Sinclair put up his hand. “Hush, my dear. Let’s take a look at you...”
Without another word, the Centurion ripped off the hood and mask of her camo suit, revealing her face, her reddened neck and her collar-length blonde hair.
Sinclair said, “Wow, you’re a pretty one, aren’t you? So let’s see who you are...”
Becker spoke first. “Ms Sophie Walsh, MI5.” He laughed, subconsciously placing his right hand on his service pistol in its hip holster.
She said, “It’s finished. You’re surrounded and the Americans are on side now too. Time to surrender. There’s nowhere for you to go—”
Becker said, “We know about HMS Intrepid. It’s not a real threat. And, let’s face it, it’s the last serious opposition left this side of the Atlantic.”
Sophie looked at her contact lens HUD—four minutes until impact. Every cell in her body wanted to survive. She wanted to see her boyfriend, Tom, again. And her parents. And her friends. She wanted a life and a future, but belatedly accepted that this was the life she’d chosen. But it wasn’t over yet. She made a decision. She decided to gamble on them not having the weaponry to stop the airstrike. It was probably a fair judgement given the bunker busters were standoff missiles and would be launched many kilometres from the facility.
She said, “We all have just over three minutes to get out of here. I called in an airstrike seven minutes ago.” She smiled triumphantly.
Zane said, “She’s bluffing!”
Becker stopped as if concentrating on something unseen. Something known only to his mind and other networked ICS users.
He said, “It’s possible... I suggest we get out of here...”
Without verbal debate, they started moving. Sophie—still held around the neck by the Centurion—strained her head, watching them run out of the door.
She said, “What about me? You’re just gonna leave me here?”
Zane stepped back and brought his face close to hers. He looked her in the eye and went to stroke her cheek—she pushed his hand away and spat at his face. He held his composure, smiled and said, “Have a nice life, beautiful. All two minutes of it.” Then he bolted for the door as Sophie struggled to break free of the stationary bot. She kicked and she bucked but it threw her to the floor.
The robot said, “Now my mission has changed again! Looks like I get to waste you after all!”
It raised the assault rifle, taking time to aim for her legs first. She froze and scrunched her eyes up tight, waiting for the inevitable pain. She could hear gunfire in the distance and the first sounds of an aero-car starting up somewhere nearby—Rats leaving the sinking ship, she thought. She thought of her partner, Tom. His warm embrace and kind smile. Her old mum and dad drinking endless cups of tea in their little living room. All she longed for was an ordinary life at that moment—even one under a crazed dictatorship. A few more seconds passed and she started wondering what was happening with her erstwhile executioner. She dared open her eyes again. First just a peek, which revealed something that lifted her from her fatalism. The bot was just standing there, its rifle raised, but still, utterly still. She took a chance and decided to leap up—this would determine whether she lived or died.
She leapt and she lived—the Centurion with the smashed eye continued to stand there. The virus must have worked! she decided. But now there was less than two minutes until impact. She grabbed the assault rifle from the robot and quickly checked it was ready to fire. She selected auto mode and then kicked open the office door. She sprinted through the reception, suddenly full of energy, elated at her unexpected life extension.
She could see the red aero-car below, on the quadrangle lawn. Surrounding it were a dozen Centurions and a giant Sentinel—all of them now inactive. Inside the sleek aero-car were the three traitors. The down-thrust pushed the grass flat as the craft started lifting off. Sophie used the rifle butt to smash through the window, losing valuable seconds. She took aim and fired three-round bursts. Some of them may have struck home, while many of them missed the accelerating aero-car. Nevertheless, it kept going and the rifle clicked empty. With no more ammo, Sophie dropped the weapon and bolted for the staircase and the front lobby. All around were statuesque droids, frozen in time—some fallen to the floor as they’d shut down while striding forwards. The bulky form of a fallen Sentinel blocked the way outside one of the main entrance doors. Staff members were leaving in dribs and drabs, some of them running but some of them just strolling as if nothing was happening. Sophie found that quite bizarre.
