Entering the Weave

Kat was sitting next to Josh watching his expressionless face and trying to imagine what was happening inside his mind.

More of the alien control room had come alive after Josh and Sir Trevor had logged into wherever they were. Most of the holograms seemed content to stay in one place, but many of them drifted around like transparent balloons. It was like being inside a giant kaleidoscope.

The professor danced around from hologram to control panel taking readings or tentatively pressing buttons. He was far too busy to answer any of Kat’s questions about Josh.

Coel was sitting next to her. His hand still rested gently on her forearm, even though he’d said that his inner sight had returned a little.

“What is the door like to this room?” He asked urgently.

“What?”

“The door. To this room. Can we close it? Is it strong?”

Kat glanced at the door which was currently guarded by two of the burly bodyguards. “Yes. I suppose so. But why?”

“We need to close it. Come on.”

Kat pulled Coel to his feet and they hurried across to the door. One of the bodyguards turned to them questioningly.

Coel grabbed his arm. “We need to get everyone inside and close the door.”

The bodyguard pulled his arm away from the blind man and resumed his watch. Coel tugged at his sleeve again.

“Look, buddy. Just keep out of everybody’s way okay? I don’t want to have to hurt you, but if you’re compromising the security of this operation then…”

He didn’t finish as a gigantic reptilian head crashed into his side, knocking him to the ground. The dinosaur turned quickly and before anyone could react it had picked up the unconscious bodyguard in its enormous mouth.

Coel pulled Kat back into the room and the other bodyguard heaved the door closed.

“Professor!” Kat screamed. “Can you lock this door?”

“Please, can’t you see I’m busy…” But he must have noticed the frantic activity by the door and he scurried over to them. “What on Earth is going on?”

“There’s a dinosaur out there.”

“Yes. I know.” He snorted. “I almost ran into its mouth while we were looking for this room.”

“It’s alive.”

“That’s imposs…” A momentous crash against the door proved that it wasn’t. The door swung open and threw the bodyguard across the room. For a second the dinosaur stood in the open doorway, but Coel managed to swing the door shut again.

The professor quickly connected his small computer to the panel next to the door and, with a coolness that belied his usual eccentricity, keyed in some commands. With an encouragingly loud clunk, the door locked itself and hardly moved with the next resounding blow.

The dinosaur, however, continued to smash against the door and before long it had started to look decidedly bent.

Kat searched the room for another way out and found nothing. The professor, now the door was shut, had gone back to his instruments, while every one else cowered as far away from the slowly crumpling door as they could possibly get.

“What the devil’s going on?” A stern voice demanded from somewhere.

The professor dropped his clipboard and scurried to help Sir Trevor who had fallen off his seat and now sat sprawled on the floor. “Professor Ackermann? What are we doing here?”

“We’re trying to help the entity, sir.”

“What entity. What on Earth are you blathering on about? And who is this child?” He indicated the still serene body of Josh. A look of sudden indecision crossed his face, only to be replaced immediately by crossness. “Where are we?”

“Sir, perhaps you’d better calm down. It can be a strange experience to return from virtual reality so suddenly.”

“I will not calm down. I demand to know what is going on here.” There was another monumental crash against the door. “And what’s that?”

“It’s a dinosaur. It’s trapped us here in this space ship control room.” Coel said mischievously.

Sir Trevor eyed Coel warily and turned to the professor. “Who is this raving lunatic.”

“I really think you need to calm down, sir. Please.”

“I remember this boy. I’m sure he had a spear. He hit me.” He said indignantly, rubbing his arm. “Then I arrived here.” He seemed to notice the floating holograms and the situation then seemed to catch up with him. His gruff superiority was replaced with smiling confusion. “Dinosaurs. Spaceships and fairies. Yes. Quite nice.”

“Were you with Josh?” Kat asked. “When you were online.”

“Who?”

“Him.” She pointed. “When you went online, were you with Josh? Is he okay?”

“I think so. We were on an island amidst a beautiful tranquil sea.” He said dreamily. “He sent me back, because he had to go somewhere else. A battle I think.”

