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‘Johnson!’ snaps Non-Lucas.

Other-Johnson breaks free of the transmission of images and they fade away.

‘Yeah,’ he says. ‘Yeah, she, uh, she got the Moth.’

‘We’ll go get him after. Take him to Billie.’

‘No point,’ shrugs Other-Johnson solemnly. He’s still looking shaken though.

‘No?’ Non-Lucas looks genuinely shocked.

Johnson must send an image of the headless Moth Two straight into Non-Lucas because the shock is obvious on his face and for a moment he falters. ‘No . . .’

Non-Lucas’s breath catches in his throat as he tries to deal with the pain.

‘Sorry, wasn’t thinking,’ Other-Johnson winces. ‘I should’ve broken that to you more gently.’

‘I’m OK. I am.’ Non-Lucas tries to gather himself, and his skin ripples over and over until it has thickened enough to somehow blot out the shock. His eyes blaze at me
unforgivingly. ‘But now I’m so going to enjoy this. And even though I’m quick, what I’m about to do to you won’t be.’

‘We’ll see about that.’ I raise my half-weapon at them, but Other-Johnson does something to my head that makes my limbs seize up. I can’t move. I’m paralysed.
He’s not even going to let me fight. He slowly walks towards me, then gently takes the weapon out of my hands as I struggle to take a breath. His eyes meet mine and again there’s a
flash of our kiss. Sadness crosses his face as he loosens his psychic grip on me and I feel control of my body again.

I raise my fists and try not to look too pathetic as I take a step forwards. ‘It’s rude to hit girls,’ I tell them.

Non-Lucas grins darkly with his horribly sharp teeth. ‘I guess that makes me ill-mannered,’ he smirks.

He leaps towards me and despite my determination to be brave and daring I clamp my eyes shut and await the inevitable.

‘Am I in heaven?’

‘Could be.’

‘Wow.’

‘Crazy.’

‘It doesn’t seem much different.’

‘No.’

‘Weird.’

‘You can open your eyes now.’

‘Not sure I want to.’

‘Open them, Rev.’

My eyes won’t open, they refuse to. I’m too scared.

‘Rev.’

‘Is it clouds and stuff?’

‘Not really.’

‘Big lush forest and green grass?’

‘Look for yourself.’

I dare to open one eye. I take a moment to look around. It’s dark in places and light in others. It also surprisingly smells of life.

‘Well?’

‘Uh . . .’ is all I can manage.

I open the other eye and everything comes into sharper relief.

‘Wait a sec.’ I tense.

‘I couldn’t help myself, Rev. Was a knee jerk reaction.’

Non-Lucas is lying dead with half of the Ape’s weapon sticking out of his throat. That’s the third time he’s been killed in under a day. Ouch.

I turn slowly and Other-Johnson is standing there, leaning back against the walkway in the tunnel. He has the same calm air as always but inside I can sense he’s completely confused by
what’s just happened.

‘Not cool, huh?’ he says.

‘Not cool?’

‘What I just did.’

‘It works for me.’ I straighten. ‘Not in heaven then?’

‘Not yet.’ He smiles. But there’s a worry behind his eyes.

‘You’re going to have to explain,’ I tell him.

Other-Johnson falls silent. Maybe he’s not sure what happened himself.

My phone rings. I look down and see Johnson’s name lit up on my screen.

‘He’s going to come back,’ Other-Johnson tells me. ‘I know because I would too.’

‘But I told them not to!’ I grab for my phone, but Other-Johnson reaches out a lazy hand and stops me.

‘I’m not going to hurt them.’

‘You’re tricky. I know the way you think. This is a ploy. To get them to come here.’

‘No.’

‘You look like Johnson and you’re cool like he is but you are also totally, totally devious.’

‘I wouldn’t do that. Not to you.’

I snatch the phone out of his reach and answer it.

‘Stay away!’ I yell at Johnson.

‘You’re OK?’ He sounds amazed.

‘I’m good. But you’ve got to stay away.’

‘Rev, I’m not lying to you.’
Other-Johnson’s voice is in my head again
. ‘I’m as dead as you are when my friends see what I’ve done to
Lucas.’

His voice caresses me, cloaks me in velvet and I can’t fight it. Try as I might I can’t seem to escape his hypnotic tones.

