Sir John’s attention was diverted to an urgent message that suddenly appeared on his monitor. Doctor Kumar’s initial analysis of Karen had come through. Speed reading the document, he noted Karen’s blood and DNA had been somehow altered. There was no doubt about it now, she was human but with subtle differences that the Doctor nor his team were currently able to fully understand. His eye’s narrowed slightly as the other information scrolled down the screen. Both aunt and uncle were completely human, with none of the strange markers in Karen’s bloodstream.
A knock on the door caused them both to turn, to watch as a woman came in with an off-white plastic tray on which two large mugs of tea gently steamed, next to a large plate of biscuits. The server ignored Karen, leaving the tray in front of Sir John, far enough away so that Karen was unable to reach it and use the contents as a weapon. As silently as she entered, the woman left the room, closing the door behind her. Karen thought she could hear electronic deadbolts clicking home.
He pushed one of the mugs towards her, followed by the plate of biscuits but not before taking two for himself. He gestured with the Jammy Dodger he was holding in his right hand.
“Good choice, Karen. I love these things, too,” not bothering to dunk it and biting off half. He looked at her and indicated he would wait while she had a drink and something to eat.
Karen decided the tea would be too hot and started on the biscuits, only to find her mouth was too dry to eat them. “Mouth too dry and tea too hot,” she told him, “I’ll wait a few minutes.”
“Water?” he asked.
Karen nodded, knowing the observers would pick up the gesture and bring some for her.
“What has the weather been like where you’ve been?” asked Sir John, noting the pronounced change in her skin colour, “You look like it was somewhere warm.” He waited for her to respond, but she only smiled back at him, wincing again as the padding around her nose pulled and tightened the skin. Another knock on the door made him pause, and he watched as the same woman brought in a glass of chilled water, which chinked from the ice-cubes as she placed it on the table, again in front of him and out of Karen’s reach.
As with the tea, he pushed it towards her and Karen took the glass gratefully, drinking half before slowing replacing it on the table with a sigh of satisfaction. She picked up the biscuit and began eating it slowly, nibbling all around the jam centre, just as she had always done since childhood. Karen ate two more, then pushed the plate away and looked at the man opposite.
Sir John took a sip of his tea, the rooms air conditioning having cooled it to a tolerable heat. He put his mug down and returned Karen’s stare.
“Right then,” he said, “that’s the pleasantries over, where should we start? At the beginning?”
“Why not,” Karen replied, but before she could say anything further, muted alarms began sounding. She watched the reflected light on his waistcoat change to a bright red and smiled as Sir John’s attention was immediately drawn to the warning messages displayed on the screen.
A disembodied voice called out from a hidden loudspeaker. “Sir John, we have a security breach at the entrance. An unidentified craft has appeared out of nowhere, and a solitary figure wearing some sort of protective armour has forced its way past the guards. Our reinforcements are unable to access the base due to some sort of force-field, neither can we currently communicate with them. Be guided accordingly.”
Sir John, his face now drained of colour, looked away from the screen and caught Karen’s gaze. He slowly and deliberately finished his tea in one go, then replaced the mug on the table.
“It seems our positions are about to be reversed, Karen.”
Above, Vimes had come to a decision. Sensors were showing a build-up of military equipment at the nearby airbase, and two lorries of armed soldiers were getting ready to leave and make the twelve-minute drive to further reinforce the small garrison here, possibly on the orders of those inside. He was uncomfortable with being unable to monitor Karen’s condition and had completed his investigations into exactly how much this country did or didn’t know about the Empire. He wasn’t bothered about their suspicions, just what they knew.
It had taken some time to break into the intelligence and military systems of the four other nations with which the UK shared its intelligence, but could find no evidence whatsoever that anything about the present situation here had been shared with any of them. Satisfied that knowledge of what was about to happen here would remain top secret and restricted on a strict need to know basis, Vimes acted.
