by Joe Craig
She nodded to Lee with a delicate smile and tossed a manila folder into the centre of the table. Its contents spilled across the lacquer— printouts of web pages, stills of Jimmy’s video message, photos of the break-in at the newspaper office in Hailsham, along with reams of other documents and reports.
Mitchell’s eyes remained on Miss Bennett. Apart from Mitchell, she was the youngest person in the room. Mitchell guessed she must have been in her late thirties, but with such glowing skin and bright red lipstick she often seemed younger. She looked as she always did—her back straight, her mouth in a knowing half-smile, her chestnut hair pulled back tightly and held in place by a green clip. Yet Mitchell was suspicious. She wouldn’t normally have co-operated so readily with William Lee. Mitchell wondered whether at that very moment her assistants were delving into Lee’s past in another effort to undermine his position.
Technically, William Lee was nothing more than Director of Special Security for the Prime Minister, but he had quickly won Coates’ trust and established himself at the heart of the Government. When he spoke, he had all the authority of a world leader.
“Lies spread fast,” he said. “We’re following protocol, which means Miss Bennett has an NJ7 team working with the Corporation as we speak, to shut down any websites that carry his messages and limit the damage. But these lies seem to be spreading more quickly than any we’ve encountered from any opposition before. We traced the initial breach of information security to the office of a local newspaper in Hailsham. The editor and staff are in custody. They’re sharing what they know.”
Mitchell couldn’t help shuddering. He didn’t need to see the pictures in the manila folder. He knew what Lee meant by “sharing what they know”. He’d seen the stale bloodstains on the floors of NJ7 interview rooms.
Suddenly Lee was interrupted by a heavy sigh from Miss Bennett. Everybody looked to her.
“Sorry to interrupt,” she said, in a way that made it obvious she wasn’t sorry at all. “But shouldn’t you tell everybody exactly what this boy’s saying that’s so dangerous?”
Lee responded calmly. “Fine. He’s saying that the Government’s reasons for going to war with France are based on a lie. He claims we weren’t attacked by the French.”
“And were we?” Miss Bennett’s smile broadened, but her eyes glinted like blades.
“Were we what?”
“Were we attacked by the French? Or were we wrong?”
“Wrong?” Lee snapped. “The evidence was presented, discussed and agreed upon. You were there, and you agreed with the Prime Minister’s decision.”
“I agreed on the basis of the evidence,” Miss Bennett replied. “If it turns out that evidence was misleading, and we have new evidence…”
“The decision to attack France has already been taken,” Lee interrupted, “and now we must follow through.”
Mitchell tried to shrink into his chair. He was stuck in the middle of the argument. Even though he was secretly delighted that Miss Bennett knew exactly how to infuriate William Lee, he hated having the eyes of the room aimed in his direction again. In desperation he looked to the Prime Minister, hoping he’d put a stop to the discussion. But Coates was staring into the middle distance, his head swaying slightly from side to side. Was he OK, Mitchell wondered?”
“Tell me,” Miss Bennett was saying, “have you considered why Jimmy Coates’s message is spreading more quickly than anti-Government messages have in the past?”
Lee wasn’t phased by the question. “I’m sure your team at the Information Division knows much more than I could about which messages people choose to disperse over the Internet.” He let out an awkward chuckle. “It seems to me that people will forward any old rubbish. They send all their friends personality quizzes, ridiculous jokes and pictures of monkeys dressed as penguins.”
“I haven’t seen that picture,” Miss Bennett cut in. “I think I’d like to. Mitchell, make sure I see the penguin-monkey that Mr Lee knows so much about. I don’t want to be left behind.” Mitchell squirmed. “And find out about ‘jokes’ as well. I might like them.”
“Miss Bennett!” William Lee couldn’t help raising his voice now, and looked around the room for support. Mitchell knew that only the Prime Minister would have dared tell Miss Bennett to be quiet and right now he looked far away, concentrating on something else.
