The Annihilation Score (Laundry Files)

by Charles Stross

  “You’re right.” A knot in my stomach that I’ve barely been aware of relaxes. “Hell, we could even invite Freudstein, couldn’t we? But seriously, let’s start at the top and work down. Who was that guy who rescued the woman who drove her car into an overflowing river the other day? We ought to look him up. Proactively identify the good citizens, filter out the ones with criminal records, and see if they’re willing to play ball. Shove all this messing around with no-hopers onto —” My phone bleeps. “Damn, next candidate is due in five minutes.” I blow on my coffee. “Too late to cancel at this point.” At least he’s the last for today. “Want to go over his CV?”

  Jim picks up his tablet. His brows furrow. “Candidate number four Age: Twenty-two. Name: Fabian Everyman. Assumed superhero alias: ‘The Mandate.’ School: Attended Eton College, took five A-levels at grade A*. University: Oxford, Brasenose College, graduated with a distinguished first in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics. Also: Member of the Oxford Union, Debating Society team captain.” His frown deepens.

  Something in my subconscious is ringing alarm bells. “That’s not a superhero CV, that’s a parliamentary —” My phone trills. “Yes?” It’s the front desk. “Right-o, send him up.” I look at Jim. “Would you mind escorting Mr. Everyman from the lift?”

  “I’ve got a bad feeling about this one,” Jim murmurs.

  “Me, too. Wait one.” I’ve taken to wearing a basic Laundry-issue protective ward all the time, but I pull open my desk drawer. There, nestled in foam inserts, are a pair of heavy-duty bracelet wards, beside a tube of extremely unusual mascara. I pass Jim a bracelet. “Wear this,” I suggest. I clasp the other one around my left wrist, then tap the mascara tube against the edge of my desk, hoping it hasn’t dried up completely. Pale Grace™ Bright Eyes® products have been off the market for years, but in the course of wrapping up the Billington corporate empire we seized some of the more exotic ingredients, and if life hands your research department lemons and a recipe, you shouldn’t be surprised if they make lemonade for you. Or, better still, anti-lemonade countermeasures.

  The mascara turns out to be dry and crumbly with age. I manage to mess up one eye before I hear Jim’s heavy tread again. Damn. I wipe it off as best I can, put the brush back in the tube and the tube in my jacket pocket, and am blinking irritably when the office door opens. Jim enters, followed by candidate #4.

  How to describe the Mandate?

  We asked all our applicants to change into character for their interview – they can use the shower room downstairs if they’re too embarrassed to be seen on the street. But the Mandate could easily have marched up the pavement and in through our front door in his superpower persona without raising any eyebrows. He smiles, teeth gleaming like a toothpaste advert: “Dr. O’Brien! I’m so pleased to meet you at last. I’ve been hearing great things about your work.” His handshake is warm, dry, and firm as a manifesto promise. “You, too, Chief Superintendent. Marvelous to see you.”

  He makes a superb first impression but I really couldn’t tell you the color of his eyes. I can’t tell you the color of his skin or his hair, either. His suit is impeccably cut, his shirt and tie immaculate, the whole turnout just a millisecond behind the leading edge of current fashion. He wears discreet cufflinks and mirror-polished Oxfords; he has a carefully rolled-up copy of the Times tucked under his left arm.

  “Have a seat.” I smile instinctively. Jim sits next to me, closer than normal – Is he nervous? “So, Mr. Everyman. You do understand that we’re not a constituency party selection committee? We’re actually recruiting for a superhero team who will work for the Home Office. What talents can you bring to the table?”

  He smiles, and it’s so contagious that I find myself grinning back at him involuntarily. “Well, you see,” he says with boyish enthusiasm, “I can run it for you. From the top, that is: I know we’re still fifteen months from the next election, but I’m going to be the next Home Secretary.” He chuckles at his own joke, and it’s so funny Jim and I join in, too, although I have a distracting shooting pain in my left wrist. “That’s my ability, you see: I have unshakable faith in myself, and if I believe in something, everyone around me has to believe it, too.” I nod along: that’s a very useful ability. “And I believe that, a-ha, tomorrow belongs to me.” He smiles and whistles a familiar melody. Cabaret.

