Sobs of terror and disbelief.
“This can’t be real, this can’t be real,” repeated one of the politicians, as if by chanting this mantra he could suddenly snap out of this nightmare and wake up safe in his bed.
“But it is,” Stone told him. “Smell the air, feel the concrete beneath your fingers. This world is as real as you or I. This is one potential future of many.”
The Prime Minister looked up at him, something akin to desperate hope glistening in his eyes.
“Potential future? You mean it doesn’t have to be like this?”
“No,” Stone smiled down at the man. “It doesn’t. Look back.”
The man did as he was asked. Even as he turned, the lurid sun overhead grew warmer, brighter, soothing his skin with its rays. The air, once polluted, tainted, grew fresh, clean; the breeze caressing him with the welcoming touch of a lover.
As he turned back to stare out once more at the horror, his eyes widened, his mouth gasped. In amazement, this time, rather than fear. He staggered backwards, falling into the soft grass now beneath his feet, feeling the dark and life-giving loam between his fingers. The other politicians each gasped out, too, in wonder as this fresh scene blazed before them.
“This,” Stone told them, voice quiet, restrained, proud, “is my vision of the future. This is what we shall work towards, if you let us.”
The gathered Brits could do nothing more than stand, than sit, than turn and gaze about in disbelief. Again, this was London. Or where London used to be, at any rate. Now, instead of a hellish realm of scorched concrete, crumbling brick, cracked roads that choked the land and penned the hordes in like cattle, there was instead but a single tower, a spire.
Golden in colour it was – though was it? Or did it merely reflect the joyous light of the sun that shined so healthily from the blue sky? – and it stretched off into the heavens, miles wide at the base and tapering to a point as it went, the subtle curve of its sides belying the immensity of its scale. How huge was this tower? It was no less than a vertical city that pierced the sky. Looking closely, the Prime Minister could make out gun emplacements, weapons arrays of strange and fantastic designs beyond anything outside of science fiction.
Yet it didn’t look forbidding; great open spaces could be seen within the flanks, allowing in fresh air and natural light. Man-made reservoirs surrounded the base of the city-mountain, the pure and crystal waters glistening in the sun. This wasn’t just a fortress, but a home. A place of beauty and safety, both.
All about the spire, the countryside; once criss-crossed with motorways and pockmarked with myriad towns that spewed forth their own pollution, choking the land with their own sprawling industrial estates, now instead it was vibrant, lush, green. The land immediately about the spire was given over to fertile fields, farmed to provide food for those in the city and fed by the glistening, snaking Thames that wound its way about the base of that great tower. Then the further one cast out, the wilder the countryside became, the fields giving over to vast and seemingly unending broadleaf forests.
Calls from the wild animals echoed through the air; the cry of soaring birds, long thought dying out. The sound of… was that the howling of wolves in the distance?
A fresh noise, a great throbbing, thrum, muted by huge distance. A shadow passed across the land from high overhead. They craned their necks and looked on in wonder. An airship, a behemoth zeppelin of sleek and futuristic design glided majestically overhead towards the city-spire. How immense was this airship? Vaster than ten Jumbo Jets, yet it spewed forth no pollution in its wake. Even its prodigious size, however, was dwarfed as it approached the tower; there it made its way to an outcrop, a landing pad, where it docked with that soaring city, disgorging commuters by the hundred.
Looking back the way the airship had come, the Prime Minister squinted into the sun, spying other such huge towers; few, they were, and far apart, but visible, piercing the heavens in the distance. But these weren’t the only signs of habitation, by the looks of it.
From the depths of the great, green forests themselves, small trails of smoke would rise up here and there, speaking of isolated villages of people living in the wilds. People shunning town-life to live in the forests, to tend to the trees, to the animals. Living in balance with nature.
A great and heavy hand rested upon the British leader’s shoulder. The Prime Minister didn’t even turn; the immensity of the hand told him who it was.
“It’s beautiful,” he breathed.
Stone smiled.
“That it is. A land where man, nature and technology exist in harmony; that is my dream. Isolated, to begin with, from the rest of the world. Focused only on our own affairs. But once our own house is in order; our people fed, employed, content. Free from fear; guarded by technology advanced beyond your wildest dreams. Then and only then, can we turn our attentions to the rest of the world. To help them, too, to make ready for the invasion to come.”
“I’d much prefer this future to that other one,” the Prime Minister admitted.
The titan nodded, gazing down with empathy.
“But the immensity of the change scares you. Intimidates you.”
“It does. I worked hard to get into office. As did all my fellows. We had only our country’s best wishes at heart.” The leader gazed about with sad eyes at the beauty of the land about him; at the scale of those towers, at the vitality of the countryside. “But there’s no way that this could come to pass; not with us at the helm. It’s beyond us.”
Stone smiled again.
“We will need administrators for this great undertaking. My people are few in number and we will need willing and able men and women; people with the gift to lead, to organise. We are not here to simply bat you aside; this future belongs to us all. It must be built by us all.”
