MaddAddam (MaddAddam 3)

"They'll think you're a hibiscus," says Crozier.

"This is a rifle," says Toby. "I'm the only one here who knows how to use it. So button up." They all grin.

Then they set forth.

The three Pigoon scouts are out in front, snuffling along the ground. To either side of them, two more act as outriders, testing the air with the wet disks of their snouts. Odour radar, thinks Toby. What vibrations well beyond our blunted senses are they picking up? As falcons are to sight, these are to scent.

Six younger Pigoons - barely more than shoats - are running messages between the scouts and outriders and the main van of older and heavier Pigoons: the tank battalion, had they been armoured vehicles. Despite their bulk, they can move surprisingly fast. At the moment they're keeping a steady pace, conserving their energy: a marathon gait, not a sprint. There's not much grunting going on, and no squealing: like soldiers on a long march, they're saving their breath. Their tails are curled but inactive, their pink ears are aimed forward. Lit by the morning sun, they look almost like a cartoon version of cute, huggable, smiling pigs, Valentine pigs clutching red heart-shaped candy boxes, the kind with Cupid wings: If This Little Piggie Could Fly He'd Bring You My Love!

But only almost. These pigs aren't smiling.

If we were carrying a flag, thinks Toby, what would be on it?

At first the going is easy. They cross the flattened part of the meadow, which still has a few handbags and boots and bones poking out of the ground from where the plague victims had fallen. If they'd been covered by weeds these objects might have tripped up the marchers, but because they're visible they're easy to avoid.

The Mo'Hairs have been turned loose and are grazing on the far edge of the meadowland that's been left for pasture. Five young Pigoons have been deputized to watch over them. They don't seem to be taking their duties very seriously, which means they smell no danger. Three are rooting around in the plant life, one is rolling in a damp patch of mud, and the fifth is dozing. Would the five of them be a match for a liobam, should one attack? No doubt of it. A pair of liobams? Possibly even that. But before they'd even get close, the youngsters would have the entire Mo'Hair flock rounded up and trotting back to the Spa.

After leaving the meadow the procession takes the roadway to the north, cutting through the forest that borders the AnooYoo grounds and conceals its perimeter fence. The northern gatehouse is deserted: no sign of life in or around it, apart from a rakunk that's sunning itself on the walkway. It stands up as they approach but doesn't bother to run away. Overly friendly, those animals: in a harsher world they'd all be hats by now.

The city streets that come next are harder to navigate. Crashed and deserted vehicles clog the pavement, which is littered with shattered glass and twists of metal. Already the kudzu vines are thrusting in, covering the broken shapes with a soft fledging of green. The Pigoons pick their way daintily, avoiding injury to their trotters; the humans have thick footgear. Still, they need to proceed carefully and glance down often.

Toby has anticipated the problems Blackbeard might have on these streets, with their shards and cutting edges. True, his feet have an extra-thick layer of skin on them, and that's fine for earth and sand and even pebbles; but, as a precaution, Toby has rummaged through the MaddAddamites' stockpile of gleaned footgear and fitted Blackbeard with a pair of Hermes Trismegistus cross-trainers. At first he was very worried about putting such things on his feet - would they hurt, would they stick to him, would he ever be able to get them off? But Toby showed him how to put them on and then take them off again, and said that if his feet got cut by sharp things he wouldn't be able to come any farther, and then who would be able to tell them what the Pigoons were thinking? So after several practice sessions he has agreed to wear them. The shoes have appliqued green wings on them and lights that flash with every step he takes - the batteries haven't run down yet - and he is now perhaps a little too delighted with them.

He's up at the front of the main body, listening to the intelligence reports of the Pigoon scouts, if you could call it listening: receiving them, in any case, however he does that. Evidently he hasn't learned anything yet that's important enough to pass along. He glances back now and then, keeping track of Zeb, and also of Toby. There's that jaunty little wave of his hand again, which must mean All is well. Or maybe just I see you, or Here I am, or even, just possibly, Look at my cool shoes! His high, clear singing comes to her on the air in short bursts: the Morse code of Crakerdom.

The Pigoons alongside tilt their heads to look up at their human allies from time to time, but their thoughts can only be guessed. Compared with them, humans on foot must seem like slowpokes. Are they irritated? Solicitous? Impatient? Glad of the artillery support? All of those, no doubt, since they have human brain tissue and can therefore juggle several contradictions at once.

They appear to have assigned three guards to each of the gunbearers. The guards don't crowd, they don't herd or dictate, but they keep withi

n a two-yard radius of their charges, their ears swivelling watchfully. The MaddAddamites without sprayguns have one Pigoon each. Jimmy, on the other hand, has five. Are they conscious of his fragility? So far he's been keeping up, but he's beginning to sweat.

Toby drops back to check on him. She hands him her water bottle: he seems already to have emptied his own. All eight Pigoons - her three, his five - shift their positions to surround both of them.

"The Great Wall of Pork," says Jimmy. "The Bacon Brigade. The Hoplites of Ham."

"Hoplites?" says Toby.

"It was a Greek thing," says Jimmy. "Citizens' army type of arrangement. A wall of interlocked shields. I read it in a book." He's a little short of breath.

"Maybe it's an honour guard," says Toby. "Are you okay?"

"These things make me nervous," says Jimmy. "How do we know they aren't leading us astray so they can ambush us and gobble our giblets?"

"We don't know that," says Toby. "But I'd say the odds are against it. They've already had the opportunity."

"Occam's razor," says Jimmy. He coughs.

"Pardon?" says Toby.

"It was a Crake thing," says Jimmy sadly. "Given two possibilities, you take the simplest. Crake would have said 'the most elegant.' The prick."

"Who was Occam?" says Toby. Is that a slight limp?

"Some kind of a monk," says Jimmy. "Or bishop. Or maybe a smart pig. Occ Ham." He laughs. "Sorry. Bad joke."

They walk on for a block or two in silence. Then Jimmy says, "Sliding down the razor blade of life."

"Excuse me?" Toby says. She'd like to feel his forehead. Is he running a temperature?