1st June
I leaned on the rail of the small deck that was located just below the bridge of the ship.
Below and in front of me I could see the vast runway area of the carrier, finally curving upwards at her bow.
I recounted in my mind the circumstances that had led me to be here.
Following Joan’s briefing of the British prime minister and senior military personnel, there had been a redefinition of the role of Theta – the cell within which we had been defined after the MI5 lockdown.
Theta was to move onto the offensive.
Our primary objective was to ensure that the plan to deflect the asteroid was not sabotaged by WAR.
This had become even more critical after the meteor explosion over Hawaii.
To have been able to predict the harbinger, the ancients must have encountered it previously: that seventeen metre wide meteor had habitually skipped off the Earth’s atmosphere exactly one hundred and fifteen days before the Doomsday asteroid that followed it.
The September thirteenth asteroid had now been afforded the Doomsday epithet due to calculations undertaken by Colin Wells, our consultant astronomer and mathematician. He had deduced that some cosmic event during the past thirteen billion years had led to a small asteroid preceding the much larger one by a period of one hundred and fifteen days.
This visitor had travelled on the same trajectory as its bigger brother, but it had clearly never entered the atmosphere until the twenty-second of May this year.
The fact that it had now done so, and exploded with the force of five hundred kilotonnes of TNT, indicated that its sibling would do likewise.
The latter, however, would have rather more energy: the Hawaiian meteor had been around seventeen metres wide; the Doomsday asteroid was closer to fifteen hundred metres across.
It really would herald Armageddon.
It was true that the Americans had planned for such an eventuality and were very possibly able to deflect the asteroid with carefully planned interception using specialised ballistic missiles. It appeared, however, that there was no guaranteed control of those weapons in the US.
The very strong, fundamentalist Christian views of many Americans meant that allegiance to religious groups was often greater than allegiance to the American flag.
Worldwide Action for Righteousness, or WAR, was one such group that appeared to have infiltrated key positions in the US such that it was very probably able to sabotage a missile launch.
WAR believed that the asteroid was the vehicle by which God would effect Judgement Day, and it was likely that WAR infiltrators would successfully sabotage any attempt by the US president to intercept and deflect the asteroid.
To further complicate matters, there could easily be WAR infiltrators in the White House, close to the president, so virtually no one in the American administration could be trusted.
Joan, the British Prime Minister and senior UK military personnel had decided that they must take the initiative to ensure successful interception of the asteroid. They were also now in a position to do so because Arkangel, the historical leader of ARK, was working with them.
ARK had already begun to implement a plan to take control of the American missiles in a way that WAR could not subvert.
To this end, ARK was working with an American group called A51H that was also composed of fundamentalist Christians.
Whilst extreme in its beliefs, A51H did not believe that God wished to destroy the Earth with an asteroid. It had therefore agreed to provide ARK with technical information sufficient to take control of the relevant American missiles. This information comprised a number sequence called the Permissive Action Link code, or PAL, and the presidential password for that day it was required.
WAR, however, had discovered the location of a UK launch base that had been set up by ARK and by a group called Python – within a World War Two bunker in the grounds of Meadowcote Hall in Dorset.
WAR operatives had destroyed that base.
It was also clear that WAR must have learned of that base due to an infiltrator in MI5.
A reserve base existed below Northchester Cathedral, the episcopal See of Bishop Julian Summerland. It was unclear if WAR knew of this. If they did, it would be easy to sabotage.
It had been decided, therefore, that Theta should make its base on an aircraft carrier. The ship had the technical capability to be a launch base, but it was also much more easily defensible.
In addition, if and when additional land based operations were required, it would be as easy to fly operatives by jet from the carrier, as to use normal transport options within America or the UK.
Work was continuing at Northchester Cathedral to provide a backup and potentially a decoy, but the primary launch base was now HMS Resolution.
Arkangel had contacted Vladimir Paulov and his team, and they were now also on this ship, in mid-Atlantic, together with me, Joan, Helen, Duck, Jenny, Robert Faraday, Robin Marsh, Paul Maple, Colin Wells and Angela Rikard.
Julian Summerland and Anthony Forrester had been allowed to return to their official duties in England after receiving a briefing and instructions from Angela – Bishop Forrester’s spectacular departure having been explained as a stunt for a TV show.
In addition, Christian Leadbetter was detained in the ship’s infirmary.
There was a possibility that his mental state might improve and allow him to provide further useful information, but also, he was the only designated pilot, other than Helen, for both the American starcruisers that were now onboard – John Hawker’s authorisation to fly Starcruiser One had been erased when Amy overwrote the pilot interface program for his craft with that of Starcruiser Two.
It was not quite clear how Leadbetter’s pilot authorisation could be used to advantage, but Joan had reasoned that it was better to have him easily available, just in case
The final guest on board was Colonel John Hawker, base commander of Area 51. He was being detained for interrogation but also to allow secrecy to remain about the whereabouts of the starcruisers. Once again, we had no idea the extent to which WAR may have infiltrated Area 51.
~*~*~*~*~
I watched a small dot in the far distance get larger as it approached the carrier. It was the helicopter transporting President John Redman and his national security advisor, Charlotte Goldman.
Helen joined me on the deck. I put my arm around her and kissed her hair. ‘Have you got any plans for the next hour?’ I asked.
‘I was going to talk to the US president about how we might deploy the starcruisers in the meteor deflection plan to save the Earth,’ she replied. She turned to look at me. ‘But if you require my naked body for your pleasure, Master,’ she continued, winking at me, ‘then I’ll have to change my priorities.’