Mhari blinks, then leans into Mo’s embrace. “You too,” she murmurs. “I’ve got a feeling this is going to be a bumpy ride.”
“I’ll have a word with Dr. Armstrong. We’ll sort something out.”
“Good luck with that.” Mhari pulls back, then takes a deep breath. “I’m out of here. See you tonight.” And she walks away with her back straight and proud, leaving Mo alone in the darkened office with the dreadful apprehension that more things are broken than meet the eye.
* * *
At sites scattered all around the UK, hundreds of projects are coming to an abrupt, disastrous end.
In Grantham, behind a cast-iron door in a high brick wall warded so that it appears derelict to casual observers, a very peculiar institution receives letters printed on paper informing the staff that their funding is being terminated. Two doctors and a (human) nurse exchange heated expressions of disbelief with an equally worried office administrator. Meanwhile, in the secure ward below, the four elderly inmates are happily unaware that orders requesting their transfer to beds in a boringly insecure NHS psychiatric hospital are being dealt with and that on the morrow an ambulance will arrive to rip them away from St. Hilda’s, their home and the site of their life’s work for the past fifty years.
(They are not in fact insane, but merely disconnected from the mundanity of consensus reality, and by the time the staff at their new home begin to realize that they are dealing not with institutionalized basket cases but with deeply scary [and dissociated] sorcerers who are now extremely irritated, it will be too late.)
The lost village of Dunwich, down on the east coast, receives a postal delivery twice a week by warded boat. The boat crew have been laid off, and it will be some time before the staff and trainees in the school realize that anything is wrong, as the commissary runs out of fresh milk, the diesel generator runs low, and the bar runs perilously low on cask-conditioned beer. (But that’s probably the least serious of the shutdowns.)
Around London, in the windowless factorylike sheds that contain the Laundry’s server farms, the racks of equipment that monitor the nation’s occult defenses begin to shut down. The staff have been ordered to leave, and the electricity bills will go unpaid. In the early hours of Tuesday morning, a fire in a substation—nothing to do with the Laundry per se—causes a local brownout and trips the backup electric system in data center TANGENT ORANGE. Unnoticed and with no drama, the site switches to internal power and the diesel backup generator kicks into life. But the tanker hasn’t been called, the fuel level is perilously low, and nobody is watching, so on Tuesday afternoon the eight thousand rackmount servers that provide SCORPION STARE coverage for London and the southwest will power down hard.
At a temporary office in Leeds, tired and disbelieving emergency workers who have spent the past weeks working sixteen-hour shifts making safe the thaumaturgic debris of an occult war receive their P45s and out-processing paperwork and are sent home, shaking their heads in disgust and asking who will pick up the pieces, many of which are heavily enchanted and still dangerous to approach. The axe swings for employees who have been injured in the line of duty as well as those who are active: Brains reads Pinky his letter of dismissal—Pinky’s eyes are still bandaged, recovering slowly, although he’s been discharged from the hospital—and swears an angry vow of vindication.
Near Bristol, in a windowless aircraft hangar staffed by a mixture of contractors and RAF personnel, the aircrew in the ready room listen with anger and disbelief as the civilian engineering manager informs them that his entire team have been laid off and they can no longer keep Bird Four flightworthy and in readiness. Heated phone calls escalate to the Group Captain responsible, and may make it as high as the Secretary of State for Defense within a day or so, hampered by the exigencies of secrecy surrounding discussing the existence of an unadmitted strategic nuclear strike capability (albeit one tacitly recognized by the other UN Security Council permanent members). Meanwhile, around the country every spare fitter and engineer the RAF can scrape together who has any record of working on similar airframes is being woken up and ordered to head for Filton immediately, in the desperate hope of getting there in time to pick up the pieces, run the checklists, and keep Squadron 666’s strike capability from degrading.
All around the UK, the lights are going out and the shutters are falling across the doors of dozens of offices and remote installations. The lights will stay on for a while longer at a handful of sites that are only tenuously connected to the rest of the nation, sites that are isolated by virtue of the perilous forces they work with or by the most draconian of security perimeters; but the orders have been issued, and by Friday evening the Laundry as an organization will have ceased to exist.
