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might hijack the lyrics for a killing
spree.
    When they reached the Suffolk town, they could have hung out with the police, the ambulance staff or the fire service. In the event of a disaster, all three would receive an emergency call at
the same time. Jordan and Kate could be on the scene in the first wave. Angel had cleared the way for them to visit the fire station. It was obvious to Jordan that Kate relished looking round the
place and chatting to the firefighters. He guessed that, for her, it brought back fond memories. For Jordan, the waiting was dull.
    No aeroplanes fell from the sky and landed on sleepy Sudbury. No bombs went off. There wasn’t even a power cut. There was a hoax call in the morning and a traffic accident in the
afternoon. The fire officers had to cut an injured driver out of his car. It was nearly evening when a 999 call reported a house on fire.
    “Is this it?” Kate asked. “A house going up in flames?”
    Jordan shrugged. “Not exactly the end of civilization.”
    The officer on the phone shouted over her shoulder, “Neighbour says it’s an old disabled woman living on her own in a computer-controlled house.”
    At once, Jordan and Kate looked at each other and nodded. A home with that sort of technology could be a target for Short Circuit.
    They hitched a ride to the emergency. When they got there, broken glass was falling from the windows of the house and flames were flashing from the holes. In Jordan’s sensitive ears, the
fire roared. Horrified neighbours were standing around with their hands over their mouths. By the time the firefighters directed their hoses at the blazing house, the door and window frames had
blackened completely. The right-hand side of the roof had caved in and tiles were collapsing into the hole.
    Jordan turned away. The temperature was so high that the whole place glowed intense yellow in the infrared part of his vision. The brightness was too much for him.
    A sudden explosion made him turn back. The solar panel on the left-hand side of the roof had shattered and a large glass tube was hurtling like a javelin towards one of the firefighters. Its
edge was a circle of jagged glass. The fireman had frozen, terrified. The tube would not just pierce him. Like a rapidly moving bullet, it would go straight through him. A neighbour screamed as
Jordan launched himself in front of the officer. His artificial arm intercepted the deadly arrow, clipping its side and deflecting it from its course.
    Jordan hit the ground and rolled over twice before he could look back. The glass javelin was poking out of a flower bed and the firefighter was blinking, recovering from the near miss. He looked
down at Jordan and said, “Are you okay?”
    Jordan got to his feet. “No problem. Are you?”
    The officer took a deep breath and nodded. “Yes. Thanks. I’ve...er...”
    “Got a job to do?”
    “Yes.” Before he made for one of the fire appliances, he said, “Thanks again.”
    Once the hoses had done their job and the heat was bearable, a firefighter in full protective gear went inside, but he was too late to save the life of the only occupant. Victoria Truman had
succumbed to toxic fumes well before the fire had reached her body.
    What else could Jordan do? At the scene, there were only shocked friends and neighbours. There was no sign of a bad guy running away. If Short Circuit had hacked into her computer, he could have
been on the far side of the planet but, according to Raven, if he’d used an e-bomb or hardware Trojan, he’d have needed to be quite close. Then, if the fire really was his handiwork, he
would probably have left the area well before the emergency services arrived. There was no one to chase, nothing requiring the power of a bionic agent.
    Jordan and Kate talked to some of Victoria’s neighbours, gathering information about her, but they heard nothing that helped them to understand why Short Circuit might attack her. They
hung around in Sudbury until