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"But we can find out, Lou. He'll be part of Bruce's inner circle. Once we've got John back together again we'll ask him if he's noticed members of his team complaining about unexpected blackouts, sleep walking or memory loss. Then we contact the colonists, give them a nice small number of suspects to check out and let them get on with it."

"What if the colonists don't come?"

"Then we have a problem. But that's tomorrow's problem. Let's concentrate on today's."

Nick glanced at Louise as he clicked the last LSU connector home. Should he tell her or keep his concerns to himself?

Only one answer. He had to keep her focussed. Doubt was a luxury for people who had the time to do something about it.

And it wasn't as though he had any proof.

But it was a concern. When they'd been stuck in Pendennis's head, Peter had known about the LSUs, and their fears of a John Bruce presidency. How? Could he access their thoughts, their memories?

And how much could he access? Surface thoughts or everything?

If the latter then their entire plan was blown. They needed to know if they were talking to John or Peter but if Peter had access to all of John's memories . . . 

Nick refused to believe it. He'd gone over their incarceration in Peter's head and there was plenty Peter hadn't known. Okay, he could have been playing a game but Peter had always referred to Nick as 'doctor.' Why? The only logical reason was that that's who Peter thought he was. A new member of the medical staff. The only time they'd met was during Peter's last regression—when he'd bitten Louise's ear—and they'd never been introduced.

And Peter was a manipulator—if he'd had access to all their memories he'd have used them, constructed a custom-built hell to press all their buttons. Which he hadn't, or else he'd have known that the threat of psychic surgery was not the way to get to Nick. Spiders or wasps—yes. In a heartbeat. But psychic surgery was a subject Nick knew a lot about and would never have been fooled by.

Which meant it had to be unguarded thoughts Peter was picking up.

And made their mission to free John even more time critical. Every second they delayed was an opportunity for Peter to learn more about John.

It was time. They flowed out the window and over the garden wall. They scudded along lane and track, over field and spinney; found the ley and blurred everything else into a streak of watery colour. Speed and determination. This time they were going to succeed. This time they had to.

Upper Heywood sprawled beneath them, its white walls shimmering in the afternoon sun. They swooped down, Nick taking the lead, lining up the reception doors and gliding through. Louise followed, dropping down to floor level, slowing all the time. They flowed along the corridor, passing through the legs of warders and cleaners, turning left and right, getting closer and closer until . . .

They stopped.

"Are you ready, Lou?" Nick asked.

"Ready," she said, steeling herself.

"Plan B then. It's straight down the corridor, take the second right then first door on your left and . . . good luck."

Luck would have nothing to do with it. She set off, floating along the corridor, imagining herself a warship sailing along a sea of white corridors. She was impenetrable, invincible and drawn up for battle.

"Jack," she whispered, soft and drawn out like a dying breath.

"Jack," she repeated, casting her voice ahead like a soughing wind rustling through the topmost trees.

"Jack."

Almost there. She could see the cell door. She stretched towards it, touched its metal surface and slowly, ever so slowly, pushed through.

The cell appeared. Pendennis was on the bed, lying on his side, his face turned towards the wall.

"Jack," she whispered, concentrating on Peter's head and thinking her voice inside it.

"Jack, wake up. I'm looking for you. I'm in your museum. The one where you met Peter when he was six years old."

She floated closer to the bed. How close did she have to get?

"Jack," she urged. "I'm here, waiting, where are you?"

Closer still. The bed only a few feet away.

"Jack . . ."

She stopped dead. Somewhere, someone was laughing. A distant, echoing, sound—as though heard through a ventilation grill in an old abandoned house when the sound and Louise were several floors apart.

Was it getting louder? Should she move closer?

"Jack," she called. "I'm waiting."

And in that instant, reality buckled. The room, Pendennis—both disappeared. And in their place, a museum stuttered into life.

Louise reacted immediately. As soon as her body materialised she clad it in armour: lightweight and flexible, its atoms fused together like diamond. A mirrored visor protected her eyes—Jack was not going to hypnotise her—and her gloved hands closed around a baseball bat studded with razor blades.

She flexed her knees, raised the club two-handed and called out:

"Bring it on, sailor boy."

