Num8ers by Rachel Ward

was pitch-black, unnatural.
    “I don’t like this, Spider. It’s too bloody dark. Let’s find somewhere with some streetlights. This is too weird.”
    “No, man. If it’s light, people will see. We won’t last five minutes. You won’t notice the difference when you’ve gotyour eyes shut. Look, climb in the back and lie down. You’ll be alright there.”
    “Where are you going?”
    “Nowhere — I’ll kip here.” His long limbs only just fit into the front; his head was brushing the ceiling.
    “No, I’m alright here,” I said. “I can tip the seat back. You get in the back, bit more space for you.”
    So much for old-fashioned gallantry. He agreed straightaway and got out of the driver’s door and into the back. He leaned over and rummaged behind the seat, then passed a blanket over to me.
    I wrapped it ’round my shoulders and wriggled down, trying to make myself comfortable. I closed my eyes, but all I could see were the images from the TV: the space where the pod used to be on the Eye, bits of blue parka, a shredded straw bag. I could see the queue again, those faces looking at me. I opened my eyes, but there was no relief, nothing to focus on, just the wretched blackness of a country lane. The darkness was so dense, there could be anything out there. There could be a bloody great bloke with a knife just a few feet from the car, and we wouldn’t see him until he loomed up to the windows, pressed his hands and face against the glass, grotesquely distorted, yanked open the doors, and…
    “You awake, Spider?”
    “Yeah.” I could hear him shifting around. “I’m so knackered, but I can’t sleep. My brain won’t switch off, it’s like I’m wired.”
    “I’m scared. I don’t like it here.”
    I felt his hand reach ’round the side of my seat, patting my arm. I got my hand out of the blanket and intertwined my fingers with his. His hand felt like it was twice the size of mine — long fingers and knobbly knuckles. He gently stroked the base of my thumb with his, soothing me without words. I guess I must have nodded off, because the next thing I knew a gray, silvery light was filling the car through fogged-up windows, and Spider was getting into the driver’s seat.
    “Time to go, Jem. We’ll find some nice wheels and get some miles behind us before everyone wakes up.”
    He turned the car around, and we headed back to the suburbs of the sleeping town. I was flung forward as he suddenly slammed on the brakes. A fox was crossing the road in front of us, a big bugger. Spider smiled as it melted away into a hedge.
    “Glad I didn’t hit him. He’s the same as us, Jem. A thief, out and about, nice and early. Respect, Mister Fox.”
    We carried on, soon finding some quiet suburban streets full of parked cars. Despite it being God knows what time, Spider was wide-awake, his eyes flicking along the rows of cars, checking things out. After a bit, he pulled up and nodded toward the other side of the road, where a big old station wagon was parked.
    “That’s the one, Jem. Get all the stuff in the bags. Let’s do this quickly, and no noise.” He held his long, bony index finger up to his mouth and winked. He was loving this.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN
     
    “Stay here. I’ll just suss it out.”
    Spider swung out of the car and darted across the road. He did a quick tour ’round the station wagon and came back.
    “Yeah, that’s fine. No wheel lock or nothing. Get all the stuff together, blankets and everything.”
    “Just a minute.” I reached into the glove compartment and pulled out the bill to McNulty. I scrabbled about for a pen and found an old pencil stub. In the smallest print I could manage, I wrote in the corner of the letter:
The end—12252023.
A parting gift to the cruel bastard.
    “What the hell are you doing?” Spider hissed at me. “We’ve got to go before the neighbors’ curtains start twitching. Come on!”
    I dropped the letter onto the floor, gathered up my stuff, and got out of