“PIN needs footage for tonight, Corporal. What else have you got?”
“There’s an interview from last month, with Bracken.”
“Does she have anything to say?”
“No …”
He cuts me off, standing up from his chair. “Find something, Corporal.”
I nod. “ … but everyone will see the bruises.”
He gives me a long stare, then sits down. “Show me what you’ve got.”
I find the drive from a month ago, and load the footage. Margaret and Colonel Bracken, facing each other in the interrogation room. Like Lee, Bracken sits to one side, asking his questions – and this time the camera picks up colourful week-old bruises all over Margaret’s exposed skin. On her face and neck, on her hands, on her arms as she shifts in her handcuffs. Her orange prison jumpsuit hides the rest of the bruising, but I know it’s there. The bruises came from my orders, and my fists.
Lee nods. “And we haven’t shown this yet?”
I shrug. “PIN’s been too busy with Craig Dewar and Elizabeth Ellman. And I wasn’t sure whether you’d approve it, Sir.”
He looks at me again, holding his gaze for a moment too long.
“I’ll approve it, Corporal. Things have changed. Get this to PIN.”
“Yes, Sir.”
*****
The car is supposed to drop me at Dover House, but the driver is happy to leave me on Westminster Bridge. It saves him dealing with the security checks on Whitehall, and keeps me away from Bracken for a few minutes longer.
I walk to the edge of the bridge and look down at the river. It’s a cold, grey day, and the scar from the South Bank Bombing looks like the aftermath of an earthquake. Cranes and diggers shift the remains of the buildings, and there’s scaffolding along the edge of the water. Metal barriers keep the river from washing more of the broken bank away, and there are barges under what’s left of the London Eye, cutting crews crawling over the metal frame as it lies across the river.
The Home Forces building is hidden behind scaffolding and plastic sheets. They’re replacing the windows, and fixing the bomb damage, and it’s going to take at least another month. Another month, working in a tiny office with Bracken. Collecting the whisky bottles every evening, and pretending I don’t see when he drinks his way through every day. Fetching coffee, and ignoring the bottles under his desk.
You can do this, Ketty. Keep your head down and keep Bracken standing.
The guard on duty at the end of Whitehall tells me off for walking in. We’re at high alert, and we’re supposed to be escorted during working hours. No one knows what else the resistance is planning – what else they can use to send us a message. There could be another bomb, or a personal attack, at any time.
But I’ve seen how Londoners reacted to the South Bank attack. To devastation in the heart of their city – to the worst attack here since the Crossrail bombing. I’ve seen how they refused to show their fear. They went out. They carried on. They made sure their lives weren’t affected.
I touch my gun in its holster, and smile at the guard.
No point living in fear. If you change your behaviour, the terrorists have already won.
*****
The clouds have thinned by the time I climb the stairs to my flat. There’s an orange-pink glow coming through my windows, and I stand and watch the colours change before I go out for a run.
There’s a moment when the sky looks as if it’s on fire, and I have to close my eyes. All I can see are the flames on the riverbank. People, injured and bleeding. For an instant I’m back on Hungerford Bridge, carrying stretchers and helping medics treat the wounded.
I shake my head.
It’s over, Ketty. You’re safe.
But my hands are shaking as I close the curtains.
This time, the bombers missed me by hours. If I’d been out running, I would have been in the middle of the attack. We didn’t see them coming, and they punched a hole in the city. Next time …
I force myself not to think about it.
Get out there. Run. Show them you’re not afraid.
Worry
Bex
There’s a quiet knock on the door as I’m lying awake. I reach for my torch and check my watch, and it’s half past two. I pull the sleeping bag over my head, but whoever’s outside the door knocks again. I crawl out of bed, push my feet into my trainers, and open the door a crack.
“Dan!”
“Bex. I’m sorry. Were you …?”
“No. It’s OK.” I step out in to the corridor, pulling the door closed behind me. The beam of my torch picks out peeling wallpaper and splintered floorboards.
“Did you mean it? Can I talk to you any time?”
I nod. “I meant it. What’s up?”
“I don’t know.” His voice catches in his throat.
“Can’t sleep?” He shakes his head. “Me neither. I just want to make our move. I want to start fighting.”
He sits down on the corridor floor, and when he speaks, his voice is choked.
“I’m scared, Bex.”
I shrug, sitting down next to him. “We’re walking into something dangerous. We don’t have all the facts. We’re hoping this will work.”
He shakes his head. “That’s not it.” He looks at me, and there are tears on his face. “I know all that.”
“So what …?”
“This is our last chance.” He takes a ragged breath. “We don’t get another opportunity to save them.”
I shake my head. “We can’t think like that. This is our best chance. This is how we make a difference.”
“What if we’re not ready?” He puts his head in his hands. “What if we’re too late? What if I can’t save her? The trial’s in two weeks, Bex. What if we don’t move before then?”
I put my arm round his shoulders, and he leans against me, sobbing quietly.
I know what he’s feeling. And I know what’s keeping me awake. We could sit here, waiting for a signal to start the attack, and we could be too late. We could be sitting here while they show Margie’s trial on TV. While they show Mum, bruised and injured, on PIN every night.
