Early Riser_The new standalone novel from the Number One bestselling author

by Jasper Fforde

  Toccata pointed at me.

  ‘I want to know why Aurora took over responsibility for a marooned Deputy Consul, and having done so, left them to almost sleep themselves out over the past four weeks.’

  Mr Hooke looked at me, then back at Toccata.

  ‘I have no idea,’ he said, staring at her without expression.

  ‘Make a guess.’

  He shrugged.

  ‘I don’t make guesses.’

  ‘Give it a whirl. For me. Just this once.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ began Hooke, ‘she felt she was in some way to blame for Worthing’s marooning. Perhaps she was just caring for someone looking lost in the Winter. Perhaps she was just being kind.’

  ‘Aurora has no understanding of the word. She’s motivated only by what HiberTech ask of her.’

  ‘We could argue over this all day, ma’am,’ said Hooke, sounding like they probably did, quite a lot, ‘but it seems to me a simple mistake. Deputy Worthing overslept. It happens. Why don’t you just take it up with Aurora?’

  ‘I try, but she’s always avoiding me.’

  ‘She says the same about you. Now, is there anything else I can help you with?’

  ‘Pantry,’ she said. ‘You’ve got shitloads of it and I want some to feed to the sleep-shy.’

  ‘If it were up to me, I’d drown them all and then compost their remains and use it to nourish the Winter beet,’ said Hooke, ‘but we live, apparently, in more enlightened times. Why don’t you come into the office?’

  He gestured us to a side office which I noted had Aurora’s name painted on the door. He invited Toccata inside, but pointed at a seat outside the office for me.

  I sat down, then heard Toccata’s voice rise in volume as she started to question why HiberTech couldn’t spare any food for the rest of the Sector, and Agent Hooke’s voice coldly explaining that it wasn’t up to private companies to deal with the shortcomings of government.

  ‘Does this happen a lot?’ I asked a youngish-looking worker sitting quite near me. He looked up abruptly, as though he had hoped I wasn’t going to say anything.

  ‘All the time. It’s like a recurring gag in a sitcom, only it’s not funny.’

  ‘Sitcom,’ I said, ‘yes. Are there any toilets close by? I’ve been on the coffee since I woke up.’

  He directed me to the second on the left down the corridor, and I thanked him and walked out of the room. I didn’t want the loo; I wanted a closer look at our driver, who was still staring ahead blankly. I was right; it was Charles Webster. The picture on the missing person’s flyer matched: he had a mole beneath his right eye.

  ‘Hello, Charles,’ I said. There was no reaction. I reminded myself that the connection between him and Birgitta was weak. All I had was Birgitta’s admission – before she nightwalked – that her husband vanished. That was it. No name, no idea where he vanished to or even when. I had no confirmation they were the same person, aside from the dream, which was no confirmation at all.

  ‘Birgitta says “hi”,’ I said, but there was no reaction. I tried again: ‘There will always be the—’

  ‘—Gower,’ said Webster, or, at least, something that I thought sounded like ‘Gower’. On reflection, it might have just been a mumble.

  I heard voices from down the corridor and looked up as The Notable Goodnight attended by a gaggle of assistants walked around the corner, Lucy amongst them. I briefly heard something about deep memory reacquisition before they saw me and all stopped talking.

  ‘Well,’ said The Notable Goodnight, staring at me with an imperious eye, ‘Charlie Worthing. What are you doing here?’

  ‘Consul business, ma’am.’

  ‘Indeed?’

  ‘Yes; to do with extra food for the winsomniacs. We have fifty-four of them.’

  ‘Have you tried starvation? Clears them out in a jiffy, I’m told.’

  Lucy whispered something in her ear.

  ‘I’ve been instructed to tell you that was a joke. Dark, but a joke. Funny, yes?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘very.’

  She grunted and they all moved on except for Lucy.

  ‘Good to see you, Charlie,’ she said as we tapped fists. ‘Someone said you overslept. Is that true?’

  I rolled up my sleeve and showed her my forearm, which more closely resembled a stick draped with furry skin.

  ‘Wow,’ she said, ‘you lost all that in only four weeks?’

  ‘Dreams,’ I said, ‘and they’re kind of still with me.’