One minute until impact. Approximately one minute. She reached the concourse outside and continued running, her legs burning with anaerobically-induced lactic acid. She needed to put distance between herself and the massive blasts that were sure to come. She opened a channel to command and spoke breathlessly.
“Intrepid Command, this is Ghost-one... Call off the airstrikes. The virus has worked after all! Three suspects, Zane, Sinclair and Becker, are in Zane’s aero-car attempting to flee... You need to use all available assets to intercept them!”
“Copy that, Ghost-one. Be advised that we cannot call off the airstrike once the birds have flown. Missiles incoming in less than sixty seconds. Evacuate the area immediately. We’ll attempt to track the aero-car. Good luck, Ghost-one... Out.”
Sophie said nothing and continued sprinting towards the exit. Her body ached all over but she ran until her legs burned like fire.
***
The pair of five hundred kilo bunker-busting missiles powered towards the server room at hypersonic velocity. The first ploughed through concrete, glass, steel and earth, expending the energy of a small nuclear device before reaching the basement level. Then its one-hundred kilos of high explosives detonated in the server room. Seconds later, the second missile slammed into the crater left by the first. The less-constrained blast sent fragments spewing out of the crater at supersonic speeds. A fifty-gram piece of missile casing sliced through the red aero-car flying south at low altitude. It passed through one of the four-ducted fans and ripped through the starboard winglet, destabilising the aero-car.
***
Sophie picked herself up from the concourse floor outside the wrecked building. The blast had thrown her down hard. She felt dazed, but as she dusted herself down, she caught sight of the falling aero-car not far to the south. At least one of the engines was smoking a dark plume as it plummeted at a forty-five degree angle on a spiralling trajectory. She watched as the craft came down ten seconds later in a wooded area to the north of Dundee, perhaps two klicks from her position. The first elements of 45 Commando, Royal Marines, were just arriving at E-Vision looking for survivors and high-value targets. Two dozen or so dazed-looking workers in various states of shock and injury were standing, sitting and lying on the floor nearby. A few more stood around chatting with nothing seemingly wrong with them. Sophie, still in her non-functional camo suit, jogged up to the nearest Marine.
The heavily built man in full combat gear raised his palm. Sophie stopped looking at him with rage in her eyes. He said, “Ma’am, why don’t you sit here and wait—”
Sophie reached inside her suit and pulled out her ID. “Security Service, I need you to come with me and secure that downed aero-car. We need to arrest the traitors and—”
He studied her ID card, then said, “No can do, ma’am. Orders are to secure the site and not let anyone leave ... But I think we can make an exception seeing as your MI5. We can’t come with you until we clear it with the CO though...”
He looked around checking that no one was looking.
“But here, take this,” he said.
He handed her his side arm—a Glock 17.
She looked up at the big marine, smiled and took the 9mm handgun.
“Thank you,” she said.
He nodded and said, “Not a problem. Good luck, Sophie Walsh.”
She stashed the gun and sprinted away from the concourse and the burning E-Vision buildings and down the access road to the count
ry B-road. The woods were on the other side of the pasture adjacent to the road. She ran down the muddy drainage ditch, unconcerned with the filth and frigid water at the bottom, and scaled up the other side. She pushed through the field-side hedge, scratching her face on a thorn. She hardly noticed with the adrenaline dulling her pain. Across the empty pasture of thick green grass she ran, and on towards the belching plume of smoke a few hundred metres into the woods.
Nearing the tree line, she unpocketed the handgun, clicked off the safety and then raised it, covering her approach. She slowed and automatically mapped out her concealment and cover options on the route towards the downed craft. Catching her breathe, she crouched behind a large tree trunk and let her eyes adjust to the dim forest light. Thirty seconds later, she stepped into the woods-proper to hunt her enemy.