“What?” Kat and Josh’s dad said together.

“Isn’t this one pretty.” Sir Trevor carefully traced the outline of one of the bright holograms that was floating past him.

“Professor. Is Josh okay?” Kat asked.

“His vitals are running rather high.”

“Can we bring him out?”

“I am not sure it would be the best thing to do. Look at Sir Trevor. I am thinking he came out too suddenly.”

“Is Josh safe?”

The professor shook his head. “I do not know, but if his vitals get any higher then I think we should risk extricating him. His heart rate is just over two hundred beats per minute.”

Kat looked at Josh and saw that he wasn’t serene anymore. Sweat beaded on his forehead and his hands were clenched tightly by his side.

Josh appeared before a giant white demon, howling its wrath into a broiling sky. Surrounding it were ugly, misshapen warriors and beasts that joined their war cry to the cacophony.

He felt very small and clutched the spear very tightly, raising it above his head and gesturing for the ravening things to halt.

“This must end.” Something made his voice resound clearly over the smoking battlefield and everything suddenly stopped.

“Hello again Joshua. And thank you.” The demon created the symbols Geigerzalion used to communicate but then it growled real words. “You have left it too late to stop me. I have too many of your puny dreamers in my power and the ones that have been brought to fight for you are powerless against me.”

Josh had expected to meet Geigerzalion here and he had hoped that he would have recognised some compassion in him. Now, with the alien’s demonic avatar towering above him, he realised that he had been foolish. Geigerzalion had planned this from the beginning and played upon Josh’s sympathetic nature all along.

“I am not powerless against you though. I have destroyed your servant and I will defeat you.”

The demon laughed raucously and was immediately mimicked by the army. “You can’t defeat me now, Joshua. I am here thanks to you and your feelings. Your emotions were excellent cover for my activities. You would not believe how much you affect this pathetic world.”

Josh glanced around to see his friends approaching. Spokes and Bandicoot were there with Toby and Michael, while the Gazetteer followed just behind them.

“Hah! Look at your puny band of heroes. These are the people burdened with the responsibility of saving your world. How can you expect to beat me?”

Josh raised the spear once more. “With this. N’rinde knew what you are, but he couldn’t do anything to stop you until you showed yourself.”

“And he’s dead now. Scattered into the memories of all your tiny minds.”

“No.” Josh swung the spear around his head. “He’s here.” The spear whistled through the air, vibrating and finding its resonant frequency until it rang out like a bell.

The demon and its minions staggered back from the noise. The smoke of the battlefield gained a life of its own and gathered into dense pockets coming together to form an enormous shape of a man with a spear.

“No!” The demon roared. “It’s impossible. He stood aside for you.”

The smoke-shadow man raised his spear and swung it towards the demon’s chest. Geigerzalion howled and staggered back from the blow and a thunderous shockwave exploded out across the battlefield. Warriors from both sides fell from the force, leaving the two mighty figures in their own arena to continue their fight.

Josh managed to keep his footing by plunging the spear into the ground. He clung to it with all his strength as a constant gale blasted out from the battle between N’rinde and Geigerzalion.

Dust swirled in the hectic wind but Josh was close enough to see what was happening. He saw the white demon recover from N’rinde’s first attack by balancing himself with his huge leathery wings and then driving forward, his powerful claws slashing into the wispy shadows of N’rinde’s body.

Josh could feel those terrible wounds like faint scratches on his own body and realised that N’rinde was somehow using him to be here. He willed his own slender strength into the shadowy form and felt his consciousness surge from behind his own eyes up high above the battlefield into N’rinde’s head.

He was now struggling spear to claw with the terrible demon and he could sense its overwhelming power. He was also aware of N’rinde’s presence lending him his own natural strength and he began to feel like a cork being squeezed into a fizzing bottle, a buffer between two unstoppable forces.

The next time Geigerzalion landed a raking claw through the shadows, Josh felt the pain as if it was his own. Nothing had ever prepared him for such a feeling, intensified a thousand times over as if the wound was being felt by so many more people than he. He cringed backwards and saw the triumph in the demon’s eyes as it strode forward to deliver the final blow.