We might be ready, but if the coalition isn’t ready to move we could still lose this fight. We could still lose our friend.
“You can’t think like that. You’re doing the best you can.”
He nods. “But what if it’s not enough?”
I move away, dropping my arm from his shoulders. He leans back against the wall, watching me.
“We’re doing the right thing, Dan.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because staying in Scotland wasn’t helping.”
He nods, looking down. “I just …”
“I know, Dan. I get it. I don’t want to lose Margie, and I don’t want to lose Mum. As soon as we can, we’ll lead this invasion. We’ll go and rescue them.”
He nods. “You’re right.” He rubs his hands over his face. “You’re right. So why am I so afraid?”
I reach out again, and put my hand on his arm. “Because you’re right, too. This might not work. The government might find us, and stop us. The coalition might wait too long to start the invasion. We might lose Margie, and Mum, and Dr Richards.”
He puts one hand over his face, and his shoulders shake.
“But it won’t be because we didn’t try. We’re making the best choice here. We’re doing the right thing. We’re doing the brave thing.”
“Yeah. I just … I hate feeling this useless. I want to go in and rescue her now. Today. I want to take her out of their horrible cells and their horrible interrogation rooms, and I want to set her free.” He glances at me. “I don’t even care if she walks away from me. From us. I just want to be useful. I want to save her.”
“I know.” I give his arm a squeeze. “And she knows that, too.”
He nods. “But that doesn’t change anything.”
“This is our chance, Dan.”
He pushes the tears from hi
s cheeks with his hands.
“You’re right. I know you’re right. I just …”
“I know, Dan. I know. I’m scared too.”
He reaches out his hand, and I take it in mine. We sit for a while, without speaking.
And somehow the fear seems easier to face when we’re facing it together. We’ve both got so much invested in what happens next. We both need to do something – for Margie and for Mum. We might fail. We might not get to them in time. But whatever happens, we both have somewhere to turn.
*****
There’s a crowd of people in the corner of the dining room when we come down for breakfast. Someone’s rigged up a TV, and people are gathering to watch PIN. I glance at Dan, and he looks back, the fear from last night showing on his face. We walk over and join the audience.
The morning news is recapping headlines from last night. There’s a clip of Mum and Ketty – no sound, but Mum’s arm is still in plaster. There’s a clip of Craig Dewar, addressing the camera. And there’s a clip of Margie, covered in fading bruises. PIN hasn’t run footage of Margie in weeks – just the endless trailers for her trial – and we haven’t seen bruises like this before.
Dan staggers beside me, and I pull a chair over from the nearest table. He waves me away, and steps towards the TV.
The bruises are everywhere. All over her face and neck, and on her hands and arms. They’re old – they’re not black and blue, but ugly shades of yellow and green and brown.
“What have they done, Bex?”
I shake my head. I know how this feels. When Ketty did this to Mum, I nearly punched my Liaison Officer when she claimed there was nothing we could do.
“We’re here, Dan. We’re going to save her.”
“Two weeks, Bex. Two weeks until they …”
“I know.” Two weeks until the rigged trial, and the firing squad.
He clenches his fists and closes his eyes. “We have to move soon, Bex. We have to.”
*****
Fiona’s briefing is short. No word from the coalition, so for now we stay where we are and hope the government doesn’t find us.
Dan walks out, fists clenched, and Amy goes after him. I stay, waiting for a chance to talk to Fiona.
Charlie pulls up a chair and puts her hand on my shoulder.
“Everything OK?”
I shake my head. “I can’t sit here forever. We need to fight. We need to act.”
“We will. Just as soon as the coalition is ready.”
“But that could take weeks. Months.” She nods. “But we don’t have weeks. Margie doesn’t have weeks.”
“I know, Bex. But marching in without the coalition? That’s suicide. You know that.”
“I know.” My voice is a whisper, and I’m looking down at the table when Fiona sits down next to me. Charlie gives my shoulder a squeeze and pushes her chair back.
“I’ll leave you to it. OK, Bex?” I give her a smile, but I’m blinking back tears as she stands up and walks away. I turn to Fiona, and force myself to stay calm.
“Dan’s not happy with us?” She glances at the door, and back at me.
I shake my head. “He’s worried about Margie.”
She nods. “We’re doing the best we can, Bex. We’re in place – we’re where we need to be, but we have to wait for the coalition before we can make our move.”
“And if that’s not enough?”
She looks down at the table. “You know the answer to that. We’ll do everything we can to rescue Margie, and the other prisoners, but taking down the government has to be our first priority.”
“That’s not good enough.” She looks up at me, surprise on her face. “We need to move before they execute my friend.”
“Bex, I can’t tell the coalition what to do!”
“You can make sure they know about the trial, though. You can make sure they know that this is PIN’s biggest event of the year. You can remind them that stopping the trial would embarrass the government. And that it would save my friend. It would keep me and my friends in a helpful mood, too.”