Moving from cover to cover, but sometimes having to settle for concealment behind dense undergrowth, Sophie closed in on the smouldering wreckage. Squatting behind a waist-high bush, she could see the aero-car. It was side on to her and sitting almost right-way-up, but with its scrunched-up nose part-buried in the leafy ground. The side windows were shattered and a bloodied head was slumped up against the nearside pane. The red beret told her it was Becker. The craft was surprisingly intact. Only one of the engines was spewing smoke. The forest canopy probably broke its fall, she thought. She surveyed the rest of the aero-car and its environs. No sign of Zane or Sinclair and Hardcastle hadn’t even gotten into the aero-car in the first place.
Now where are those two snakes? she thought, concentrating hard in the half-light, looking for clues. She looked more closely at the rear window and could swear there was a second figure slumped in the back seat. It was hard to tell as the safety glass had shattered and the inside of the cabin was dark. There was only one way to find out, and with Colonel Becker apparently dead, she felt better about making an approach.
After rising to her feet, she advanced gingerly, covering from side to side in sweeping arcs. On reaching the far side of the aero-car, Sophie peered inside the window. As well as the lifeless Becker up front, the pudgy Sinclair had come to rest slumped forward in his seatbelt. His head hung sideways at a grotesque and unnatural angle. It was obvious he was dead. With no sign of Zane, Sophie tried to yank open the jammed door. After several attempts, it came free and then it happened. Sophie became unbalanced and stumbled backwards. As the door swung open, it revealed Zane lying prone on the floor pointing a handgun up at her. Before she could react, he fired. Time slowed down. She saw the muzzle flash, then heard the crack and then milliseconds later felt the searing pain in her upper leg. She half fell, half dove to the side, dropping her Glock, to end up sprawled on her back. Blood had already started seeping through her suit from the agonising wound. Zane stood over her, pointing his gun at her face while grinning malevolently at his prey.
He snarled and said, “You really think you’re the hero don’t you?”
She said nothing, but held eye contact, her breathing laboured.
“Well, let me tell you something, Sophie ... the real hero isn’t me and it certainly isn’t you—”
Suddenly, distant shouts—probably from some nearby Marines—echoed through the woods, wiping the grin from his face. Zane his left index finger his lips and thrust the handgun towards her a few more inches, instructing her to stay hushed. She focused on him, regulating her breathing and her pain. He glanced back in the direction of the sound and Sophie saw her chance. With inhumanly fast reactions, she swept away his legs sending him tumbling onto his side. He dropped the gun and she scrambled on top of him, her wounded leg imploring her to stop. Before he could fight back, she landed a wicked right hook under his jaw propelling his whole head backwards. Being thirty kilos heavier than her he threw her off, but inadvertently towards her Glock. Both scrambled to grab the weapon, but Sophie was closer. It became clear to Zane that she’d get it first, so he rolled over and started towards his own weapon on the woodland floor. Sophie had lost a lot of blood and was starting to feel weak. Her vision phased out intermittently and she felt light-headed. Then her hand reached the Glock. Its engineered form felt reassuring in her hand. Instinctively knowing where he was, she rolled onto her back and fired a spread of three rounds. Zane was kneeling, raising his gun when the first two missed. But the third entered Victor Zane’s forehead freezing his shocked expression for an eternity. With the first rivulets of blood from the small entry wound snaking its way down his face, he fell forwards onto the leafy ground. Sophie stared at the enormous exit cavity that the supersonic shockwave had dug into the back of his head. Her weakness started to return, washing over her like a wave of lethargy. Her sight was growing dim. Warm blood continued to stream from her wounded leg. Seconds later, her world went black.
28
Friday, August 3rd, 2046: The London Guardian News Report
Hardcastle Found Guilty
by Jessica Thomas
Friday 3 August 2046 15.30 GMT Last modified on Friday 3 August 2046 16:10 GMT
One of the most secretive trials held in Britain since the Second World War has ended with the former defence secretary, John Hardcastle, being found guilty on all charges. The long list of crimes—all related to last year’s attempted military coup—include treason, murder, sedition, breach of the official secrets act and false imprisonment. The jury’s verdict was unanimous on each charge laid. The former minister and close confidante of the late prime minister, Nigel Faraday, is expected to receive a whole-life tariff when sentencing takes place next week.