Something else stirred within him then. He could feel N’rinde twisting and weaving the golden strands of the lives that were dependent on this battle and suddenly his mind was full of sound. Voices merged with animal calls and he could feel himself swelling up as if N’rinde was pouring souls into him.

Use the spear. N’rinde’s vibrant symbols flowed before his eyes. Use the spear and channel these minds.

Josh knew what to do now. He surged back towards the advancing demon and clashed the spear against its mighty arms, fighting with the ferocity that only desperation can fuel. He ignored the burning tiredness in his arms and the tightness in his chest and continued to batter away at the reeling demon before him.

The spear was a blur in his hands now and he had learned some technique from some of the minds crowding inside his own. He feinted one way and then lunged another. The spear cracked through the demon’s undefended ribcage and into its body.

Geigerzalion roared and clutched at the smoky spear, but there was nothing for his terrible claws to find purchase on. A silence fell across the battlefield and the demon brought his head up to look Josh calmly in the eyes.

“You cannot harm me with this, Joshua. Nothing can harm me here. You are defeated.” And it breathed acid fire into his face.

Josh thought his very nerves were on fire. He could feel his flesh melting away from his bones and his bones turning to ash and yet he held firm onto the spear that was still protruding from the demon’s side.

A rumbling groan rose in his throat and suddenly he could feel the host of souls that N’rinde had pushed inside him coursing through what was left of his body and into the spear. A hundred million minds shrieked past his own, every one of them intent on destroying the monstrous demon that was threatening their home.

Geigerzalion stopped breathing his lethal fire and looked down at the pulsing spear. He scrabbled frantically at it, this time jerky panic drove his movements. Josh drove the spear deeper and the demon fell to its knees.

The dark shape of a tornado fingered its way out of the sky and touched down on the ground around them.

The spear shattered and Geigerzalion slumped to the ground. The wind whipped up ever stronger and Josh could feel himself swirling around in it, no more substantial than smoke. The crumpled demon was caught up in the tornado’s fury and whizzed round and upwards as the funnel of wind rose off the battlefield.

Josh was sucked back into his own body with a jolt and he collapsed onto his back just in time to see the tornado disappear into the clouds. Geigerzalion shrank to no more than a dark dot spinning away in the tumultuous sky and then he was gone.

The heavy metal door collapsed and the dinosaur’s huge head poked through the battered entrance. It snorted once and, just as Kat thought it was going to spring through and devour them, all the lights went out and the room was plunged into darkness.

Kat couldn’t help letting out a small yelp of fright when Coel touched her forearm.

“It’s alright. Don’t be frightened.” He whispered.

“I can’t help it. There’s a dinosaur in here with us.”

“We have to protect Josh. He’s helpless.”

Kat’s stomach lurched. She tried to remember the exact layout of the room and found that she barely knew which direction the door was.

“It’s okay. I know where he is. We must move quietly.”

Kat realised that to Coel the darkness was nothing new. Even without his arcane power he was now the most able person there and she clung to his arm as he tiptoed across the room. She could hear the others stumbling about in the dark, and she was certain that every breath she heard was a prelude to a dinosaur’s snort.

Eventually they reached the makeshift virtual reality station and found Josh’s limp body. His face was slick with sweat; his breathing was ragged, and all too loud. Kat ran her fingers over his features and whispered to him that everything was going to be fine. She didn’t know if he could hear her.

Coel heaved Josh up onto his shoulder and Kat steadied his other side and slowly they made their way towards the door.

Warm, fetid gas made Kat gag, and she realised that the dinosaur was close enough to be breathing on her. She could now sense its enormous bulk somewhere behind her and she stopped breathing.

Josh moaned quietly and Kat froze. Coel pulled them along with a little more urgency and Kat had no choice but to follow. She expected the wicked teeth to close around her at any second. She could feel its hot breath on her neck.

A crash from behind them indicated that someone else had tried to move, knocking something over. Kat felt the end of the dinosaur’s tail slash her back as it whipped around to investigate this new noise.

