2084 The End of Days

by Derek Beaugarde

  Ewan spoke to placate Buster.

  “It is okay, Buster. Tell Michelle to make you a coffee and I’ll square her up next time I’m in here.”

  Buster raised his fists mockingly like a boxer to the group of policemen then, mumbling oaths under his breath, he staggered over to see Michelle, who was standing agog behind the counter. The senior officer turned to Ewan and Gary.

  “Okay, gentlemen, are you ready to come with us?”

  Gary answered back huffily.

  “What is aw this about? You would think we were terrorists or somethin’ with all those guns trained on us. Do ye think we killed Prince Eddie or what?”

  The officer was beginning to get frustrated with all the backchat.

  “You are both needed for questioning on a matter of national security. This is not the time or the place to conduct that questioning. So we can either do this the easy way or we can do it the hard way. What is it to be?”

  Ewan stood up and waved Gary on to his feet.

  “Come on Gary. Look, sir, we are both happy to do it the easy way.”

  As they all piled out to the waiting police cars Michelle put down a small cup of Americano in front of Buster.

  “Ah could a told ye Buster that they two were gonna come a cropper one day, ken.”

  *

  It was almost 10.30pm and Jill was thinking about getting to her bed. She was exhausted by the day’s events. Jill had argued vehemently with Buckley about his demands to reveal her sources for the Schenkler comet story. He had argued back that there were matters of national and international security interests that outweighed the public interest and the fact one of his journalists was not obliged to reveal her sources. In the end Buckley had to accept that he could not force Jill to name those sources. She had then urgently phoned Ewan to warn him that the National Security Services and probably the CIA were hot on their trail. Jill had spent the rest of the day worrying about what would happen to Ewan and Gary. She knew that it was only a matter of time before they were caught and taken in for questioning. They would probably get the book thrown at them. She went in to the bathroom to brush her teeth when suddenly the doorbell rang. Maybe the cops are here for me too, she thought. Jill opened the door and he stood there on her landing looking beaten and cowed.

  “Khan – ah wasn’t expecting you at this time of night? Ah’ve been trying to get you on the phone for weeks –“

  It had been raining heavily across Berkshire all evening and Khan stood there soaked to the skin.

  “Can I come in, Jill - it is rather wet outside tonight?”

  Jill waved Khan in and she made him get his wet clothes off and get into his bathrobe, which had still been in the bedroom wardrobe. Jill made some hot tea and they sat facing each other as they drank.

  “Where have you been, Khan?”

  Khan bowed his head.

  “I know you have, Jill, but I have been very tied up with some heavy stuff lately.”

  “That big property deal up in Manchester -?”

  Khan did not answer. He put his forehead in his right hand and he ran his fingers nervously through his thick black hair. Jill thought he looked worried and exhausted. His black eyes seemed sunken and hollow with lack of sleep.

  “Khan, you look terrible – what the hell’s the matter with you?”

  He looked up into Jill’s eyes like a caged tiger looking for some means of escape.

  “I’ll tell you in a minute – but you were looking for me. Did you want to tell me something, Jill?”

  Now it was Jill’s turn to feel a bit nervous. They had not been getting on for weeks and now she had some important news for Khan. Jill was not sure how he would react, but she thought that she might as well just get it out in the open.

  “Khan ah’m about eight weeks pregnant. You are going to be a father –“

  Khan looked at her with his eyes bulging wide in disbelief. He broke down sobbing pitifully.

  “Oh god, oh Allah – wh-what have I done, Jill? What have I done?”

  Jill sat beside him and took him into her arms as he continued sobbing.

  “Don’t you want to be a daddy, Khan?”

  Khan looked deep into Jill’s eyes.