The Prime Minister stared up at the giant. Behind him, the men and women of Parliament gathered. Upon their faces, hope. In their minds, one accord. An accord voiced by their leader.
“Tell us what to do.”
***
“Are you sure about this?”
Gwenna’s voice was light, but still carried with it some undercurrent of concern. For the last months, secrecy had been their byword. Now they were to unveil their existence and purpose before the whole of Britain. The world would not be the same from this day forth.
The titan nodded.
“These men and women of Parliament now know all they need to know to enact this change. We’ve not shown our full hand yet; the public won’t know of the dragon. Won’t know of your shamans and their powers. Won’t know that we come from another world. Won’t know of me. They will only know what the Prime Minister tells them; that British Intelligence has wind of a threat and that, for the safety of the country, things will have to change.”
He smiled, happy with this turn of events. This meant that they wouldn’t have to show their full power too soon and he was glad of that; he’d been worried that too much too soon would simply throw the country into disarray. He wanted to bring order, not chaos. Progress, not turmoil. Despite what the Avatars, what Wrynn had told him, that he wasn’t to be afraid to use his powers, he still held back. He had shown the politicians some of the truth.
That was enough for now.
This way he could run things from the background, allow the mortals; his own people, Gwenna, Arbistrath, Alann, as well as the soon-to-be-disbanded Parliament, to run things while he orchestrated out of sight. The people of Britain wouldn’t have to see anything too miraculous, too out of the ordinary. Not straight away.
“Have you seen them?” It was Arbistrath’s voice, from the window, Alann beside him as they gazed out to the gardens outside the House of Commons. “It’s like the whole of the country’s press are here.”
Stone didn’t even need to stride to the window; his green eyes pierced the stone, the concrete, revealing to him the scene below. Television cameras, journalists. The Prime Minister, his Cabinet, all down there, making ready
to reveal their decisions to a shocked and unready world.
Britain was on the cusp of change.
***
The Prime Minister fiddled with his notecards from atop the podium. The din of traffic could be heard, as buses and cars streamed through Westminster, oblivious to what was about to unfold. The hubbub of the assembled press and television crews chatting before him, making ready to record his announcement.
Little did they know what he was about to unleash upon them.
His hands were shaking. His knees were weak. But he swallowed and maintained his composure. What was her majesty going to make of this? Did she have the power to overrule him? To overrule Parliament? He was winging it, he knew. This whole thing was unprecedented. Such a handing over of power should have been preceded by months of talks, of planning, of debate.
But Stone had shown him the fallacy of such action. Or inaction, as the case may be. The slow, cumbersome nature of politics. They could ill-afford such glacial progress. Not now. Not with all that they had been shown. Not with the future that was racing towards them.
He looked up. The spring sun was shining weakly through the London clouds. The breeze caressed his skin and he closed his eyes.
“Prime Minister,” came a voice from his side. “You’re live in five… four… three…”
***
“I repeat, Echo Alpha, two-three-seventeen, this is Flight Lieutenant Foster of the Royal Air Force. Please respond. Over.”
Nothing. No sound, not even the hiss of static from the radio.
Daniel shuddered, feeling the airframe of his Eurofighter Typhoon vibrate in sympathy with him. They’d trained for this; countless times. In the event of a suspected hijacking over the city of London, he and his wingmen were to shoot down any airliner that might threaten the population below, blasting it to smithereens with air-to-air missiles, in the hope that small fragments might do less damage than the impact of a whole five-hundred ton aircraft smashing into the ground.
Up ahead, the Airbus A380 lumbered through the sky; a vast rhino of a plane, shadowed by the three hawk-like Typhoons that trailed behind it. Mayhem at Heathrow, he’d been told; the control tower in chaos after a suspected terrorist attack. In the confusion that had followed, before backup systems and reserve crews had taken over, this jet had slipped the net. And now, with its payload of five hundred innocent men, women and children, it was heading into the city, its pilots unresponsive to hails over the radio.
The Typhoons, under Foster’s command, had been out on manoeuvres over the North Sea when the call had come in. Afterburners on, they’d streaked into London at nearly twice the speed of sound, ready to intercept as they’d been trained to do. But now they were here, with the hijacked aircraft there before them, did Daniel Foster have what it takes to make the call?
“Sir?”
A voice over the radio, Pilot Officer Nigel Hawkins asking what they should do.
With a cold sweat and a silent prayer for forgiveness, Foster thumbed the switch of his AMRAAM missiles from safe to armed.
***
What was that smell? Had the pilot soiled himself in death? Michael wrinkled his nose in distaste and cast a disapproving glance back at the two corpses on the cockpit floor behind him. Never mind; he would be out of here soon.
Out and away, having left his mark on the world.
“Respond, please respond. This is your last chance, over.”
The RAF on the radio again. Trying to deter him. He reached over, flicked a switch to silence the voice. And pushed down on the throttle, urging the engines to power the massive craft faster and faster. His target grew larger in the window.
Westminster, the instantly recognisable buildings looming above the banks of the river Thames.
