Drake told her. “He’s fine, though.”
“Fit as a fiddle,” Pestilence chimed.
“My, uh, predecessor,” Drake said, keeping his voice low. “I found out who he is. His name’s Dr Black, he’s a teacher at my school.”
“Really? Interesting. But not our biggest worry at the minute.”
“What? Why? What’s happening?” Drake asked.
They’d left the robo-bullies back near the school. Dim and Spud had spun after them for a few hundred metres, but the horse had easily outpaced them. Even so, Drake shuddered to think what they and Dr Black might be up to now.
“We’re taking Mel home,” Pest said. He leaned round in the saddle. “I like what you’ve done with your hair, by the way.”
“Thanks,” Mel said. “But I don’t want to go home. I want someone to tell me what’s going on.”
“The end of the world,” said Pest. He turned and met Drake’s eye. “We’ve had the call.”
“What call?” asked Mel.
“The call?” Drake gasped.
“What call? Will someone please tell me what’s happening?”
The horse stopped, suddenly and without warning. Drake looked along a gravel driveway at a large house with two cars parked out front.
He swung down, just a little awkwardly. Mel dismounted beside him. She stared at him expectantly. “Well?”
“Look, the thing is,” Drake said. “I’m not really entirely sure what’s going on myself, so I don’t know how to explain any of it.”
“Try.”
Drake’s mouth moved, as if testing out the words before he said them. “The Horsemen of the Apocalypse live in my garden,” he said. “No, wait, that makes me sound mental.”
“It does a bit,” Mel agreed.
Drake tried to think of another way of phrasing it. “No,” he realised, “that’s pretty much it. The Horsemen of the Apocalypse live in my garden. Or three of them do, anyway. Dr Black used to be the fourth. He was Death, but he got bored of waiting for the Apocalypse, so he left to destroy the world on his own. And so I’m the new one.”
“You’re the new Death?” Mel said.
Drake smiled faintly. “Pretty hard to believe, right?”
“So, who’s he?” she asked, jabbing a thumb at the man on horseback beside them.
“Pestilence,” Drake said. “He’s not really my Uncle Bob. I made that up.”
Mel nodded. “I didn’t think he looked like a Bob.”
“Thank you! See? I thought maybe Alejandro or—”
“Not now, Pest.”
Mel looked at the two of them, then at the horse. “So, what happens now?” she asked.
Drake’s eyes widened. “What, you mean you believe me?”
“I just saw a cat change into a... thing that wasn’t a cat,” Mel said. “And some kids I’ve known for ten years become killer robot hula-hoops. Right now, I’ll believe pretty much anything you tell me.”
Drake found himself smiling. Mel didn’t join in.
“So, it’s happening?” she asked. “He’s really going to destroy the world, like you said?”
Drake nodded. “It looks like it.”
“We need to move,” said Pestilence softly. “The others will be waiting.”
“Uh, yeah,” Drake mumbled. “Just a minute.”
“We made a deal, remember?” Mel said. “This morning. We made a deal. I thought you were kidding, but… we made a deal. If he’s trying to destroy the world, we stop him, remember?”
He nodded. “I remember.”
“OK, then. Good,” she said. She leaned in and kissed him, just briefly, on the lips.
“What was that for?” he asked, when she pulled away.
“Luck,” Mel said. “Something tells me you’re going to need it.”
The shed looked different when Drake and Pest stepped inside. It took Drake a moment to realise why. The square table at which the horsemen usually sat had been pushed off to one side. Three of the chairs were stacked neatly on top of it. Famine’s reinforced seat was half tucked underneath.
“High time you got here,” said War as they both entered. He bent down and caught hold of a circle of metal that was set into the floor. Had the table still been there, the handle would have been almost completely concealed.
War pulled and a wide hatch swung upwards, revealing a stairway leading down into a brightly lit chamber beneath the shed. “Famine’s already down there,” he said. “Getting ready.”
“Getting ready?” said Drake. “What do you mean, getting ready?”
“Well, he’s hardly going to usher in the Apocalypse in a baggy grey tracksuit, is he?” War said. “He’s getting into uniform, like we all should’ve done ten minutes ago.”
“No, but listen, it’s not the real Apocalypse,” Drake said. “It’s Dr Black, the old Death, he’s the one doing it.”
War blinked. “So?”
“So? What do you mean, so? So it’s not the real Apocalypse.”
“Who’s to say what is and isn’t