Surviving the Evacuation, Book 17

by Frank Tayell

  “A mutiny,” I said. “I know there’ve been rumours, but this sounds serious.”

  “You don’t seem worried,” Kim said. “Or surprised.”

  “I have my own spies,” the admiral said.

  “Even so, shouldn’t you be more worried?” I asked.

  “Not yet,” the admiral said. “They won’t act until it becomes clearer where the rest of us are going, or whether we are staying here. And since we have an expedition scheduled to go to New England in a few weeks time, they will wait until then at least.”

  “This is why The New World has left, why the Courageous has gone south, and why you wanted to get the Amundsen out of here today?” I asked.

  “Indeed. They might try to take the Ocean Queen, but I can protect one ship. More than one is difficult.”

  “Then we should do something?” Kim said.

  “Such as?” the admiral said. “Anything we do will only bring forward a confrontation we can otherwise defuse. That confrontation will only result in rebellion which, even if it doesn’t begin with violence, would end with it. But yes, I will do one thing. I will keep the Amundsen ready for departure, and I will ask Commander Crawley to take command of the skeleton crew. If he wishes to take a ship, let it be that one.”

  She picked up a photograph from her desk. In the picture were two women, about the same age as the admiral, though neither was her. One woman wore lilac, the other was in green, both wearing the type of hat and flowers only worn at weddings.

  “A new picture?” I asked. “I don’t think I’ve seen it before.”

  “Just a new frame,” she said. “The picture is about all I have left of my old life.” She placed the picture flat on the desk. “What time do the children eat dinner?”

  “About half five,” Kim said. “We’re eating in the school today, after lessons are finished.”

  “I will see you then.”

  It was clear we were being dismissed.

  “Did you see, in that picture, the women were both bald,” I said. “I think the woman in lilac must have had chemo, the other shaved her head in solidarity.”

  “We can gossip about the admiral’s old life later,” Kim said. “What about this mutiny? Oh, we should have gone with Sholto. This is what we’ve been dreading.”

  “I don’t see there’s anything we can do,” I said. “Even if we had a judicial process, we’ve only got rumours for evidence. We can confront them, but that would force them to act. If they really do want to go to Boston, why wouldn’t they wait a few weeks until we’ve put together an official expedition? No, the admiral’s right, there’s nothing we can do at the moment, and no reason to worry just yet. What have you got planned for the rest of the day?”

  “Find Dean, tell him he’s organising a talent show now. Then tell Reg and Gloria they’ve got to teach Dean how to organise it. And then I’ll see who’s looking bored and get them to help me drag some freezers out of the un-electrified part of town. You?”

  “I’m doing the same, if you don’t mind the company.”

  And that was our day. I watched more than helped, but it was a good day. A normal day. If it hadn’t been for Markus’s warning, we both might even have enjoyed it.

  Day 274, 12th December

  Chapter 4 - The Balance of Risks

  The Faroe Islands

  “Even the one-armed man can’t catch half a fish,” Annette said. “What does that mean?”

  “What’s that?” I asked, looking around from the dishwasher I was slowly loading.

  “I hadn’t finished it yet,” Kim said, taking the notebook back from Annette.

  “What does it mean, though?” Annette asked.

  “I’m writing a children’s book,” Kim said. “With you writing your history book, and Bill writing his journal again, I didn’t want to be left out. I expected the drawings would be the hardest part. I was wrong.”

  “And what’s that got to do with Bill fishing?” Annette asked.

  “It’s not about Bill,” Kim said. “It’s about a boy with a broken arm and a broken leg who is trying to get by. How there are some things he can still do, but sometimes we all need to ask for help.”

  “It sounds like Bill,” Annette said. “And what’s this?”

  “A bat,” Kim said. “That’s the wise animal giving the boy the advice.”

  “About catching half a fish? Why a bat?”

  “Because I can’t draw a horse,” Kim said. “Now get your sister, and your bag. You’ll be late for school. Bill, do you mind taking them this morning? I want to check the harbour.”

  “What wonderfully normal chores,” I said. “Loading the dishwasher. Taking the girls to school.”