FIVE
BREAKOUT
Zero drives me out of the center of London efficiently and calmly. I sweat inside my rubber fright mask every time we pass a traffic camera or a police car, feeling the itch of gunsights on the small of my back. It’s never nice being a fugitive, but it’s a thousand times worse being a fugitive in your own country. I don’t want to talk to Zero about the situation—if I tell him what happened at Belgravia that’ll make it much harder for him to deny being an accessory when it comes up in court—so I keep my mouth shut and my thoughts to myself. And I’ve got a lot of them, mostly tainted with guilt, mostly attempts to second-guess what else I could have done.
I’m still drawing a blank and wondering if I could have avoided hurting Jo when we drive down a concrete trench in the East End and come out in a maze of spaghettilike roads overshadowed by skyscrapers. Finally Zero turns into the entrance of an underground parking garage—the barrier rises automatically for him: there’s no ticket machine and no human attendant—and parks between a bright red Italian skateboard with a bull-headed badge on the bonnet, and something that looks like Porsche tried to make a stretch limousine. “She’ll see you upstairs,” Zero tells me, passing me a card key. “Eighth floor, suite two.”
“But I—” I rub my face mask. “Really?”
“Yes, really.” Zero nods. “Please move, I’ve got a false trail to lay down.”
I use the contactless ebony card to open the elevator door, and find myself in a darkly reflective infinite regress, subtly distorted versions of myself mirrored to every side between columns of white LEDs. The doors close and the lift begins to rise without waiting for me to do anything so gauche as to push a button; there is a control panel, I eventually notice, but it seems to be emergency controls only. (Secure apartments, I realize: you can only go to the floor you have a key card for.)
When the doors open I recognize the corridor. I go straight to the safe apartment, open the door, and go through to the gigantic living room at the far end of the corridor. Persephone, standing in front of the window, turns to face me; the flash of surprise that crosses her face is balm for my paranoid soul. I whip off the Ronald Reagan mask—or try to whip it off, the sweat sticks it to my face like a hideous alien parasite. “If it wasn’t for you meddling kids I’d have gotten away with it! Uh thanks, ’Seph. Do you know what’s going on?”
“The agency is under attack. If you’re going to kill a man, aim for the head: you’re not the only Mahogany Row staffer with an outstanding arrest warrant.” She raises an eyebrow. “Why don’t you go and freshen up, maybe change into something less instantly recognizable to anyone who saw the CCTV of you making your escape? I’m waiting for the others to get here.” I spot my unmasked reflection in the window. I look like I’ve been dragged through a hedge backwards. “Your bag’s in the spare room.”
“Thanks,” I say, and retreat in confusion. It’s clearly casual Monday for Persephone: she’s got her hair tied back and her outfit is more battle dress than cocktail dress, albeit still in black. “Be back in ten minutes.”
It’s more like fifteen, but by the end of it I’m feeling human again, showered and shaved and changed out of management drag. I slope back into the living room and find we’ve been joined by J
ohnny and the SA. Dr. Armstrong smiles. “Ah, Bob, glad you could join us. Here.” He hands me a surprisingly heavy mailer.
“You know I—”
“Broke out of a police station, injured a detective chief inspector and a taxi driver, are wanted for receiving stolen goods and assault and, I believe, an entirely spurious murder charge? Yes, Bob, nothing to worry about.” His smile vanishes. “Sit down. We’ve got a lot of ground to cover.”
“’Aven’t we just,” rumbles Johnny, as I do as I’m told, then absentmindedly open the jiffy bag and pour the contents all over my lap.
“Whoa,” I say, seeing the phone. And, “What’s this?” There’s a well-aged leather wallet—not mine—and when I open it it’s full of cards. Debit, credit, driver’s license, health club, and something else that says CONTINUITY OPERATIONS.
“Pay attention,” says the SA, looking me in the eyes with an expression that makes my blood freeze because I’ve been here before. “Ruby. Seminole. Kriegspiel. Hatchet. Execute Sitrep One.”
And with that, I’m gone. Someone else with my voice replies: “Subjective integrity is maintained. Subjective continuity of experience is maintained. Subject observes no tampering.”