“Quickly. Hold on.” Coel hissed and pulled Josh even more forcefully. They were now almost running through the pitch darkness. Kat could see nothing, and yet Coel guided them unerringly.

Suddenly, in the distance behind them, she heard an agonised scream. The dinosaur had found someone.

Josh was caught between worlds.

In one he was being dragged along in the darkness supported by unknown hands on either side of him. In the other he was kneeling down looking at a shattered spear.

He could sense a living essence still within the shards of the blade, and he tried to nurse it back to brightness, but it was too weak.

I am spent, now. You did what you had to. A faint thought whispered through his mind and Josh could see the eldritch symbols flowing. We have driven him away for now.

“Will he return?”

Perhaps. I cannot feel his presence on this Earth of ours. He will have to find another way to corrupt us. We should be rejoicing.

“I don’t feel like it. You’re dying aren’t you?”

Yes. But I will still be with you in Trinity Vale. It will be nice to just enjoy the view. You will be fine, Joshua.

He heard a scream, but it was in another world so he ignored it.

You must leave here. The Gazetteer will purify the bodies and tomorrow the world will wake up not knowing how close to catastrophe it has been. Your efforts will not be rewarded or remembered, by anyone other than your friends, but that has always been our lot I am afraid. Now go.

Josh dropped the broken spear and left Vigrid Plane. He found himself in the dark, jostling along a corridor. Although his physical eyes were accustomed to the darkness, his mind wasn’t and he found it difficult to adjust to the sudden change in his environment.

He stumbled and strong arms caught him as he fell.

“Josh?” Kat’s voice was to his left.

“Kat.” His voice was a coarse whisper because his mouth was so dry.

“Shhh! We’re not out of this yet! Remember the dinosaur.” Coel warned. “Come on.”

“Dinosaur?”

A huge crash erupted from behind them, followed by the sound of thunderous feet, accelerating up the corridor.

The three of them started to run as fast as Josh’s injured leg would allow. He could make out the end of the corridor as a dark grey against the absolute blackness of the surrounding walls. He fixed his eyes on it and hurried down the corridor.

They emerged into the light of the chamber of stalagmites and stalactites, which after the utter darkness of the tunnel seemed almost blinding. The two spheres that guarded the entrance to the tunnel were smashed and there was no sign of their saurian inhabitants.

“How many dinosaurs were there inside?” Josh asked.

“I could only sense one.” Coel said. “Why?”

“We’ve got two more to worry about I think, but at least we can see now.”

“Well where are they then?” Kat’s voice was trembling.

A roar answered his question as the pursuing dinosaur hurtled out of the tunnel almost overrunning their position. It quickly turned and stalked towards them. The other two must have been close by, because, to Josh’s horror he saw them approaching from the other direction.

They were trapped.

“Josh. Can you feel them?”

“What?”

“With your mind. Like the minds of New York, or the frog in the jungle. Can you sense their minds?”

“I don’t know.” He closed his eyes and tried to picture the monsters stalking towards them. As he concentrated they materialised into his mind with tendrils of coppery-red lace flowing from their heads.

He snapped his eyes open again and saw that his imagination had placed the dinosaurs exactly. They were close now; so close that Josh could see their teeth glistening like dripping stalactites.

He closed his eyes again. The delicate medusa snakes of thought waved around the dinosaur’s heads and he reached out with his mind, trying to gather them up like a puppet’s strings.

It wasn’t as difficult as with the frog because this mind was much more primitive. Each thought was connected directly to a single action and there was no subtlety in the way this creature worked. Chase, eat, sleep and eat again.

Josh now felt huge and feral and strong. Looking out of the dinosaur’s eyes he saw three soft people cowering before him. They looked delicious.

Part of his mind recoiled from the thought and he struggled to control his hunger. Slowly and delicately he tried to coerce the salivating dinosaur back away from Kat, Coel and himself.

It was fairly easy to stop the dinosaur from doing something, but quite another to actually make it do something he wanted. It was like trying to stop thinking about something when someone keeps reminding you about it. He found the key was to sort of pretend not to be bothered about what you wanted to happen.