  Kim smiled. “I know. All that’s missing is a news bulletin for us to shout at. You don’t mind?”

  “No problem. You expecting trouble down at the harbour?”

  “The opposite. I’ve got to collect the numbers from Heather on yesterday’s catch, check in on the launderette, and then I’ll be done.”

  “Hey, that’s not fair,” Annette said. “How come I’ve got to spend all day at school?”

  “I mean, then I’ll be done with the jobs I know about,” Kim said. “Meet you at the hotel, Bill?”

  “I’ll book us a table.”

  The puddled pavements and partially submerged roads resounded to the patter and splash of feet. I wouldn’t call it a throng, but there were far more people about, all walking more quickly, more confident of the route. Heads were bowed in deference to the drizzling sky and gusting gales. Factoring in my limp, and their haste, I didn’t get a chance to ask anyone where, exactly, they were going. I suspect it was just ‘out’. Other than in size, and the lack of swaying, their billets can’t have seemed much different than aboard the ship, and not much more exciting.

  The weather didn’t bother me, but despite the rainproof covering on her pushchair, it seemed to bother Daisy, and it definitely bothered Annette, having to push her sister through the muddy streets. They were both glad to get to the school. Annette vanished the moment we were inside, off in search of her new friends before I’d even wrestled a squirming Daisy free of her seatbelt.

  It was so wonderfully normal, I wanted to fix it in my mind as a reminder of how life could be, should be, will be.

  At the hotel, a quartet of maps pinned to a whiteboard dominated the entrance lobby. One map showed Faroe, another was of Iceland, a third Greenland, with the fourth depicting Canada. The further west the maps went, the smaller the scale, the less the detail, making Faroe appear as large as Newfoundland.

  “The red thread marks the ship’s route?” I asked.

  “It does,” Mirabelle said.

  “The ship was blown off course?” I asked.

  “Turned south,” the programmer said. “During the night. The wind picked up, they headed south to avoid running aground.”

  “Ah. They’re at least a hundred miles from Iceland now.”

  “And heading southwest, aiming for Greenland,” Mirabelle said.

  “I see,” I said, and left it there. “These cables, are they for processing the satellite images?”

  “I wish,” Mirabelle said. “We’re getting a lot of pictures of clouds. Dee-Dee’s writing some pattern recognition software, but it’s not that complex. Ken has a plan, you see. But he needs a supercomputer.”

  “Go on, I’ll bite. Why does he need a supercomputer?”

  “It’s to do with the satellites,” Mirabelle hinted.

  “I’m not going to guess it in a million years,” I said.

  “It was something Ken read, years ago. He checked with Sorcha Locke, and she said it was true.”

  “What?”

  “That Lisa Kempton’s satellites are able to refuel each other. In orbit.”

  “You want to use one to refuel the others?” I asked.

  “Sort of, but not really. None of them have enough fuel. But the other thing Ms Locke said, it’s that she, or Ms Kempton, was responsible for di
sabling all the other satellites. Ken thinks we might be able to restore power to some. Even if we can’t, we could steal their fuel, and keep our satellites operational a lot longer.”

  “How likely is that?” I asked.

  Mirabelle screwed up her face. “Yeah, I don’t like those kinds of questions. How can you put a number on something that’s never been tried before? And if I were to say it was seven, or seventeen-to-one, or seventy percent, what would that really mean?”

  “Fair point. You don’t think it will work?”

  “Well, I wouldn’t say that,” she said. “Look at it from the other side. There are satellites on Earth, constructed, waiting for a rocket launch before the outbreak. And there are rockets, awaiting assembly. Assembly-sites are close to launch sites, and those are usually next to the oceans. We could reach one, and could assemble a rocket, and launch it.”

  “Could we really do that?” I asked, and my eager excitement must have been clear.

  “Sorry, I… no. Not a chance,” she said. “You’ve grasped the wrong end of the wrench. It would take all of us an absolute age. We’d starve before we launched. Even then, we’d probably blow up the rocket on the launch pad, and us with it. At which point, we’d have no rocket. No people, either. That’s the point I was making.”