‘Let them come,’
he says.

I shake my head at him, but even as I do this I can hear my voice telling Johnson to come get me. ‘Hurry up,’ I say to Johnson, despite myself.

‘You want us to come get you?’ The delight in his voice makes this twice as hard.

Other-Johnson smiles at me because I can’t fight his overpowering mental powers.
‘It’ll be OK,’
his voice says in my head.

‘It won’t though,’
I tell him.

But then out loud I tell Johnson, ‘It’s safe. Promise you.’

‘You beat them?’ he asks.

‘Uh, yeah.’ I can’t say what I want to say, Other-Johnson’s got me in too much of a mental grip.

‘Bet that was my weapon,’ I hear the Ape boast. ‘My three pointer.’

‘We’ll be there in minutes.’ Johnson hangs up.

‘Rev,’ says Other-Johnson, out loud this time. ‘Think about it. I could’ve made you call them back before I killed Lucas.’

I hesitate.

‘We could’ve both been waiting to kill your friends right now.’

I can hear the sound of their car echoing down the long tunnel.

I watch Other-Johnson lean back against the walkway again. He moves his hat a little so it’s on a different angle, pushed away from his face. He looks more innocent that way, more
appealing, if that were possible.

‘Rev, I don’t even know why I did what I did,’ says Other-Johnson. ‘But I couldn’t let Lucas hurt you. It was instinctive. It was my heart, not my head.’ His
eyes lower but I don’t think it’s because he’s lying, but more because he’s uncomfortable about his feelings for me. They don’t embarrass him, but they have knocked
him sideways and left him off balance. ‘Lucas wasn’t a best friend or anything but he was one of my kind.’

The Ape’s car appears around the bend in the tunnel. The horn sounds and the noise travels and expands through the empty tunnel. Other-Johnson immediately tenses.

‘It’s OK,’ I tell him. ‘I’ll explain to them.’

Other-Johnson’s eyes widen a little. ‘He needs to shut up.’

The Ape sounds his horn again.

‘Seriously,’ says Other-Johnson, obviously spooked. ‘He can’t do that.’

Over and over the horn echoes throughout the tunnel.

‘Phone them, Rev. Tell him to stop that!’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘Do it!’

I quickly call Johnson back and the horn is so loud and incessant I have to shout to be heard.

‘Tell the Ape to shut up!’

‘What?’

‘I said—’ But there’s no need to say any more because coming at a lumbering trot is the Non-Ape. He has heard the car horn and been instantly drawn to it. He must still
be roaming around looking for people, or else he somehow followed Non-Lucas and Other-Johnson here.

‘It just had to be him, didn’t it?’ Other-Johnson says. His face has paled at the sight of the Non-Ape.

‘Hurry!’ I yell into the phone and watch the Ape speed up. But the minute he does, the Non-Ape sees the car and does likewise.

‘He uh—’ Other-Johnson begins.

‘He doesn’t like you,’ I finish for him.

‘You know about that?’ he asks and then quickly sifts through my mental history and finds me back on the train while the Non-Ape talks to the Ape over the phone. ‘Yeah, I may
have upset him. A little,’ he offers.

It’s now touch and go between who gets to us first. The car or the Non-Ape. Other-Johnson takes my hand and leaps me through the air towards the car, obviously hoping to outrun Non-Ape.
But he’s not as strong or athletic as Non-Lucas is and I slow him down, so we’ve still got a way to go before we’ll reach the car. Behind us the Non-Ape is lumbering faster and
faster and I realise that the tunnel is on an incline and he’s coming down it while the car is trying to race up it. The momentum of the Non-Ape’s huge body is building with each step.
His pace is increasing.

‘JOHNSON!’ he bellows and it’s ten times louder than the Ape’s car horn ever was.

The Ape sees us and applies the brakes at full speed, trying to do some clumsy handbrake turn that he’s probably seen in a film so that at least the car will be facing away from the
Non-Ape when he picks us up. But it goes spectacularly wrong – the car starts turning in circles and spins right past me and Other-Johnson.

