'I'm sorry I disappointed you,' Gumshoe said, taking strength from sarcasm. 'I'll try not to do so when I wake up as no more than a head, surgically grafted onto the neck of a pig, mere inches from the severed heads of my mother and father, both rendered insane. I'm sure I can manage it.'

  'Excellent,' Wilson said, offering a slight smile that did not reach the icy blue eyes in his handsome, unemotional face, under that head of healthy blond hair. 'I like a man of spirit. The sarcasm shows that you're stronger than I'd thought and might yet prove of value when you've only your parents' faces to stare at for the rest of your life. Your love for them and, hopefully, their prevailing love for you, might return them to sanity and thus give us more insight into the mental stress produced by our experiments.'

  'Love? What would you know about love?'

  'A lot,' Wilson replied. 'I have observed it for years, seeing it in all its infinite variety and foolish permutations. The self-sacrifice of love. The betrayal of love. The self-deceptions of love. The deceptions of love. The vanity and the vain hopes of love. The ephemeral nature of love . . . Love, my young friend, is no more than self-delusion, historically short-lived, a concept of modern Man who needs to believe that he is more than an animal with base appetites. This is, however, an illusion, since Man is an animal, barely out of his cave, impelled by the instinct to survive — an instinct that overrides all other considerations, including love — and with no more importance in the general scheme of things than a fossil at the bottom of the sea. Human beings, despite their pretensions, are no more than manure for the nourishment of the future and should be treated as such. They are, indeed, no more than

  the instruments of evolution, a bridge between the cave and the stars, between primitive man and Superman. You and I, despite our differences of opinion, are mere nuts or bolts, perhaps less, in that immense construction. As for love, which sustains the illusion of human superiority, it has no place in evolution's grand plan, though it may have its transitory uses. If, for instance, your parents' love for you succeeds in making them sane again, then love will indeed have served a purpose. I look forward to seeing the results of this, one way or the other.'

  You're mad,' Gumshoe said, having nothing to lose and needing to hear the sound of his own voice to confirm that this was actually happening — that it wasn't a bad dream.

  I'm afraid that's not true. I've simply accepted that Mankind is but a tool of evolution and that what raises Man above the beast is his mind, his ability to reason, not his emotions, which cloud clear thought and lead to self-destruction. It's the pure logic of science that has led us out of the cave and that same logic will take us to the stars before the sun dies.'

  And the human suffering caused by your so-called logic?' There has never been progress without human suffering and

  Mankind has brought more suffering upon himself— with his wars, his religions, his pursuit of material wealth, his polluting of the Earth — than any suffering we can possibly inflict here. Indeed, the numbers who have suffered at my hands are mfinitesimal compared to the numbers made to suffer even more at the hands of their fellow man. And here they do at least suffer for a cause — the continuity of the human race; the transformation of mortal man into Superman — which is more than can be said for the suffering their fellow man causes them. Think of this, Gumshoe, my sarcastic young friend, when you awaken as no more than a severed head and stare into your parents' eyes. Think of this and then try to communicate with your parents, easing their suffering by letting them recognize you and regain joy in seeing you. Seeing you, knowing that you're still alive, may make all their suffering worthwhile.

  Think of this and accept your lot.'

  'Go fuck yourself,' Gumshoe said.

  Wilson did not bat an eyelid, though he was silent for a considerable period of time, his blue gaze steady and dispassionate, devoid of malice, displaying only detached curiosity. He might have been studying an insect under a microscope . . . and that made him even more frightening.

  'We will now prepare you psychologically for the operation,' he said. 'A process that will take about three days.'

  'You're going to do a brain implant,' Gumshoe said, still terrified deep down but hoping that he would, at least, be insensible when they were doing their worst. The true worst, of course, would come after that, when he awoke as a severed, still fully conscious head. But right now he didn't want to think about that and, like a man on a gallows, was trying to convince himself that he was dreaming. There were times when putting your head in the sand was the only way out.

