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He introduced them as Miquel Serrano Domínguez and his sister, Eleana. They both work on La Batalla, one of the anarchist newspresses. I shook hands with Serrano Domínguez. Both Catalonians were shorter than myself – I seem to be head and shoulders above most here. Eleana reached over and shook my hand as well. Eleana asked if I was, as McNair had told her, a writer and what I was working on. I explained that I’m just in the notes stage at the moment. We talked for a few minutes, both in French.

Serrano Domínguez sat, putting his camera on the table and smiling at my accent.

‘Perhaps you will consider writing an article for La Batalla,’ Serrano Domínguez spoke in English, ‘when you have been up to the front?’

I tried to explain that I was a novelist, not an essayist.

* * *

There were six, for his first attempt. The information had contained instructions and a crosscheck had brought up the necessary biological information. It was a simple matter, for one who belonged to the System. Gather the information from inside the brains of the planet’s inhabitants.

The information from one creature was poor: its vision was limited to shapes and vague colours. Its fine sense of smell was intriguing but it lacked the complex language of the humans and its hearing was too sensitive to be of much use. It found humans painfully loud. The Absolute withdrew his connection from the alley cat: it didn’t provide useful information.

The humans were much more interesting though. He started small, concentrating on a group sat at a café.

She perceived the tall, thin Englishman as a tourist. Blair looked too ailing to be a fighter, especially with the long scarf wrapped so tight around his throat. He was here to watch, not to participate. Her brother was talking in English to the man, telling him about the days and night they had spent on the barricades back in July. He was neglecting to mention the smell of blood baking on the cobblestones in the sun, or the hours longing for it to be over. Miquel always did like to glamorise the struggle. McNair was quiet, sitting back smoking a cigarette, having heard this before.

He was watching Blair’s reaction to Serrano Domínguez’s story. Blair was nodding and smiling, only occasionally asking questions. He had checked Blair’s credentials, risking a message to London to be sure the stranger wasn’t a CP spy. Eleana was looking thinner than she had a few weeks ago – the rationing was starting to bite. The waitress was prettier though.

The four were poor and two were English, with their coarse pale faces. All angles and elbows. They might tip, since they were still in the habit. Tips would pay for a new pair of stockings, perhaps. That Eleana, she wouldn’t miss her if she never came to the café again. With her fat face and her scruffy hair, dragging her poor brother about.

The newcomer was wide-eyed, listening to his every word, impressed with his valiant fighting in the streets back in July. It had been an exciting time, never a dull moment as the streets ran with blood and they had defeated the regular army with ease. This Blair was old, his face was lined and pockmarked and he coughed like a consumptive. This must be his first visit to somewhere as insane as Barcelona, he looked so awed. McNair was listening with rapt attention too, only Eleana looked bored. Perhaps the Englishman would take down his story and send it to England, to be published.

The Spanish photographer talked a lot, and fast, in a mix of French and Spanish, so he had to concentrate to understand even half the story he was being told. The distorted song that had started up from the loudspeaker in the next café made hearing the boy’s story even more difficult, though the others seemed to hear fine. The woman wore the coarse clothing of the working classes but he had heard her accent and knew she was slumming it.

This was no good: each one of them saw the situation differently. One heard music from the loudspeaker and the others didn’t. The people looked different depending on whose perception he was