Chapter Two
Tuesday
(Revelations)
‘Make it happen!’
The Prime Minister slammed the phone down and rubbed his irritated eyes. It had been like this all night. Crisis management, and plenty of it, enough to share out, except the PM had absolutely no intention of doling out power and influence to anyone. This would be his gig! The PM at the sharp end: sleeves rolled up, banging the table and telling sundry underlings what to do.
But why was he getting away with this? He had grown accustomed to politics working in a different fashion. Usually, by the time he’d managed to ask the question: “what should we do about this?” someone or some group was already quietly working on it, leaving the leader out of the loop: sleeves rolled up, banging the table in frustration and asking sundry underlings what was going on.
But a lot had happened in the last twenty-four hours: most visibly, the meteorite strike on London, or, more accurately, the upper atmosphere above Thames Estuary. That was the principal global news story at the moment and dealing with foreign leaders and their ambassadors was certainly part of the PM’s work, but it didn’t seem that important. Ditto, the press; his MPs; the Civil Service. Even the emergency services. Whatever any of these groups, or power blocks, thought about any of this didn’t really matter. Naturally, he’d talk to them, reassure where possible, be statesmanlike – given the chance… but who was there to take this from him?
That led the PM to ruminate over the other of yesterday’s big happenings: the peculiar trashing of a Whitehall building. The press were sniffing around that one but fast action on his part had effectively quarantined this story, at least for now. And that was another strange thing: mobilising Special Branch, MI6 and the army would usually result in phone calls from ministers or advisors explaining in urgent tones why the legal case for this-or-that simply could not be made. That was the aspect of his job he loathed the most: every action inevitably met by legal inaction. The most notable change was in the behaviour of the Civil Service. With Sir James Hampton-Staines among the confirmed Whitehall dead that behemoth organization seemed to have rediscovered its primary role – meeting his demands.
The PM smiled at the novelty of all this but as he reflected on why the changes had occurred his features and mood darkened. He had been in that building just before it all kicked off. He couldn’t be sure who or what organization was behind the attack but it did appear to be aimed at aliens! Yes, aliens! In Whitehall!!?? How long had that been going on? He had no way of telling, but he did feel sure that these aliens, disgusting insect things, had been taken out, and, perhaps as a direct consequence of that, the Whitehall machine was now unclogged.
The PM’s intercom buzzed.
‘Talk!’
‘Prime Minister, Sir Neville Stonehatch is waiting.’
Good, the head of the security services. Time to find out what he really knows.
‘Yes, send him in immediately.’
Sir Neville Stonehatch leisurely sauntered into the Prime Minister’s office languidly and ostentatiously gripping a manila folder between the ring and middle fingers of his left hand.
‘Some alacrity, Sir Neville, please. I don’t have time to watch you show off!’
Sir Neville looked as though he’d just received an electric shock. His bearing suddenly stiffened and his pace quickened. That was more like it. ‘Prime Minister,’ he said, with a slight bow as he reached the other side of the PM’s substantial desk. The PM reached forwards and shook his hand.
‘Take a seat, what have you got for me?’
Sir Neville opened his file and began to huff and puff over the bullet-point contents page. The old ham, thought the PM, preparing to get angry, but the intelligence chief quickly hit his stride: ‘As widely reported in the media: at fifteen twenty-three UTC-plusone an object believed to be a meteorite or comet fragment impacted upon the Earth’s atmosphere at an altitude of approximately 65 kilometres. This resulted in a megatonscale explosion, or air-blast, centred just to the north of the Isle of Sheppey. The blast from this event has been responsible for the significant damage reported over a large swathe of mainly eastern London, the Thames Estuary region, and parts of Kent.’ Sir Neville paused and glanced up at the Prime Minister.
‘Yes, thank you, BBC. Most informative,’ replied the PM, and before the security chief could reply he asked pointedly: ‘And do you believe this?’ ‘No,’ came the blunt reply.
