Games Makers

by Andrew Calcutt

  Credits

  Terrorism@Olympics meets the Unbearable Lightness of Being London

  words Andrew Calcutt

  design

  Alex Cameron

  You are Director of the Cultural Olympiad. Three weeks before the opening ceremony

  and you are panicking: the Olympic Torch has failed to ignite the country, and London 2012 is shaping up to be a Mega-Non-Event.

  Surely you can do something to make London really excited about the Games?

  On a night out on the town with your long-lost friend, you recall that 7/7 – the suicide bombings that followed London’s selection as host city – was the last time Londoners came together as one.

  With the Olympic clock ticking towards Games Time, nothing can stop you trying to

  recreate that feeling of togetherness. If only you had been able to stop yourself....

  Games Makers: A London Satire chronicles the attempt to bomb London back to the

  Blitz spirit.

  This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0

  Unported License.

  To view a copy of this license, visit http:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 444 Castro Street, Suite 900, Mountain View, California, 94041, USA.

  Andrew Calcutt is the original ‘hackademic’

  (journalist turned academic). He has written a dozen non-fiction books. Games Makers is his first novel.

  Alex Cameron is an editorial art director and design writer.

  © AC2, 2012

  cbc publishing

  ISBN: 0954 261828

  Games Makers: a London Satire

  Part 1. There's no there there

  Prologue: courting appearances

  His face on screen. The familiar face of my best friend Tony, looking up at me

  electronically.

  But this is not iPhone4, face-time, intimacy-on-a-stick. This is the big picture I’m seeing.

  Breaking news, available now on a screen near you. And that’s where Tony is – on screen, in the news, broken. The Shock! Horror! stuff that’s right now – London, dateline 23rd July 2012 – is happening to him.

  Dear Reader, in the league of international hate-figures, my friend Tony Skance is

  currently ranked between Colonel Gaddafi and Osama bin-Laden.

  Every big news story must have its icon. In this instance it’s the police station portrait of Tony, splayed against the wall, taken when they brought him in. I guess it was leaked to the Met’s favourite blogger, and now it’s out spurting out through every media outlet.

  But the face in the mugshot is no bug eyed bovine.

  He ain’t cowed by the camera. This is Tony Skance, looking back, appraising you, Mr

  Police Photographer, and the millions standing behind you. Appraising himself looking back at you taking his picture.

  They’ll say his expression is cool, calculating.

  Already have: Tony Skance, alleged mastermind of Olympic Games bomb outrage

  (broadsheet version).

  Sicko Psycho (tabloid).

  ‘Alleged’ seems unnecessarily circumspect. Not as if Tony will be suing anyone for

  blotting his escutcheon.

  So here I am at East Thames magistrates’ court (name of Pete Fercoughsey – yes, say it fast to get the full effect), queuing for a seat on the Press bench to see my oldest friend remanded in custody, browsing the news while I wait. From the BBC to CNN to Al Jazeera, every website leads with the ‘outrage’ perpetrated by my childhood friend.

  Meanwhile, in the street outside, anticipating the prison van and its outrageous occupant, there is a small group of hostile onlookers, and a much larger crowd of professional

  photographers. Through the glass doors I can see police officers patrolling like sheepdogs: grouping the press, herding the proles; keeping the two cohorts apart.

  Doors opening. I power-off and fall in with the line of journalists admitted to court. I should explain, Dear Reader, that I once was a journalist but now I teach at a university in the East End of London. I’m being ushered in with the real hacks because my Press card isn’t out of date yet (‘Property of the National Union of Journalists, this card is recognised by the British Army, Metropolitan Police’, etc etc ). Also, I’m recognised round here for sending students to cover court cases (used to be that they would learn the ropes from full-time court reporters; now my students are often the only ones doing it), so no one’s going to knock me back.

  In the courtroom, we take our allotted seats. I know the routine and I know what it’s for.

  Recording court proceedings on behalf of the public, acting as the eyes and ears of the people, journalists are there to ensure that the judiciary observes the law which it is there to implement.

  Here endeth the lesson.

  Sorry about that, folks. It’s my new job to tell young people about my old job, and

  sometimes the job(s) take(s) over.

  So come on, then, Mr Professional Persona. Take me over completely. Save me from the

  sickening feeling in the pit of my stomach. Release me from the wrenching, churning, dreadful yukkiness now that the beast in the dock - they’ll bring him in at any moment - is my close, personal friend. The dearest friend I shall ever have.

  I close my eyes and think of Tony. I do love him.

  What else to call it, this mixture of loyalty, jealousy, and like-mindedness? We lived our early lives together. Now he’s Public Enemy No 1 and I’m so frightened for him I’m losing my concentration.

