“Who’s Vassa Hyatt?”
Bliss smiled. “Let’s try something else. What is the precise nature of Damon Rhys’s involvement in this affair?”
“How should I know?”
Bliss touched his fob, “water for Mister Hooker, please.”
They sat in silence until Chisholm arrived. The detective placed a bottle of chilled water on the desk. Hooker nodded, cracked the cap and gulped. It tasted good. Clean. Chisholm nodded and left.
Bliss produced a notebook and a fountain pen. “Vassa Hyatt is ex-MI6, although knowing them she still might be. The story is she left the service under something of a cloud, you know. Nonetheless, she’s still playing the game. They look after their own, the spooks. I’ll give them that.”
Hooker wiped his mouth with his sleeve. “And you don’t? Look after your own, I mean?”
“No. This place is like a bloody shark tank,” Bliss smiled. “The scent of failure is like blood, draws in the predators. I find it a healthy way to do business, it keeps the gene pool refreshed.”
“What about you, Bliss?”
“Oh, I’m fine. They call me Daddy-Shark. Behind my back, of course. It’s better to be feared than loved, after all.”
“Machiavelli?” said Hooker.
“Very good.”
“There were plenty of books in the prison library,” Hooker shrugged. He could be across the desk, strangling Bliss, in two seconds. Then he thought of Leah. The girl could look after herself, but she didn’t know the Green Zone.
Bliss steepled his fingers, “you need to understand what’s at stake. We want the same thing, don’t we?”
“And what’s that?”
Bliss snapped his fingers and the music stopped. “The People want security and reconstruction. And, most importantly, no Archangels. Aren’t those bastards the reason we’re living in this half-baked police state in the first place?”
“I don’t much like ‘em either, but you can’t un-invent RXP,” Hooker replied. “Archangels are like guns or nukes. They’ll keep coming back, because they’re weapons. Everyone wants weapons.”
Bliss nodded. “I agree. You’re a sensible man. Pragmatic. But doesn’t it make your skin crawl? Knowing those… deviants might have the whip hand again?”
Hooker shrugged. “You think this is about transhumans?”
“Everything’s about Archangels, they’re an existential threat. More so than the Crimson Brigade or Black Bloc. The Reds’ masturbatory fantasies of class warfare are nothing compared to what transhumans are capable of.”
Hooker remembered the briefing with Hyatt. “They say there’s only a handful of archangels left. They’re helping the Wessex Parliament with the Reconstruction.”
Bliss made a so-so gesture with his hand. “That’s the official line. But their real desire? The Archangels want to breed, Hooker. Breed. They’ve got the technology to the point where RXP will be passed on genetically.”
“It’s an arms race. What about the Chinese and Russians? Or the ‘mericans? They all have RXP.”
“Of course, the Americans do. Russia has a much earlier iteration of the procedure – the side-effects are killing their transhumans slowly but surely. The Chinese? Their facility in Tianjin was sabotaged during the war. Beijing are reviving the program, but they’re a decade behind the Americans. By then it’ll be too late.”
Hooker glanced at his watch. “What’s it got to do with me and Leah?”
Bliss tapped the omni on his desk. “Now, this was a good piece of detective work.” An image of Natly Hare’s manifest flickered onscreen, the list of smuggled tea and cigarettes. “You’ve linked a terrorist suspect directly to the Commune International. Furthermore, I know Rhys is being blackmailed by the Crimson Brigade.”
“Why’s the Commune so important? It ain’t surprising, a smuggler mixing with anarchists and squatters.”
“We know a Crimson Brigade intelligence officer called Sorcha is active in London,” Bliss replied. “An Irishwoman, associated with a man described as chain-smoking Marlboro Red cigarettes. Our analysts have been hard at work. They found a report from the CIA in southern Italy – the Americans seized a Marlboro cigarette butt from the scene of an execution in Naples last year. They’ve a DNA match to a known Crimson Brigade assassin.”
