by John Marrs
PROTECTION OF THE INFORMATION I RETAIN IS PARAMOUNT. VIOLATION OF THE FULL TERMS I HAVE BEEN PROVIDED IN TRAINING WILL RESULT IN REMOVAL FROM THE PROGRAMME AND, WHEN NECESSARY, CRIMINAL PROSECUTION, PERSECUTION OF MY FAMILY, OR MY JUSTIFIABLE KILLING.
SIGNED
DATE
WITNESS
DATE
CHAPTER 11
FLICK, ALDEBURGH, SUFFOLK
Name: Flick Kennedy
Previous Name: ███ █████
Age: 36
Previous Occupation: Restaurateur
Dependents: None
Strengths: Quick to learn; adaptable; loyal
Weaknesses: A conscience; contemplative; self-critical
As the driverless robo-taxi made its way towards the coastal town, an unexpected cloud of summer rainfall hovered above it. Fine droplets gently drizzled against the windscreen as Flick absorbed the countryside passing her by.
The changing climate wasn’t discouraging ramblers in waterproof jackets from following well-beaten paths through the flat fenlands. And something about the pigs taking shelter under their corrugated-iron sties made her smile. This was already a completely different world from the one she had left in London that morning. Here, there was space to breathe.
Flick was vaguely familiar with the Tudor town of Aldeburgh, located on the Sussex coast. She had spent a long weekend there years earlier when she had tagged along on a thirtieth-birthday celebration weekend for Heidi, a friend of her brother Theo. It was a much more sedate weekend than she’d imagined. Instead of nonstop drinking, it involved beach walks, coffees in cafes, and gorging on pub lunches and the seafoods the town prided itself upon.
Once equipped with a completely new identity and history, Flick had been given the choice to relocate to almost anywhere she wanted within the British Isles, her hometown of London being the exception. Aldeburgh was the first place that sprang to mind. Perhaps its sedentary nature might be the perfect antidote to the constant cycle of depression she had found herself swallowed up by in London.
It had also helped that the last four months of intense physical and mental training and re-education had altered Flick’s perception of herself, her past, and the decisions she’d made. It had been like an internal spring clean. Christopher Bailey was no longer going to dictate her past, present, or future.
“Taxi, pull over,” she said aloud, and the cab decelerated, choosing a layby adjacent to the beach to come to a halt. She withdrew a blank, black numberless credit card and held it up to the paypoint until the door opened. The card resembled every other one but was completely untraceable and gave her almost unlimited funds with which to kick-start her new life. All her possessions were now tucked inside a blue canvas rucksack slung over her shoulder. Everything else was consigned to an anonymous lockup unit somewhere in Wales.
Her family and friends were also consigned to her past. Flick couldn’t inform anyone where she was going or what she was doing before she vanished from their lives. The team charged with rebuilding her had used her identity to inform her contacts by email that she was leaving London to travel the world for the foreseeable future and they could follow her adventures via social media. Carefully curated fake photographs of her had already started appearing on Instagram and Facebook and were updated regularly. Phony location check-ins and replies to direct messages were created by an algorithm. Her bank accounts, mortgage, birth certificate, driving licence, National Insurance number, national identity card, and any references to the old Flick Kennedy were frozen.
She had been trained to alter everything about herself, from her favoured brand of clothes and perfume to the supermarkets she shopped at, the colour of nail polish she wore, and the beverages she picked at cafes and bars. All that remained of her past was what she chose to remember.
Flick exited the taxi and, ignoring the rain, she reached inside her jacket for a packet of cigarettes that wasn’t there. Old habits die hard, she thought. She made her way on foot across the shingled beach towards the relatively calm North Sea. Above her, a rainbow arched from empty fields towards the middle of the expanse of water. Suffused with excitement and possibility, she wanted to dive in and swim until she reached its end. Instead, she dropped her rucksack to the ground, removed her socks and trainers, rolled up her jeans, and waded.
A grin crept across her face. She couldn’t recall the last time anything or anyone had made that happen.
* * *
—
TO FLICK’S RELIEF, Aldeburgh’s high street had changed very little since she’d last walked along it. By avoiding chain stores and favouring small independent boutiques, the town hadn’t suffered from the continuing boom in online retail, unlike many of its contemporaries. Clothes shops, fine art galleries, and book retailers nestled amongst staples like cafes, pubs, and an abundance of fish-and-chip shops, all untouched by e-commerce.
Inside a cafe, she ordered an Indian spice herbal tea, sat at a table in the corner, and reached for her standard-issue mobile phone. It was the one gadget she was permitted and allowed access to a single site—ReadWell, the world’s largest website for book lovers. Millions of subscribers regularly used it to discuss novels, share opinions, and leave reviews. She searched the site until she found a discussion thread with the title of Shakespeare’s play The Two Noble Kinsmen. There were no posts under its heading, which was good news. A message there indicated something had happened and her handler, Karczewski, was recalling her to a safe house. She had been assured that the chances of that happening were negligible.