  An overdose of emotion can make you drowsy, or so I’ve heard...

  ‘All ri-ise’, intones the usher, his voice rising to emphasise the point.

  We duly stand for the judge to enter. So the defendant’s already here. How did I miss

  them bringing you in, Tony? Your grand entrance! Now we are both upstanding. We both, we both. Once there was always both of us. Who knows when we will be together again? In prison you’ll refuse to see me, I know, even if I’m granted permission to visit.

  It’ll be quick today. Read the charge. Plead (not that it matters how you plead).

  Remanded. Over and out. My eyes are hungry for you, now there’s so little time.

  From the Press bench that stretches along one side of the court, I see you in profile: straight-backed but not quite square to the polished brass rail.

  Decidedly at odds with this room of perpendiculars.

  Better to find your own angle, I agree; or the unforgiving light might strike you down, dead.

  The judge sits, so do we.

  Forty years ago you sat next to me for our first school photograph; when we were six. I have it on the wall at home.

  Every boy in white shirt and grey shorts; hair combed and parted, all eyes peering into the camera. Except your face was off-centre, turned a crucial inch to the right. Already you were watchful. Too wary of the camera’s beady eye to look straight into it, even then.

  From where I’m sitting I can’t see your eyes. I’m not getting the full effect of your

  carefully controlled expression. But I can guess which performance you have selected from your extensive repertoire:

  ‘Though the muscles in his face were tight, and his skin taut, Tony Skance managed to

  hint at a wry smile’. No cliché like an old cliché, you would say.

  I don’t want you to perform for me, Tony. I don’t need to look straight into your eyes. I already know why you did it.

  (1) Trying to connect you

  Three weeks earlier Antony Skance stepped smartly through the doors of City Hall on the south bank of the Thames. Outside, summer sunshine glinted on the river like highlights in a shampoo advert. London, because you’re
worth it.

  But what is London worth? More to the point, how can London show its worth? Little

  more than three weeks away from ‘Games Time’, less than a month until the sales pitch of the century (remember the Mayor of Newhamlet’s motto: the Olympics have nothing whatsoever to do with sport), and London’s presentation is sadly lacking. At least, that’s how it appears to our hero, the man in charge of the Cultural Olympiad.

  The countdown is continuing, but it feels like the clock has stopped. It’s happening here, but there is so little excitement about ‘being there’.

  Tony Skance longed for a cigarette, fondly remembered how it would light up the

  moment and burn it away. Instead he unwrapped a lollipop and stuck it in his gob, Kojak-style.

  Hands in trouser pockets, elbows out, linen jacket unbuttoned. There was even a thin, silk scarf around his tender neck.

  Was this a sixth former impersonating an impresario, or London’s culture czar acting the sixth-former?

  Tony would have acknowledged the conundrum, if you’d been able to ask him. But just

  then he was busy performing a jaunty walk along the south bank of the river. Achieving an acceptable level of jauntiness required considerable effort on his part.

  Tony’s mind was in turmoil. The problem was...

  nothing. Much ventured – much, much, loadsamoney much. Not much gained. Nearly

  four years into a programme of events dubbed ‘the Cultural Olympiad’, only 26 days away from the Olympics themselves, and London’s mood was little changed. Did the capital even have a mood?

  ‘Subdued’, Tony said to himself, anticipating the moment (it’ll come, it’ll come) when he could look back comfortably at this difficult period of nerve-wracking doubt. He did his best to sell it to himself: ‘Subdued atmosphere before the party started. Followed by a perfect storm of jubilation.

  Must be, must be, must be’.

  Tony inhaled the thought. For a second or two he heard London’s silence as the precious instant when the house lights go down and the audience bates its breath. He remembered it well (a past life, Dear Reader, of which more later). But where were the stage lights and the wall of sound? Above all, who or what were the headliners? Without something to make it come to a head, London 2012 was set to be not only a non-event but a Mega-Non-Event. And with his name stamped through like it was a stick of rock: Olympics Failure, Tony Skance; Tony Skance, Olympics Failure.

  Tony exhaled. Out (and never coming back) went the gossamer thought of London in a

  moment of hushed anticipation. Now he knew for sure it wasn’t true; it wasn’t going to be like that; it wasn’t anything like that; it just wasn’t anything.

  Of course, Games Time hadn’t actually started yet. There was still time for something to happen...

  (2) London united

  It will have been the red coat that caught his eye.

  A flash of colour at the periphery of his vision became a red coat and a woman wearing it; a red-coated woman in the midst of others-less-striking. They were clustered together, alternately peering down and turning their heads sideways to speak and listen to each other.

  There was something there on the ground between them; but as yet no telling what it was.