  I told her about the retrospective nature of my dreams and she nodded knowingly.

  ‘Narcosis can do weird things to the mind,’ she said. ‘How are you getting along with the Consuls?’

  ‘Sort of okay.’

  ‘I shouldn’t really tell you this, but be extremely wary of Toccata. She’s allowing her hatred of Aurora to cloud her judgement and invents all manner of conspiracies. HiberTech has been wanting to get rid of her for years, but it’s kind of complicated when Aurora is so valuable. Toccata can be volatile, and we don’t want any wrinkles when we roll out Project Lazarus. I can’t say much, but there’s talk of Morphenox-B being available to everyone.’

  ‘That’s good,’ I said.

  ‘It’s very exciting. Be careful, Charlie. You know you can call me if you need anything. I’ll always be a friend first and an employee of HiberTech second.’

  And she gave me a hug, waved goodbye and hurried off down the corridor just as the door to the HiberTech offices opened and Toccata walked out.

  ‘Wanker,’ said Toccata, joining me in the golf cart. ‘I’d poison him quite happily and dance on his grave given half a chance. A compliant toady, acquiescing to Aurora at every level.’

  She told Charles to return us to reception, which he did, without word, complaint or delay.

  ‘Have a nice Winter,’ said Josh as he saw us off. ‘May the Spring embrace you.’

  ‘And embrace you, too.’

  ‘That was interesting,’ said Toccata once we had retrieved our weapons and were walking back to the command car outside.

  ‘What was?’

  ‘That they all seemed quite uninterested.’

  ‘Uninterested in what?’

  ‘In you. HiberTech regard every unusual face as someone who is a potential RealSleep member, ne’er-do-well or loser. They paid you no heed and even allowed you to wander off – where did you go?’

  ‘The loo.’

  ‘Right – which makes me suspicious that they’ve been told to leave you alone. Why is this?’

  ‘I’m not sure being ignored is grounds for suspicion,’ I said.

  ‘You don’t know them like I do. Speak to anyone about Project Lazarus?’

  I told her I knew someone there – an old friend from the Pool, and she had said that it would be a game changer.

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘Universal availability of Morphenox-B, apparently. That’s good, right?’

  ‘So everyone says,’ she said, ‘and it will triple the number of nightwalkers to redeploy. Greater survivability, sure, but lots of cheap labour. I’ve always been suspicious of game changers,’ she added. ‘Sometimes the game doesn’t need changing – or no one has a clear idea of which game will be changed, and for what and how much.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘No,’ she said, ‘neither do I.’

  I thought for a moment, then said: ‘Something odd happened.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘The Notable Goodnight wandered past.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘She knew my name. She met me once, four weeks ago. Is she good with names?’

  ‘She barely knows mine,’ said Toccata, ‘why would she remember you? Make an impression?’

  ‘Not in the least.’

  ‘As I said,’ murmured Toccata, ‘something about you has interested HiberTech. It’ll be an opportunistic exploitation, or my name’s not Toccata.’

  We climbed into the command car and drove slowly back do
wn towards the town. I was in Sector Twelve only because of Aurora. First by letting the train go, then finding me an apartment on the ninth floor of the Siddons, then not checking back or telling anyone I was there. The meeting in the Siddons basement that morning might have been contrived, too, in order for her to come over all chummy and helpful.

  ‘Permission to speak, ma’am?’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Why do you think HiberTech are interested in me?’

  She stared at me with her one good eye for several seconds.

  ‘I have no idea, Wonky. But believe me, it won’t be anything trivial.’

  Fodder

  * * *

  ‘… Porters never went out during the Winter, mostly out of duty to their charges. Even in a dire emergency – fire, Villain or nightwalker incursion, HotPot overheat, starvation – no porter would abandon the building if there was a single sleeper left inside. A porter went down with their building …’

  – The Oldest Profession, by Porter Fabrisio

  I went and found Jonesy as soon as we got back.

  ‘Let me guess,’ she said, ‘Aurora wasn’t anywhere to be found?’

  ‘Not hard to figure. Can I ask you something?’

  ‘Shoot.’

  I took Charles Webster’s missing persons flier from my back pocket and showed it to her.

