember voting for her. Nicola had long red hair and was one
of those confident, clever girls who made Maxie feel a bit stupid and useless. She was glad she had Blue with her. Blue didn’t take any bullshit and wasn’t impressed by the set-up.

Nicola stood up again. She’d been running the meeting, using phoney adult language.

‘Thank you, Jester,’ she said.
‘There’s a lot to debate. But, before we do, I’d like to say a few words …’

Blue leant over and whispered to Maxie. ‘You could take this lot out in a second if you wanted, babe,’ he said. ‘This is all just play-acting.’

Maxie couldn’t take any of it seriously either – the OTT decoration, the titles everyone gave themselves, the idea that anyone could claim to be prime minister
… What she did take seriously was what they were actually talking about.

An army of grown-ups.

She didn’t know whether to be scared or excited. The idea was pretty intense. The picture Jester had painted of the army – how many they were, how organized they were – had been way too vivid. But the idea that the kids might actually be able to beat them had given her a tiny shiver
of hope.

Jester had managed to get most of the local London kids to turn up. Or at least a representative from each camp. David was here with some others from the palace. Maxie recognized Pod, who was in charge of palace security; Franny, who looked after the gardens; and Rose, who ran the sick-bay. They sat apart with some of David’s red-blazered boys, his personal guard. Maxie,
Blue, Whitney, Jackson and Achilleus had come from the museum, escorting Justin and Einstein. Maxie had tried to persuade Ollie
to join them, but he’d explained that little Lettis wasn’t strong enough yet to leave the museum grounds and he couldn’t leave her behind by herself. Will and Finn, two of Ed’s friends from the Tower, had also come along. They were representing the Tower
kids, since Ed himself had gone west to look for Ella and nobody had been in a hurry to go all the way out east to the Tower through the badlands to let anyone there know what was happening.

There was a strong contingent from the Houses of Parliament. They didn’t look much like fighters, but they did look smart and sensible. From what Maxie had picked up they paid Ryan and his
guys to do all their dirty work for them. The hunters were here, sitting quietly in a group under the windows. They were clearly more civilized than they looked.

The only settlement not represented was Just John’s squatter camp. Maxie was glad they hadn’t showed up. They were a grubby, hyper, disruptive bunch, and they had reason to hate Maxie and her friends. Achilleus had
beaten Just John in single combat. Smashed him to bits. It would be a long time before John would forgive him for that. John’s squatters were apparently still in a sort of truce with David – which was what the fight had been about – but the thought that John and his chaotic gang would be able to sit still and help make plans was ridiculous.

Sitting alone, out of the way, was the
boy called Shadowman. He was in the darkest, quietest corner and had a hood half covering his face. Maxie sensed that he didn’t want to be here, didn’t want to be seen. She was intrigued by him. Most of Jester’s information about the grown-ups’ army had come from him. He seemed happy, though, to allow Jester to do his talking for him.

Nicola was still bigging herself up, saying
how important it was that they’d come to the Houses of Parliament today, that it was democracy in action, how they would have a fair and open vote on what to do.

‘As far as I knew,’ Blue muttered under his breath, ‘we came here because it’s neutral territory. Safe. Ain’t no chance that Nicola and her wimps are gonna suddenly pull some crazy stunt, assassinate all the other leaders
and take over.’

There had been a lot of discussion about this. About where to meet. David had of course wanted everyone to come to the palace. Nobody else had thought that was a good idea. Justin, on the other hand, hadn’t wanted anyone to come to the museum. He didn’t like the idea of outsiders being there, didn’t want the risk of things going wrong. So that left this place. The
soft option. The safe option.

Parliament.

‘So I assume we all want the same thing,’ Nicola was saying.

‘Yeah,’ said Blue quietly. ‘World peace and free Wi-Fi.’

‘Stop it,’ Maxie whispered, trying not to giggle. ‘This is serious.’

And this
was
serious. The fact that everyone had come here today was proof of that.

‘So we need to work out a plan of what to do if
the oppoes attack,’ said Nicola.

‘Objection, Your Honour.’ Achilleus was slouched in his seat and had his hand up.

‘You don’t have to call me Your Honour,’ said Nicola patiently. ‘But can you please not interrupt until I’ve finished speaking?’