“Naples? Sounds like a long-shot,” Hooker replied coolly. Yet his pulse raced. Sorcha is Roisin…
“Come on, Hooker. Marlboro? Vintage cigarettes, very rare and very expensive. It’s too much of a coincidence.”
Hooker folded his arms. “Perhaps.”
“The DNA belongs to a terrorist using the name Paolo Falcone, Commanding Officer of the Action Group Andreas Baader. He’s in London I’ll wager, on a mission of critical importance. A kidnapping, perhaps?”
Hooker sighed. “I ain’t got nothing to say.”
Bliss cocked his head. “My patience is wearing thin. You told the munis you were looking for a missing girl. Charlotte isn’t at the Rhys compound in Holland Park. We provide her father’s protection team, after all.”
“You should sack ‘em.”
Bliss smiled. “Oh, I shall. But on the other hand, few forces of nature are less containable than a headstrong teenage girl.”
Hooker shrugged. “Well, it sounds like you’ve got the case solved, Chief Superintendent. You’re wasting your time with us.”
Bliss spooned honey into his tea. “If only, Mister Hooker. Here’s the thing – we think Damon Rhys is being blackmailed to reveal classified information. That information might fatally compromise the Reconstruction. Do you want another Hate War? Maybe the Kentish insurgency will spread...”
Hooker remembered the redacted ransom demand he’d read in Gordy’s office. “What information? What’s so important?”
“The details are ultra-classified. Even I don’t know. The distro list is limited to half-a-dozen people in Whitehall and Wessex.”
“What’s in this for me?”
Bliss smiled like a quiz show host. A man who knows all the answers. “You wish to visit Wessex, but are unable. The Sanctioned Persons Index is a blunt instrument, I know. You have matters that need putting in order. Your daughter for example. Although I’m aware Beatriz….”
Beatriz. Her hand tracing Hooker’s through an armorglass screen on the Isle of Man. So out of place, standing in the visiting room. Beatriz had her mother’s cheekbones, sharp and high. Her hair was like Hooker’s when he was a kid, an explosion of shiny ringlets…
Bliss’s teacup clinked on its saucer. “Hooker?”
“Choose your next words carefully,” Hooker replied, unclenching his fists. Breathing deeply, willing the rage away. Gordy always said Hooker had a long fuse, but you didn’t want to be around when it was lit.
Bliss sat forward. Hooker thought he was enjoying himself. “Rhys is planning a press conference, probably at the kidnapper’s behest. Sadly, and for the greater good, Charlotte Rhys must die, and be seen to have died, before her father starts yapping.”
“What the fuck did you just say?”
“If the girl dies, Rhys has no reason to acquiesce to the kidnapper’s demands. He won’t talk. It’s that simple.”
“If you know where she is, why not send an Apex team? Rescue Lottie and tell Rhys to keep his mouth shut?”
Bliss shook his head. “We don’t know exactly where she is. Only that she’s in the Goons, and quite possibly inside the Commune. And that’s thirty floors of armed, feral scum.”
“If you don’t send help, she’ll die anyway,” Hooker replied. “It’s a war-zone on the Crosland Estate.”
“In which case, may I ask your professional opinion? Few men know the Goons as well as you.”
“Ask your question, Bliss.”
“Let’s assume Lottie Rhys is held by Falcone’s cell, somewhere inside that damn commune. No more than three or four operatives, if they’re Crimson Brigade and working to their usual model. Lottie is surrounded by anarchists, street leaguers and trigger-hap
py tacticals. Tell me, what do you think the odds are of her being killed by the terrorists and not a third party?”
Hooker shrugged. “My crystal ball ain’t working.”
“Precisely my point,” Bliss replied. He took another sip of his tea. “If events run their natural course, the girl might die at the hands of her captors. Conversely, she might be captured by rioters, or even escape. We simply don’t know.”
“So?”
