Terry Pratchett - Johnny and the Bomb

"Won't mention it ever again," said Yoless.

"If we do, may we be pulled apart by wild Vegans," said Bigmac, smirking.

"No, vegans are the people who don't eat animal products," said Yoless. "You mean Vulcans. Vulcans are the ones with green blood-"

"Will you lot shut up? Here's me not even being born and you're goin' on about daft aliens!" said Wobbler.

"What did we do here that changed the future?" said Johnny, turning around.

"Practically everything, I suppose," said Kirsty. "And Bigmac left all his stuff at the police station."

"They shot at me-"

"Let's face it," said Yoless, "anything we do changes the future. Maybe we bumped into someone so he was five seconds late crossing the road and got hit by a car or something. Like treading on a dinosaur. Any little thing changes the whole of history."

"That's daft," said Bigmac "I mean, rivers still flow the same way no matter how the little fish swim."

"Er ... " said Wobbler. "There was this ... kid ..."

He said it in the slow, plonking tones of someone who is afraid that he might have come up with an important piece of evidence.

"What kid?" said Johnny.

"Just some kid," said Wobbler. "He was running away from home or something. To home, I mean. All long shorts and bogeys up the nose."

"What do you mean, running to home?"

"Oh, he was goin' on about being evacuated here and being fed up and running off back to London. But he followed me back into town throwing stones at me 'cos he said I was a spy. He's probably still outside, "s'matter of fact. He ran off down that road there."

"Paradise Street?" said Johnny.

"What about it?" said Wobbler, looking worried.

"It's going to be bombed tonight," said Kirsty. "Johnny's got a thing about it."

"Hah, can't see any Germans wanting to bomb him, he was practically on their side," said Wobbler.

"Are you sure it was Paradise Street?" said Johnny. "Are you sure? Did you have any relatives there? Grandparents? Great-grandparents?"

"How should I know? That was ages ago!"

Johnny took a deep breath. "It's right now!"

"I-I-I don't know! One of my grandads lives in Spain and the other one died before I was born!"

"How?" said Kirsty.

"Fell off a motorbike, I think. In 1971." Wobbler brightened up. "See? So that's all right."

"Oh, Wobbler, Wobbler, it's not all right!" said Johnny. "Get it into your head! Where did he live?"

Wobbler was trembling, as he always did when life was getting too exciting.

"I dunno! London, I think! My dad said he came up here in the war! And then later on he came back on a visit and met my grandma! Er! Er!"

"Go on! Go on!" said Johnny.

"Er! Er!" Wobbler stuttered.

"How old was he when he died?" said Yoless.

"Er! Forty, my dad said! Er! He'd bought the bike for his birthday!"

"So he's ... " Johnny subtracted in his head, " ... ten now?"

"Er! Er!"

"You don't think he was that boy, do you?" said Yoless.

"Oh, yes," said Wobbler, finally giving up panic for anger. "I should have asked him, should I? "Hello, are you going to be my grandad? PS don't buy a motorbike"?"

Johnny fished in his gas mask box and pulled out a crumpled folder stuffed with bits of paper.

"Did he mention any names?" he said, flicking through the pages.

"Er! Er! Someone called Mrs Density!" said Wobbler, desperation throwing up a memory.

"Number Eleven," said Johnny, pulling out a photocopy of a newspaper clipping. "Lived there with her daughter Gladys. I got all the names for my project."

"My gran's name was Gladys!" said Wobbler. "You mean, because he didn't run off back to London, he's going to die tonight and I'm not going to be born?"

"Could be," said Yoless.

"What'll happen to me?"

"You'll just have to stay here," said Johnny.

"No ways This is the olden days! It's awful! I went past a cinema and it's all old movies! In black and white! And there was this cafe and you know what they'd got chalked on a board in front? "Meat and two veg"! What kind of food is that? Even Hong Kong Henry's takeaway tells you what kind of meat!

Everyone dresses like someone out of Eastern Europe! I'd go round the bend here!"

"My grandad always goes on about how they used to have so much fun when he was a kid even though they didn't have anything," said Bigmac.

"Yes, but everyone's grandad says that," said Kirsty. "It's compulsory. It's like where they say "50p for a chocolate bar? When I was young you could get one and still have change out of sixpence."

"I think they had fun," said Johnny, "because they didn't know they didn't have anything."

"Well, I know," said Wobbler. "I know about food that's more than two colours, and stereo systems, and decent music and ... and all kinds of stuff! I want to go home!"

They all looked at Johnny.

"You got us into this," said Yoless.

Me.

"It's your imagination," said Kirsty. "It's too big for your head, just like Sir J ... " She stopped. "Just like I've always said," she corrected herself, "and it drags everyone else along with it. I don't know how, but it does. You got all worked up about Paradise Street, and now here we are."

"You said it didn't make any difference if the street got bombed or not," said Johnny. "You said it was just history!"

"I don't want to be history!" moaned Wobbler.

"All right, you win," said Kirsty. "What do you want us to do?"

Johnny shuffled the papers.

"Well ... what I found out for my project was that ... there was a big storm, you see. The weather got very bad. And the bombers must've seen Blackbury and dropped their bombs anyway and turned around. That used to happen. There was ... there is an air raid siren. It was supposed to go off if bombers were near," he said. "Only it didn't."

"Why not?"

The folder shut with a snap.

"Let's start by finding out," said Johnny.

It was on a pole on the roof in the High Street. It didn't look very big.

"That's all it is?" said Yoless. "Looks like a giant yoyo."

"That's an air-raid siren all right," said Kirsty. "I saw a picture in a book."

"How d'they work? Set off by radar or something?"

"I'm sure that's not been invented yet," said Johnny.

"Well, how then?"

"Maybe there's a switch somewhere?"

"It'd be somewhere safe, then," said Yoless. "Somewhere where people wouldn't be able to set it off for a laugh."

Their joint gaze travelled down the pole, across the roof, down the wall, past the blue lamp, and stopped when it met the words: "Police Station".

"Oh, dear," said Yoless.

They sat down on a bench by a civic flowerbed, opposite the door. A policeman came out and stood in the sunshine, watching them back.

"It's a good job we left Bigmac to guard the trolley," said Yoless.

"Yes," said Johnny. "He's always been allergic to policemen."

Kirsty sighed. "Honestly, you boys haven't got a clue."

She stood up, crossed the road and began to talk to the policeman. They could hear the conversation. It went like this:

"Excuse me, officer-"

He gave her a friendly smile.

"Yes, little lady? Out in your mum's clothes, are you?"

Kristy's eyes narrowed.

"Oh, dear," said Johnny, under his breath.

"What's the matter?" said Yoless.

"Well, you know you and wouldn't "Sambo"? That's Kirsty and words like "little lady"."***

"I was just wondering", said the little lady, through clenched teeth, "how that big siren works."

"Oh, I shouldn't worry your head about that, love," said the policeman. "It's very complicated. You wouldn't understand."

"Look for something to hide behind," said Johnny. "Like another planet."

Then his mouth dropped open as Kirsty won a medal.

"It's just that I get so worried," she said, and managed a simper, or what she probably thought was a simper. "I'm sure Mr Hitler"s bombers are going to come one night and the siren won't go off. I can't get to sleep for worrying!"