  Without thinking Tony moved towards the group to find out. At five metres distance their voices came fully into range. Snapped to his attention.

  ‘Just walking along’, said Red Coat, whose lipstick was an exact match. ‘He was just

  walking along and one of the cyclists smashed into him.’

  ‘There were two’, said a man with a frail moustache.

  ‘One attacker, one outrider. They rode away fast towards London Bridge’. At this he

  stroked his silvery hair and looked along their exit route to the point where he had seen the bikers disappear.

  As if his gaze might oust them from the office blocks covering their escape. He sighed, then looked back down at the ground and the man lying on it.

  As soon as he could see the man on the ground, Tony got the picture: City-type, 50-

  something; decked and violently relieved of his laptop. Fetch a decent price down Brick Lane.

  Hit and ride. Bicycle thieves, BMX-style.

  Shaking his head, the victim got as far as sitting up, then slumped down again. One of the group stepped away, taking out his phone. ‘I’m phoning’, he announced, letting the others know he wasn’t walking out on them. They heard him say, ‘Ambulance, please. And Police.’

  While Phone Man did his bit, Red Coat took a scarf out of her bag, rolled it up and

  inserted it underneath City-type’s head. How soon, thought Tony, they have reached an

  understanding. Somebody else produced a blanket. She flicked it out to full length and it floated down onto City-type.

  Instinctively he moved into the foetal position, the better to receive this chivalrous gesture.

  Tony’s memory blurted out a picture of Walter Raleigh prostrating his cloak for the

  Virgin Queen to walk on.

  Too much! Better rein himself in. Never mind chivalry, let’s get cynical.

  In his head, Tony’s soliloquising had already changed register: less Francis Drake, more Frank Sinatra as Tony Rome: ‘So if you ain’t a tramp, Lady, and Blanket Lady was wearing pearls, for Chrissake, who the fuck walks around town with a fucking blanket?’

  Tony took a step back from the group. The tone of his inner voice had already set him

  apart. As if they had heard the extravagant cynicism of his thoughts, he made himself scarce.

  Edging backwards, in a few seconds he was far enough away to take out his phone and

  photograph them. No flash, but somehow they registered it. Two of the group turned to him, a look of routine distrust welling up in their eyes: the London Look. But by now Tony was in full retreat, swivelling round towards the river, resuming the performance of his jaunty stride.

  He was always taking pictures; liked to regard people. Walking away now, he sneaked a

  peek at the new pic, if only out of curiosity. As it turned out, though, this really was something worth seeing. For a few moments Tony kept walking, but the more he looked at the photo, the more it held his attention.

  A hundred metres away he stopped, transfixed.

  When he was there among them, he guessed there was something, but hadn’t quite known

  what it was. How could he? The people helping City-type were acting without a trace of self-regard, and they almost had Tony acting the same way, for the few seconds he was with them.

  But having stepped out of the group, far enough way to look back at it with his camera, he now saw how the picture told a really important story: two whites, one black, two browns, one off-white Oriental, united in their concern for the man on the ground (largely unseen: it could be anyone, Everyman). In helping him, they were perfectly composed. Without thinking they had composed themselves into the very picture of integrity – a vignette of multicultural Londoners acting together in the teeth of violence.

  This was London, the city as one, united in action.

  And Tony had the perfect image: experience shared; iconography squared. Be a shame to

  waste it. But how on earth was he going to make something of it?

  (3) I have a dream

  Tony’s at home in his flat near Tower Bridge. Fell asleep with the TV on. More restless than restful.

  Smoke. Dark. Can’t breathe. Is that a light at the far end of the tunnel? And where are the others?

  Y’know, the other people. Sitting in the carriage, how long ago?

  Tony moves forward, inch by inch, holding out his hands for something to hold on to. ‘I wanna hold your ha-a-a-and’. When he does touch something, his fingers recoil. What was that: snail, mouth, wound?

  In bed his legs are bicycling.

  Smoke. Dark. Coming out of the dark and the smoke.

  The train is lifted from under ground, just like that. Coming out
of the tunnel, its

  movement begins to sound different even before the light changes.

  Now Tony is bathed in clear white light.

  All over now. No war no more. City streets decked with bunting. The children sit down at trestle tables. All sticky-out ears and crooked teeth and lovely smiles. The women are smiling, too. You,ve never seen so much smiling.

  ‘When you,re smiling...’

  That,s Tony,s grandmother, there. With the polka dot frock and hair like Jessie Matthews.

  Who was Jessie Matthews? We were supposed to have liked her during the War, his grandma always said, though I never heard of her till they kept having her on telly.

  But one of their bombers got away. We must blow him out of the sky or there will be

  children, dead on the ground. Limbless, headless, lifeless. Princes and princesses who will never take the throne.