“We all have our orders, Mister Hooker. Mine are to shape events. Whatever happens, the world must know the Crimson Brigade executed Lottie Rhys.”
“You’re asking me to risk my life and let the girl die?” Hooker replied.
“Why not? We live in hard times. Lottie is Damon Rhys’s daughter, the man who set up the tribunals that sent you to prison.”
“You got kids, Bliss?”
The policeman said nothing.
“I reckoned you didn’t. Lottie Rhys didn’t choose her father.”
Bliss poured the last dribble of tea into his cup. “Irrelevant. It’s an incontrovertible fact Damon Rhys is soft on extremism. He thinks he’ll make peace with the Black Bloc, but if his daughter is murdered, he won’t even sit in the same room. We want Rhys on our side. I am going to deliver him.”
“I’m still wonderin’ what this has got to do with me?”
“Vassa Hyatt chose you to find the girl for a reason. I’m simply asking the same, except I need you to ensure she dies. Look on the bright side, assassinations are easier than rescues.”
“You’re a sick fucker.”
Bliss shook his head. “Mister Hooker, I’ve given you the courtesy of candour few people receive. Will you accept my offer?”
“I want a lawyer.”
“A lawyer? Given your background, I’d have thought you’d be intimately familiar with Section Twelve of the Emergencies Act.”
“You think you can do whatever you want,” Hooker replied.
“I know this must be galling, but I can.”
“I’m leaving,” said Hooker.
“Not before you see this,” said Bliss, tapping the omni on his desk. It showed a dimly lit room, Leah trussed to a surgeon’s chair. She was naked, body white as chalk. Standing over her were two masked figures, dressed in surgical scrubs and rubber aprons. Their faces were hidden behind anti-spatter visors. “You’re an old hand at coercive persuasion, aren’t you?” Bliss continued. “An unfortunate tactic, I know, but sadly necessary in extraordinary circumstances such as these.”
Hooker tensed in his seat, fists balled.
“Please, Mister Hooker. There’s an Apex team outside. They’d love nothing more than to toss you out of a window. It would look like an escape attempt gone tragically wrong. It happens here occasionally.”
“I don’t care.”
“No need for bravado, Rufus.”
Through the office window, Hooker saw fires to the east. Out in the flood zone, London burned. Bliss tapped his desk impatiently. “The record will show Miss Martinez was arrested for grave offences against the Reconstruction Administration…”
“What are you going to do to her?”
“I’m not a… technician,” Bliss replied, wrinkling his nose.
“I’m going to kill you,” said Hooker matter-of-factly.
“No, you aren’t,” Bliss replied easily. “You’re going to accept my offer, and Miss Martinez will be released unharmed. Then you will be at liberty to make your… pilgrimage to Wessex.”
“You don’t know me, do you?” said Hooker.
The secret policeman smiled. “Your answer, Mister Hooker?”
“Fuck you.”
Clearing his throat, Bliss spoke into his fob. “This is Bliss. Begin Miss Martinez’s treatment.”
Sixteen
Paolo watched Abid and Sorcha cross the darkened plaza, finally merging with sludge-coloured shadows. Beyond the palisade, street leaguers waved gaudy banners and flaming brands, fences bulging under the weight of their bodies.
“There must be five thousand of the bastards,” said General Ignacio of the Black Rifles. He squinted through NVGs, bug-eyed beneath the brim of his helmet. “If only we had heavier weapons.”
“Your escape plan is ready?”
“Of course,” the General replied. “Everything is in place. Free Cordoba awaits.”
“I will be back soon, General,” said Paolo. Returning to the apartment, he re-checked his equipment – tripod-mounted camera, omni and the comms node for uploading images of the girl’s execution. They were satisfactory. Next was the sword, razor-sharp. Candlelight reflected in liquid ripples on the plastic covering the walls and floor.
Lottie Rhys sat in her room, hands cuffed in her lap. Her hair was matted with blood, a smear of dirt down her cheek. She glowered at Paolo. “You’re going to kill me now?”