  “Ah. You’re saying, or Ken is saying, that trying to re-programme a satellite in orbit now is the only way we’re going to keep some eyes above our head. Ever.”

  “Pretty much,” she said. “We can have radio and TV. But our population size, and its projected growth, limits what we can achieve. No matter how you cut it, a lot of things are never coming back.”

  The admiral was in her office. The new photo frame was facing her on her desk, now surrounded by a drift of loose papers.

  “I always had a rule,” I said, collapsing into the nearest chair. “Never trust anyone who has their photographs pointing out.”

  The admiral glanced at hers. “I keep looking at it. I don’t know what lesson I should draw, but I suppose that means I’m still learning. You’re out of breath,” she added, before I could ask what lesson might be learned from the picture.

  “I’m out of shape,” I said. “Too much sitting around on that ship.”

  “It’s your cast,” she said. “It’s too heavy and is altering your posture, putting a different strain on your muscles. I think we’ll replace it.”

  “Oh, there’s no need.”

  “Sorry, Bill,” she said. “My new medics need training, and I’d rather they practiced on a real patient.”

  “Ah. Well, fair enough. Better they practice now than the next time I break a limb. When do you want to slot it in? I seem to have more free time than I was expecting.”

  “Colm is securing the hospital at the moment,” she said. “When he’s finished, I wanted to go ward-to-ward, inspect and catalogue the equipment. Would you be able to accompany me?”

  “Sure. I saw that map downstairs. I was hoping they’d have made landfall in Iceland by now. Mirabelle seems to think they’re heading to Greenland already.”

  “They are. Nilda has abandoned any attempt to reach Iceland. The wind is too strong, the ice already too dense, and mixed with debris from the shore.”

  “From wrecked ships?” I asked.

  “She believes so.”

  “We’re seriously giving up on Iceland already?”

  “She is the officer on the ground, albeit at sea, and we must trust her judgement. As neither the chief nor your brother disagree, we can assume it’s worse than they were willing to say over the sat-phone. It is a pity that we won’t reach Reykjavík. I had high hopes for that city. However, if The New World can’t approach closer than fifty miles to shore, the Ocean Queen certainly won’t be able to.”

  “So they’re making for Greenland?”

  “A place about which I am far more interested,” the admiral said. She searched beneath the pile of papers and produced a thick, loosely bound stack. “Your journal,” she added, then gave a rare smile. “I should ask you to sign it. Now, where was it… ah, yes. Greenland. You said that refugees from across North America headed there. What happened to them? The wreckage off Iceland gives us a clue, but we need to confirm it.”

  There were footsteps outside. It was Kim. “I bring a message,” she said. “Colm says the hospital is clear.”

  “That didn’t take him long,” I said.

  “It’s not a big hospital,” the admiral said. “Bill, your appointment awaits.”

  “Appointment?” Kim asked. “Is something wrong?”

  “I’m replacing his cast,” the admiral said. “And I’ll use that as a teachable moment for my newly recruited nursing staff.”

  “Ah. But could I have a moment first?” Kim asked. “There’s something I wanted to ask you, Admiral.”

  “Janet, please,” she said. “Formality does grate sometimes. What’s troubling you?”

  “It’s not medical,” Kim said. “It’s a government matter. Or a military one. Or both. It’s the balance of risks.”

  “Which risks?” I asked.

  “Calais. The cartel. Denmark. The whole of Europe, really,” Kim said. “You remember, at the dockside, when Thaddeus got the list of Kempton’s redoubts in North America from Sorcha?”

  “I have a copy here,” the admiral said. “Which, in particular, do you think is a cause for concern?”

  “All of them. None of them,” Kim said. “We can’t go to any because the cartel know about them, right?”

  “In North America, it is more likely a corrupt politician has survived, taken up residence, and is now calling themselves president,” the admiral said. “The principle, however, is the same.”

  Kim waved that away. “That’s not the problem. Not an immediate one. Haderslev is the problem. Some of those gangsters will have survived Sorcha and Chester’s attack. Where would they go?”

