“It’s okay,” she said. “I was just…just…”

“This place isn’t a trap,” soothed Peter. “You know we’re only here to help you?”

“I know. But I wasn’t…”

He put his hand on her arm and led her back to her own room. “Come on. Why don’t you lie down for a while?”

Eva lay on her bed gazing at the ceiling. The rain had lost some of its earlier violence, but it still poured down in a steady stream that streaked and blurred the view from her window. She wondered if it rained harder out here in the middle of the countryside than it used to in the city. She remembered South Street rain as being either a tired and miserable mist, or huge fat drops that left sooty, greasy stains where they fell. There was none of this cold violence, this clear division between the inside and the outside. Eva had never felt so isolated in all her life, trapped in the cocoon of the Center, floating away on a grey sea, the rest of the world left far behind. But isn’t that what I wanted? she thought. Isn’t that what I aimed for?

There was a knock on the door.

“Come in,” called Eva, but the door was already being pushed open. Alison walked in, closely followed by Nicolas. Eva could see Katie hovering in the background.

“I’ve come to say I’m sorry,” said Alison.

“What for?” asked Eva.

“Being so silly earlier on. I nearly blew the plan. I shouldn’t have spoken about it in the lounge.”

“That’s okay,” said Eva. She hesitated for a moment and then said, “Should you be talking about it in here?”

Nicolas gave a grin. “Safest place, probably. They wouldn’t dare tap our rooms unless they could prove it to be in our best interests, and then they’d have to let us know. They could be sued for malpractice.”

Eva sat up on her bed to make space for the others.

Alison sat down next to her. “Go and get yourself a seat from the lounge, Nicolas,” Alison said.

“Okay.” He walked happily from the room to fetch the chair.

“Don’t you want to sit down, Katie?” invited Eva.

“Katie will stay standing,” said Alison. She had washed her hair since that morning and changed into a pair of jeans and a cotton top. She stared at Eva. “I’m not being mean or bossy. I just know that Katie would prefer to stay standing, wouldn’t you, Katie?”

Katie nodded. She reached into a pocket of her jacket, pulled out a bottle, and handed it to Alison.

“We bought this in the village last week. Vanilla whisky. Some new thing they’re trying to put on the market. Alcoholic and incredibly sweet. I can’t imagine it ever taking off. Still, it makes you feel nice and warm, and there’s nothing else to do on a wet afternoon like this except drink and tell stories.”

Nicolas carried a chair from the lounge into the room, knocking it on the doorframe as he did so. He placed it in the middle of the room and sat down on it. Katie went to the window and looked out. Alison unscrewed the top of the bottle and looked around her.

“Cups,” she said.

“Here,” said Eva. There was a stack of disposable cups by her bed. She shook them apart and handed them out.

Alison poured them each a measure of vanilla whisky. The clear liquid smelled sickly sweet, and seemed to want to stay stuck to the plastic sides of the cup. The four conspirators looked around at each other. Alison wriggled back on the bed so that she leaned against the wall, her bottom on Eva’s pillow, her feet stretched out across the duvet. Nicolas sat in his chair in the middle of the room, sipping at his whisky, grinning at the two women on the bed and thinking heaven knows what. Katie lurked by the doorway-keeping watch, Eva realized.

Alison spoke first. “We’re escaping first thing tomorrow.”

“How?” Eva asked. “Where are we going?”

“We don’t know. We’ll toss coins to decide. It’s the only way we can be sure that we’re not being second-guessed by the Watcher.”

“You must have some plan.”

“Several excellent ones. All so perfect they can’t be ours. So we’re going to extemporize.” Alison smiled.

“Extemporize?”

“Make it up as we go along.” Alison wriggled again suddenly and messed up the duvet. She kicked her tiny feet up and down on the bed.

“Oh, I feel so much better than this morning. It’s amazing what a hot bath can do.” She flashed Nicolas a dirty look. “Or a shower, eh, Nicolas?”

“Oh yes,” said Nicolas. He looked at his feet, confused.

“Have you ever thought about what it must be like for the Watcher?” Alison said, glancing at Nicolas with a suppressed smile. “It can access all that information. It knows everything, and yet it’s impotent. What can it do?” She wriggled a little more on the bed, shifting her breasts beneath her cotton top. Eva noticed how closely Nicolas watched them.

“She does it deliberately, doesn’t she?” said the voice. “That’s how she keeps him following her around, like a pet.”

“I thought that was obvious,” Eva muttered.

“She’s doing it again,” said Katie from her position by the door. “Did you see her, how she relaxed and went all blank?”

“I did, Katie,” said Alison. She gazed at Eva. “You just heard the voice, didn’t you?”

“Yes,” Eva said uncomfortably.

“What did it say?”

Eva hesitated a moment.

“It thought you were right about the Watcher,” she lied.

“Too true,” said Alison. “Katie thinks it’s evolved in all those databases, all those computer networks and so on. It has become aware. Now it wants to stretch its wings, it wants to do things. But how? It’s far more intelligent than we are. It must be; it knows far more than we do. What if our machines and our senses are no longer enough for it? What is it going to do if it wants more powerful eyes and arms?”

“Build its own, I suppose,” replied Eva. “Oh. That thing on the news earlier today…”

“A mathematical expression that describes itself,” Katie said from the doorway.

Alison interrupted her. “And no one knows for sure where it came from. It just turned up on a computer.”

“Maybe that man; what was his name…?”

“Kay Lovegrove,” Katie said.

“Isn’t it possible that Kay Lovegrove wrote it?”

“It was the Watcher,” said Nicolas. “It’s beginning to shape the world into a fashion that suits itself. What does that tell you about us? About humans? What is it going to do to us?”

Alison stared at him. Outside the rain rattled against the windows and Eva stared out at the limes. She heard the voice.

“He’s right. What is the Watcher going to do to you? It’s watching you at the moment, you know. It can see you.”

“Eva! Speak to us, Eva!”

Suddenly, Alison was kneeling in front of the bed, gazing up at her. Eva didn’t remember her moving there.

“What’s the matter?” asked Eva, confused.

“I thought you were going to black out that time. What did it say?”

“It said the Watcher was looking at us now. It said it could see us.”

Katie was jumping up and down by the doorway. She seemed very excited.

“What is it, Katie?” Nicolas called.

Katie was having trouble speaking. Nicolas moved up beside her and put one hand on her arm. “Deep breaths, Katie. Deep breaths.”

“I think I understand!” Katie gasped. “Eva. Get off the bed. Go and stand over there.”

Katie was fighting for breath, such was her excitement. She pointed toward the opposite corner of the room.

Eva looked at Alison.

“Do it,” she said. Hesitantly, Eva obeyed. She moved across to the space by the tiny desk. Two magazines, bought for her at the village by one of the helpers, sat by her elbow. She looked at their glossy covers, embarrassed and confused.

“Ask the voice to speak,” said Katie, excitedly.

Eva nodded and coughed a little.

“Er, hello? Are you there?” she said. Nothing.

“I can’t hear anything,” she said.

“I know. We can tell,” said Alison.