The last of the overhead lights flickered into life but shadows still remained. There were no windows in the museum and the only door, the one behind Louise, was closed.

She peered into the gloom. The layout had changed. The laughing sailor exhibit was no longer by the door. She glanced left and right. Everything else looked the same.

"Come on, Jack," she called out. "What are you frightened of?"

No answer. Not even a howl of wind from outside like last time. But the smell was the same. Stale and musty. She moved away from the door, still flexed, still ready to lash out at the first sight of navy blue.

She went left, her eyes flicking from exhibit to exhibit, her ears hyper-sensitive. He had to be somewhere.

Then she saw it—side-on—the display case, Jolly Jack Tar, The Laughing Sailor. She closed on it, changing her grip on the bat to swing from the left. And stopped. The case was empty. The glass panel at the front was smashed. She swung round, expecting a trap, instinctively ducking and crouching low.

Nothing was behind her.

He had to be hiding. There were so many dark nooks and crannies in between the machines—or even behind the machines. She thought light and a cone of light shot from the top of her helmet. Nothing was going to stop her.

"Jack," she called. "Come on out and play. I'm waiting."

Feet scurried in the distance. It had to be Jack. Coming from the museum's right-hand bay. Louise swung round and raced back towards the door. Invulnerable, she told herself. I can't be hurt, I can't be deflected.

The sound grew louder, tiny feet skittering over the floor. Louise reached the right-hand bay and turned. Nothing visible. He was hiding, maybe to the left, maybe to the right. She stopped and scanned both walls, turning up the intensity of her torch. Nothing. No, wait . . . there was something. A painted mirror on the back wall. Or was it a window? Whatever it was, Jack was there, his twisted face smiling out from behind the glass. She advanced, bat held high. The sailor's image didn't move. She started to run, winding up her shoulders, ready to put everything into one devastating swing. Five yards, three, swing and . . . smash! The glass shattered, shards everywhere. But no Jack. It must have been an image.

Laughter. From behind. Louise started to spin around but something fastened onto the back of her left leg. Jack. She looked down. The sailor had wrapped himself around her armoured leg and clamped his teeth to her thigh.

She swung down with the bat but Jack was too close. She couldn't swing hard enough. She changed grip, grabbed the bat like a Kayak paddle and stabbed down with it two-handed—once, twice, three times—hard onto the top of Jack's head.

He didn't even flinch. He stuck there, arms and tiny legs wrapped around her leg, his teeth . . . she could actually feel his teeth. Even through her armour!

She hit him harder. Again and again. No effect. She spun around, smashing Jack and the back of her leg against the edge of the nearest exhibit. He still wouldn't budge.

Pain shot up from her thigh. His teeth on her skin. Her armour must have given way. She threw down the bat, grabbed hold of Jack's head and pulled . . . and twisted; thinking strength, give it to me, as much as there is. Now!

Jack's sailor hat ripped away in her hands but his head stayed clamped and . . . she could feel something else . . . something coming out of Jack's mouth, something sharp, something solid, pushing into her thigh. It had to be several inches long.

No! She fastened her hands around Jack's head, twisting and pulling. The pain in her leg increased. Part of Jack was now inside her—a splinter, a tongue, six inches long—and every pull on his head twisted the splinter like a knife in the wound.

Think Louise, think! She was losing feeling in her left leg. Her thigh turning to wood, that 'thing' penetrating deeper.

Flame, she thought. Emulating Nick, fire shot from the fingers of both hands. She focussed the flame, turning it from yellow to searing blue, making it hiss and roar. Then turned it on Jack, twisting her body around and sending ten jets of flame searing down on the sailor's head.

His head blackened. So did her armour. And pain . . . that thing inside her—white hot now and pushing further inside, up her leg, into her buttocks and hip.

No! She pushed more power into the jets from her hands. Jack crackled and peeled . . . but never let go. Charcoal Jack smouldered and clung on. Smoke everywhere, the smell of burning wood and flesh.

No! She'd lost all feeling below the waist, she was loosing balance, teetering, about to fall. Think Louise, think!

Air, she thought. I'm no longer solid; I'm a gas, inert and free. Let Jack try and grab hold of that.