Next on her to-do list was choosing somewhere to stay. She made her way back to the far end of the high street and to the digital information board listing a commercial breakdown of the area. Instead of sending suggestions to her phone, she had to memorise the locations of all hotels and bed-and-breakfasts. The smallest caught her attention, and after a two-minute walk, she arrived.
As far as she could tell, the two-storey property with a Vacancies board in its front window contained two entrance and exit points. A camera was installed above a secure modern front door. Aside from that and a cable exchange cabinet two doors away, Flick reasoned the technology inside was likely to be limited, which suited her.
Driftwood sculptures were scattered about its front garden, surrounded by yellow rosebushes and a selection of vegetable crops in raised beds. The brickwork’s rendering was painted a nautical blue and there was a first-floor balcony and seats offering an unspoiled view of the sea. It was so far removed from her own contemporary London apartment that it was just what Flick was looking for.
She knocked on the door and caught her reflection in the window. She hadn’t been this toned and fit since she’d trained in Muay Thai martial arts classes back in her twenties. The programme’s self-defence programmes and regular gym workouts had helped her to shed more than 2.5 kilos. The cheekbones she hadn’t seen in years had reappeared, along with the sparkle in her brown eyes.
A young woman wearing baggy clothes and with hair tied loosely in a topknot answered. Her appearance was at odds with the building’s quaint presentation.
“Hi, do you have any vacancies?” Flick began.
“We do, come in, come in,” the girl replied enthusiastically and ushered Flick inside. “Would you like to see the rooms we have?”
Flick examined the lounge and its kitsch floral wallpaper, with matching curtains and sofa fabric. “No, I’m sure it’s fine,” she replied.
“I know what you’re thinking,” said the girl. “It’s like Laura Ashley and Cath Kidston came to visit and exploded, isn’t it?”
“It has a charm about it.”
“It was my mum’s place; she passed away last year. Alzheimer’s. It got the better of her a fortnight before the meds to cure it were given a licence and became available to buy.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.”
&n
bsp; “Thank you.” For a second, her gaze fell and Flick recognised that her grief was still raw. “I’ve taken it on until I either decide what to do with it or I’m swallowed up and spat out by the chintz. I’m Grace, by the way.”
The two women shook hands as Grace explained the rates and amenities. “How long do you think you might be staying for?”
Flick shrugged. “I have no idea.”
“Shall I put you down for a week for now?”
“That sounds perfect.”
Later, alone in her room, Flick unpacked her few possessions from her rucksack and placed them inside an old oak wardrobe. Then she cracked open the window, lay back on the candlewick bedcover, and spread her body out into a star shape.
She closed her eyes and took in a handful of deep breaths through her nose and released them from her mouth. Even from inside her room, the salt in the sea air brought a warmth to her skin. This is what happiness smells like, she thought.
CHAPTER 12
CHARLIE, MANCHESTER
Name: Charlie Nicholls
Previous Name: ████ █████
Age: 25
Previous Occupation: Graphic designer
Dependents: None
Strengths: Determined; sociable; capricious; focused
Weaknesses: Headstrong; prone to spontaneity
Charlie opened the curtains that ran the width of his fiftieth-storey hotel room.
He turned off the lights by hand, having already deactivated the room’s OS and all Wi-Fi capabilities, and gazed across Manchester’s dusky landscape. He dropped the thick white towel that covered his waist and it fell into a crumpled heap on the floor. Naked, he rested his forehead against the glass, rubbed his hands across his sculpted torso, and positioned them by his side. Then he closed his eyes and imagined plummeting to the ground before catching flight.
“This will be the headspace you return to if your thoughts become too intense or muddled,” his programme therapist had advised. “And in the early days, there will be occasions when it will happen. Think of this as a form of self-hypnosis. Use this as your release.”
Charlie thought of the wind catching his body and pulling him back up into the sky. There, he circled the city below him, swooping and diving, always out of sight and aware he could fly in any path as long as it was forward.
He opened his eyes and pushed himself back into a standing position. He had once been ashamed of his nudity, but now it didn’t embarrass him. In the tallest building in the city centre, there was nobody to see him, unless a drone had been deployed. And while he’d learned the response techniques should he ever find himself being tracked by one, it was improbable.
With a new appearance, a new backstory, and nothing tethering him to his old life, Charlie was even more alone here than he’d been back in his hometown of Portsmouth. There, he’d been waiting for someone else to give him meaning. But here, he had no such concerns.
Manchester wasn’t how he’d imagined it before his arrival that afternoon. After expanding to become Britain’s second-largest city, it had hidden much of its historically important architecture behind neon advertising signs, rotating billboards, and giant television screens. A city couldn’t afford to dwell on the past when money was a factor. Everything was now a moving image. Even the driverless trams and buses were adorned with screens that changed what they were promoting by reading online purchases from your phone. However, the algorithms struggled with Charlie’s device. The standard-issue clamshell was so featureless that when he’d disembarked the train inside Piccadilly station, the screens on a passing bus repeated targeted ads for the woman in front of him, offering him sanitary towels.