A warning alarm sounded, shrill and piercing in the cockpit. The fighter jets had locked on with their missiles. Too late, he thought with a snarl. Far too late. He pushed down on the controls, feeling the weightlessness rise in his stomach as the huge, lumbering liner began to dive down, down towards the seat of British government.
The engines shrieked in protest. The wind battered the cockpit windows.
The ground zoomed up to meet him.
There was no stopping the beast now. It would hit, regardless of the missiles that no doubt streaked towards him, even now. The carnage wrought would be terrible. But greater still would be the aftermath, the effects that would reverberate through the world.
There would be no unity. This day would mark the enemy’s defeat.
And Michael’s, the Brotherhood’s, victory.
“Take me, Lord Memphias!” Michael shouted above the din of the stricken liner. “Take me as you promised! Let me live that I might have my revenge.”
He closed his eyes, awaiting the heat of dark flames and the smell of sulphur. Memphias had promised to snatch him away, to keep him alive, that he might one day take his revenge on those that had wronged him.
He opened his eyes. Westminster grew larger. The shrieking of tortured air louder. The alarm that signalled approaching missiles still calling out shrill and clear. Where was his salvation? Where was his rescue?
Eyes wide with mounting horror as the ground raced towards him, Michael realised the truth.
He had been betrayed.
***
Stone took a step forwards towards the window, staring into the heavens. Could no-one see that? Did no-one notice? Were they too enraptured by the Prime Minister’s words? The impossibility of what he was saying?
An airliner, an Airbus A380 in fact; tons upon countless tons of flying metal and fuel, screaming towards them at hundreds of miles per hour. Green eyes flashed, flaying metal, reaching over distance, counting in an instant. Over five hundred people aboard. At the helm, the very terrorist that had escaped their custody once already, the two rightful pilots behind him, dead.
It would hit them in moments. Destroy everything. Or would it?
Behind the stricken liner, dark shadows flitted through the heavens; Eurofighter Typhoons. From their stubby wings, flashes of orange as missiles leapt, spearing across the sky to destroy the falling jet.
No! That would kill them all, all those innocents that were carried, terrified and helpless, aboard the plummeting beast. People had started noticing now; the crowd below turning, gazing up at the scene that unfolded above. Screams as they noticed the doomed liner, the streaking missiles.
Stone, the man, felt the weight of responsibility as a cloak of lead, resting heavy about his shoulders. It numbed his mind, stifling, paralysing. Then as swiftly as he felt it appear, it dissipated, blown away by a fresh surge of purpose. For he was not just Stone the man, a voice reminded him.
He was the cleansing flame. He was the life-giving water. His was the strength of Earth and the urgency of the wind. His was not to be scared.
His was just to be.
The missiles flew, moments from impacting the airliner.
No.
Stone issued a mental summons and a roar split the heavens that far exceeded the sound of the combined jets.
***
Flight Lieutenant Foster stared in shock as the missiles he had just loosed erupted into blossoms of fire and smoke, still hundreds of yards from the diving airliner. What the hell had they hit? From the explosions, a great ripple of distorted air cascaded out, revealing the outline of something invisible hovering in the air. Something invisible. Something terrible.
And vast beyond comprehension.
Twin flashes of blue illuminated the sky before him, looking for all the world like huge, reptilian eyes. And the Typhoons were racing towards them.
“Pull up!” Foster screamed down the radio to his wingmen, as he pulled back hard on the controls of his wailing jet. “For the love of Christ, pull up!”
***
The Prime Minister paused in his address, gazing up at the scene above. The missiles, launched from the fighters, had hit something invisible and unyielding in the air, the Typhoons themselves breakin
g away in a whine of tortured engines.
The airliner itself, still diving, jets screaming, towards them.
All of this; his whole address, the earth-shattering news he had delivered to the media, all for nought. They were going to die. But then what was this? A shape beside him? It was Stone himself. What was he doing, for didn’t he say that he wouldn’t reveal himself, not yet? His eyes were closed, but hands by his sides open, as if waiting for something.
Streaks of light came racing from that nigh-invisible shape that hung in the sky; shards of crystal, like twin comets, the air whistling as they flitted past the diving airliner, rushing over the crowd to be caught perfectly in Stone’s waiting grip.
His grey clothes erupted into radiant light and time seemed to slow to a crawl.
He opened his eyes. They glowed green, with an intensity that spoke of aeons of time and boundless power.
Our future, he boomed, in a voice that could crumble mountains to dust, will not be denied.
***
Michael screamed his fury. His vengeance. His hatred of all this world. Of everything that had shaped him, that had caused him to lose faith in man and want nothing more than its destruction. Everything in this world was shit. Everything was a let-down. Nothing and no-one deserved to live.
Even those forces of darkness he had dedicated his life to serving had failed him, betrayed him at the last instant. At least the moment of his death would take many others with him. He would leave his mark on the world, nonetheless.
Bloodless Revolution (The Graeme Stone Saga Book 5) Page 16