by Chris James
Chapter 14
09.44 Tuesday 7 February 2062
TERRY SAT BACK in the chair and let out a sigh as figures left and right of him began to disappear. He pulled the VR glasses off, the auditorium vanished and he was back on the couch in the flat at 10 Downing Street. Napier sat opposite him, her expression as pensive as his own. Next to her, Terry noticed Webb’s right eye dart in its socket.
“Ah, Prime Minister, Sir Terry. More bad news, I’m afraid.”
“What’s happened now?” Terry asked in a neutral tone.
“United Airlines is reporting the disappearance of its Sydney-Frankfurt flight, BA is saying its lost contact with its Wellington-London flight, and Lufthansa and Emirates are also reporting missing planes, all in the last forty minutes.”
“Do they say where contact was lost?”
Webb frowned: “No, but flight monitoring services claim locations in Kazakhstan and over the Caspian Sea.”
Terry sipped his tea and tapped a glass panel in the surface of the coffee table. “Simms, John, adjutant to General Sir Terry Tidbury, MOD.”
Webb spoke: “If the Caliphate starts shooting down civilian plans, it will cost them a lot in PR.”
Napier said: “I’m surprised any are still in the air after the night’s events.”
Terry replied: “No new flights would’ve taken off after the attacks on the navies began, but the European Civil Aviation author—”
Terry broke off as the screen in the coffee table came to life with an image of his adjutant. “Yes, Sir Terry?”
“Article Five has been invoked and all NATO FMNs are going to full readiness at once. Any news from Turkey?”
Simms’ bushy eyebrows came together in consideration. “It’s chaos, I’m afraid, Sir Terry. Caliphate ACAs are burning out all equipment with highly directed microwave bursts before their jamming devices block all contact with lost territory. Our SkyWatchers are picking up final comms from Turkish military units on the front line as they’re overwhelmed, but there is much confusion.”
“Why? The Turkish military knows who the enemy is, yes?”
“Not entirely, Sir. It seems certain units have some sympathy for the Caliphate.”
“Any indication of how the invaders are behaving?”
“Not yet, Sir.”
Terry queried, “Nothing?”
Simms replied: “The microwave bursts comprehensively burn out all exposed components—”
“But that only affects civilian equipment; their military comms should still work. Haven’t we got anything?”
“Any captures would be restricted, so I think that might depend on how much GCHQ feels like sharing.”
Terry let out a scoff and said: “Agreed. I’ll be on my way back there soon. Organise a meeting with the service chiefs. We have a lot to discuss.”
Simms nodded and the connection ended. Terry looked up at Napier and said: “If GCHQ are getting any captures, any captures at all, from the Turkish military, I absolutely need to see them.”
Napier replied: “Of course,” and then added: “Is there anything else we can start doing now? Anything we should be doing?”
Terry nodded: “Procurement,” he said, glancing at Webb. “We need to build up material reserves in case the peace-loving Caliph has broader plans than merely assimilating Turkey.”
Webb opened his mouth to speak but Terry put out a hand and said: “No, I don’t want to hear there’s no money. The money’s got to be found, one way or another. It looks like the SkyWatchers and PeaceMakers are already outmatched by the Caliphate’s machines, but until we can catch up, we’re going to need them. Thousands and thousands of them, I suspect.”
“The Treasury is going to love this,” Webb said.
Terry said: “How the Treasury feels about it is irrelevant, Mr Webb. We’ll also need more funds for our key research facility at Porton Down as soon as possible. If this turns out as I expect, we will have to design, test and build new ACAs in record time. Even if the Third Caliph told the truth this morning—and I don’t for a second believe he did—we’ve got to show him that we’re prepared.”
“But we are prepared. We were prepared…” the confidence in Webb’s voice cracked. He paused and then looked at Terry and Napier in turn. “How could this have happened? How could we not have seen this coming?”
