‘Take his gun,’ said Lewis, ‘before he shoots me in the foot.’

Inside the room, Maxie and Blue had silently forced the window open and were seeing if there was any way they could remove the bars that blocked it.

They turned together as the door swung open.

One of the guards from outside, the one with the big nose, stumbled into the room. Behind him came Lewis and Achilleus, who was carrying the guard’s rifle.

Maxie set her face into a cold mask.

‘What do you want?’ she said.

‘It’s like that scene in Star Wars,’ said Lewis. ‘We’ve come to rescue you.’

Maxie laughed without much humour.

‘Straight up,’ said Achilleus. ‘And you’d better hurry, we ain’t got much time before David realizes what’s going on.’

‘I don’t get it,’ said Maxie. ‘I thought you were on his side.’

‘That prick?’ said Achilleus. ‘You got to be kidding me. The only side I’m on is my side. And as I see it, that’s your side too, Maxie. And yours, Blue.’

‘You can count me in,’ said the girl from the Museum.

‘Who’s she?’ said Achilleus.

‘I’ll explain later,’ said Maxie. ‘All you need to know for now is that she’s coming with us.’

‘Fair enough.’

‘Where’s everyone else?’ said Maxie.

‘If it’s all gone to plan Whitney should be waiting for us outside on the parade ground with the other kids. We’re all going over the wire. We’ve had to keep it quiet in case David found anything out. But so far so good.’

‘But David’s bound to find out what’s going on,’ said Maxie. ‘He’ll try and stop us.’

‘We created a diversion,’ said Lewis. ‘Let out his pets. With any luck the palace bozos are going to be way too busy to notice we’ve gone till it’s too late.’

‘My man,’ said Blue and he gave Lewis a hug.

Achilleus looked at Maxie. ‘You want a hug?’

‘Nope.’

‘Didn’t think so.’

They went to the door and checked that the coast was clear.

‘Wait!’ Big Nose shouted, and they turned round, ready for anything.

‘Take me with you.’

‘What?’

‘I’ve had enough of David’s crap. Please. Take me with you. He’ll only punish me if I stay.’

‘Fine with me,’ said Achilleus. ‘But if you try any funny stuff, Big Nose, you’re sausage meat.’

Five minutes later the six of them burst out through the front arch on to the parade ground, where they found all the Holloway crew assembled in battle formation, ready to leave. Maxie laughed and whooped and tilted her face up into the rain to shout ‘Yes!’ at the top of her voice.

Paddy The Caddie hobbled over to Achilleus, struggling beneath the weight of his golf-bag and Achilleus’ shield.

‘You need your spear yet, Akkie?’

‘Not yet, caddie-boy. Give me one of them cans, though.’

Whitney gave the order and the whole group marched towards the already-open gates. Maxie could hardly believe it. Ten minutes ago everything had looked hopeless. And now they were walking to freedom.

It wasn’t over yet, though.

As they were trooping out on to the road there came a shout from the balcony.

‘Where do you think you’re going?’

It was David. He had Jester and five guards with him. The guards were training their rifles down towards the block of kids.

‘We’re off,’ said Maxie. ‘You blew it. That’s all you need to know.’

‘I don’t think so,’ David shouted. ‘You go any further and I’ll order my guards to open fire. And don’t think I won’t, because –’

There was a sharp crack and one of the guards fell back with a cry.

He’d been hit by a slingshot. From this distance it wouldn’t kill him, but it sure would hurt. Maxie looked round. Ollie was already fitting another steel ball into its pouch and pulling back the elastic. His skirmishers were with him. The next moment a hailstorm of shot was rattling up on to the balcony. David’s guards ducked down and cowered behind the parapet, Jester ran back indoors and David was left crouching behind a pillar.

The Holloway kids laughed and jeered, and with Ollie’s missile unit watching their backs, they all safely left the palace grounds.

As they regrouped in the road one of the little kids pointed to the Victoria Memorial and shouted. ‘Look at that!’

Achilleus was standing there. He had added his own message to Freak’s. Big clumsy red letters spelled out two words.

FREAK LIVES.

And under them the tag – ‘AKKIE DEAKY’.

Maxie smiled and ran over to Achilleus. This time she hugged him.

‘I finally figured out what Freak’s original message meant,’ said Achilleus. ‘I was wrong about him. Blamed him for what went down with Deke and Arran. Wasn’t his fault, any more than it was mine. Should have listened to him more. He was all right. He believed in what Arran believed in. For us to be together and strong and to do the right thing. In the end, all the bad stuff that happened to us, as well as all the good stuff, we got to share.’

‘I thought you’d gone over to David’s side,’ said Maxie. ‘I thought you liked it here.’

Achilleus shrugged. ‘Once I found out David had locked you up, that was it. You’re one of us, Maxie. You’re our leader. And besides, it’s like I said, I wasn’t gonna sit around here counting potatoes. I go where the action is.’

‘And what about Ollie?’

‘You best ask him yourself. That boy is way too complex for me.’

As the kids tramped off down the road singing a selection of TV themes, Maxie went to find Ollie.

‘I thought you’d sold me out,’ she said.

‘It did cross my mind,’ he said with a grin. ‘I genuinely thought David had a good set-up here. I didn’t want to leave. But at the same time, I never really trusted him and I needed to find out how far he’d take things.’

‘All that stuff you gave him in the sick-bay…’

‘By then I’d found out. He’d played his hand. And the last thing I wanted was to get locked up in there with you and Blue. Someone had to tell the others what was going on.’

‘You’re a devious little red-haired rat,’ said Maxie. ‘But I love you.’

‘Steady on, girl,’ said Ollie.

Maxie went to take her place at the front and Ollie was left with his thoughts.

He looked at his watch. Quarter to eleven. Not long till midnight.

He hadn’t told anybody about tomorrow. The others may have forgotten what date it was, even what day it was, but not Ollie. He had it all logged.

Tomorrow was his birthday.

Ollie knew a lot of things, but he had no idea what was going to happen to him as he got older. None of them did. If you made it to the end of the day, then it was a good day. You didn’t think any further ahead than that. The future was a mystery.

How could Ollie know if he’d get sick or not? He was only a kid after all.

He would just have to wait and see.

They marched down the middle of the road. Maxie, Blue, Achilleus, Paddy the Caddie and the girl from the Museum at the front with a fighting crew. Whitney in the middle with Maeve, Ben and Bernie, all the non-fighters and the little kids. Blu-Tack Bill, Monkey-Boy and Ella fussing over Godzilla. Big Nose walking with them, not sure if he’d made the right decision. Lewis and his fighters were on one flank, Big Mick on the other with the gun he’d taken from the guard. Ollie at the back with the other skirmishers.

The little kids weren’t scared. They’d been through too much together for that. They knew that the big kids would look after them. They trusted that they’d find a safe place to sleep and food and water.

They headed west away from the palace. And as they entered Belgrave Square they came across a group of ten grown-ups who were eating a dead dog. When they lifted their heads from their filthy meal and saw the resolute army of kids approaching they were like rabbits caught in the headlights.

Weapons bristled from the front rank of kids.