A Ring, a Ring o' RosesA ring, a ring o' roses,
A pocket full o' posies-
Atishoo, atishoo, we all fall down.
- English nursery rhyme
Red lights flickered all across the board filling one wall of Dartford Vapour Monitoring Station. The tiny gas flames in the bulbs hissed, their combined sound angrier and angrier as more and more sparked into life.
“Bleedin' hell.”
Albert Crowe watched as the entire south-eastern corner of England went red, a great bite taken out of Kent. It wasn't possible. More red bulbs lit up, further and further inland. Gale-force winds today, of course. Any bad air coming off the Channel would move at quite a lick. At this rate it would hit the London Low Miasma Zone in, what, an hour? Maybe less. But it was vast. It couldn't be real.
He glanced at the brass dia