  “Wonderful,” Jim says with feeling. “But what about your other powers?”

  “Oh, I don’t need any.” The Mandate’s smile widens. I realize that he’s absolutely correct: if you can make the people around you believe whatever you believe, why would you need super-strength or the ability to fly? He’ll be a wonderful Home Secretary, right up until he graduates to Prime Minister. “I can make bank robbers hand themselves in and volunteer to return their ill-gotten goods. I can make orphans laugh and I can make wife-beaters beg their victims for mercy. If I was so inclined, I could sell you bridges that don’t exist. I can and will bring peace to the Middle East. I can even do a Tony Blair impression.” He has Jim in stitches with that one: it’s true, he’s got the charismatic former Prime Minister’s mannerisms down perfectly – only he’s better, more convincing.

  I struggle to keep track of my interview checklist. I seem to have mild heartburn – no, my silly necklace is just overheating. I’m about to reach up and unfasten it, but the pain in my left wrist has turned into a burning itch like nettle-rash, spreading halfway to my elbow. I rub it with my right hand, and feel an unfamiliar restraint that seems to pulse in time with my heart. “Why do you want to, to work with, with our —”

  His smile disappears, replaced by a tiny frown of concern. “Oh, I don’t want to work with you, Dr. O’Brien! I’m sorry, you seem to be laboring under a misapprehension. I’m here because I want you to work for me.” I nod, encouraging him to continue with his explanation even though I’m squirming in my seat, driven half mad by the nagging itch in my left wrist.

  “’Scuse me,” I finally burst out. “Need to powder my nose – urgently. Back in a minute.”

  “Take your time,” the Mandate says indulgently. “I’d be very grateful if you could fetch me a coffee on your way back? White, two sugars.”

  I scurry towards the door and dash for the ladies. I lean over the sink for a minute, gasping and trying not to throw up as I run my left wrist under the cold tap. The red welt left by the high-power defensive ward on the bracelet begins to fade. Damn! That was close. I shudder, skin crawling, and force myself to breathe slowly and deeply. I’ve seen heavy-duty glamours in action before, but that was something else. I try to remember his face, but there’s just a smear of skin between hairline and chin, a vacant mask onto which it is altogether too tempting to project the kindly, caring features of an identikit best friend. Hairline? I can’t remember. Then I realize he’s still in the room with Jim and my violin case is parked under the desk and I swear softly.

  I pull out the mascara tube and carefully brush more of it onto my lashes. It’s crumbly and rubbish and as it moistens it begins to run – I’m going to have horrible raccoon eyes this evening – but I have a compact mirror, and I manage to get some of it to stick where it belongs. It stings a little, but when I finish blinking, everything is bleak and crystal-clear. I put the tube away, pull out my phone, and call Mhari’s office line.

  “Yes? I’m in with a candidate —”

  “We have trouble,” I interrupt. “Jim’s in my office and we’ve got a problem, our candidate has a glamour, level six or higher, maybe even an eight. It’s a full-blown you-gotta-believe-me field and I need backup to get the bastard out of the building. Put your candidate on hold and meet me at the front desk right now. Over.”

  I put the phone back in my pocket and head for the front. Mhari arrives a moment later, followed by Ramona. They seem to have caught my sense of urgency. “What?” asks Ramona, looking up from her wheelchair. I offer her the mascara tube. “Is this what I think it is?” I nod.

  Mhari shakes her head. “Level six or higher,
you say?” She takes my left wrist and I suppress a violent flinch as she touches the bracelet: “Like that’ll do you a lot of good.” She tries to look me in the eye. “Mo, stop that. Don’t freak out on me now! Listen, are the blinds in your office down?”

  “I – I —” I swallow. “Yes.” I breathe deeply, trying to center myself again. “He sneaked in under the radar and he’s got Jim’s undivided attention, and worse: my violin’s inaccessible. Under my desk.”

  Ramona pauses in the middle of applying the brush to her lashes. (Ew, sharing mascara brushes, part of me thinks, but it’s not as if we’ve got spares: that stuff is worth at least three times its weight in gold, and they’re not going to be manufacturing any more of it once the supply of ingredients runs out.) “You should be safe from him with this,” she says. “It’s pretty potent stuff.”