  “I-it’s not that, Jill. I have betrayed you – I have betrayed my child –“

  Jill listened completely aghast as Khan got all the months of guilt off his chest. He told her that his affair with Jill had just been a front for his operation with the Group. He admitted he had always been in love with Aisha al-Gazari. Aisha was the ‘A’ on the errant text message. He also said that it was the Group who had been bugging her home. Khan had ripped out the tiny bug from its hiding place. Jill could not believe what Khan was telling her. She should have been angry and shocked at what he was relating, but the investigative journalist mode switched on inside her and she was taking in every detail of his incredible story. He went on to tell her that he was the money man for the jihadists and he and the others had planned the assassination of the Prince of Wales. Jill felt her stomach churn at hearing that the man that she had been sleeping with, the father of her unborn child, was a murderer and a terrorist. But she kept her nerve.

  “Khan, why are you telling me all this now?”

  He looked at her with black dead eyes.

  “Aisha was not meant to be in that air-car. I’m sorry, Jill, but I loved Aisha from the bottom of my heart and now she is dead. They had her killed because she knew too much. He did it and I am going to make the bastard pay!”

  “Who did it, Khan?”

  Khan shook his head.

  “I cannot tell you. I can’t get you too involved. These are dangerous men that I work with. And they are planning something so terrible that I can’t go on living with all this guilt and living without my Aisha. I want you to take me to the nearest police station and I will tell them everything. Right now, Jill!”

  Jill drove the air-bike with Khan riding pillion as fast as she could, heading for the police station at Richmond. Suddenly, a beam from a single headlight came up from behind them. Khan looked back and saw another air-bike closing in on them fast and he knew right away that they were in big trouble. He yelled into his helmet mic with urgency in his voice.

  “JILL – go as fast as you can! It’s the Palestinian behind us – he must have followed me!”

  They could both feel and hear a gunshot whoosh past them and Jill knew then how dangerous things had become. She started to bob and weave the air-bike and to try to get as much speed out of the machine as she could muster. The Palestinian kept firing shots at them, each one closer than the one before. Jill saw Richmond High Street below her and dipped the bike in a dangerously steep dive. She could see the police station about three hundred yards ahead. Another shot winged past them and she heard Khan screaming in pain on his mic.

  “Aaargh – I’ve been hit Jill!”

  “Hold on, Khan!”

  Suddenly, a police air-car going out on a routine patrol started taking off from the police-station and it was heading towards the two oncoming air-bikes. The Palestinian saw the car and veered his bike back into the air and began heading back in the direction of Kew. Jill whizzed past the police car which instantly put on its sirens and flashing lights. She was going too fast coming in to land by the station and the bike hit the ground too hard. She and Khan were thrown off the bike. The police car had done a U-turn in mid-air at the top off the High Street. It flew back to land beside the crashed air-bike lying at the bottom of the entranceway into the station. Two startled looking coppers jumped out of the car as a bruised and battered Jill was trying to tend to the injured Khan. Jill cried out.

  “Please help me – he’s been shot!”

  Khan groaned up at Jill. She could see he was in terrible pain.

  “It is okay, Jill, I th-think it’s only a flesh wound –“

 
Then Khan passed out.

  It was almost one o’clock on the Saturday morning and Jill had been sitting for hours in the waiting room of the Berkshire Royal General Hospital. The waiting had been punctuated with a couple of interviews with CID and field officers from MI5. Jill could detect their excitement at having made a major breakthrough in the Windsor terrorist attack investigation and there was a lot of coming and going between her and, she suspected, with Khan. She had also seen Chief Superintendent Mike Hollingsworth arriving with a cavalcade of other officers. He had not spoken with Jill but she could see he was exultant. She had also managed to get a call through to Buckley. He was not exactly thrilled at being woken up at that early hour. However, once Jill had told him that there had been a major breakthrough on the Prince of Wales story he was soon wide awake and full of excitement.

  “Okay, Jill, I’m on my way to the Times office right now. I need your exclusive on this ASAP! The Bloid home page is all yours – and Jill, I don’t know how you managed to be first on scene again and I don’t care - bloody fantastic work, Jill!”

  The two CID officers, Adams and Evans that had interviewed Jill earlier came back into the waiting room. Detective Adams looked grimly at Jill.