“That,” Terry replied, “is a question for the historians. Today, it’s one step at a time. The Caliphate is aggressively assimilating Turkey, and nothing’s going to save her. But it doesn’t necessarily follow that Europe is next. They could advance northeast into Russia and the Caucuses. Certainly there are plenty of Muslims for them in those countries, and that would make Moscow nervous.”
Napier said: “We have to put the hammer down on diplomatic channels. I can’t believe no one outside the Caliphate knew this was going to happen.” She turned to Webb: “Crispin, research all diplomatic comms for the last year, including intel from the US and our NATO allies, to identify any hint that we should’ve seen this coming.”
Webb replied, “Of course,” and his right eye began twitching. Terry watched Napier’s aide and decided to hold his tongue. Whether any missed indications could be found mattered little now.
Webb spoke: “Initial research results come up blank. The Caliphate’s isolation has been extremely effective.”
“What about the Chinese?” Napier asked. “They must have known. They’re the Caliphate’s key trading partner.”
“PM,” Terry said with a practised tone of diplomacy, “I’d better be getting back.”
“Yes. Yes, of course. Thank you, Terry.”
Chapter 15
19.44 Tuesday 7 February 2062
JANE PHILLIPS PUT her arm around the shoulders of her youngest child and tried to comfort her: “Things like this happen, love. We’re all shocked.” Jane heard herself speak the words but didn’t understand why she sounded so defensive.
Maria said: “But cousin Bernard, dead, and for no reason—”
“We don’t know he’s gone.”
“Two survivors out of how many in that fleet? Five thousand? More?”
Jane felt a pain in her stomach which did little to alleviate the headache that had been grinding behind her forehead for most of the day. The shock defied explanation. These things simply didn’t happen any more. When was the last time the Royal Navy had been involved in a proper sea battle? She wracked her memory, all the way back to her schooldays thirty-five years earlier, to briefly studying a long-forgotten skirmish called the Falklands War, nearly a century ago in the 1980s.
“We mustn’t give up hope—”
“But so many people, dead, all at once, Mum. It’s horrible, it’s wrong—”
A new voice spoke: “Nah, happens all the time in games.”
Jane spun around to confront her middle child: “Mark, this isn’t a game. Real sailors died last night, thousands of them.”
Mark gave his mother a nonchalant glance as he walked through the living room, “Yeah, I did hear about it. Was the food I ordered delivered?”
“Yes, it’s in your cupboard,” Jane answered.
When Mark disappeared into the kitchen, Maria prodded her mother and whispered: “I thought we agreed? You remember what Piccolo said? Much more crap food and Mark will get diabetes.”
Jane didn’t need her daughter to remind her of what their apartment’s super AI had told them about Mark’s health. But Mark had always been difficult. Her oldest and youngest, Martin and Maria, were both well-rounded adults: responsible, polite and calm. But Mark had always been surly, insolent and hurtful. His constant immersion in virtual gaming worlds made him an exemplar of one of society’s biggest ills, but repeated pleas to moderate his gaming and food consumption only brought stress into the house. At fifty years old, feeling the detrimental health effects of raising three children while working full time as a history teacher, Jane considered that two out of three wasn’t bad.
“I know, sweetheart,”
Jane replied with a faint trace of resignation.
Mark emerged from the kitchen with an armful of cardboard cartons and a one-litre drink in one hand. He said to the two women: “I’m about to enter an S–73 level, so I might not come back till tomorrow.”
His mother blurted out: “Why don’t you stop wasting you life, you stupid little boy?”
Mark replied with a sneer: “You’re the ones wasting your lives. What do you gain here, in this world? It’s dull and pedantic and tedious and really, really boring. And all of you get upset because I spend so much time in a place that makes me happy, and at the same time, I’m working towards a goal which will make your boring lives a little bit better.”
Jane felt Maria squeeze her hand in support, but Jane fought to hold her emotions back.