  'Yes,' Wilson replied. 'First, we'll give you an injection that will put you to sleep for three days: in deep, painless coma. While you're in that condition we'll use electronic implants to prepare you mentally for the trauma of disembodiment and instant transplantation to the donor body —

  in this case, as you know, a pig already blessed with the grafted heads of both your mother and your father. Given this new treatment, we're hoping that when you regain consciousness, after the transplant, you'll learn to accept what you've become and eventually view it as natural.'

  'And if you're wrong?'

  Wilson shrugged. 'All scientific experiments are conducted in the knowledge of the possibility of

  failure,' he said. 'If we're wrong, it will be neither the first nor the last time and we'll simply try something else. Believe me, nothing will stop us.'

  'And what happens to me and my parents if you're wrong?' Gumshoe asked.

  'The blessing of termination,' Wilson said. 'And that wouldbe a blessing, if you can't accept your new form of existence.'

  'Jesus Christ!' Gumshoe exclaimed, trying to bury his rising dread in a display of disgust, though secretly feeling that he was sinking still deeper into this swamp of unending nightmare. 'So what if I don't cooperate?'

  Wilson smiled. His smile was like ice and fire. 'How can you not?' he said. You have nowhere to go.

  This room is guarded at all times by cyborgs armed with stun guns and even if you managed to get out

  — let's say, by a miracle — you couldn't possibly escape from this establishment. You're trapped here absolutely, my young friend, and you'll just have to accept that hard fact. Now we can do it the easy way or the hard way, but either way we will do it. Have you any more questions?' No,' Gumshoe said.

  Good.' Wilson pushed his chair away from the bed and stood up, preparing to leave. 'In a few minutes,'

  he said, 'one of our male nurses will arrive to give you the preliminary injection. He will come here in the company of two cyborgs, so resistance is useless. I won't see you again for three days, by which time the operation, successful or otherwise, will have been completed. If it's successful — and if you manage to stay sane — you'll certainly still recognize me. The best of luck to you.'

  'You cunt,' Gumshoe said.

  'That's a sexist remark,' Wilson responded, 'and it certainly proves my point that human beings, with their wasteful emotions, are still essentially primitive. On that note I will leave you.'

  'Yeah, fuck off,' Gumshoe said.

  Wilson left, closing the room door firmly behind him.

  When he saw that door closing, Gumshoe found himself gasping in and out as if desperately taking his last breaths. He understood then just how frightened he truly was, how close to the edge of panic: when his heart started racing and he broke out in a cold sweat, he thought that he was losing control completely and might actually crack up.

  Fuck, he's right, he thought. No point in resisting. Best to get it over and done with. Let the hastards inject you . . .

  For, in truth, he wanted oblivion, escape from his teeming thoughts, from the encroaching nightmare; to at least have that fleeting reprieve before the real horror came.

  He took refuge again in the vain hope that he might be dreaming. But then, as he had known that it must, the door opened again and a male nurse entered the room. He was wearing a white smock, had short-cropped dark hair, and was wheeling a surgical trolley in front of him. After pushing the trolley up to the bed, he stared silendy, steadily at Gumshoe.

  Gumshoe looked up, first in choking dread, then in growing recognition . . . and finally in sheer disbelief.

  The male nurse was Snake Eyes.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  As Michael and Ben walked around the Lincoln Memorial, intending to avoid the White House area by going through Foggy Bottom, then east from Washington Circle, a Prowler came lumbering out of 23rd Street, its headlights boring through the moonlit darkness. It was the size and shape of a tank, a steel monolith on steel treads, and it had, Michael knew, sensors that enabled it to detect body heat and movement, decide for itself whether the observed person was a friend or foe, and act accordingly, ruthlessly. It also had powerful laser weapons that could stun, paralyse or kill.

  Even worse, as the Prowler entered the road that circled the memorial it was followed by a SARGE, one of the four-wheeled, highly manoeuvrable scout telerobots that looked like giant metallic insects and housed thermal-imaging and zoom cameras. Although neither vehicle contained an actual crew, whether cyborg, clone or human, they were both capable, Michael recalled with a sinking heart, of dead-reckoning navigation and could calculate in advance where they needed to go, then head straight there.