  “Miss Geeson, we have been informed by the doctors working on Khan al Ahmed that we can no longer interview him tonight. Mr Al Ahmed has been extremely helpful to our investigation and we are currently in the process of making further fruitful enquiries, although I am not at liberty to say anything further at this stage, Miss Geeson.”

  Jill stood up and looked at the two detectives pleadingly.

  “How is Khan? He said that he had only taken a flesh wound –“

  Adams looked at Detective Evans then back at Jill.

  “You will really need to talk with the doctors, Miss Geeson…look, Jill, he’s in a bad way, but I can’t tell you any more.”

  Jill felt an awful feeling in the pit of her stomach and she forced tears back. Evans changed the subject.

  “Miss Geeson, based on Mr Al Ahmed’s statement, and we have no reason to disbelieve it, he states that you had no idea of his involvement in the Windsor attack. Is that correct?”

  “Yes, th-that is correct officer.”

  “We will still require you to come to Scotland Yard in the morning - in order to make a formal statement. Do you have any objections to that, Miss Geeson?”

  Jill agreed to appear at the Metropolitan Police HQ at eleven o’clock on Saturday morning and Detectives Adams and Evans left her alone in the waiting room. She watched through the glass doors at the MI5 and police entourage making their way out of the hospital. Hollingsworth passed by and he smiled his recognition of Jill from her attendance at his many press briefings. He stuck his head in the door.

  “Hello, Miss Geeson, first off I have to say to you that I cannot make any comments at this crucial point in the investigation. But off the record, Jill, you have done your country and the world a great service tonight and I would personally like to thank you for that.”

  Jill mumbled her thanks and as Hollingsworth departed with his other senior officers, she thought, and I’ve done your career a great service tonight too! She had only sat down for about another two minutes when a doctor in his blues came in to the waiting room. Jill could tell from his face that the news was grim.

  “Miss Geeson, I am Doctor McKendrick – I was the surgeon who operated on your partner Mr Al Ahmed. I am very sorry to say that Mr Al Ahmed passed away about five minutes ago –“

  Jill was ashen.

  “Oh please God no –“

  “I am afraid to say that the bullet went through one of his aortic arteries and he has died from internal bleeding. There was very little that we could do for him – but he did die peacefully and without pain.”

  Jill began to cry.

  “But ah’m carrying his baby!”

  Doctor McKendrick bowed his head.

  “I am very sorry, Miss Geeson. Do you want me to get someone that you can speak with?”

  Jill shook her head again forcing back the tears.

  “No, Doctor McKendrick, ah have work to do – ah have Khan al Ahmed’s epitaph to write on tomorrow’s headline story!”

  BOOK 2 - EXODUS

  Chapter 15

  Earthdate: 19:15 Monday February 24, 2081 GMT

  The weekend had passed in a blur. After they had been picked up by the police in Chuck’s iCafè, Ewan and Gary had been whisked in an army helijet down to the Metropolitan Police HQ at Scotland Yard. They had been subjected to intense questioning over their ability to hack into NASA’s E2MSN system and what they knew about the Schenkler HMM2 comet. However, the National Security Services officers from MI5 who were in charge of the interrogation made it clear to the two Scotsmen that they were not under arrest at that point in time. This was on the basis that Ewan and Gary had actually conducted ‘important research’, which under normal circumstances would have been deemed illegal. However, it was recognised that their discovery at this early stage was vital knowledge to the survival of the human race. Although they were not under arrest, the MI5 officers told Ewan and Gary that they had to remain, at least until Monday, in confinement at Scotland Yard for their own protection. Everyone else in the UK that they had contacted about the comet had been agreeable to withhold all information on Schenkler HMM2. In effect this meant Jill, William Buckley and all the online Leak sites. They were all effectively being monitored and kept under surveillance. On Monday evening Ewan and Gary were led into the small office at the rear of Scotland Yard. The two of them could not believe they were to actually meet the Prime Minister. They were introduced to John Ralston and then, apart from an MI5 case officer sitting near the door, the two young men and the PM sat alone around the small conference table with a monitor hibernating on top of it. Ralston playfully chided the two young Scots.