‘Nah,’ said Achilleus. ‘That don’t work for me. I’ll say what I want when I want to, Your Honour, all right?’

‘All right, yes,
go on then.’

‘First thing we gotta do is work out what to call the enemy. It’s confusing the crap out of me. I only just worked out what you meant by oppoes. Didn’t have a clue before. It’s grown-ups, yeah? That’s what you call them? Oppoes.’

‘Yes,’ said Nicola. ‘Oppoes, short for the opposition.’

‘Yeah, OK, I don’t need the Wikipedia entry. And it’s a stupid name anyway.
Thing is,
you
call them oppoes, David’s mob call them strangers, Ryan and his crew just call them bastards – which I personally like, at the museum they call them sickos, and us lot from Holloway just call them plain and simple grown-ups. Can we decide what we call them, and all stick to it, yeah? Gonna make it a whole lot easier when the battle commands start flying. So I’m not,
like, “Attack the oppoes? Which one’s an oppo again?”’

‘Can’t we stick to the important stuff?’ asked Justin, who didn’t like Achilleus one bit.

‘This
is
important,’ said Nicola and Achilleus raised an eyebrow in appreciation. ‘I think it’s a good idea. It’s the first step towards us all working together and it shows unity and will avoid confusion in the future.’

Now Finn
stuck his hand up.

‘We call them sickos at the Tower too. Can we just go with that?’

‘I prefer
bastards
,’ said Achilleus, and he laughed.

‘We’ll take a vote,’ said Nicola. And so they did.

One vote per unit. Maxie and Blue overruled Achilleus and chose sickos, which, with the Tower boys’ and Justin’s vote, made three, and that swung it. Not surprisingly, all
the others
voted for their name and not surprisingly David moaned and grumbled when the vote went against him, but sickos it was.

With that out of the way, Nicola carried on.

‘OK,’ she said. ‘Next we need to decide exactly what we do when the sickos arrive.’

‘It’s obvious, isn’t it?’ said Ryan. ‘We fight them. We hit them hard. What we need is a battle plan.’

‘What we need
is an army,’ said David, standing up and raising his voice. ‘A properly organized army with a strong leader. Someone who knows how to take charge and give orders.’

‘And who might that be?’ said Achilleus. ‘No, let me guess … it’s you, isn’t it!’

‘Yes,’ said David. ‘And what’s wrong with that? Who would you rather took control? Nicola? Justin? Ryan maybe?’

‘Prefer Ryan to
you, to be honest.’

‘No way,’ said Ryan. ‘I ain’t no general. I can look after my lot, but I don’t want to take on running the whole show.’

‘Exactly,’ said David. ‘So it should be me.’

Maxie didn’t know what to think, seeing David again. They’d walked out on him after turning down his offer to stay at the palace. He’d been relying on them to improve his fighting force.
They’d had other plans.

So far he’d been aggressively ignoring them. Refusing even to look at her and Blue. He had that awful snooty look about him that made you want to slap him round the face. Blue had already hissed nearly every insult he could think of to Maxie. Now he added a couple more.

David couldn’t ignore Achilleus now, however. Achilleus was on his case.

‘Might
as well be Justin in charge as you,’ he said.

‘Justin?’ David scoffed. ‘You’re joking. What does Justin know about military tactics and leading troops into battle?’

‘Is my point exactly,’ said Achilleus. ‘You two is pretty similar, to be frank. Neither of you is my idea of a general. If I was going to vote out of anyone here I’d vote for Blue. He knows what he’s doing.
He’s got experience out on the streets. He’s a hard man, not a talker.’

‘David is the most natural leader here,’ said Jester. ‘He’s used to giving orders, and he already has a well-disciplined fighting unit in the personal guard.’

‘He’s also a dick,’ said Achilleus to a scattering of laughter. Maxie saw that even Nicola was trying to hide a smile. ‘You need a general everybody’s
gonna respect and listen to or your great army is just gonna fall apart and do their own thing.’

‘Can I say something?’ This time it was Will who had put his hand up.

‘Go on,’ said Nicola.

‘If you want a general we have a general. No disrespect to Blue, but the guy that runs the Tower, Jordan Hordern, knows more about battles and military tactics and giving orders and organizing
an army than anyone else in London.’