  ‘So?’

  ‘He’s up at HiberTech, redeployed as one of their golf-cart drivers.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘He’s a missing person, yet turns up at HiberTech?’

  She looked at me, then at the flier, then led me towards the records office, which was situated at the far end of the Consulate.

  ‘These are the Sector Twelve files,’ she said as we walked in. ‘Every person who ever arrived, every person who ever left. The ones who died, the ones who married, the ones who had children. Hibernation records, work records, special skills register, schools records, fertility reports, genetic screening, Dormitoria, car, dental and food records. The lot. Hang on a tick.’

  She rummaged for a moment in a large and very battered grey filing cabinet, and then handed me Webster’s file. His address was the Cambrensis, room 106, his job HiberTech ‘Medical Orderly Grade II’. There was a copy of his birth certificate, several references from the Thomas Carlyle Dormitorium in Sector Fifty-eight North, a General Skills certificate pass confirmation and letters of recommendation from his previous employments as a bus driver, aquarium maintenance engineer and insurance salesman. There was also a ‘Partial Death’ certificate – HiberTech had logged him as having been delivered to their Sleep Sciences Division twelve weeks after he went missing.

  ‘He was signed across to The Notable Goodnight by Agent Hooke,’ I said, reading a copy of the chain-of-possession document. ‘Is that unusual?’

  ‘Not really,’ said Jonesy.

  There was nothing about being married to Birgitta, but then I didn’t really expect there to be. Beyond my dream, the only evidence they might be the same person was that they both vanished, and could have the same first name. That was it. I sighed. Webster was just a guy I’d picked to clothe the empty face in my dream, nothing more, nothing less. He might not even have said ‘Gower’ at all – just a mumble, an artefact briefly bubbling to the surface.

  ‘Happy?’ said Jonesy.

  ‘It’s just my mild narcosis,’ I said, ‘overactive imagination. Oh, and I think you should probably know if you’re planning to bundle with Fodder: when we Winter embraced, he kissed me very gently on the ear.’

  ‘Yeah, I heard he does that.’

  I yawned, and then apologised.

  ‘You’re looking tired,’ said Jonesy. ‘It’s best to take it easy the first couple of days. Come with me.’

  I followed her out of records and into the office, where we found Fodder balancing a hunting knife on the tip of his finger.

  ‘Hey, Fod,’ said Jonesy, ‘will you show Wonky around town before nightfall? You both live at the Siddons, so it makes sense to end up there.’

  ‘Delighted,’ said Fodder.

  ‘You may want to keep an eye out for intruders,’ added Treacle, who was at the front desk. ‘We’ve had a couple of reports of a possible incursion of people or creatures unknown at the far end of town.’

  I felt the cold wind slice into my exposed skin as we stepped outside. It had shifted around to the north and already flurries of snow were portending a heavier fall some time within the next forty-eight hours. Fodder, instead of taking one of the Sno-Tracs parked outside, strode off on foot.

  ‘No transport?’ I asked, following close behind.

  ‘Where practical I walk,’ he replied. ‘Once cocooned in a Sno-Trac, the senses are numbed. Out on the fringes you need a feel for the air, the wind, the environs. The Three Vs can strike at a moment’s notice.’

  ‘The Three Vs?’

  ‘Villains, Vacants and Volk. Hear that?’

  We stopped. I listened intently but all I could hear was the faint whisper of ice crystals blowing across the drifts.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Exactly. There’s nothing there. But one day there will be – and you want to sense it or them before you can see them – or they can see you.’

  ‘I understand,’ I said, ‘you think there are Volk?’

  ‘I’ve seen some weird stuff,’ he said, ‘but nothing that makes me think the Gronk exists – which is a shame. I’d like Laura to win her bet.’

  We trudged on, the snow swirling around us, the visibility barely thirty feet, the daylight dull, soft and directionless. Fodder put on a knitted hat shaped like a penguin, which looked faintly ridiculous. He might or might not have known this, but I’m firmly convinced no one in their right mind would point it out.

  ‘Treacle said something about an intruder report.’