Inside the main living room of the yacht, an avatar began forming out of the floor, taking the aspect of Alexander, someone he knew Karen would immediately recognise and obey without question. From one of the aft storerooms, a fighting suit appeared, walking over to where the now fully formed avatar was waiting. Vimes instructed it to open and climbed inside, telling it to bulk up further as he activatedits weapon and automated defence systems. It had been over one hundred and fifty years since the last time an avatar of Vimes had reason to don a suit, so he took a few moments to ensure everything was working at peak efficiency.
Satisfied, Vimes brought the cloaked yacht down in a field alongside the concrete roadway, opposite the offices and entrance to the underground complex. A number of guards waited outside, weapons loosely aimed towards the ground, held in place by their straps. One of them looked up and called out to the others, pointing to the shimmering effect fifty yards opposite their position. Their weapons snapped up, and one of them spoke into a shoulder-mounted radio. Vimes extended the yacht's secondary wall-shields to encompass the immediate area and buildings, effectively sealing it off from the rest of the base and the outside world, then turned off the cloak, revealing the yacht’s true size, noting the look of utter amazement on the guard’s faces.
He exited, and walked down the now extended ramp, heading towards the shocked soldiers, noting all their weapons were now trained on him as he approached. He closed to within twenty yards then stopped, letting the soldiers compose themselves. Not wishing to seriously hurt anyone, especially those bravely following orders, Vimes had switched all his suits offensive weaponry to stun, following Karen’s lead back on Skye.
“Halt. Hold position and identify yourself,” shouted out one of the soldiers, moving forward and aiming his weapon directly at the suit’s helmet. The others followed suit and would obviously take their cue from the first soldier.
Vimes slowly raised his right hand and with his innate mischievousness, called out. “I come in peace. Take me to your leader! Let them make of this what they want when they play a recording back.” he thought to himself. To help him determine the most effective way to disable them, the suit’s sensors examined the soldier’s protection, detecting ceramic and some form of flexible armoured fabric beneath the soldiers clothing.
“Lie down on the ground and put your arms behind your back,” the man shouted again, his rifle never wavering from Vimes face, “We are authorised to use deadly force if you do not comply.”
Vimes considered for a moment, debating if he should obey and whether in doing so might speed up being taken below ground to where Karen was being held. The chances of this weren’t good enough, so he took action instead, firing hollow slugs from both arms towards the soldiers, the force of the slugs impacting on their body armour and knocking them off their feet.
Using his suit’s speed and agility, Vimes immediately closed the distance to the nearest soldier, bending down and crushing the gun barrel with his right gauntlet. He noticed one of the soldiers nearest to the building had managed to remain conscious and was about to fire at him. Fearing for the safety of the soldier beneath him, Vimes turned his back and shielded the soldier from the stream of bullets fired in his direction. Waiting a second for the magazine to be emptied, Vimes stood up and accelerated towards the soldier, who only had moments to fumble in his webbing and fit another magazine before Vimes reached him. Unable to reload in time, the soldier swung his r
ifle. Vimes allowed it to connect with his helmet, the impact hardly registering. Not wanting to waste time, a gentle tap to the soldier’s head rendered him unconscious. To avoid the risk of friendly fire, Vimes quickly disabled the soldiers’ remaining weapons and walked over to the entrance, examining the door which, unsurprisingly, was firmly locked.
Not wishing to hit anyone that might be waiting behind it, Vimes refrained from blasting the door open. Instead, he punched both hands through the thick metal and used the makeshift hand-holds to wrench the door off its hinges, setting off alarms which sounded across both the base and inside the building. Despite its deadbolts, the reinforced metal door was unable to resist the power of Vimes battle suit. Inside, several waiting soldiers immediately opened fire, the projectiles making little impression on his armour, other than filling the passageway with noise and metal. Again, Vimes was faced with a dilemma. Should the soldiers continue firing as he approached them, it would only be a matter of time before one or more bullets would ricochet and hit someone. Looking at the mangled door still held in his hands, Vimes threw it down the passage, knocking the men off their feet, rendering several of them unconscious, the others groaning in pain.