He could see the other two dinosaurs standing still and realised that Coel must be controlling both of them. Slowly, they turned around and crashed away. He managed to persuade his dinosaur to follow and they went as deep into the cave as possible.

Now he felt like he had a tiger by the tail. Except, of course, that what he had was three times as big as a tiger and thirty times as toothy and clawed. He also had no idea how long it would take for him to regain control of his own body. If it took too long the dinosaur might be able to race back and devour him before he knew where or who he was. It was a terrifying thought, but he knew that he had to let go at some point.

So, after a very slow count of three to himself, he released the mind of the dinosaur and snapped back into his own body.

He recovered himself almost immediately. Coel must have let go at the same time, because as soon as Josh was seeing out of his own eyes again, Kat and the blind man dragged him away from the dinosaurs and towards the lights of the camp.

Josh could feel the dinosaurs behind them and heard them smashing through the smaller columns of ancient rock in their feral determination to catch them.

“Run!” Coel yelled, warning the people they could see milling about in the camp, as well as encouraging Kat and Josh.

Josh saw them stop what they were doing and peer into the darkness. They were still quite a distance away. Josh added his voice to Coel’s shouting, hoping that they would be able to do something to help. He thought about sending his mind back to the dinosaurs again, but he was using too much effort to run. He would have to stop.

As he slowed, Coel heaved him onward. “Don’t you dare Josh. We need to get out of here. Listen to the rock.”

A splintering shriek echoed through the chamber as he spoke and an enormous boulder crashed to the ground somewhere to the side of them.

“The cavern’s collapsing.” Shouts reached them from the camp.

As they ran, Josh kept looking over his shoulder. He could see the columns snapping like twigs now and the ceiling was shaking and cracking. The dinosaurs were close now and the noise of their thundering pursuit was inaudible over the collapsing of the cavern. Josh heaved in huge mouthfuls of damp air as he ran and his legs felt weak beneath him. Coel stopped him from stumbling and urged him on.

Then with a booming crack the roof completely caved in behind them. The force of the blast knocked them all off their feet and Josh found himself skidding forward on the slick stone. When he came to a halt he was lying down looking back at the devastation and rubble.

“Dad?” He whispered without knowing. Then realisation pulled at his heart. “Dad!” He shouted and tried to stand up. His left leg gave way beneath him as pain lanced through it. As he crumpled to the floor he thought he saw a fragment of bone sticking out through his thigh.

He fainted.

Toby watched the demon disappearing into the cloudy sky and then looked back to the rabble of the dark army. They were confused now, and the gamers picked them off easily enough, and before long there was no ravening horde, just frightened beasts.

Spokes and Bandicoot were hunched over the prone figure of DoomLord. An unhealthy green tinged his skin around his neck, and within these areas his veins were black, as if the blood within them had turned rotten.

The Gazetteer joined them and cradled the warrior’s head in his gnarled hands.

“He fought bravely. I must try to cleanse him of the infection. He must not wake in the real world if we cannot remove every trace of this malignancy. And that goes for all of these poor people.”

“You mean they’re not dead?”

“No, they’re not dead. They will awaken tomorrow. Although naturally some may not because their hearts could not handle the strain of the battle, but the majority should be healthy enough. As long as we get rid of this virus.”

He breathed in the air around DoomLord’s head, sucking it deep within himself. Toby saw a faint shimmering, like steam, flowing from DoomLord’s slack mouth. The Gazetteer held his breath for a second, stood up and coughed green clouds. He wafted a hand in front of his nose to disperse the gas.

“This is going to take longer than I thought.” He looked out over the limitless battlefield covered with bodies.

DoomLord groaned. “This is the worst week of my life. I’ve been defeated twice in the less than a week. I’ll never live this down.”

Spokes laughed. “He’s okay.”

The Gazetteer continued to work tirelessly, healing all the fallen and wounded regardless of which side they had fought for. The air became foggy with the green gas that he drew from them.