  “Under different circumstances lads, I would have had the two of you hung, drawn and quartered for what you did –“

  Gary, ever the joker, quipped back with a broad cheeky grin.

  “Aye, typical Englishman, you guys did the same thing tae William Wallace!”

  Ralston smiled and then grew more solemn.

  “Indeed, Gary, but now we must get down to this evening’s serious business. In a few minutes we will be connecting to a conference call with US President Trueman, UN Sec-Gen Gupta-Chaudry, Israeli PM Shalomon and I believe you will also be meeting for the first time Mr Ari Schenkler of INSACC in Tel Aviv.”

  The two scientists were agog at what they had just heard and were almost speechless. Ewan mustered the courage to speak.

  “P-Prime Minister, you have just mentioned some of the most powerful men on the planet, including yourself. Why are we here tonight in such exalted company?”

  “Well young men, we may be what you call the most powerful men on the planet. However, what the human race is facing in three years time requires some of the greatest brains on the planet. By your own sterling actions – and that of Ari and the guys at NASA too – you have both elevated yourselves into the exalted company that you speak of.”

  Gary was flabbergasted.

  “Jeez, Prime Minister, ah think you want tae have a wee word with ma father!”

  Just then the monitor in front of them came alive and they were connected through the secure lines to the White House in Washington, UN HQ in New York and Beit Aghion in Jerusalem. President Trueman introduced himself to the conference call and asked all those taking part to do likewise. Beside him in the Oval Office were Aaron Eckler and Beth O’Donnell. Ravinder Gupta-Chaudry was alone in his UN HQ office in New York. In the house of the Prime Minister in Jerusalem sat Moshi Shalomon, Yosep Goldenheim and Ari Schenkler and in 10 Downing Street John Ralston, Ewan Sinclair and Gary Mackintosh. Trueman began the meeting.

  “Guys, and Beth, of course - we are part of a very select elite band of
human beings who are aware of the existence of the comet we now call Schenkler HMM2 and of the terrible wrath it is about to unleash on planet Earth. Ari ah hope that you don’t mind yore name being associated with this comet?”

  Ari bent towards his mic and spoke nervously.

  “W-well, Mr President, it is a bit of a burden to carry – and really the credit should go to Mr Sinclair for its discovery –“

  Ewan spoke surprising himself with his confidence.

  “If it had not been for your infamous footage, Ari, it might not have been discovered for another good few months. Anyhow, Gary and I had been jokingly calling it Schenkler from the outset.”

  Trueman continued.

  “Okay, we are all agreed on Schenkler HMM2 – the HMM2 bit should not be overtly explained to the press, media or other outside agencies in any detail. In fact, at this stage I am proposing that today we agree a tri-partite approach to announcing this to our peoples basically in three stages. Stage one is a simultaneous broadcast of the text previously discussed and agreed between myself, the UN Sec-Gen and the two Prime Ministers present. The tenor of that announcement is basically to let the world know of the arrival of Schenkler HMM2 into the solar system. That it is heading towards our part of the solar system and that our projections are that it will be a near miss from the comet - but that Earth will suffer serious collateral damage from meteor showers from the tail. Is everyone agreed on Stage one?”

  Gupta-Chaudry, Ralston and Shalomon all indicated their agreement. Ewan was baffled and he had to ask a question.

  “Mr President, at first I thought the comet was going to be a near miss, but I have been over my calculations a hundred times hoping that I was wrong. Mr President, this thing is going to smash right into Earth. I’m sure Ari will back me up here?”

  Ari came over on the monitor.

  “Mr President, I have to completely concur with Ewan’s research. Unfortunately, the gravitational pull of Jupiter will draw the trajectory of, um, Schenkler directly on a terrible collision course with our planet.”