The PM was momentarily taken aback by this, but he was also relieved to hear the security chief being apparently honest with him.
‘Well!?’
‘The meteorite story does not square with the evidence and is actually one of our concoctions. For a meteorite explosion to match the blast characteristics the rock needed to be approximately eighty metres in diameter, and such a body should have been tracked as it approached the Earth. It should also have been known about before its approach. Most of the rogue asteroids in eccentric Earth-crossing orbits are continually tracked and their future paths are fully understood. Something like this could not have slipped through.’
‘Are you sure? What about a comet fragment?’
‘Even less likely, sir.’
‘I see, so nothing was tracked, not even when the data was rechecked afterwards?’ ‘No, sir.’
‘Any visual observations of the explosion?’
‘The explosion itself, yes, but nothing from before.’
‘Hmm… The MOD tell me it was definitely not an atomic weapon.’
‘Yes, thankfully we can rule that out, sir – no radiation.’
‘How about a smaller rock, travelling faster?’
‘No, sir. None of the meteorite/comet scenarios fit. None of them can explain the large amounts of ash and pumice that fell over most of London, and surrounding areas. Estimates suggest that collectively this material amounts to several million metric tonnes.’
‘Christ! What would a meteorite that size do?’
‘That would be a full extinction event, sir.’
‘My God!’
‘It means that the object, if indeed there was one, was travelling considerably slower
– many orders of magnitude slower.’
‘I take it social media is having a field day with all this!’
‘It is, but the wider public are accepting the official line. We are trying to discredit the more plausible amateur pundits with our own misinformation programme.’
The PM thought about this for a moment. ‘What about physical evidence? Is there anything apart from the ash?’ he asked.
‘There may be, sir. Some large fragments reportedly crashed and subsequently disintegrated into the English Channel. We’ve got some ships out there looking for anything anomalous.’
‘What about the press?’ asked the PM.
‘Not my area, sir, but from my experience they won’t go near this, unless it is to debunk.’
‘Hmm, that could change,’ said the PM, half to himself.
‘Sir?’
‘Nothing. So what have we got on these fragments?’
‘Anything we collect will be sent to Porton Down for analysis.’
‘And you will inform me.’
‘Certainly.’
The PM gazed at his security chief for a deliberately long time. ‘Sir Neville, you must inform me of anything Porton Down discover.’
‘Yes, Prime Minister. But we haven’t actually found anything “concrete” yet.’
‘I doubt this thing was made out of concrete, although it could explain the ash, I suppose.’
‘I just meant–’
‘Yes, I know what you meant, Sir Neville.’
Satisfied, the PM delicately moved on to the incident that still disturbed him the most.
‘What have you got on the Whitehall… event?’
Sir Neville looked uncomfortable. The laid-back indifference he’d projected at the start of this briefing was giving way to guardedness and also some stammering.
‘At fifteen twelve UTC-plus-one, a call was forwarded to Special Branch regarding a disturbance and possible terrorist attack at a Whitehall address corresponding to a
Foreign Office annex…’
The PM sat patiently while he heard the long version.
‘…as well as all CCTV footage pertaining to this matter. The building remains sealed and patrolled by the army, but it will take an estimated twenty-four hours before all biological contaminants have been bagged and removed.’
‘For transfer to Porton Down?’
‘Yes, Prime Minister.’
‘And… has anyone handling this stuff become ill..?’
‘They wore full bio-suits, Prime Minister, but early indications suggest the material is harmless.’
The PM nodded on hearing this. ‘Thank God! Keep me informed on the analysis of this material as well, Sir Neville.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And apart from the bio-material, what else was found?’
‘The deceased remains of twenty-six office workers. Mostly very senior Civil Servants, including Sir James Hampton-Staines.’
‘Causes of death?’
‘Still with the coroner, sir.’