  “Perhaps to Kaliningrad,” I said. “If that’s where the rifles came from. Or perhaps they went to wherever they found the tanks. Presumably somewhere in France. Hopefully, they’ll have died en route.”

  “Sure,” Kim said. “But what if they didn’t die? And they wouldn’t have gone straight to the tank depot because they’d need fuel first, and the only places they know had diesel are Calais and Haderslev. We’re reasonably sure of that. So, since we destroyed the fuel at Haderslev, wherever they might have gone in the last few days, inevitably, eventually, they’ll head to Calais.”

  “The horde is in the way,” I said.

  “Is it? Still?” she asked. “The cartel made it to Denmark, didn’t they? So why can’t they make it back? That Russian destroyer in Calais could blow the Courageous out of the water, and send our other ships straight to the bottom, yes?” she added, turning to the admiral.

  “It could,” she said.

  “There are mines in the harbour,” I said.

  “Are there?” Kim asked. “You made it out.”

  “The boat following us didn’t,” I said. “What about the neurotoxin with which the ship’s captain coated the decks?”

  “You think he did, or Captain Fielding did, based on a Royal Navy myth,” Kim said. “We don’t know that it’s true.”

  “There is some truth to that myth,” the admiral said. “At least in regards to Russian submarines, a carry-over from the Soviet era. I don’t know if the same is true with surface vessels, but Captain Fielding recognised a corpse on the deck.”

  “Who may have died from some other cause,” Kim said. “But let’s say she was correct. Both Bill and Flora went aboard the ship, and neither succumbed. Perhaps time and rain have neutralised it.”

  “It’s a lot of ifs,” I said.

  “Except it’s not,” Kim said. “That’s what I mean about the balance of risks. We don’t know how many slavers might be alive, how many weren’t at Haderslev when it was destroyed. But we do know there aren’t many ships to be found on the continental coast. We know there isn’t much fuel. We know there aren’t a
s many mines as before in the harbour. What if they get that ship out to sea? Where would they go?”

  “The Thames,” I said. “They thought we were British sailors.”

  “Okay, sure,” Kim said. “We suspect they know about Kempton’s other retreats, including the one in Portugal. So, after they’ve found London teeming with the undead, where would they go for food? We know they were starving, don’t we? They would go south. To Portugal. Which will take them past the Bay of Biscay.”

  “Ah,” I said, finally catching up. “So if we’re sending a ship there to look for Scott and the French and Ukrainians, we’ll present a sitting target.”

  “The balance of risks,” Kim said. “Admiral, what do you think?”

  “I think it’s a very good thing we left Elysium when we did,” she said. “As they would know of its existence, too. Unfortunately, we have a crippled Trident submarine sitting in a bay a few miles from there, with its warheads still aboard, whose former captain refuses to scuttle his boat. Thank you, Kim. You’ve given me a lot to think about. I’m sorry, Bill. Your new cast will have to wait until another day.”

  “I was hoping for reassurance, not a dismissal,” Kim said when we were both outside the hotel. “What do we do now?”

  “Not think about it,” I said. “And be glad that someone else is.”

  “I’ll never be happy doing that,” she said.

  “Think on this instead,” I said. “The New World is on its way to Greenland.”

  “Already?”

  “The wind was too strong, the waves too high, and the sea too full of ice and wreckage for the ship to approach Iceland.”

  “So they’re giving up? That’s good.”

  “It is?”

  “The clock’s ticking,” she said. “Less time in Iceland means more time in Canada. If the next mission, the critical mission to forestall a mutiny, will go to New England, then the only viable stopping-off point is surely St John’s in Newfoundland. They’ll have more time to explore that island, give us a feel of what to expect there, or whether we can expect to even go ashore. We want information, too. Books in English or French, both of which you’ll find in Canada, and in far greater volume than Reykjavík. Don’t get me wrong, when I say it’s good, I mean in the context of Commander Crawley wanting to go to Boston, and us having a potentially cartel-ridden coastal fortress between the Bay of Biscay and the Mediterranean. Do we know why he wants to go to Boston?”