She began to fade, but not her legs. Come on, she cried, concentrating hard, imagining herself tugging at that intricate lattice of matter—the cells and molecules and smaller still—pulling and stretching at the very fabric of her being—teasing everything apart, distending her legs from solid into gas.

Free!

She flew to the ceiling, spread out, flattening herself against the cracked plaster and paint. And looked down. Charcoal Jack blinked up at her, the whites of his eyes shining out against his blackened skin . . . and that 'thing' . . . that twisted tongue that protruded some eighteen inches from his mouth.

He flexed his legs. Was he going to jump? Should she be looking into his eyes?

She shot along the ceiling, back towards the door then dived down, turning and materialising at the same time. She landed on armour-clad feet. The same armour as before but this time coated in a protecting flame. Let Jack try and sink his little wooden teeth into that.

She ran at him, her razor-tipped baseball bat appearing in her hands. He laughed, white teeth pushing through the cracking black mask. Jack was regenerating, and growing, new paint pushing through the crumbling charcoal husk.

Not quick enough, Jack, thought Louise. And she swung, swinging from her shoulders, swinging from her biceps, bringing her wrist in at the last second and willing that bat to not only hit Jack but to go straight through him.

He tried to duck but the bat caught him on the back of his head. Louise lost her balance on the follow through, tumbled into Jack, tripped over him, kicking at him as his little hands grabbed at her legs. She fell, rolled over and came up swinging. Jack danced away from the blows. What did it take to knock him out?

She threw away the bat, stared at her right hand—chainsaw—then at her left—glue hose. Both hands morphed immediately, smoke shot from the revving chainsaw exhaust, the other hand she aimed at Jack.

"What do you think this is going to be, Jack? Fire? Can your little brain feel fear?"

Jack threw back his head and roared. He didn't care. There was nothing inside him to care. Now, thought Louise, unleashing a jet of milky liquid—wood glue—first at Jack's mouth, then at his feet. Dance your way out of that, Jacky boy.

She lunged at him with the chainsaw. He ducked from the waist but his feet had stopped moving. Her next swing connected. The chain bit, vibrating up through her arm, throwing up a stream of sawdust from Jack's neck. She had him!

He kept laughing, even when the chainsaw took off his head and sent it rolling across the floor. A little hand grabbed for Louise's arm, she pulled away and brought the chainsaw down hard on Jack's right shoulder. She'd lop off his arms and legs, dice him up and feed the remains into a shredder if necessary. Nothing of him was getting away this time. Nothing!

She sliced and diced. Jack's laughter roared louder. She looked up. His head was growing another body, tiny legs had sprouted from his neck. He was running away. She aimed a glue jet at him but missed as he dashed behind one of the machines.

More laughter came from behind her. And to the sides. Jack was regenerating. All the pieces of Jack were regenerating. Even the shavings. She spun on the spot, spraying glue in an arc. There were thousands of little Jacks. All of them sprouting little mouths, all of them laughing.

She turned the floor white around her, miring as many as she could. But there were so many of them; running behind the machines, up the walls, across the ceiling. They were like ants, hundreds of insane laughing ants.

She sprayed the walls and the slot machines but couldn't keep up. They were dropping on her from above. Hundreds of them. She turned up the flames on her armour; singed them, blackened them but still they moved—crawling and nibbling.

A tingling, tickling sensation shot from her right wrist just above the join with the chainsaw. She looked down. Her wrist armour was rippling, crawling. He was inside her. Jack. Hundreds of him. The sawdust from the chain! It must have carried him inside her.

Panic. Her arm alive. Air, she thought. Air now!

She evaporated and shot to the ceiling but had Jack come with her? Was he still inside her—hundreds of tiny cuttings of Jack?

She span, thinking tornado, thinking centrifugal force, thinking spin that thing out of me!

She shot along the ceiling back towards the door, a spinning tornado turning right and right again into the other bay. Then stopped, she needed time to think. What kills wood? Rock, paper, scissors, what? Behind her the laughter grew . . . and the skittering. There had to be an army of Jacks racing towards her—over the floor, the walls, the ceiling.