  “Right.” Mhari taps her toes, waiting for Ramona to pass her the makeup tube. “So you want to get him out of the premises as fast as possible? Do you want him to leave via the window or the lift shaft?”

  “I think he’ll go willingly if he realizes we can see through him,” I say. “The big problem is Jim. If he decides to stand his ground and tells Officer Friendly to neutralize us…”

  Ramona glances at Mhari, who is now working on her own eyes. Our clumpy lashes make us look like a failed goth revival. “Right, so that’s what we plan for. How about you and I distract Jim, while you” – she’s looking at me – “go in, avoid engaging the target, retrieve your violin and order him to leave? If he doesn’t leave – then we tackle him.”

  “Wait one,” says Mhari. She hands me the mascara, then she disappears. I mean, she literally disappears: she dashes back towards her windowless cubbyhole of an office so fast that I can’t track her. A couple of seconds later she comes screeching back, all but leaving scorch marks on the carpet. “You’ll need these,” she says, offering us a small, translucent box.

  “What.” I focus on it. “Earplugs? Good thinking.” Why does Mhari keep silicone earplugs in her office? Ramona takes the box, extracts a pair, and passes it to me. I have second thoughts and pass it back to Mhari: plugs will get in the way of me deploying Lecter. “You need these more than I do,” I tell her. Then I beckon: “Follow me.”

  It all goes down in a matter of seconds. I open my office door and march directly to my desk. Mhari follows at my left shoulder, and Ramona wheels in behind her and zigzags to clear the doorway. I pay no attention to the two sapient cauliflowers from Arcturus but instead bend down, pick up my violin case, press the eject stud, and bring my instrument to bear on Fabian Everyman in one fluid movement.

  “Freeze,” I say, glaring at him along the fretboard. Lecter hums under my fingertips: he seems edgy, even nervous. Mr. Everyman turns to look at me, and with my Pale Grace™–enhanced vision and my defensive wards cranked up to eleven I see him for what he is. The fine hairs on the back of my neck rise and I burst out in a cold sweat as Mhari and Ramona grab Jim and pull him out of the firing line, shoving him towards the door with go, go, go! urgency.

  “Well, this is a surprise,” says the Mandate. He grins widely. I’m not sure which is more disturbing: the gaping jaws crammed with pointy carnivorous ivory, the red-rimmed eyes, or the scaly green skin. “I really didn’t think you had it in you, Dr. O’Brien. May I congratulate —”

  “This interview is terminated,” I announce. I draw my bow lightly across a string that shimmers as it vibrates, bringing a note into being that is so pure that it threatens to rip apart reality. Firmly: “Your application is rejected with prejudice. You will leave this building right now and never return. You have ten seconds to comply.”

  My target raises his arms in surrender – arms that end in green-skinned webbed hands, their fingers tipped with claws. I tense, nerving myself for the next note in the killing symphony, but he seems to mean it: “As you insist, I will depart peacefully. There’s absolutely no need to be nasty about this! But please, I urge you, don’t say anything you might regret after the next election?” His smile gapes wider, but thanks to the Bathory™ brand mascara I’m immune to his charms.

  I track him, alert, bow at the ready. “Which party is going to select you as a candidate?” I demand, as he stands and turns to leave. “Not that it matters, but I want to know who to vote against.”

  “Which party?” The lizard-man spares me a saturnine grin from the doorway. “It doesn’t really matter: I’ll be running for whichever party wins the election. Toodle pip, dear girl. I expect to see you in my office sooner or later…”

  Late morning, the day after.

  We’re having a post-mortem on the interviews, and have reached a consensus that none of the applicants are even remotely suitable. Mhari and Ramona have just finished swearing about their last exploding clown-car of an interview with TV Channel Changing Boy. (He can fast-forward through advertising intermissions by snapping his fingers and pointing at the TiVo, crack the DRM on Blu-ray discs by squinting at them, and he’s the Federation Against Copyright Theft’s worst nightmare; Home Office superhero candidate, not so much.) “Definitely no more interviews with open applications,” Mhari complains. “We had seven meetings with highly dysfunctional no-hopers and one plausible nightmare that was entirely too close for comfort.”

  Jim sits, hunched and uncharacteristically quiet. “Indeed,” he says thoughtfully. “That was a teachable moment.”