Mark continued, his strong jaw line jutting forward: “You’ll see, all of you. I’ll gain one of the Bounties. And when I do, you’ll be so grateful to me for allowing you to move to a decent place to live—”
Jane felt her body tremble, but then Maria snapped: “Shut up, Mark. The Bounties are false, they don’t even exist—”
“You are so wrong. I’ve talked to Bounty winners—”
“They are AI, Mark. They’re not real people who’ve won anything.”
“Now you’re repeating the government’s propaganda—”
“No, I’m not. How many reports do you need to see? How many victims of these scams will it take to convince you?”
Mark stepped towards his younger sister, struggling to hold on to his cargo. “There are two sources of those ‘reports’: one, the government-controlled media who are trying to restrict the gaming companies; two, other gamers, who are putting out false reports to put other gamers off playing for the Bounties. Seriously, sis, you don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Maria hissed: “No, dear brother, it is you who doesn’t realise what is going on. While you submerse yourself in the false, pretend worlds where you can die a million times and never feel an ounce of pain, war is coming here, to the real world, where the pain will hurt very much, and where each of us will die only once, and when we do die, there will be few left to mourn us. So go, dear brother, and enjoy your pleasure while it lasts.”
Mark scoffed in contempt, turned and left the room. Jane looked at the face of her youngest child, and saw the hard metal of determination in the girl’s eyes, and she felt proud of her daughter.
Chapter 16
07.08 Wednesday 8 February 2062
KIVI GRIPPED PAZ’S hand as the crush of people swept the two young women towards Rabin Square in Tel Aviv.
“Did Seth say where?” Paz asked above the din as the crowd of people flowed like a river along Frishman Street.
Kivi glanced at her best friend and noted the concern in her bright blue eyes. “Close to the edge of the monument. Don’t worry, my lens has their location.” Kivi wished Paz wouldn’t fret. To Kivi, the atmosphere seemed more convivial, like a carnival, the kind of fairs she and Paz used to go to years ago. She glanced down at Paz and raised her voice: “If the rumours are true, I think we’re going to hear good news.”
With her free hand, Paz brushed stands of black hair from her face and replied: “I can’t believe we’ve attacked the Caliphate, it’s so incredible.”
“After yesterday and the day before? It was inevit—”
“No, it wasn’t,” Paz said, and Kivi felt Paz squeeze her hand harder. “The Peace Buffer has kept the peace for years. What’s happened is exactly why it’s there: to keep Israel safe from the—”
“Don’t be ridiculous.” Kivi didn’t want to fall out with her friend over such a thing as politics, but sometimes she wondered if Paz realised the seriousness of the situation. “Now the Caliphate has revealed itself to be the warmonger Fischel said it was all along, we had to do something. You’ve seen the suffering in Turkey—”
“Yes, and it’s awful, but it doesn’t mean we should’ve attacked, if we have. How many times have we talked about it, Kivi? I don’t understand how you can be happy about this.”
“It’s not about being happy; it’s about being safe.”
The pressure of the throng eased as the flow poured into the square. Kivi stood a clear head above most of the people around them, and she noted all of the orthodox black caps that bobbed up and down. High over the thousands of people in the square, the expansive bright blue morning sky shone brightly, flecked with a patchwork of distant cirrocumulus hued a light pink.
“Yeah, but the hate, Kivi, you remember last summer, at Asaf’s party? We stayed up the whole night discussing it—”
“I remember, but this is different.”
“No, it isn’t. This is exactly one of the scenarios we discussed. Do you recall what you said then?”
Kivi felt too much excitement to concentrate on remembering one of the previous summer’s many parties. She only wanted to find Seth and the others, as she followed directions from the lens in her eye. She guided and then pulled Paz with her towards the Holocaust Memorial. She heard the splashes as people fell or jumped into the water feature close to the memorial.
Paz reminded her: “You said you believed, finally, there was a real chance to end the century of hatred. You said the Caliphate was a sensible consolidation of the region and the Peace Buffer Zone would protect us eno—”
“That was when we assumed the Caliphate was peaceful. When we gave them the benefit of the doubt. Before yesterday happened.”