“I still can’t get my head round all this.” Toby said quietly.

“I know.” Rose agreed. “To think that the future of all humanity is played out here.”

“All life.” Michael added.

They stood silently for a while and watched as more and more of the healed and unwounded disappeared. The gamers got bored as well and soon they too had all winked out of existence.

“Well I guess we’d all try and get home.” Spokes said. Bandicoot and DoomLord nodded. Toby looked at Rose, but she grinned at him.

“This is only the beginning of my adventures Toby. Don’t worry about me. I hope I can find Vienopolis again, but if I can’t, well…” She shrugged.

Toby smiled at her and watched the others vanish. Then he closed his eyes and thought of home. When he opened them again he was lying on the bed in the spare room.

He turned his head slightly and felt a sharp pain in his neck. In fact whatever he tried to move seemed to hurt. Gingerly, he inched his legs over the edge of the bed and pushed himself into a sitting position.

As if she had been waiting for any sound of movement from outside, his mum bustled into the room.

“Oh, good. You’re awake. I’m glad you’ve managed to have a bit of a sleep. Are you feeling better?”

He nodded and winced.

“You’re not alright are you? Mums know about these types of things. Get back into bed and get some more sleep. Bed rest. That’s what the doctor ordered.”

“But mum!” But it was merely an instinctive reaction. He didn’t want to get out of bed.

“No buts, young man. Now relax and I’ll bring you something nice to eat.”

Toby sighed and lay back onto his pillows again. He closed his eyes for a second, just to see where he would end up and saw the elegant, ancient spires of Vienopolis rising around him.

“Is he waking up?”

“I don’t know.”

“Josh?”

The whispers came from all around him. He opened his eyes and was almost blinded by a light hanging directly over him. A dull humming reverberated through the hard bed he was lying on, and he could feel a sharp pain in his leg.

“Where am I?”

“Oh, Josh. I’m so glad you’re awake. We’ve been so worried about you.” A female voice said.

“My dad? Is my dad okay?” Josh frantically tried to sit up, but he was strapped down by his shoulders and waist. “What’s happening?” Panic juddered through him.

“Calm down, Josh.” His father leant over him and put a cooling hand on his forehead.

“Dad? I thought you’d been… When the roof came down…”

“Shhh. You’re safe. We all are.”

Josh felt the restraints being loosened and he noticed for the first time the thick, white plaster cast on his leg. “We’re going home. We’re on Sir Trevor’s plane, just coming into New York I think.”

“What happened?” Someone had loosened his straps and Josh could sit up now. He was in one of the small bedrooms on the private jet. Kat and Coel were sitting on a sofa opposite the bed and his dad was on a chair next to him. It all seemed so normal.

“After the roof collapsed no one knew what was happening. All the generators failed and it went completely dark again, so we had a hard time even finding you.” Kat’s voice was scolding, as she held him personally responsible for injuring himself.

“I’m sorry…”

“Do you want to hear what happened or not?”

“I’m…”

“Don’t you dare say you’re sorry Joshua Bennett.” She was by the side of his bed now and he could see tears in her eyes. “I’m so glad you’re okay.”

He smiled at her weakly, not knowing whether she was going to attack him or hug him. She did neither. She quickly leant over him, kissed him and hurried out of the room sobbing.

Josh dumbly watched her go. “What…?”

“Don’t worry about it Josh. She’ll be fine. She’s just relieved you’re on the mend. She’s been really worried about you.” Coel said.

“Can you tell me what happened then? Without running away.”

“Well, you must be feeling better.” Coel laughed. “I can fill you in on some of the details, but I think you’ll find you know it already.”

Now Josh laughed. “Er. I don’t think so. The last thing I remember we were being chased by dinosaurs and the cavern collapsed.”

“Did you listen to the rock, Josh? When we were running away?”

“Yeah, it was all I could hear.”

“No. I mean did you sense the rock? Did you feel the mountain?”

Josh shook his head. “Not really. I was thinking about the dinosaurs, I guess.”