Ignoring the alarms going off all around the passage, he moved forward, again disabling the men’s weapons, taking a few moments to launch from his suit a small cloud of short-range micro-drones to quickly search and report back on the immediate area. While waiting for a comprehensive map of the area to be assembled by the drones, he reached down and lifted the heavy door laying on top of three soldiers, setting it aside. A quick scan reassured him none of the injuries suffered was worse than fractures or clean breaks.
Activating the suits public address, Vimes spoke to the prostrate soldiers, mainly for the benefit of the security cameras, for he wanted to leave a good impression when the recordings were played back and analysed. “Please do not get up, gentlemen. I have no wish to hurt you further and simply want to reclaim something you have taken from me. Once it is returned, I will be on my way.”
One of the soldiers, who had been trying to get up on his unbroken leg, managed a heartfelt, “Fuck off,” before slumping back down against the wall and began watching Vimes with undisguised anger. Moments later, Vimes’s suit assembled the information coming in from the drones and identified the location to the entrance of the underground complex. The information matched the direction shown by Karen’s scent trace, everything pointing to the large, double doors ahead. Satisfied this was where he needed to be, Vimes headed towards the elevator entrance. Behind him, one of the soldiers began firing with his small sidearm, the bullets bouncing harmlessly off Vimes suit. Ignoring this minor irritation, Vimes reached the doors.
Rightly assuming access to the underground complex via the lift would by now have been switched off, Vimes forced apart the twin doors, then bent them outwards so they could no longer be closed. Satisfied it would take some time for a maintenance crew to fix the damage, Vimes turned around to face the prostrate soldiers and stepped backwards into the open shaft, falling straight down into the dark.
A second later, as he dropped down inside the Faraday Cage and shielding, Vimes was able to link with his opposite number in Karen, instantly updating himself on everything that had happened. Reassured she was wasn’t in any immediate danger and had been well treated, Vimes was pleased his decision to use minimal force had been justified. Now able to pinpoint her location, he used the suits repulsors to slow his descent. On reaching the floor level where the scent trails indicated Karen had passed through, he grabbed one of the thick counterweight cables and came to a stop, sparks from the tortured cable briefly illuminating the shaft. One-handed, Vimes opened the right side of the twin doors and stepped through into the corridor. Karen’s scent signals were much stronger now, confirming he was in the correct place. Before he could move further into the complex, Vimes was hit by multiple rounds coming from every direction as guards tried to bring him down. He did nothing for ten seconds, letting the soldiers exhaust their magazines and for any remote observer to realise the futility of trying to stop him, then ran to the room where Karen was being held, knocking the soldiers aside like so many skittles. Leaving them quickly behind to pick themselves off the floor and regroup, Vimes skidded around a bend in the corridor, coming across two soldiers guarding the door to where Karen was being questioned. Immediately they caught sight of him they opened fire, the ricocheting rounds taking multiple lumps out of the walls and floor around Vimes.
Ignoring the firestorm directed at him, Vimes strode forward, reaching out and wrenching the rifles from their shocked grips, mangling the barrels and casually throwing the weapons aside. Before the soldiers could react further, he took a step forward and knocked their heads together, rendering them unconscious, their bodies slumping to the floor amidst the hot bullet casings. Vimes used the suits sensors to sense the electromagnetic traces in the door surround, showing the position of magnetic deadlocks. Vimes braced the feet of the suit against the floor and readied himself to force the door open.
Sir John watched the live feeds from the internal security cameras with undisguised admiration, not just at the seemingly unstoppable figure in the armoured suit, but also for the soldiers who were trying, and failing, to halt its progress. Switching to a split screen that showed both the internal struggle and what was happening on the surface, he watched the increasing frustration of those trying to break through the invisible barrier erected by the unknown vessel. Every so often he looked away from the screen and looked across the table at Karen. Knowing he had little time to act, Sir John made a decision. He got up and walked around the table to where Karen was sitting, watching what he would do next.