“Jolly good. Bob, repeat after me—”
Ears hear and larynx speaks but I am not consciously aware of what I’m saying. The SA is uttering words of power and I am repeating them, binding myself to something powerful, something that hums and throbs in the empty space where my oath of office once burned, as a huge, silvery icon flames and takes form against the eigengrau background of my mind’s eye.
“Exit supervision mode.” And then I’m back in my own head, not watching from an abstract distance as the SA nods, guardedly. “Sorry about that, Bob. Had to repair the damage.”
“I know.” I clear my throat. Fuck, this is not turning out to be a good day. “How bad is it?”
Dr. Armstrong folds himself onto the sofa opposite. “The picture at ground level is that the organization is under attack from the top down, by our own government,” he says bluntly. “SOE is officially being dissolved, effective immediately, and all personnel are being laid off. There is no provision for continuity of staff, although Crown assets and property are being secured and a successor agency is due to spin up next Monday—no word on who will direct or staff it, of course, but that’s how these things happen.”
Well, that might go some way towards explaining why nobody showed up to bail me out of pokey. (Although now I feel a bit like the prisoner of war being held in a Japanese military prison camp at Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, complaining that his breakfast is late.) “Schiller?” I ask.
The SA raises a finger. “Most probably, but we need to rule out other possibilities first. I will note at this point that the original warrant for your arrest, Bob, implies inside knowledge that would only be available to the operation that tried to snatch you. Also, there is a spurious and preposterous Immigration Service Leave to Remain warrant out for Ms. Hazard, and I believe Johnny is wanted on firearms charges”—Johnny whistles tunelessly between his teeth—“and a number of other Mahogany Row key operatives are the subject of criminal proceedings by the police. This has obviously been in train for a little while now. They’re very well prepared, whoever they are.”
“Mo—”
“Is safe for the time being.” Dr. Armstrong raises another finger. “They’re not so well prepared that they exhibit any special knowledge of the role the Audit Commission plays within the agency, otherwise”—he spreads his arms—“I would have been their very first target.” His smile, this time round, is vulpine and frightening. “So that’s their first misplay. And their second is that there is no sign of special provisions for the PHANGs, the residents of St. Hilda’s, and any number of personnel with unusual and exacting requirements.” His smile disappears. “That is both a weakness on the adversary’s part, and a huge problem for us.”
“No provisions for PHANGs?” My mind is spinning. “They’re firing everyone, PHANGs included? But what about”—I stare at him—“Alex?”
“Exactly. Bob, Johnny, Persephone: welcome to Continuity Operations. The oath I administered binds you much as your previous oath of office did—only the name of the organization has changed. And, ahem, its source of authority, which reverts back to the previous Royal Prerogative. Our first task is to secure our resources and establish our threat perimeter, and as you so perspicaciously observed, this means someone needs to retrieve Alex and the All-Highest before a use for them occurs to the adversary. Persephone, I need you for another job—low risk but delicate—up north. So it’s down to you two likely lads to break into a prisoner of war camp and ensure the two most valuable prisoners aren’t used against us.”
“But … Schiller?” I will freely confess that my brain is stuck like an old-time vinyl record with a bad scratch. “If he’s back, does that mean he successfully awakened the, the…”
“The Sleeper isn’t your problem, Bob,” Persephone assures me, only slightly patronizing.
“Anyway, if ’e’d succeeded in waking it fully, d’you think we’d be sitting ’ere?” Johnny adds rhetorically. “No, it’s just Ray with some extra mojo walking about. Worse case, the Sleeper’s in ’is driving seat, but it’s still sized for a bloke, and he’s no less human than you are these days, mate.”
“Thank you very much.” I manage not to snarl, but he’s right about one thing: if it is the Sleeper, it’s way above our pay grade—and if it isn’t, there’s no need to worry about it. Something as big as the Sleeper wouldn’t be pissing around declaring bureaucratic war on a Civil Service department. “Okay, agenda item number one: how to get to our two assets. Do you have any suggestions?”
“Sure do. Duchess…?”
Persephone stares at me thoughtfully. “Yes, I think it could work.” She snaps her fingers. “The mask—it’ll do, but I need to make some adjustments.” Then she nods thoughtfully. “And while I’m doing that, you need to go clothes shopping with Johnny.”