“It didn’t collapse by accident, Josh. It was by design. And the design had been calculated by the most powerful intelligence on Earth: Trinity Vale. The microscopic organisms within the rocks were all instructed in a particular way and that was it. Many people will be tired tomorrow after their brains have been used to work that out I can tell you.”

“And they did it so accurately that we all survived?”

“Yeah. We had luck on our side, I suppose. You were the only one with a significant injury. Everyone else came out of the cave with a few bruises and scratches.”

Josh snorted. “Typical.”

“What about the spaceship?”

“Well, that’s buried now. And I don’t think anyone’s going to want to unearth it in a hurry. Sir Trevor seems to have had quite a change of heart about alien technology recently.”

“That’s a relief.” Josh grinned, but then he remembered what N’rinde had told him on the battlefield. “He’s not dead though. Geigerzalion, I mean. N’rinde said we’ve just sent him back and he’ll be trying even harder now.”

“Don’t worry about that. It might be millions of years before he gets another chance. I think you’ve earned some time to relax for now.”

A week later Toby came round to see Josh, who was still confined to his bedroom. He had been watching a news story on the TV about how millions of people around the world had recovered from an unexplained sleeping sickness. The strange thing was that most of the sufferers reported having the same dream.

“Well that’s weird isn’t it?” Toby said wryly. “You’d think people would put it all together don’t you?”

“Not really. Would you have believed it three weeks ago?”

“To be honest, if I didn’t end up in Vienopolis every time I close my eyes, I probably wouldn’t believe it now.” Toby chortled. “Do you know I’m now easily the cleverest living person on the planet?”

“You’ve always told me that, Tobe.”

“Yeah, but it’s true now. Ask me a question. Anything.”

“Erm. What’s the capital of France?”

Toby closed his eyes, and then opened then quickly. “Paris. No. Ask me a really hard question that you think I’d never know the answer to. Ask me a question about books or something like that.”

“Alright then, who wrote ‘The Book Of Three’?”

“Right. Good one. Hang on let me think.” He closed his eyes for a few seconds.

“Toby?”

“Lloyd Alexander.” He said triumphantly reopening his eyes.

“Well that’s not so hard. You might have heard me talking about it.”

“Ask me another then. I’m telling you I know everything.”

Josh narrowed his eyes. “Okay. In the Earthsea novels, what was Ged’s use-name?”

Toby close his eyes again and then said. “Sparrowhawk. I’m right, aren’t I?”

They played this game for a while with Josh asking more and more obscure questions. Toby got every one right.

“How are you doing this? You don’t know anything about George Eliot.”

“I beg to differ, Josh. I think I proven that I know just about everything there is to know about him.”

“Hah! Her. George Eliot’s a woman. You didn’t know that. How can you know when all her books were published, but not know she was female?”

Toby looked a little sheepish. “I’ve got help.”

Josh frowned. “What do you mean? Have you wired yourself up to the Internet or something?”

“Better than that. There’s a building in Vienopolis that acts as a repository for all the information on the net. I can ask it anything I want any time.”

“That’s amazing, Toby.”

Toby grinned. “It’s fab. And it’s useful for school I can tell you. By the way you should hear all the kids talking about their Shiver experience. No one tells the same story, but they’re all claiming that they were there. Everyone who’s ever played a computer game reckons they played the Vigrid Plane level of Shiver. It’s hilarious.”

“I wish I hadn’t been there.” Josh said quietly.

Toby looked at his hands. “It’s a good job you were. No one else could have stopped it you know. Before you arrived it was fragging everyone. You know Jonny White? I think he really played the game, because he brought his console in to school. It actually exploded when he was killed by Geigerzalion.”

Josh smiled at his friend’s excitement and his spirits lifted a little.

“You’re a good friend Toby. Thanks for coming round.”

He had been thinking so much about his new arcane responsibilities that he had almost forgotten that he was still just a boy. Coel had told him not to worry about what could happen, but to concentrate on getting better and enjoying himself.

He looked out of his window and saw a flock of birds flying around and a broad smile crept onto his face.

The world was still turning. And he didn’t seem to have to do any pushing to keep it going.