“No need to shout,” purred Miss Bennett. “All I’m saying is that it looks like people are responding to the boy’s message. Maybe they believe him, and maybe they want to believe him.”
Mitchell was amazed. He’d seen Miss Bennett argue with William Lee before, but never in front of so many other people.
“A message doesn’t spread itself, does it?” she went on. “It takes members of the public to—”
“Members of the public?” roared Ian Coates, suddenly bursting into life as if he’d just woken up from a nightmare. Everybody was startled. “Since when did we take the advice of strangers in the street on how to run the country?”
Mitchell watched the faces of Miss Bennett and William Lee. They were both dumbfounded by Ian Coates’ outburst. But as the PM went on, Mitchell noticed a change in his voice. It was thin and frail, like the voice of a man thirty years older.
“Members of the public?!” Coates repeated, even more indignant. “The system of Neo-democracy protects the British people from the ignorance of the general population.” His eyes bulged with rage and his temples were throbbing. Mitchell found he couldn’t look away from the beads of sweat glistening in the furrows on the man’s forehead. “The vital decisions are taken by experts,” Coates was saying. “By us. Nobody in Britain should live with the responsibility that they might have to make decisions of national importance. The consequences of such decisions are immense.”
Around the table, the Cabinet members were either staring into their laps or shooting each other glances of concern at the Prime Minister’s outburst. But nobody dared interrupt him.
“It is more vital than ever,” he went on, “that the country is fully behind this Government. The war with France is a vital part of that process. It’s the perfect way to unite everybody in Britain. And we’ll be united behind Neo-democracy.” He fixed his glare on William Lee. “That’s why we’ve come up with the Walnut Tree Project.” With another curt wave, he indicated that Lee should continue the briefing.
“Quite simply,” Lee explained, still rattled by the PM’s rant, “we have planned a new French attack. Not a strike on an oil rig or military target, but an attack on the British people themselves. This will be the best reminder to everybody in the country that we have a common enemy.”
“You’re going to attack British citizens yourself and then blame the French?” Miss Bennett wasn’t aghast, as Mitchell expected her to be. She sounded like she was calmly clarifying the details.
“We’ll try to minimise casualties, of course,” Lee replied. “But for the attack to look genuine, some members of society may have to be sacrificed.”
“Expendable ones,” Coates explained. “Criminals the courts haven’t convicted yet, homeless people, the unemployable…”
“I’ve chosen the most suitable site I could find on such short notice,” said William Lee. He picked up a large roll of paper from the floor and unfurled it on the table. It was a map of London. “In order to have the most impact, I realised that it had to be somewhere in London. And then I thought—why not use this to solve our other little problem?”
Everybody looked puzzled. Mitchell already suspected what Lee had in mind before he explained, “Jimmy Coates escaped our aerial task force. The strike on his helicopter was a success, but it turns out Jimmy wasn’t in it.”
Sounds like a British success, Mitchell thought to himself.
“Our investigative team now believes he could only have slipped away on the train. The train reached London twenty minutes ago, making it too late to seal Waterloo Station. But if we stage the attack carefully, in the vicinity of Waterloo, and
we clear the area of police and ordinary security services, we might be able to tempt Jimmy Coates out of hiding to try to stop the explosion. We’ll make sure he doesn’t succeed, of course. At the very least, we may be able to pick up his trail. With any luck we’ll blow him up along with the building.”
Finally, Lee leaned forward, his shadow extending over the map of London like night falling across the city. He extended an elegant index finger and tapped a small lane called Walnut Tree Walk in Lambeth. All he said was, “A tower block.”
Everybody craned forward to get a look at the exact spot. The people at the far end of the table had to stand up to see and a general murmur broke out. Mitchell waited for someone to make an objection, but from the fear on their faces it was obvious nobody was going to. He wondered whether he should protest himself, but when he took a breath to speak it seemed to freeze his throat. He looked again at the map. The lines swirled around with the confusion in his head. He didn’t understand the politics of it, but he understood that the Government was going to blow up its own people just so they could blame the French.