La Maison du Court was the first hotel he’d spotted as he wandered through the city with all his worldly belongings inside a rucksack strapped to his back. The towering skyscraper housed a grand marble entrance and floor-to-ceiling fish tanks. Fresh flowers in vases towered above him and a waterfall flowed behind the reception desk. It was far removed from the Travelodges he’d been used to. But access to the programme’s funding meant he could afford the best, and he vowed to begin his new adventure in style.
Charlie had been kept away from the outside world during his training. He picked a rolling news channel on a television to watch as he lay in a warm, soapy bath. It felt quite old-fashioned to rely on the television to bring him news as for his whole adult life, digital assistants had given him access to it where and when he required it. Like other obsolete tasks such as reading a physical copy of a newspaper, buying clothes at a store, or using a key to unlock a door, it was going to take some getting used to.
His stomach rumbled just as his door buzzed and opened itself. He had not needed to slip on his towel when room service turned out to be an automated trolley that wheeled itself into the room. The menu had offered Farm or FabLab meats, the latter an epithet for Fabricated Meats and an inexpensive option bioengineered in laboratories from animal cells. Charlie had decided to treat himself and chose Farm—and the priciest veal steak on the menu. He glanced at the empty seat at the table next to him and briefly wondered what it might be like to have someone to share this with.
Charlie logged on to the only website his phone could access, the ReadWell message board. To his relief, a quick search revealed no response to the Two Noble Kinsmen thread.
He devoured the last mouthful of the tender meat and thought of his old friends Stelfox and Travis and what they might think if they could see him now, dining on expensive foods in a hotel that would cost them a week’s wages for a one-night stay. He raised a glass of mineral water to silently toast them.
With his stomach fit to burst, Charlie sent the trolley back to the kitchens and examined his appearance in the bathroom mirror. He approved of what he saw. The beard he once relied on to hide his pitted, acne-scarred cheeks was now unnecessary following skin resurfacing treatment. He ran his fingers over his chest and stomach; everything was tenser and tighter since he’d lost twenty kilos. He’d worked hard with personal trainers and learned combat techniques, self-defence, and weapons training from former SAS soldiers. And he’d removed all junk food from his diet to create this new, leaner version of himself.
He wondered how many other Minders there were and if, like him, they’d taken advantage of the cosmetic procedures on offer. Charlie had replaced his crooked teeth with sparkling new veneers, and straightened the wonky nose he’d twice broken playing football. Three tattoos he’d had since his teenage years had also been lasered from his chest, arm, and left buttock. He rubbed his fingertips against one another and marvelled at how smooth they were since his prints had been erased. He felt like a completely new man because that was exactly what he was.
Yawning, he dimmed the lights again, then returned to the window to rest his head and close his eyes. And once more, he imagined himself in flight.
CHAPTER 13
SINÉAD, SUNDERLAND
Name: Sinéad Kelly
Previous Name: ████ ███
Age: 33
Previous Occupation: Space debris coordinator/office worker
Dependents: None
Strengths: Appraises all scenarios well; methodical; organised
Weaknesses: Compassionate; prone to guilt and introspection
It took Sinéad around twenty minutes to reach the summit of Sunderland’s Tunstall hills.
She had last completed the walk with college friends Imani and Harriet some two decades earlier. They had accompanied her on the 288-mile journey from her hometown of Bristol to offer their support as she carried the small mahogany caskets containing her parents’ ashes. Today she held only a small bouquet of red and white carnations.
Sunderland had been the first place her parents relocated to after emigrating from Ireland, so it seemed fitting that following their deaths during the Mumba
i tsunami that claimed two thousand lives, their ashes were cast to the breeze atop a high hill overlooking the northeastern city. Sinéad was one of very few people who knew the truth of what really happened that morning. And of everything she’d learned, it gnawed at her the most intensely and most frequently.
The wind brushed her cheeks and caught her new shoulder-length hair extensions. It was the first alteration she had requested from the programme’s image-enhancement team after years of keeping it short to please Daniel. It was also no longer a nondescript mousey colour, but a rich brown with subtle lowlights. And she couldn’t stop running her fingers through it. It was one of a handful of alterations made to her appearance. Laser eye surgery meant she had no more use for her glasses, and the combat techniques and Pilates had made her physically fitter. She gently ran a fingertip against the edges of her eyelids, tugging ever so gently at the recently implanted lashes, as if challenging them to come loose. Once, she would have pulled at them until they detached in their twos and threes by the root, only ceasing when her eyes watered. But not any longer.
If only Daniel could see me now, she thought, then reminded herself that he’d still probably find fault with something.
Amongst the many techniques Sinéad had learned throughout her training was how to breathe again. Instead of short, shallow bursts, she now drew in deep breaths, pushing her stomach out as she inhaled and drawing it in as she let the air out. It was a simple exercise but one that she had come to rely upon to keep her gathered.
There had been little time to dwell on anything other than the programme during her training. But now that Sinéad was completely on her own for the first time, she wasn’t sure how she should be reacting. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had so much control of her life; it was going to take time to acclimatise to.
