Underdogs. Chris Bonnello
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was nothing in this world she could do to change the outcome.
Nicholas Grant, however, had the whole event covered. Or at least the Cerberus system did.
There were explosions – lots of explosions, but they were all tame. Grant’s near-impenetrable network of defence missiles rose from the corners of the Citadel, giving it the appearance of a giant birthday cake, and intercepted the threat with a series of detonations.
Once upon a time, the Cerberus system had been Grant’s way of persuading the British government to trust him with their country’s safety. His promise of almost futuristic security – in exchange for limitless funding and influence – had been the catalyst for everything that had been allowed to happen since. That morning Cerberus had been used to repel a foreign attack for the first time, but not in a way the government could ever have predicted.
By the time the smoke started to clear, it was obvious that nothing remained in the sky. A couple of seconds passed in silence, and then the soundwave reached Spitfire’s Rise. The explosions had lost their volume over the many miles in between, and sounded little louder than tame fireworks. But those inside the Inner City prison must have been in a state of utter panic. (Although from Kate’s experience on the inside, perhaps some were already harvesting the fallen metal debris to reinforce their fragile shelters.)
‘Well,’ muttered Mark, ‘looks like Grant’s safe.’
The internal conflict gave Kate a heavy heart. The world may have been a better place if Nicholas Grant and the rest of New London had died in a horrifying missile strike, but at least James would survive his twentieth birthday.
‘What the hell was that about?’ Raj asked at her side.
Kate had no idea how to respond.
‘Something big,’ she eventually said.
Chapter 2
Ewan had hated shopping centres for as long as he could remember. The crowds, the noise, the pressure on all five senses and the constant onslaught of everything demanding his attention. His mother had tried her best when it got too much for him, but she couldn’t control the inside of his overloaded brain. Ewan’s childhood memories of Luton Retail Centre consisted of him not meeting the public’s expectations, their frowns of disapproval and their lack of sympathy whenever he had a meltdown.
I guess those memories apply to my whole life, really.
Luton Retail Centre felt much more pleasant nowadays. Ewan had the whole place to himself, except for one trustworthy friend by his side.
‘I hope you know your way around,’ Shannon said to him, ‘I spent my school years avoiding places like this, thanks to all the popular girls.’
‘You and me both,’ said Ewan. ‘Well, replace “popular girls” with “humans in general”. OK, it’s round the next corner. I think.’
He was revealed to be right: the catalogue store had neither moved nor closed down since whenever his last visit had been, and hopefully it was still well-stocked. Other Takeover Day escapees would have looted it before the clones hunted them all down, but nobody would have thought to steal the GPS devices for hikers.
Whatever they stole, they wouldn’t have held on to it for long. W e probably only survived the purges because of the thermal blocker my dad stole from his barracks, keeping our body heat off Grant’s scanning equipment.
Ewan entered the store and headed straight for the warehouse at the back. Shannon paused and grabbed the nearest catalogue.
‘No point in searching before you know its serial number, Ewan.’
Ewan saw her point, turned around and headed back to her. It was one of Shannon’s interesting abilities (and he was seeing more of them week by week): she could point out Ewan’s mistakes and misjudgements without him feeling uncomfortable. He wasn’t sure how she managed it; maybe it was some kind of unspoken empathy. With a father like Nicholas Grant, her own childhood may not have been much better than Ewan’s.
‘So how’s this for your first mission?’ he asked as she flicked through the catalogue’s faded pages. ‘It’s a boring one I know, but boring is good. Trust me.’
‘The first time you met me I stabbed a man to death,’ Shannon answered without looking up from the page, ‘after he slaughtered my ex and a load of innocent people. I know that boring is good, thanks. Besides, this mission doesn’t really begin until we know where the test centre is.’
Ewan gave an understanding nod. Even though it was her first outing as an official Underdog (leaving aside that first night and her deadly attack on Grant’s number two assassin), Shannon had already proven her worth. Since their last victory – which could never have happened without her providing them the technology to destroy the clone factory – Shannon had spent three weeks analysing her father’s plans, the scariest of which was AME. Atmospheric Metal-something-or-other: an anti-metal shield over the whole of New London, and presumably one for each of his other Citadels, which would render Grant and his allies utterly indestructible.
The stolen plans had mentioned an AME test centre: a building outside New London where a smaller shield could be launched and examined before the real version went live. The centre was reportedly half-complete, but they had most likely sped up production after their plans had been stolen.
But other than the words ‘test centre’ and some GPS coordinates, the paperwork had contained no useful clues. The time had come for Ewan and Shannon’s final piece of research: finding where those coordinates led to.
Shannon found the technology section, and ran through the item list with a finger which brushed away the dust as it went. Ewan glanced too, and saw the prices on some of the items.
‘Three hundred quid?!’ he asked. ‘People paid that much for a GPS thing? They could have just downloaded an app.’
‘There are always people who want quality,’ Shannon answered. ‘Photographers didn’t stop buying professional equipment just because their phone could take a few snaps. Right, how about this one? “Purpose built for the great outdoors, accurate to within one metre, contains 1:50,000 Ordnance Survey maps—”’
‘Can you use it to search for coordinates?’
‘Only one way to find out. Ewan, grab me some batteries.’
She ran for the warehouse, leaving Ewan to turn and head for the pound shop next door.
She just commanded me, the Underdogs ’ head soldier, to obey her .
Why aren’t I uncomfortable? Shouldn’t my PDA kick in or something?
As Ewan walked into the pound shop, he wondered how much Shannon knew about his pathological demand avoidance. She must have seen the diagnosis on the list of names she had first brought to Spitfire’s Rise, but a three-word diagnosis was no description of lived experience. The words ‘pathological demand avoidance’ weren’t enough to summarise a childhood of being frightened by other people telling him to do things, or the loss of self-control that came when people’s demands made him uncomfortable. A year ago, a command as blatant as ‘Ewan, get me some batteries’ would have switched on his defiant instincts as an act of self-defence, but somehow it was different when the command came from Shannon.
Shannon had done a good job of climbing up his friendship rankings during her time at Spitfire’s Rise. McCormick would always hold the number one spot thanks to his life-changing compassion and influence, and ever since Charlie Coleman had been gunned down by a red-haired assassin, the runner-up spot had been occupied by Kate. But Shannon was now in third, which wasn’t bad for three weeks of friendship.
There was something else though: something which numbers and rankings couldn’t account for. Shannon was fiery