London Eye: 1 (Toxic City)(56)

“There's no way they'd allow that,” Ruben said.

“But we have to try!”

Rosemary shook her head. “They can cover up what's happened here from the rest of the world. They can hide the existence of the new talents created on Doomsday—an evolved humanity, how incredible!—and the fact that those talents are growing every day. They can do all that, and keep the rest of the country ignorant of the truth, so do you really think a few pictures and bits of film will be believed?”

“Get them to the right places, sure,” Sparky said.

“Do you believe everything you see on TV?” Rosemary asked.

“’Course not. Load of bullshit.”

“That's my point.”

“But…” Jack shook his head, angered by the Irregulars’ lack of faith and belief in what was right, but unable to see a way through. “There's hope,” he said. “You have to hang onto that.”

“I lost it long ago,” Rosemary replied. “At least, until we found out about you. Because the only hope for the people left alive in London—several thousand of us, perhaps—and the powers we have, is for all of us to unite and fight our way out.”

Sparky laughed. “You're joking, right? Get together, you and all those Superior superhero wannabes, and start a war?”

“Not start a war,” the woman replied. “Finish one.”

“And can you give us any alternative?” Ruben asked.

“Not off the cuff, but I can tell you it'll end up with them killing you all,” Sparky said.

“And you want me to go to my father, this Reaper you talk about, and persuade him to do this?” Jack asked.

“In a nutshell,” Rosemary said. “We tried, and he turned us down. You're our last hope.”

“But you don't believe he'll even care.”

“Not anymore.” She shook her head, wretched, tortured. “Our last hope is almost hopeless.”

Jack sat back against the wall and sighed. He looked at the ceiling and saw a fine network of webs, and in the corner sat a small, fat spider. It was waiting for unwary flies to become caught in its net. And if a dozen flies ganged up on it, the result would simply be a fatter spider.

“So how did you find out about Jack and Emily?” Sparky asked. “Someone with a people radar? Some bloke who can sniff paternal genes across hundreds of miles?”

“No,” Rosemary said, “their mother told me about them.”

“My mother,” Jack said, and he smiled. He thought of Sparky immediately and felt bad, but his friend was looking down at Jenna's face. Now that he knew his parents were still alive, the idea of exposing the lies of the Toxic City seemed even more pressing. Because if he had discovered they were alive only to lose them again—either to the Choppers, or if his father disowned them—Jack did not think he could mourn a second time.

“I need to see her first,” he said. “You can take me down to where she is?”

“Tomorrow,” Rosemary said, her face flushed. “So you'll do it? You'll go to Reaper?”

“I'll go to my father, yes. How will you find him?”

“He's not difficult to find.”

“Then why don't the Choppers come and take him?” Emily asked.

“They've tried,” Rosemary replied. “Often. None of them ever come back.”

My dad's a killer, Jack thought, but the idea was not as reprehensible as it should have been. Perhaps in his mind, he was already viewing his father as a radically changed man. It had been two years, and when they met they would be strangers. Maybe that was the best way for whatever future there was between them to begin.

“Thank you,” Ruben said, his gratitude heartfelt.

“And I'm sorry for…” Rosemary said, but she trailed off.

“All the lies?” Sparky suggested.

Jack laughed. “We're used to them. Didn't you know it's now lies that run the world?”

As the sun settled red across the London rooftops, they heard the sound of a wolf's howl in the distance.

“Is that really what I think it is?” Sparky asked.

“I saw one once,” Rosemary said. She was sitting on the small sofa beside Ruben, eating tinned tomatoes from a large bowl. She'd fetched the food from a house further along the street, saying that keeping safe houses well stocked would take away the safety. “Hyde Park, about a year ago. That's a wild place now. The trees and bushes have gone mad, the grasses come up to your knees, and the first of the mass graves is there. Lots of it was dug up by wild dogs and other carrion things just after the authorities withdrew from London, so there are bones scattered everywhere. And I found somewhere where the bones had been arranged around a copse of trees like some sort of…symbol. I went closer to the bushes, and a wolf came out. It was beautiful. So powerful, so of nature, that I felt…insignificant. Here we are, humans being inhumane as we always have done, and the wolf survives.” She nodded, staring at the wall opposite and seeing into her past.