As it does, I see the Ape at the steering wheel, swearing, and Johnson in the passenger seat holding on tight, but looking astonished at what’s happening and also maybe that I am with
Other-Johnson. In the back I see Billie being thrown in a heap across the seat. They are heading straight towards the Non-Ape, and Other-Johnson re-grips my hand again, pulling me through the air
as he tries to leap us back towards them. The car finally stops but it’s now facing the Non-Ape, who is less than forty metres away.

‘JOHNSON!’ Non-Ape bellows again. The tunnel trembles from the roar.

Incredibly, the Ape starts climbing from the car. ‘I got this.’

But I reach him and shove him back into the car, bundling his large body back behind the wheel.

‘He destroyed a train, you idiot! You can’t fight him!’ I scream. I yank open the rear door and make to jump in, when I see Other-Johnson standing looking at me. He
doesn’t need to enter my head to tell me what he’s thinking.

That this is goodbye. Despite everything, he manages a slow lopsided smile at me.

The Non-Ape is thirty metres away and still racing towards us. ‘JOHNSON!’

‘What did you do to make him that angry?’

Other-Johnson puts on a big fake wince rather than tell me. ‘It’s complicated.’

‘Get in!’ Johnson calls. ‘Rev, come on!’

I turn and look at the Non-Ape lumbering towards us, his eyes fixed on Other-Johnson, and I can’t help myself as I instinctively grab Other-Johnson’s hand and drag him into the back
of the car with me.

‘Back up!’ I scream at the Ape.

Other-Johnson and Johnson look totally perplexed and they speak at the same time with the exact same voices. ‘What are you doing?’

‘I have no idea! But move this car, Ape!’

The Ape engages reverse and the wheels spin then grip and we start reversing away from the Non-Ape.

Only we’re not moving fast enough because the Non-Ape is gaining on us and looming ever bigger. We stare in horror through the smashed windscreen as he gets closer and closer. The Ape
mashes his big foot down onto the accelerator and we speed up. But the Non-Ape’s momentum is building and building, empowered by some deep animal rage.

‘JOHNSON!’

‘Oh God,’ says Billie. ‘Oh dear God.’

The engine is screaming in protest as it strains to build speed. I look behind us and see that the opening to the tunnel is close. Bright sunlight beams down onto the empty tarmac
carriageway.

‘C’mon,’ I whisper. ‘C’mon, Ape, c’mon.’

The Ape is straining his thick neck round so he can see where he is reversing and glances at Other-Johnson, who is now sitting on my lap while I cling on tightly to him. ‘That’s
weird,’ he says as he glances at Johnson. He looks back through the windscreen at the behemoth bearing down on us hollering Johnson’s name over and over again. He’s definitely
gaining on us.

‘Turn the car round! We can’t keep going backwards!’ Billie screeches.

‘Going too fast,’ says Johnson.

‘We’d tip over,’ says Other-Johnson at the same time.

‘
We?
You’re one of us now?’ Billie is completely bewildered. ‘Last I knew you wanted us dead.’

‘People change.’ He shrugs lightly.

We break out of the tunnel straight into the daylight and immediately career towards the stone barrier of the central reservation. The Ape is becoming fixated with his other self and forgetting
to steer.

‘I could take him,’ he says.

‘No, Ape. No,’ I tell him in no uncertain terms.

‘Easy,’ says the Ape.

‘Tell him, Johnson.’ I nudge Other-Johnson, but it’s our Johnson who speaks.

‘You didn’t see what he did to the train.’

‘I ain’t a train,’ boasts the Ape.

‘You should listen to them,’ Other-Johnson tells him. ‘That Ape out there is something else.’

‘He’s giving us advice now?’ Billie’s voice drips with sarcasm and then as she looks behind us and sees the central reservation looming up she yells out. ‘Look
where you’re going, you idiot!’

The Ape swerves at the last moment and the side of the car scrapes along the concrete dividing the road, banging back and forth against it, sparks flying, until the Ape manages to heave it free
of the central reservation.

It has slowed us down though and the Non-Ape is drawing ever closer.

‘JOHNSON!’

‘You really made him angry,’ I whisper breathlessly to Other-Johnson.

‘If it’s him he wants, then let’s throw him out,’ shouts Billie.

‘Open the door, Rev.’ I’m surprised when Johnson says this and my grip on Other-Johnson tightens.