She looks at the expression on my face. “Are you threatening me, Committee Member Ellman?” She’s whispering, but there’s nothing soft about her words.
I fight the urge to shake my head and back down.
“I’m reminding you what’s at stake. I’m reminding you that we’re here to rescue our friends and our families, as well as to lead your invasion. And I’m asking you to pass that on to the coalition, Madam Chairman.”
She looks at me for a few moments longer, then pushes her chair back from the table.
“I’ll bear your comments in mind, Miss Ellman. I hope you’ll take note of mine.”
Rumours
Ketty
“Have you heard?”
I shake my head and carry on making notes. “I don’t need to hear anything from you, Corporal.”
Conrad rolls his eyes, and pulls a chair over to my desk.
“You want to hear this.”
Bracken is at a meeting with Lee, so I have the tiny room to myself. I give Conrad a cold look – he’s come to leave some papers on Bracken’s desk, and I’m expecting him to leave. I have nothing to say to the person who killed my best friend.
“Troop movements, across the North Sea,” he says, ignoring the look on my face.
I shrug. “So?”
“So we think they’re going to try to invade.”
I put my pen down and fold my arms. “Who?”
He smiles. “We think it’s the OIE. And we think they’re working with the Netherlands.” He waits for me to react. My missing recruit is in the Netherlands, rescued from deportation to London by a deal with the Scottish government.
I don’t want to talk to Conrad, but he’s right. I need to hear this. “OK. I’m listening.”
He shrugs. “That’s all we know. Troop movements. Some sort of training camp. And a lot of warships at the Den Helder military base.”
“They don’t stand a chance. We’ve got the Army, the Navy, the Air Force, and the Home Forces. What do they think they can do?”
“No one knows. But something’s happening. And your recruit is in the middle of it.”
*****
Bracken’s face is pale when he comes back from his meeting. He reaches for the whisky bottle as soon as he’s sitting down, and I focus my attention on the papers in front of me while he drinks two glasses and slumps back in his chair.
“Coffee, Sir?”
He nods. I leave him with his bottle, and walk down the corridor to the kitchen. The coffee is instant, and terrible – there’s no space for the coffee machine here – but it’s better then nothing. I shake two painkillers from the bottle in my pocket, and carry the coffee back to the office.
“Thank you, Ketty.”
I leave one mug of coffee and the painkillers in front of him, and he swallows the tablets before putting the whisky bottle back under his desk.
“Bad day, Sir?”
He looks at me, trying to decide what to say.
“Bad news, I think.”
“The invasion?”
He raises his eyebrows, and he’s about to say something.
“Conrad was here,” I say, quickly. “He told me.”
“I thought you two weren’t speaking.”
Not when I have a choice.
I shrug. “This concerns Jake, and the other recruits. I let him talk.”
There’s a ghost of a smile on his face. “Very commendable, Ketty.”
I can’t help smiling back. “Thank you, Sir.”
He wraps his hands round the coffee mug, and stares at his desk.
“So are the Netherlands invading? Is this the end of the UK?” I keep my voice steady, but I can see that Bracken is worried.
He shakes his head. “We don’t know.”
“But they can’t have enough people …”
“We don’t know, Ketty. We don’t know what they’ve got.” He looks up at me. “The government of the
Netherlands worked with the Scottish government to make sure Jake wasn’t sent back here.” I nod. One of the list of failures that Lee is holding against us. “Who knows what else they’re cooperating on?”
“Are they working with the OIE?”
“We think that’s likely.”
“So the other recruits could be heading for the Netherlands.”
“I think that’s a fair assumption.”
Which means we’ve lost our leverage with their hosts. We’ve lost them.
“So Craig Dewar …”
“Threatening the life of a Scottish citizen might have had exactly the effect we were hoping for, Ketty.”
“Persuading Scotland to expel the OIE, and the recruits?” He nods. “But that doesn’t help us, if they’ve found another safe place to stay.”
“It doesn’t.”
I stare at my coffee mug.
“Did we screw this one up, Sir? Putting Craig Dewar on PIN?”
Did my suggestion prompt an invasion?
“Who knows, Ketty? Maybe this was happening anyway. Maybe this is to do with the bombing.” He shakes his head. “Maybe the OIE has been planning this from the start.”
“Is Lee blaming us?”
Bracken gives a harsh laugh. “He’s blaming everyone. But yes, we’re on his list.”
Just what we need. Giving the brigadier something else to use against us.
I think about what Conrad told me. Warships and troops. Cooperation with the OIE. If they’re planning an invasion, they must be confident that they can win.
“Can they do it, Sir? Can they defeat us?”
He shrugs. “They must think so.” He takes a sip of his coffee. “But we’re sending troops to the ports. The Air Force is on high alert. The Navy is positioning its ships to defend us. Major General Franks is working with the head of the Army. We’re doing everything we can.”
“Can we persuade them not to invade? Can we show them that fighting would be a mistake?”
“We need to wait and see how they respond to our defences.”
So this could be war. This could be fighting in the streets.
Victory Day (Battle Ground YA UK Dystopia Series Book 5) Page 2