‘Yes, well, he’s at the Tower, though, isn’t he?’ said David as if he was talking to an idiot.

‘Doesn’t have to be,’ said Will patiently. He wasn’t going to get flustered by David. What Maxie had seen of Will she liked. He was smart and a good listener. ‘Surely we need all the kids we can get?’

‘That’s true,’ said Nicola.

‘And
maybe …’ Will went on. ‘It would mean you lot here wouldn’t argue among yourselves so much. Jordan’s
someone from outside. Someone neutral. Me and Finn, we could maybe go to the Tower and fetch him, bring back a really strong fighting force. Well armed, well disciplined. A proper army.’

‘That sounds like a great idea,’ said Nicola.

‘Not to me it doesn’t,’ said David. ‘This
is what you’ve been planning at the Tower from the start, isn’t it?’

‘What d’you mean?’ said Will. ‘I’m not with you.’

‘That’s always been your idea,’ said David. ‘I knew it. First that boy DogNut came to spy on us, and now you’re here, all innocent – “Oh, we can bring Jordan, he’ll help you.” We’re not stupid. We know you’ve been trying to take over here from the start.’

Will was laughing. ‘Are you serious?’

‘Yes.’

‘Come off it. If Jordan had wanted to take over here he could have marched in any time he wanted. He doesn’t have to be invited. He could just walk right over the lot of you.’

‘No,’ said David, going slightly red in the face. ‘We don’t need any outsiders here …’

‘We do,’ said Blue. He didn’t put his hand up. Didn’t need
to. People listened to him. ‘Will’s right. We need as many kids who know how to fight as possible. I mean, how many soldiers we got between us? A hundred and fifty? Sixty maybe? I don’t mind some other kid coming and taking charge if he’s better than me. Makes sense.’ He looked round at Will. ‘How many can he bring?’

‘At least another hundred.’

‘Gets my vote,’ said Blue.

‘Mine too,’ said Ryan.

‘We should have a proper vote on it,’ said Nicola.

‘Wait a minute.’ Pod put his hand up. He was a good-looking boy, but not the brightest pixel on the screen. He also always wore his collar turned up on his shirt, which Maxie found really irritating. ‘Can I, like,
ask
something?’

‘Go ahead.’

‘Well, even with Jordan’s kids, yeah? If I figure this
right we’re talking two fifty, maybe three hundred tops, trained fighters? Is that right?’

‘I think so,’ said Nicola.

‘And how many sickos are out there?’ Pod went on. ‘How many are we expecting?’

‘At least twice that, probably more like five times,’ said Jester. ‘We didn’t get close enough to count them. But there’s maybe up to a thousand.’

‘Jesus.’ Blue shook his head.
‘That ain’t great odds.’

‘They won’t be armed, though, will they?’ said Ryan.

‘No …’ Jester didn’t sound too sure.

Now Shadowman spoke for the first time, surprising the other kids who had forgotten all about him.

‘Some might be,’ he said. ‘They’re changing, growing smarter. They’re not just mindless zombies any more. They can communicate with each other. They could
wipe the lot of you out. They’re getting organized, and you have to be organized too if you want to defeat them. So stop your arguing.’

‘Exactly,’ said Nicola. ‘We all want the same thing – to defeat the sickos. Get rid of them once and for all. So let’s vote on whether Jordan will be our general when he gets here.’

And so they voted again, and there was only one vote against
– David’s.

‘Don’t think you can vote for me to join you,’ said
David afterwards. ‘That’s my decision and you can’t make me change my mind.’

‘But it’s Jester who called this meeting,’ said Nicola.

‘I thought it would be obvious that I am the only natural leader here,’ said David and Jester shrugged. ‘I didn’t think you’d all be stupid enough to invite some unknown outsider
to come in and take over.’

Maxie had always known that David was going to be a problem, and she wondered how important he was to this. How much of a difference would his troops really make? They had a few guns, but how many bullets? They had fighters like Pod and the boys in the red blazers, but how many in all? Twenty-five, maybe thirty? And then she remembered the squatters.
Just John’s guys were mean and streetwise. You wouldn’t want to go to the prom with any of them, but you might want to go into battle with them. Whatever else you said about them, they knew how to fight. They could tip the balance. Make the difference between winning and losing. And losing didn’t bear thinking about.