“It’s for the greater good,” Lee whispered, resting a hand on Mitchell’s shoulder. Mitchell quickly nodded and made his face go blank. It wasn’t his job to react to Government decisions. He was lucky to even be at this meeting.
“Prime Minister.”
A firm voice broke through the hubbub. It was Miss Bennett. Her icy tone forced everybody back into their seats and commanded their attention. “Clearly you won’t be dissuaded from this ridiculous plot, and I can see the logic in it, but I must urge you not to rush into this. A disaster like this will certainly pull the country together and distract people from Internet rumours, but it does seem a little…clumsy.”
“Clumsy?” barked Coates.
“Yes. Like sending a torpedo to kill a mosquito.”
“It would do the job,” mumbled William Lee.
“It would also do the job to give an NJ7 team a little more time to shut down or reframe the necessary websites and spread counter-information. Meanwhile we’ll continue to hunt Jimmy Coates. We know he’s in London. There isn’t a square millimetre of the city that’s not covered by cameras or real-time satellite imaging—or both. We’ll find him and kill him by the end of the day.”
“A day is too long,” Coates rasped. “The operation is already under way.”
“I thought you’d say that.” Miss Bennett shrugged. “So my objections are over-ruled?” The Prime Minister nodded. With a flourish, Miss Bennett unclipped her hair and let it tumble about her shoulders. She tapped her hairclip on the table and with a broad smile announced, “You’re a fool.”
There was general shock around the table, but Ian Coates looked close to smiling too.
“We’re blowing up a tower block,” he insisted quietly. Then he pounded his fist on the table and roared, “We’re blowing up the tower block on Walnut Tree Walk! If anybody has any problem with that they can leave the room now!”
Mitchell looked up and down the table. Nobody made eye contact. The only noise was the soft shuffle of people shifting in their seats. Mitchell knew that if anybody left the room now they would never make it to the street. Miss Bennett was simply watching calmly. The Prime Minister broke the silence.
“We all agree that Neo-democratic principles are vital to the strength of this country, don’t we?” There was a reserved murmur of agreement from his Cabinet. “And that it is our duty to protect Neo-democracy whenever it is threatened.” Again, people nodded and muttered, slightly louder this time.
“Then the British public has nothing to fear from the people in this room. We’re protecting them.” Coates’ voice rose steadily and started to quiver. “The danger comes from beyond Britain’s boundaries. If people don’t know that then it’s our duty to show them.” He pushed himself to his feet and supported himself on the table. “Their fear will protect the system, and it’s the system which is protecting them. If they question the system then they’re not afraid enough!” Mitchell watched, astounded, as the Prime Minister swayed more violently, then staggered backwards, knocking his chair to the floor. “Don’t they realise there’s a foreign country only thirty-six kilometres away across the English Channel, and that it’s full of French people?!” The PM was staggering about now, blinking frantically and unable to balance himself. Every member of the Cabinet, except Miss Bennett and William Lee, rushed to try and support him. Like a feverish bear, he swiped them away.
“There are horrors on our doorstep!” he wailed, his words slurring into each other. “If people are sleeping so soundly at night that they can spread the cankerous filth of an ignorant, traitorous boy…” He rocked to one side and threw his arm out towards the mantelpiece to catch himself, but missed and sent a huge vase crashing to the floor.
Suddenly, people were rushing everywhere to the sounds of screams and desperate shouts for help. Mitchell was transfixed. He felt like he was watching everything in slow motion: the Prime Minister’s eyes rolled back in his head. His arms shuddered and his upper body twisted like a snowflake in the wind. Finally, his legs seemed to melt away from under him. He swivelled and collapsed forwards on to the table, smashing his forehead into the wood. His outstretched fingertips were centimetres from Miss Bennett’s hairclip.
04 CRATE EXPECTATIONS
Jimmy hurried away from Waterloo Station. It hadn’t been hard for him to stay unnoticed by the commuters bustling their way to work. They kept their grim faces downcast unless they were squinting up at the departures board. Jimmy was more worried about keeping his face off the surveillance cameras. With facial recognition software, he’d be picked out of the crowd in seconds.
