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 and determined. Uncompromising yet vulnerable. There was too much common ground for Ewan to ignore. For most of his life he hadn’t liked people who were similar to him, and he wondered what that told him about his opinion of himself. But at that moment he was met with a young woman whose anger and passion pointed in the same direction as his own, whose fiery nature aligned with him rather than fought against him.
Ewan grabbed the nearest pack of batteries and headed back for the warehouse. He had been right about the looters; with so many boxes strewn across the aisles it was difficult to find Shannon. By the time he did, she was ripping open the cardboard packet. She removed the GPS tracker and tossed it over to him, and he got to work with the batteries.
‘Bloody hell, I miss the internet,’ he muttered. ‘In the old days this whole trip could have been avoided by using a search engine.’
He took a moment to feel grateful that the Underdogs still had phones even though the internet was gone. Nicholas Grant could have knocked out their communications just by destroying a few phone masts, and the simple reason he hadn’t was because he had needed telephones too. His Citadels’ secure intranet system, however, had enabled him to safely cut off internet access for the whole of Britain without impacting himself.
‘Yeah,’ answered Shannon, ‘well, here are the numbers when you’re ready for them.’
‘One second… go.’
‘Fifty-one point eight one two—’
‘Wait wait, slow down. Let me process what you’re saying.’
Shannon sighed sympathetically.
‘Sorry, Ewan,’ she said. ‘I still keep forgetting. You just don’t—’
‘I don’t look like I have learning difficulties. Yeah, heard it before.’
‘Well, you just seem really capable…’
‘Wow, autistic guy with PDA and anger issues is capable of doing stuff. Stop the bloody press. Now just go slowly. Fifty-one…’
Shannon read out the rest of the numbers with a saddened look on her face, which may have meant guilt. It made Ewan feel sad too. Normally it was nice and satisfying when he made someone realise just how little they understood his needs, but there was no satisfaction when it happened to Shannon.
‘Seven five eight eight,’ Ewan repeated as he typed in the final numbers. ‘And our mystery location is…’
He pushed the search button, and waited for the map to load. When it did, it revealed a large building the outskirts of Harpenden.
‘Where is it?’ asked Shannon.
‘Not far at all. About half a day’s walk from Spitfire’s Rise. In fact, pretty close to…’
Ewan looked closer, and his eyes widened.
‘Ewan, what is it?’
The device shook in Ewan’s hand. He was trembling from a mix of fear and rage, which must have been what Nicholas Grant had wanted when he had chosen the location.
He threw the GPS tracker against the nearest wall, where it smashed to pieces. Unsatisfied, he took a short run-up and booted an empty box down the warehouse aisle. It didn’t go as far as he wanted, thudding to a quick stop like it was trying to insult him, so Ewan ran again with a scream and stamped it into the ground as if it were personal.
‘Ewan?’
He took steady breaths and tried to ground himself. He rested both of his feet flat on the ground, one hand against his hip, and the other gripped against the nearest shelf.
‘Your father’s after a fight,’ he snarled, ‘with me and my friends, personally. You want to know the real name of the “AME test centre”?’
‘It’s not…’
‘It is. Oakenfold Special School.’
*
Half an hour had passed. Ewan had barely stopped running since they had escaped Luton, and it was difficult to run and talk at the same time.
‘Alex,’ he barked into the phone, ‘you know what Oakenfold means to us, right? The guys at home won’t like the news.’
Ewan knew he was using the other students’ fears to mask his own. The very thought of breaking such sensitive news terrified him. But he didn’t need Alex to know he was terrified.
‘Mate, they’re already struggling with the missile attack on New London. Losing an already-abandoned school isn’t going to add much stress.’
‘Is that meant to be some kind of comfort?’
‘It’s meant to be the truth.’
Alex Ginelli was hardly a sensitive guy, and he had no empathy for teenagers with special ed backgrounds. The twenty-two-year-old from Brighton had been brought up in a different world, where places like Oakenfold Special School were safely hidden away from the rest of society. And even in the world he inhabited, he kept himself far away from most people emotionally. Alex put on a distinct lone wolf persona, and it showed so strongly that it was probably a part of his real personality too. But it meant he had an outside perspective in most situations, and Ewan reluctantly admitted it was useful at times. Alex had certainly been in his element during their last mission, sheltering alone in a bungalow until the others were ready to escape. Without his self-isolating approach to combat, perhaps he would never have been able to help Ewan, Kate and Jack escape New London alive.
‘Look mate,’ Alex continued, ‘I’ll head home and pass on the news to McCormick. If you’re sure I can abandon comms.’
‘We’re only an hour away, and the hard bit’s over. Go and tell him.’
‘Got it. You’ve probably used up your three minutes of untraceable time, so I’m hanging up before Grant ends up finding you. Interrogate Shannon about the attack, though. She may know what’s going on in Daddy’s world.’
Without another word, Alex was gone. Ewan removed his phone battery, and slowed himself