“I know it was a shock, but violence can only lead to more violence. You rememb—”
“Seth!” Kivi called and she caught sight of her brother’s boyfriend. She dragged Paz through the people and hugged the olive-skinned, muscular Seth, whose smile beamed with pleasure.
“Hey, Sis. You know Deen and Nadin, right?” he said, indicating two smiling young men next to him.
Kivi smiled back and cried, “Hi, guys.” She let go of Paz’s hand and asked Seth: “What news?”
Seth’s smile faded: “Strange.”
“How?” she asked.
He spoke into her ear: “We sent our best. We threw everything at them. But our machines just seem to have vanished. So far, no one knows what’s happened.”
“How could they just vanish?”
Seth shrugged his shoulders.
“So we have attacked them, then?” Paz asked, and Kivi saw the fear in her eyes. “What about America? Did they join in and attack them as well?”
Seth shook his head. “My Dad said he heard that it was unilateral—”
“Fischel trying to look like a hero,” Paz said with a frown.
The young man called Nadin said: “Or maybe he understands that we can’t rely on our allies like we used to?”
An older, bearded man in a white tallit turned to face the group and wagged a finger at the youngsters: “It was the best time. All of the Caliphate’s ACAs are involved attacking Turkey. Our government realised that they must be defenceless and exposed, and that is why it was better to attack now.”
“You seem to be very well informed, Sir,” Seth said, but the man just tapped a finger on the side of his nose in reply.
“I don’t like it,” Paz said. “I thought we were coming here to protest, not celebrate.”
Kivi shrugged and said: “What’s there to protest if we’ve already attacked?”
“Then we better pray it succeeds,” Paz replied.
Kivi glanced back at Seth and saw his eye twitch. He said nothing so she asked: “News?”
He shook his head, “Still no contact. There’s a rumour that the attack must have failed because… Oh, wait. I’ve got a friend in ACA tech support, and he says for sure our ACAs must have failed.”
“At least we’re safe enough, yes?” Kivi asked.
“Of course,” Seth replied. “I just asked him how he knew, and he said the engineers report no seismic disturbances which they’d expected when the nukes should’ve—”
“What?” Paz exclaimed. “How many n
ukes?”
Seth smiled at her, the sunlight reflecting the sheen of sweat on his dark forehead. “All of them, I think.”
Paz’s mouth hung open for a moment, then she said: “That’s madness. The rest of the world will never forgive us… And none of them exploded?”
Kivi shook her head and anger flashed across Seth’s face. “What would you prefer, Paz?” Seth asked. “That we wait until it’s too late?”
Kivi tutted and said: “I tried explaining that to her on the way here.”
Then it was Paz’s turn to shake her head. “What’s happened to you two? The attack on Turkey has turned you into bloodthirsty degenerates, and I’m appalled—”
“Shut up, Paz,” Kivi spat. “You’ve never learned to recognise when you’re being cheated, and you know Fischel did the right thing.” Kivi stopped when she heard a low murmur of “Oh, no,” from Seth. She spun round to him: “What?”
Seth put his hand out, “Wait,” he said, and his right eye twitched. At the time, Kivi’s own lens began to malfunction. She noticed other heads in crowd around them dip and shake.
Paz said: “My lens is losing data.”
“No, something else is going on.” Seth said.
Nadin held out a device in his hand: “My slate’s working fine.”
Kivi looked at the men in turn and then at Paz’s tearstained eyes. Around them, the blare of single-tone sirens rose up in a continuous wailing. Kivi felt a ripple of shock wash over all of the people around her. A man’s voice called out: “Must be an earthquake.”
Suddenly people began moving, pushing, shoving, but Kivi knew there could be nowhere to go. If an earthquake was about to hit, the middle of Rabin Square was probably one of the safer places to be. The people in the area around her began to thin out.