  Shit!' Ben whispered, freezing where he stood.

  Michael froze also.

  They both stood there on the sidewalk, exposed in the moonlight, hoping that the Prowler and the SARGE would

  not detect them so long as they remained absolutely still. They were also hoping that the vehicles would take the opposite direction around the memorial, on the side of the Reflecting Pool, thus enabling them to continue unmolested to 23 rd Street.

  That hope died on the instant.

  The Prowler and SARGE turned right, coming straight towards them, and their headlights, which were sweeping both sides of the road, instantly picked them out: two human beings who should not have been there after the curfew.

  'Shit!' Ben said again, this time not bothering to whisper. 'Run for it!' he bellowed.

  They turned back the way they had come, running in the direction of the Arlington Memorial Bridge, but the ground patrol vehicles had already detected them with their thermal imagers and immediately started chasing them, with the SARGE, much smaller and quicker, racing ahead of the Prowler and rapidly catching up with them.

  'Stay away from the bridge!' Ben shouted. 'There's no shelter there! Keep going around the memorial until we get to . . . Oh, shit! We won't make itf

  Michael had never known fear before, but he felt it for the first time when he glanced back over his shoulder and saw the SARGE racing up behind him like some giant, devouring insect, its headlights flashing like hideous alien eyes, its thermal imagers moving left to right, as the moonlit silvery snout of its laser weapon swung in his direction. He had felt safe all his life, protected by Freedom Bay in a benevolent, orderly society devoted to good, but now he was caught up in a world of danger where everybody felt threatened. He was being threatened this very moment, about to be fired upon by the SARGE's laser weapon, and he knew that if it struck him, even if it didn't kill him, he would be doomed to an unimaginable future. So he tried running even faster, glimpsing Ben to his left, also running, also panting, but the SARGE was coming within the firing range of its laser weapon and it was clear that neither of them would escape.

  Suddenly, to Michael's horror, a small flying saucer, no more than three feet wide, spinning rapidly on

  its own axis and emitting an eerie, pulsating glowing — the kind of disc-shaped sensing device that he'd learnt was known as a 'football' — appeared out of nowhere, flying too fast to be seen in actual flight, and stopped abruptly to hover right in front of him, preparing to fire at him.

  He froze where he was.

  'Oh., fuck? Ben called out, also freezing on the spot and staring like a condemned man at the small, hovering saucer.

  A laser beam filled with sparks suddenly shot out of the football to burn through the concrete at Michael's feet and make him jump back when it exploded into swirling dust and debris. He saw the laser weapon in the football adjusting itself, shifting slightly higher to focus upon him, even as the SARGE came up behind him to block his retreat. An eerie, pregnant silence descended.

  I'm finished, Michael thought.

  At that moment, however, from a good distance behind him, from beyond the Prowler and the SARGE, a cacophony of roaring engines shattered the tense silence, accompanied by the sound of squealing tyres. The SARGE, with a speed that defied belief, spun around on its four wheels to face the advance of a horde of Speed Freaks.

  They had come roaring out of 23rd Street and now raced along the road that encircled the Memorial, advancing on the Prowler and the SARGE, then sweeping past on both sides of them even as the more ungainly Prowler was still making its turn and the SARGE was taking aim with its laser weapon. In souped-up sedans and Skylines with after-market tail fins, aerofoils, skirts, spoilers and stolen, constantly flashing police lights; in low-riders with deep bucket seats and graphic equalizers that emitted surreal waves of light; and, more dangerously, on garishly decorated Yamaha and Kawasaki motorcycles, they swept around the ground patrol vehicles

  and threw small, block-shaped objects at them as they raced on.

  The small objects — obviously the home-made bombs often used by the Speed Freaks — exploded into boiling yellow-white flames and billowing black smoke that engulfed the Prowler and the SARGE, bringing them both to a standstill.