  “Was he applying to be a superhero or a supervillain?” Ramona asks plaintively.

  “It depends on whether he fills out his parliamentary expenses form right. Damn, we’re definitely going to have to keep tabs on him. I have a feeling there was something else inside the lizard-skin…” I stop, convinced I’m jumping at shadows, but Ramona picks up on it.

  “Yes, I think so, too,” she says. “The super-politician front with the level seven glamour is just a cover – the first secret identity. When you got him to drop it, the lizard-man wasn’t his real identity either – there was something even deeper going on. I wouldn’t rule out the possibility that it’s onion skins all the way down: just a vacuum wearing an empty suit.”

  Jim speaks up. “I think we may just have met our first genuine five-sigma superpower. The question of whether he’s a superhero or supervillain is, at that level, strictly irrelevant.”

  “Irrelevant, why?” Mhari crosses her arms.

  Jim leans back: he looks almost bored. “Crime isn’t always black and white. It’s easy enough to finger petty criminals, but the high-level ones get really complicated. Was the 2007 financial crisis a crime? Certainly there were criminal actions involved: it flushed out Mr. Madoff’s pyramid scheme, for example. Over ten billion pounds were stolen. But that was just the ripple on the surface, as trillions of dollars of derivatives evaporated when the market lost confidence in their existence. Were those losses criminal? Were the naked short-sellers who gambled against the market and undermined confidence in it criminals? Or was something else going on? Sometimes bad stuff – crimes, even – happen, but there’s nobody to blame. And sometimes you get people who commit criminal acts for what they consider to be good moral reasons.”

  “I don’t think —” Mhari begins, and I’m about to interrupt because I don’t want to get derailed into an argument over fraud between our super-cop and our former investment banker, but Jim rolls over her.

  “Criminology,” he announces, “is the study of criminal behavior and criminal psychology. But it has an Achilles heel” – good grief, a cop who uses classical references and expects his audience to follow him – “insofar as we can only study the criminals who, through happenstance or stupidity, manage to get themselves arrested. Designated or self-proclaimed supervillains are idiots. They’re damaged narcissistic personalities acting out their needy cravings in the public gaze. They’re creating the spectacle of the absurd, Warholian junkies searching for their fifteen minutes of fame. Supervillain teams are even worse: they get locked into group-think and end up with the same failure modes as the h
omicidal maniacs who fly packed airliners into skyscrapers. But those are just the ones we know about.”

  Suddenly Mhari focuses on him like a guided missile that’s just locked onto a target. “Like vampire elders,” she says thoughtfully.

  Jim looks puzzled. “Elders?”

  “Let me tell you the first law of vampire school.” She stands up and paces across the office to stand against the wall, daringly close to the window blinds. “The first law of vampire school is, if I can tell you’re a vampire, I must kill you. Because if I can tell, the sheeple – no offense, that’s how the elders think of you – might also notice, and institute national noonday naked roll calls or something.” She frowns at Jim. “Functional supervillains would be like vampire elders, staying out of the limelight, maybe even finding ways to dispose of the narcissists who risk drawing public wrath down upon the superpowered. Yes?”

  “Possibly.” He looks pensive. “But there are super-criminals – I’m sorry, that’s unclear. I don’t mean criminals with superpowers, I mean criminals who overachieve spectacularly and get away with it. They’re so successful that they pass laws to legitimize their past actions: we don’t call them criminals, we call them the Prime Minister of Italy or the President of the Russian Federation. ‘Treason doth never prosper, what’s the reason? For if it prosper, none dare call it Treason.’ Add superpowers to that kind of super-criminal and they could plausibly go where you’re pointing.” He looks up at Mhari. “But the Mandate isn’t a supervillain: he’s not damaged enough. He’s something worse.”

  I sigh and shove a stray wisp of hair out of the way. “I’m going to get Sam and Nick to open a file on him,” I tell them. “I also need to seek advice from Legal – maybe even the DPP. We need guidance on how to handle political cases. The blowback could be immense if we start monitoring a candidate and it turns out he isn’t guilty of anything. But this bears further investigation. Just in case we’ve got a two-meter-tall flesh-eating lizard running for Parliament.”