The locked court at the Old Bailey has been running for the last seven months and has placed heavy restrictions on journalists reporting the case. Before today’s verdict, more than two hundred co-conspirators have been tried around the country, a hundred and seventy-nine of them being found guilty of a variety of charges. The most high profile case prior to this one involved five MPs who were members of the so-called Westminster Circle—the plotters’ government-in-waiting.
The court heard how Hardcastle and the now-deceased co-conspirators—Victor Zane, Roman Sinclair, Colonel Thomas Becker and former home secretary, Malik Khan—harnessed the new robot army to seize power. The evidence concluded that they would have succeeded had it not been for undisclosed intelligence and military intervention. We are unable to report the details of how a limited number of plotters managed to control over two hundred thousand battle robots. On grounds of national security, the judge, Mr Justice Smithers, excluded journalists from sensitive parts of the hearing. Many other details have been shrouded in such secrecy that many other matters at the heart of the case cannot be reported.
Before the verdict was announced at the Old Bailey in London, Mr Justice Smithers rejected an application from seven media organisations for the reporting restrictions to be lifted. Jeremy Adams QC, counsel for the media, had argued that there was a “legitimate and substantial public interest” in the public being permitted to learn why their country had been brought to its knees. In rejecting the application, Mr Justice Smithers ruled, “For reasons that I can only explain in the accompanying private judgment, I reject Mr Adam’s application.”
After hearing the jury’s verdict, the judge addressed Hardcastle, saying, “Mr Hardcastle, you have been found guilty of leading the most serious threat to the Crown and the legitimate, representative government of this country in the last four hundred and forty-one years. You have abused your position of power to the utmost extent possible and have used that power to commit the gravest crimes imaginable against the state and its people. Through your wicked actions, you have committed mass murder of His Majesty’s brave service men and women as well as countless civilians. You are the worst of the worst of the long line of traitors that were behind this attempted coup d’état. You should expect nothing but the harshest sentencing permissible under the law.”
Hardcastle was apprehended in February last year by the Royal Marines who had surrounded the Dundee campus of E-Vision Entertainment. Evidence revealed t
hat the complex was in some way connected to the military coup, although details have been withheld by order of the court. This newspaper understands that the other coup leaders—Zane, Sinclair and Becker—were killed in an airstrike that destroyed the facility, disabling the group’s control of the robot army. The company was owned by Roman Sinclair, but has since been renamed and taken over by its major competitor, Game Dynamics Ltd. Victor Zane was CEO of British Defence Systems, manufacturers of the robots involved. The other members of the BDS board have denied all knowledge of the coup, but several of them are still under investigation by police and the security service. Colonel Thomas Becker was commander of the Second Battalion of the Parachute Regiment, based in Colchester, Essex. The turmoil the plot unleashed rendered Britain’s loyalist, non-robotic military virtually powerless. Major reforms to the military are now expected. At the heart of these will be additional security measures around the control of the robot army before its expected deployment in the Middle East next year.
In his defence, Hardcastle’s counsel, QC Martin Campbell, had argued that his client’s implanted computer system had had a part to play. In a bizarre explanation of his client’s conduct, Mr Campbell told the court that an artificially intelligent being named Eva had brainwashed Mr Hardcastle. In every case so far, the convicted have had implanted computer systems in their brains. It is now understood that the interim government is looking at emergency legislation to curb their use. Similar bans and restrictions have been put in place in America and parts of Europe over the past decade.
Hardcastle told the jury that he had “diminished responsibility” due to the infiltration and control of his ICS. Because of the secrecy surrounding the case, the details of how this may have happened cannot be made public. This mitigation is expected to have little effect on sentencing, with Mr Justice Smithers saying it was “an outlandish and unsupported mitigation.”
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