“When I release you, I hope you will show the same restraint as that thing outside,” he said, trusting his instincts. Karen nodded, trying not to show the relief she felt.
He knelt and used a small key to unlock the restraining band around her ankle, then those holding her wrists. Not bothering to go back to his seat, Sir John sat on the edge of the table, seemingly relaxed and not at all concerned about what might happen next.
Outside, a loud grinding noise could be heard, followed by the sound of automatic gunfire, which suddenly went quiet.
“Open the door, and everybody stand down, and by that, I mean everybody,” he called out, knowing the listeners would hear and act on his command. Almost at once a faint click could be heard as the magnetic locks disengaged. The door opened and in strode Vimes, ducking down to clear the header before straightening up. Behind the figure, Sir John could see soldiers lying on the floor. He looked up at the towering figure facing him, reminded of the robot Klatuu from the film The Day the Earth Stood Still. He stood up and took several steps towards it, extending his hand in greeting, fighting the urge to say “Gort. Klaatu Barada Nikto!”
Vimes looked at the man, admiring his sang freud in the face of what had happened, hoping here was a realist with whom he could see to it that the fallout from today’s events would be minimised. The chain of drones he had left in his wake relayed a feed from above ground to Vimes, bringing to his attention several Apache helicopters being hastily prepped for take-off at the nearby airbase, armourers frantically wheeling missiles over to the hard points on the stubby weapon mounts. Further away, the Chinook ferrying Karen’s damaged Mini was still fifteen minutes’ flight time away, so he gave the yacht’s AI instructions to monitor it and inform him if it diverted.
“If you have the authority, Sir John Soames, I recommend you stand down the helicopters and other forces which are being readied to converge on this position. Once Ms Mcleod and her family are safely on board my ship, the screen surrounding this area will be withdrawn, and we will be on our way, allowing you to concoct whatever cover story you feel is required.
“I take it you don’t think we are in any position to stop you from leaving?” Sir John asked, already knowing the answer, but talking for the cameras.
“No, you are not and are w
ell aware of it, too. Stand them all down or will more displays be required?” asked Vimes, turning slightly and looking at each hidden camera in turn to make a point.
“Vimes, can’t we just get Alastair and Flora and get the hell out of here? asked Karen, privately. “If you want to talk to John can’t we just bring him with us for a bit? Oh, and just how are we going to sort this mess out?”
“Leave it to me, Karen. I’ve lost count of how many First Contact situations I’ve dealt with over the centuries and although few have been as messed up as this one, I have every confidence what happens here today will be on a strict need to know basis. After all, this is one of their most secret bases, and nothing becomes public knowledge unless they want the outside world to know about it.” Vimes turned back to look at Sir John, who nodded and walked over to the desk and at his small screen, then back to the wall mirror, finally giving instructions for everyone outside who was listening in.
“Everyone is to stand down immediately. Contact the Prime Minster and put her through once communications with the outside world have been restored. Medical personnel to attend the injured. Oh, and will someone please bring me a double whisky from the unit commanders cocktail cabinet? No, tell them to bring the bottle.”
Sir John turned to the metal figure. “Is that sufficient?” he asked, taking a moment to wipe a small bead of perspiration from his top lip.
By way of an answer, Vimes instructed the battle suit to open. Sir John watched, transfixed, as the armour opened at the front, flowing back to reveal who was inside. Not knowing what to expect, Sir John braced himself to possibly see something alien but was relieved to see only a human figure. Impressively tall and dressed in a one-piece uniform that looked like a pilot’s flight suit, the figure stepped out, walking over to him and extending its hand.
Imperium: Coda: Book Three in the Imperium Trilogy Page 14