The PM paused for a while as he considered how much of his own experiences regarding this matter he wished to disclose. The secret service chief had been most forthcoming so far; that did not mean he had to respond in kind. There was no need to reveal anything just yet, let’s just prise out what Sir Neville knows first…
‘You are aware, Sir Neville, that I was attending a security briefing in that building, at that time?’
‘I understood you were able to make your escape before the attack took place, sir.’ The PM paused again as he recalled the shocking events of yesterday afternoon: After apparently jolting from a deep sleep he had found himself staring at a disintegrating and screaming man-sized bug. Then he saw that the room was full of intact versions of the insect-thing, and people. Next, the terrorist, or freedom fighter, whatever she was; that fearsome visage… and then the command to run: ‘get out of here!!’ And so he did. He ran for the metal security door, locked it behind him and ran back to Number Ten just as the booms and screams began.
The PM shuddered and glanced over at Sir Neville. Yes, the insect aliens would remain his secret – at least for now, but he would give an accurate account of the rest.
‘Yes, Sir Neville, I was lucky. Before I escaped I clearly saw the perpetrator. Female, tall, err…’
‘Would you be prepared to sit with a photo-fit expert and perhaps flesh out that description, sir? I believe this to be of the utmost importance.’
Was Sir Neville being impertinent? Well, he had a point. This woman needed to be tracked down.
‘Erm, yes, I would. Can you arrange that, Sir Neville?’
Sir Neville nodded and reached for his phone before remembering he’d been required to relinquish it at the lobby of Number Ten. ‘Yes, Prime Minister, I will arrange this now. If I send a chap around here can you prioritize this?’
‘Yes I will… and, Sir Neville?’
‘Yes, Prime Minister?’
‘Assuming Porton Down discover anything that could be classed as an extraterrestrial smoking gun – I need to know!! The PM half expected the security chief to rubbish the notion of an ET connection but he plainly did not:
‘I can have a further briefing ready for you by noon, Prime Minister.’
‘Good, report back, asap.’
‘Yes, sir, will that be all?’ Sir Neville began to stand.
‘Just one last thing. If we are under threat from something – ET or otherwise – I’m sure you grasp the importance of clarity with regard to the chain of command.’ ‘Yes, sir,’ but the security chief looked hesitant.
‘You report to me. Not me and the men in suits, just me. I am the next link in your chain of command. Do not let anyone deflect you, or stonewall you. And if anyone does, tell them you are working under my direct orders, and if need be, call me and I’ll bang heads.’
‘Yes, Prime Minister!’ Sir Neville appeared to have been cheered and emboldened by that little speech. Everyone appreciated strong leadership. And that’s what they were going to get from now on.
The phone rang.
‘Speak!’ shouted the PM, as he watched Sir Neville leave his office.
***
Alan gradually emerged from troubling dreams of rushing frantically through rainforests, savannah, ocean depths. Always the pursued; the pursuer – nature. Every beast and creepy-crawly imaginable on a relentless quest to grab him.
Lying on the Finsbury Circus roof, he squinted into the sharp sunlight and then studied his surroundings. Traffic sounds. He stood up and slowly walked over to the edge and viewed the scenes below. A road sweeping truck trundled by sucking up crap and debris from the road below. Other trucks performed the same duty in other streets, and pavement sweepers were also out in force.
London looked battered. Most of the roads and pavements were covered in something and his roof locale was similarly affected. He rubbed the stuff between his fingers: a fine volcanic ash by the looks of it. It began to penetrate his skin so he hastily brushed it off. Further afield, isolated plumes of smoke rose up.
His memory of events remained vivid but disjointed, so much had happened in such a short space of time. He was no longer Sponsor, his alien tissue and genes brutally ripped away, almost killing him in the process. Recollections of his final moments on the roof were particularly vivid but also nonsensical, blending into his nightmarish dreams. The Earth had done this. Its primary agents were on the roof with him, goading and mocking – the Sponsors probably never stood a chance.