* * *
I barely have time to finish a mug of tea and set a password on my shiny new hacked-about CyanogenMod phone when Johnny whisks me out the door for a brisk afternoon out, clothes shopping GI Joe style. Anonymity (and immunity from speed cameras) is ensured because Johnny’s idea is getting about town is a matte-black Kawasaki Ninja ZX-14. I am not used to wearing a mirror-visored crash helmet—or riding pillion, for that matter, especially on an insanely souped-up sports bike that’s not designed for passengers—so after the second time I nearly fall off he sticks within hailing distance of the speed limit. It’s a bit like taking a Lamborghini to the corner shop, and by the time we get to our destination I’ve almost stopped shaking with fear.
“’Op off, Bob, we’re there,” he tells me via Bluetooth as he drops the kickstand, and I stumble away from the terror machine, take a deep breath, and look around the industrial estate in northeast London we seem to have crash-landed in.
“Where’s here?” I ask.
“Army surplus.” And with that he shoves open the door to the nearest warehouse-like building and takes his helmet off as he goes inside.
Now, at risk of being accused of sexist stereotyping, I’d like to note that a lot of retail psychology (and sales) depends on the fact that men and women shop (or are trained to shop) in different ways. Broadly: women forage while men hunt. This is especially true of clothing, where I’ve noticed Mo can spend all afternoon searching for exactly the right pair of shoes and end up with a jacket, two bras, a skirt, and an umbrella—while I begin to sweat bullets and edge close to a panic attack if I can’t find exactly the correct size of plain black tee shirt in Marks and Spencer within thirty seconds of entering the front door.
In this case, Johnny is working to a countdown timer and knows exactly what he’s going to dress me in. Which is why precisely sixteen minutes after we walked in the door we walk out again with a cheap backpack slung over my shoulder, which includes all the elements to make up No. 13 tem
perate barrack dress (Army Legal Services Branch) in my size, along with appropriate insignia for a major with a law degree, and a few extras. Some of it is secondhand, some of it is new, but it all fits, and between the glamour Persephone’s working up for the rubber mask and Johnny’s coaching on how to Talk Officer it might just work.
Back at the safe house I discover that the SA has already left. While Persephone is doing something unspeakable to the rubber mask in the kitchen, Johnny sets me to work with spray starch and a steam iron, explaining the requirement for razor-sharp creases with a sergeant major’s sarcasm while he blacks up both pairs of boots. His own costume is, unsurprisingly, already hanging in the wardrobe; I’m pretty certain that when Johnny impersonates an NCO he’s doing so from firsthand experience.
I’ve just about finished the shirt when Persephone walks in. “Try this for size,” she says, holding out a flaccid mask.
“Must I?” I take the thing and pull it on over my face.
“Great work, Duchess!” Johnny seems to approve.
Persephone cocks her head to one side as she inspects me. “Yes, I think it’ll do,” she says after a bit. “All right, my work here is done.” A brief flicker of concern as she glances at Johnny: “Bring them back alive, please, I’ll be too far away for backup if it goes pear-shaped.”
“What?” I say, but it comes out muffled because the mask is half-covering my face, and she’s already out the door by the time I wrestle my spare face into submission. “Where’s she going?” I demand.
Johnny gives me a very odd frown. “Ye dinna wanna ken,” he says, accidentally dropping out of his usual fake two-bob Cockney and into something not unlike his original Highlands dialect.
“Well that’s okay then,” I say, and get back to ironing.
* * *
Early the next morning I dress in my new duds, mask and all, and follow Johnny—turned out as a sergeant in the Military Provost Guard Service—down to the car park, where we take Zero’s Peugeot hatchback out for a spin. Johnny is carrying a bunch of paperwork that arrived by courier overnight; the SA’s little helpers have been busy, and I get a nice warm glow of reassurance from knowing that not everyone’s hand is raised against us—at least, not yet. For my part, I’m trying to look like a major in the Service Prosecuting Authority, which is to say, an army prosecutor. They’re both plausible roles for visiting a prison, and as we barrel along the M5 towards Bristol Johnny drills me in what I’m going to say to get us inside the fence and I drill Johnny in what we’re going to say in order to get out again.
The Delirium Brief Page 16