  Even as a series of internal explosions further devastated those vehicles, the silvery-grey football that had been hovering directly in front of Michael whipped to the side and fired its laser weapon at a Speed Freak passing by on his motorcycle. The laser beam cut through him like a thin blade through butter and the top half of his body, gushing a fountain of blood, fell sideways to the road while the lower half, also gushing blood but still, instinctively, gripping the saddle with its thighs, was carried on for a few more metres before the motorcycle crashed to the road. It dragged the bloody torso behind it as it slid on for another ten metres or so, only stopping when it crashed into a street light and burst into flames.

  The football ascended vertically, dropped down again and shot its laser beam here and there, the bolts of sparks bright in the darkness, as the other vehicles passed by directly below it with the Speed Freaks, all high on drugs and beer, whooping and hollering.

  Ben started running again and Michael instantly followed him, just as wary of the Speed Freaks whom he knew could be dangerous, particularly when high on drugs, as he was of the football that now, clearly confused by the sheer numbers racing below it, its sensors overloaded from the heat and sound and vibration of the hot rods and motorcycles, from the whooping, hollering Speed Freaks, from the continuing explosions as more home-made bombs were thrown, went into a series of remarkably fast aerial manoeuvres, flying this way and that, but clearly not knowing which way to turn. More Speed Freaks were struck by the football's rapidly firing laser weapon, their vehicles flying from under them, some crashing, others exploding, incinerating

  them as their friends swept on around the Memorial, heading away from the blazing, smoking Prowler and SARGE, turning back the way they had come, towards 23 rd Street.

  Michael kept running. He had lost sight of Ben by now. He hoped that Ben was okay, but he couldn't stop to look for him because the Speed Freaks were roaring all around him, coming dangerously close to him, and he feared that one might run him down.

  He was running past the grounds of the Korean War Veterans' Memorial when the football, having lost most of the Speed Freaks, suddenly appeared right in front of him.

  Michael didn't think to freeze — he was too frightened to think of that — and as he kept running, breathing harshly, his heart beating too fast, the football, now merely gliding, bobbing gently, gracefully, like a cork in turbulent water, moved down to head level to block his path.

  He saw the moonlit silvery snout of the laser weapon and thought he was doomed.

  Suddenly, a silver-tanked Yamaha 400 motorcycle roared up from behind him and skidded to a halt just in front of him.

  'Get on!' a high-pitched voice squealed.

  Without thinking twice, Michael jumped on the pillion seat and held on to the rider as the motorcycle took off again. The football, attracted by a passing hot rod, pursued it instead of the motorcycle, letting Michael and the rider who had rescued him travel on unmolested.

  Hang on tight!' the motorcyclist said to Michael as she — for indeed it was a female — raced around the Lincoln Memorial and then into the long, dark stretch of 23rd Street.

  Clinging to her waist, surprised that this particular Speed Freak was a woman and abruptly becoming aware of the slimness ofher waist, the softness of her rump, the swan-like neck clearly exposed by the short-cropped green-and-red-tinted hair (like a lot of the Speed Freaks, she was not wearing a helmet), he glanced to the right and saw the Department of State bathed in moonlight. No flying saucer floated above it, though beyond it, directly over the White House, a large flying saucer, about three hundred feet in diameter, was hovering as usual.

  Though still feeling threatened, well aware of the dangers of travelling at this time of night, he nevertheless felt high on a kind of excitement he had never experienced in Freedom Bay. Looking ahead again, over the girl's right shoulder, he saw the lights of Washington DC as a magical tapestry.

  Entering Washington Circle, the girl tilted the motorcycle dangerously low to the left, then straightened up again as she raced into New Hampshire Avenue, heading for Dupont Circle.

  'Thanks!' Michael shouted. 'I thought I was finished back there! If you hadn't picked me up, that football would have zapped me and called in a paddy wagon.'

  'Yeah, right,' the girl replied. 'Then — hey presto! You're gone for fuckin' good. No doubt about it, you were lucky we passed