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the elevator doors opening and sliding shut.
    All clear , Daniel gave him the signal.
    It was a close fit, even tighter than it had been in the ducts, but by breathing in as much as he could Leonard managed to wriggle his way up through the small space between the side of the car and the wall of the shaft. On the roof of the car there was a hatchway, but as Leonard went to open it he noticed something about the car that made him uneasy.
    How does it stay up? , he asked Daniel. He could not see any cables or wires holding the elevator car in place. The entire car hovered unsupported in mid-air inside the shaft, as if by magic.
    Anti-gravity , Daniel told him, as though it answered everything.
    Still unsatisfied, Leonard wanted to ask another question and find out more. Daniel's voice had sounded impatient though, so instead he forced the hatchway open and squeezed himself down into the car. Inside, to the side of the elevator's interior door, he saw a long triple row of buttons, each marked with a different number. Leonard knew his numbers, even if he wasn't so good when it came to reading words and such. He pressed the button marked "200" and waited for the car to start moving.
    Nearly there , he told Daniel as the elevator begin to rise. Inwardly, he still wondered about anti-gravity. It was another of the city's mysteries. Trying to puzzle it out for himself, Leonard realised anti--gravity must be the opposite of gravity. It felt like some kind of breakthrough. Now, if he could only get Daniel to explain to him what gravity was, he figured the whole thing might start to make sense.
    There was a small display panel set above the elevator's doors. It counted up the numbers of the building's floors as the elevator rose past them. Once again, Leonard was struck by how smart Daniel was. When his friend had first told him the bad man was on the two-hundredth floor, Leonard had imagined having to climb the entire two hundred storeys the same way he would a mountain. This way made his life a whole lot easier.
    Suddenly, with the display counter at one hundred and ninety, the elevator stopped.
    "You have requested a floor in the restricted access zone," a polite voice piped up from inside the metal grille next to the elevator buttons. Caught by surprise, Leonard nearly jumped out of skin. "Please insert your building keycard and enter your personal identification number if you wish to continue."
    Peering closely at the grille, Leonard breathed a sigh of relief as he realised there was a talking machine hidden somewhere inside it. Of all the strange sights and sounds of the city, he had found it hardest to get used to the fact there were machines that talked. In the Cursed Earth, machines were just machines. In the city though, they all seemed to have their own voices. Cars warned their drivers to make sure they were wearing their seatbelts. Doors told you to stand clear when they were opening, and to have a nice day as you left them. One time, Leonard had even encountered a garbage bin that had thanked him for his litter. Frankly, he found it kind of creepy. In Mega-City One it was like the machines were so lonely and desperate for conversation they could not bear to let anyone pass through a door or throw away a food wrapper in silence.
    We're going have to climb the rest of the way , Daniel said. Leonard could feel the little boy's impatience inside his head; an urgent sensation growing stronger. It's just another ten floors, Leonard. Another ten floors, and then we'll be there .
    Ten floors. It didn't sound so much, but Leonard soon found out climbing an elevator shaft from the inside was trickier than it looked. Squeezing out again through the hatch in the car roof, Leonard grabbed a good hold of the shaft wall and began to climb it while Daniel held tight round his neck and hung from his back. The wall was smooth and sheer, its surface slippery with an oily lubricant. To make progress, Leonard had to push his fingers into the