  ‘We get them from time to time, but if it had been a credible sighting Jonesy would have made more of a hoo-hah. Megafauna are too smart to be out, but Winter nomads have been known to move through. We leave them be, and even scavengers are not particularly disliked, so long as they don’t enter buildings. Villains are something else entirely: no rules outside their own society and a strange mix of violent ruthlessness, decorum and an overdeveloped sense of entitlement. There’s been an uneasy truce these past three years with Lucky Ned.’

  ‘What were the terms?’

  ‘Exclusion zones. We don’t go on to their patch if they don’t come on ours. It means admitting that there are areas that are no-go in Mid-Wales, but Toccata can work with that, she says.’

  Fodder lapsed into silence and we joined the long straight road that led towards the gardens and the museum, the only sound the breath of our exertions and our feet as we tramped through the snow. I had a thought.

  ‘You have the right to Morphenox but don’t use it, do you?’

  ‘Is it that obvious that I don’t?’

  ‘You live in the Siddons,’ I said, ‘a Sub-beta payscale Kipshop – but you’re a Consul. I put two and two together.’

  ‘It’s an honest place to sleep. The soft rasp of natural snoring is comforting, like rain on a tin roof. Morphenox dulls the subconscious,’ he added, ‘and steals your dreams. I like to dream.’

  ‘And do you?’

  ‘Every night, always the same. The Ottomans used to hit us with their Gigawatt Highrollers. I’m in the forward OP in a six-by-six Bedford softside, reporting on incoming size and velocity. There’s no moisture so the pulse rings are visible only as faint ripples in the hot air, a couple of hundred yards wide. I report on a stonker that’s coming our way but it’s faster and tighter than the rest, and by a thousand yards out it starts to cone. By the time it reaches me the torus has a spin so tight that implosive collapse is inevitable. No time to run – pointless anyway – and then my eardrums burst and I’m waking in the sand, alone, with the sun already overhead and the Bedford upside down two hundred yards away. I’ve lost my foot and most of my clothes and part of my skin is blasted off. Worst of all,
I can feel the moisture leaching out of my body. My eyes crisp over, my tongue feels like leather, my skin blisters and then cracks, like mud on a dry lake bed.’

  ‘You want to dream that?’

  ‘It stops me dreaming about the really unpleasant stuff. Nightmares are catharsis; they purge the mind to make the day bearable.’

  ‘Oh,’ I said, not wanting to think what his other dreams might be. ‘Do you dream of anything else? Like … blue Buicks, for instance?’

  He turned to look at me with a quizzical expression.

  ‘We looked into what Moody and the others claimed,’ said Fodder. ‘Personally, I’ve dreamt nothing, but then I live on the eighteenth floor; it’s the ninth floor of the Siddons that’s full of bad dreaming.’

  He was right, come to think of it: everyone who had dreamed of the blue Buick seemed to have come from the ninth.

  We continued on the journey, Fodder pointing out places of interest. Which Dormitorium was which, why I should avoid the porter at the Captain Mayberry, where the electrical sub-station, phone exchanges and cold refuge points were situated. He imparted the knowledge without fanfare, and occasionally punctuated the observations with local lore: a serial sneak thief here, an incident with Lucky Ned’s gang there – and shockingly, the harbouring undertaken by Olaf Yawnersson, who kept two Tricksy nightwalkers alive for almost three years.

  ‘He did the honourable thing when we discovered them hidden in his basement,’ said Fodder. ‘But despite considerable investigation he left no evidence of his depraved acts. The Cold Way Out was probably the best thing for him.’

  But most of all, Fodder told me to memorise the town precisely. ‘Your aim,’ he said, ‘is to know Sector Twelve like the swirls on your own wintercoat, and be able to navigate the streets when a combination of blizzard, gale-strength winds and darkness reduces visibility to zero – without the fixed line.’

  ‘Without?’

  ‘It’s the first thing Villains would cut. Rely on the line, and you’ll be utterly lost without it.’

  As if to demonstrate the wisdom of his statement, there was a sudden squall that reduced visibility to less than ten feet. I instinctively moved closer to Fodder, who, instead of clipping on to the line as Winter Best Practice dictated, simply extended his baton and used that to feel his way. He put out a hand for me to hold and I did so, his massive hand both warm and surprisingly soft.