Alan brushed some of the ash and muck from his crumpled clothes and slowly headed for the stairwell. Considering how ill he had felt in the aftermath of the attack it was puzzling just how well he felt now. But he did feel different: fully human, no longer part Sponsor – like switching from digital back to analogue. Capabilities lost, thought processes a bit sluggish but a compensating ripeness to his senses: smells and sounds, all just a bit more vibrant. Contemplating how different his life would be from now on he made his way down the steps and headed for his place of work, three floors below.
On entering his department he stopped and took in the buzz and activity of the open-plan office. He no longer fitted in here. Not only was he now incapable of performing his duties, of working any kind of number on the clients, but that whole line of work simply did not exist any more. The first jolt of anxiety. Of all the hybrids he was the least on-message when it came to the Sponsors’ programmes but he knew they were essential. What was going to happen to the human system now!? Why, only yesterday the supervisor had listed the number of times the Sponsors had prevented a nuclear war. But that was merely one obvious aspect of their work. What about the environment? The global economy? Did economics even work without Sponsor intervention? So many of the threads keeping modern society intact and healthy would now be pulled apart. Disturbed by this notion, Alan decided he would attempt contact with the Sponsors; he knew the psynet was down, and felt sure they were all dead on Earth, but maybe something remained… in space perhaps.
He entered his office unnoticed and was immediately taken aback by the foul stench. Time to open a window, and check out a few things.
Unlocking a lower drawer on his desk, he quickly discovered the source of that acrid smell: secret communications equipment, fully Sponsor technology, now reduced to a pool of crude oil and the odd bit of metal. He carefully removed the drawer and took it to the toilets for a thorough rinse. Various office workers reacted badly as he passed by with the drawer dripping all over the carpet.
‘Sorry.’
As Alan returned once again to his office he was intercepted by Tilly who came running over to meet him.
‘Alan!’
Alan offered a weak smile. ‘Hello, Tilly.’
‘What happened to you!? I left you for just a moment then when I returned with the doctor you’d vanished!’
‘Well I, err…’
‘I’m just glad you are still with us, you looked terribly ill, on death’s door! Did you go home? You should have waited for the doctor, Babes!’
‘Err, yes, well, I…’
‘You know Bruce and the division supervisor are both dead. Horrible it was, they… I won’t go into details. But you seem to have recovered, are you feeling okay, Alan? We should still get you checked out by the doctor.’
‘It’s alright, I have received treatment,’ he lied, ‘and I am fine.’
‘Okay,’ said Tilly, noncommittally, before remembering something else: ‘The police are here, investigating the deaths. Apparently there have been quite a few like this all over London! Something toxic from the asteroid, according to Twitter. They’ll want to speak to you.’
‘Who, Twitter?’
Tilly laughed, ‘No, the police, they are still around, somewhere. They’ve got Scenes of Crime over in Bruce’s office. Oh yes, and we’ve got a new boss! James Something-orother, although he prefers Jim.’
‘Fairclough?’
‘Yes, that’s it. How did you know?’
Alan had checked his list of new emails and a certain Jim Fairclough featured prominently. He showed Tilly.
‘Ah, he’s been firing off lots of those this morning.’
Alan sighed loudly and unhappily. He did not want to talk to this guy! Jim Fairclough, presumably human, was no doubt looking forward to working with the company’s financial guru and whiz kid, but he knew squat about any of that now! Oh God, he felt like resigning on the spot, but this remained a very well-paid job, and he still had bills to pay. Real life crowded in; how exposed he felt as a human: no special skills, no powerful benefactors.
‘I presume they have replaced the supervisor as well?’
‘I don’t know, Alan, I think that job may be advertised,’ replied Tilly.
After a few more minutes of chitchat, Alan began to cheer up. Maybe he could handle this after all. He could give himself a crash course in financial advice, and the likes of Al Nasa would be happy to take guidance for some time to come, assuming he played that safe. Yes, he had a great client list – if he concentrated on the really dim ones. That meant dropping Helen Warner. No problem, Alan thought, that woman gave him the creeps anyway.