Fortunately, that also worked in his favour. It meant that nobody would be monitoring the camera feeds personally, and there was no software that knew to look out for a boy wandering through the streets alone.
On the train journey he’d managed to find out a little more vital information from a leaflet he’d found behind the snack bar. It was the train operator’s guidelines on emergency procedures, and it confirmed what he’d thought: the only major hospitals left in the country were in the big cities. It set out clearly that in the case of a significant incident at Waterloo, the nearest hospital with the facilities to cope was a place called St Thomas’.
Jimmy didn’t want to risk going anywhere else. If the other hospitals weren’t big enough or well enough funded to cope with more than a few casualties, there was no way they’d be any help with Jimmy’s radiation poisoning. He’d be putting himself in danger for nothing. No—he had one shot at going to a hospital so it had to work. It had to be St Thomas’.
Jimmy had only been to hospital once before, and he’d been too young to remember now which hospital it had been. He’d fallen in an adventure playground and his mum thought he’d broken his arm, so she’d taken him for an x-ray.
All Jimmy remembered was sitting in the waiting room for hours and hours, only to be told that he was fine. It was almost funny now to think of the way his body had developed. Since his powers had kicked in, it took a lot more than falling down to break his arm. All those cuts and bruises he’d suffered while he was growing up—those days were over. Jimmy knew that it was extreme danger that had awakened his programming early, but he wondered whether there was anything that could possibly make it go away again. He quickly told himself to put thoughts of the impossible out of his mind. His programming couldn’t be switched off. It was part of him.
Jimmy prowled through the streets towards the River Thames. He reckoned the streets were safer that the tunnels of the Underground system, and he’d memorised the map from the train leaflet to guide him to St Thomas’. But within minutes he saw that he had a problem. Armed policemen were blockading the roads and pavements.
Jimmy slipped into the doorway of a café to hide, feeling a surge of anger at himself. How could he have hoped to walk to the hospital? They’ve already set up a ring round the station, Jimmy realised. He’d been coun
ting on it taking a little longer for NJ7 to work out he’d been on the train, not in the wreckage of the helicopter.
There was nothing for it but to turn round and walk back in the direction he’d come. Retracing his steps increased his chances of being recognised, so he chose a different route, while still making his way back towards Waterloo Station. All the time, he was racking his brains. If he couldn’t get to the hospital on foot, it was obvious NJ7 would have the Underground platforms monitored as well—that’s if the trains were running at all.
By now Jimmy was feeling like every thought had to fight its way through a veil of tiredness and hunger. He didn’t dare try to remember the last time he’d slept for more than a couple of hours at a time, and his stomach was aching for some kind of breakfast.
Very soon he was back in the network of road tunnels around Waterloo Station. If they’ve set up a ring, he thought to himself, I’m safest in the centre. He could feel frustration biting at the back of his mind. He didn’t have any time to waste, yet it looked like the only thing he could do was wait. His programming was throbbing through his brain, like dark liquid coating the inside of his skull. It was lining up his options: surely NJ7 wouldn’t be checking the boot of every car, would they? What about the undercarriages?
Jimmy rounded a corner and realised that his body had subconsciously guided him to one of the station’s service entrances. He moved without hesitation, keeping his head ducked low behind the mounds of discarded plastic crates. This was where the stock was delivered to the retail and refreshment outlets. It was a little late for a delivery, but if any supply lorry had been held up it could provide Jimmy with two things: a much needed breakfast and a potential escape opportunity.
Within seconds, Jimmy’s prayers were answered. A white van swung into one of the bays. It backed up to a set of loading doors and stopped. Jimmy waited for the driver to get out. He’d have to choose his moment carefully. What was in the van, he wondered. Sandwiches? Crisps? Muffins? There was nothing on the van that gave any clue—no writing, no logo… But Jimmy’s chance to find out didn’t come.