It all hinged on this Jim bloke: if he was more manager than financial expert then Alan could just affect an enigmatic act and refer to patterns and stuff. Bamboozle the guy with bull! Ah, but that suited old Alan, new Analogue Alan would more likely put his foot in it. Still, he could be the silent enigmatic type. Maybe he should get a cape… but what if this guy was red hot on finance..?
‘Where have you put Jim? I suppose I should say hello.’
‘He’s in the Blue Room at the moment. When the police have finished with Bruce’s office I presume he’ll switch over.’
‘Cheers, Babes. Catch ya later.’
Alan began to make his way to the Blue Room via a circuitous route that included a sweep past Bruce’s office. Not much to see, as it turned out – just some bloke in a tight grey suit fiddling with his smart phone. The bodies had been removed.
Arriving at the Blue Room – more of an extension to the open-plan area than a proper office – Alan gave a little wave to the man behind the desk who was talking to another man he did not recognize. Already Alan had doubts about his ability to do this.
His body language seemed off. Was a friendly wave appropriate?
The man behind the desk motioned the other to stop and then turned to Alan.
‘Yes, can I help you?’
‘Hi, I won’t interrupt, if you are in a meeting,’ Alan advanced with a lurch into the office space, ‘I’m Alan Dosogne, I just popped in to say hi, welcome.’ Alan extended a hand and thankfully the other man grasped it without too long a delay.
‘Alan! I am surprised to see you in, I heard you were very ill. I am Jim Fairclough, this is Superintendent Walters; I believe he wants to speak with you about yesterday’s business.’
Alan was lost for words already.
‘Good morning, sir,’ said the police officer. ‘Glad to see you in the land of the living, we did fear the worst. Where have you been, Mr. Dosogne? We have been trying to track you down all night, but you weren’t at home, or admitted to any hospitals.’
What was Alan going to say? He hadn’t done anything wrong, but he felt guilty, and telling this cop he’d spent the night on the roof would not help matters. It probably wouldn’t go down too well with his new boss, either.
‘I don’t rightly recall, to tell you the truth,’ said Alan, shiftily. ‘It’s all a bit of a daze.’
Would that be good enough? Both men stared at him. Eventually Supt. Walters replied: ‘Of course, Alan. Yesterday was disturbing for all of us. It’s alright, you are not under any suspicion, but I will need to take a statement from you. We can do that now, if you like, or you can pop into the police station.’
Alan checked the cop’s insignia: not City Police. ‘Which nick, I mean, police station?’ God, get a grip!
‘South Norwood. Do you know where that is?’
‘Is that down by Crystal Palace way?’
‘Yes, near there.’
Another pregnant pause. ‘I think we should do it here then.’ Yet another pause.
‘Okay, Alan.’ The superintendent glanced over at Jim Fairclough, who promptly indicated that the statement could be taken here in the Blue Room.
‘Here, take my seat,’ said his new boss, standing, ‘and, Alan, after the statement I think you should go home, get some rest. We’ll talk tomorrow.’
Jim departed leaving Alan to ponder on how embarrassing their first meeting had been. Was he coming across as zonked? He knew he wasn’t, he was just no good at chitchat any more. Even though first impressions had been extremely brief, he sensed his new boss was no fool.
Alan provided the police with their statement: accurate in all matters up to the attack; indistinct and misleading, thereafter. He decided to go with amnesia, and vague recollections of wandering the streets, blah, blah, blah. That seemed to satisfy the superintendent.
With that business over, Alan returned to his office to collect his jacket before leaving for home. What was he going to do with the remainder of the day? He never took days off..! The thought of a pile of junk food, a bottle of wine and a box-set seemed both novel and enticing. Maybe new Analogue Alan could reinvent himself as a couch potato...
On entering his office he found Jim Fairclough using his phone. Someone really needed to give this guy a permanent office!
‘Ah, Alan,’ said Jim