“No, Lottie.”
“You know I’m pregnant,” she whispered. Her fingers lay on her stomach, trembling.
“You want to abort it, don’t you?” Paolo pulled the encrypted fob from his pocket and took Lottie’s picture. Adding a time-stamp and a one-line message, he Darkwired it to Vassa Hyatt:
Proof of Life as agreed. Now deliver.
“Why did you do that?” asked Lottie.
“To show Vassa Hyatt you’re still alive and well,” Paolo replied. “You see? We’re negotiating your release. As long as your father sees sense, you’ll live.”
“I don’t believe you.”
Wise girl. “You will see, Lottie. Tell me, who made you pregnant?”
“I don’t know for sure,” she replied. “It’s why I want an abortion.”
“You’re polyamorous?” said Paolo sharply. He held old-fashioned opinions on monogamy.
Lottie pulled a face. “No, of course not. I think I was drugged. I was at a party…”
The degenerate lifestyles of the elite were of little interest to Paolo Falcone. He’d seen, and experienced, every manner of perversion. He was grateful for the ennui that had rescued him from it. “That’s unfortunate, Lottie. I’ll bring you something to eat and drink soon. Until then, rest.”
The omni bleeped, a newsreader reading from a pad. We interrupt our regular feed to bring you live images from Lagoon City. The Government has declared a National Security Event, as ten-thousand armed Street Leaguers overwhelm the increasingly stretched police lines…
Paolo stood on his tiny balcony, watching leaguers swarm around the Commune. There was no sign of the security forces, either NatSec or Munis. They’d left the job to the feral militias, roaring as one as they tore down the fences protecting the outer perimeter.
We’re going live to the scene, where the Leagues are making an announcement.
The newscast showed a tall man on a podium, besieged by journalists. He was boyishly handsome, with neatly-combed hair, his three-piece suit bedecked with medals and league regalia. He was flanked by bodyguards wearing balaclavas, carbines held stiffly across their chests. Paolo recognised him as Zachary Fry, Lord Marshal of the Loyal Croydonia Brethren. “Zachary, do you condemn your leaguesmen for attacking police lines?” said a journalist.
“No,” said Zachary Fry. “We trusted the Reconstruction Government to control these Reds. They wanna drag London into their insurgency, turn us into the next Medway. Now, I’m tellin’ you, Croydonia ain’t avin’ it. We’ll fight fire with FIRE.”
“Do you expect to be arrested, Zachary?” shouted another reporter. “Aren’t you concerned about being sent to prison again?”
“Oh, I expect prison,” Fry smirked, “but I don’t fear it. My message to the Government is simple – you counted on our support, and we gave it freely. Now you’ve attacked us for defending our land and women and kids from CHAOS. We were only there ‘cuz you FAILED. We’ll finish the job on the Crosland, I PROMISE you that.”
“Lord Marshal Fry are you actually threatening the Government?” asked another Journalist.
“No, ‘course not. We ain’t called LOYAL Brethren for nu
ffin’. As you know, I served as a corporal in North Africa. I risked my LIFE for this country. I was shot twice. Loyalty is what pumps the BLOOD ‘round my heart.
“BUT the Government must understand we’re PARTNERS, not slaves. If they move against us, I will call for a Council of the Leagues. I’ll form an army so strong, they’ll LOSE London. Let’s see if the military agrees to move against us, shall we? We’ve got many brothers and sisters serving in uniform…”
“And your message tonight is, Mister Fry?”
“Lord Marshal Fry,” a bodyguard warned.
Zachary Fry’s eyes glittered, a sheaf of black hair falling across his brow. “The Crosland will BURN. Anarchist scum will BURN. And the SAVAGES down in Kent? The Reds can come up ‘ere if they think they’re ‘ARD enough. We’ll fuckin’ well BURN THEM TOO.”
Outside, Paolo heard a roar.
It had begun.
Opening the door to Lottie’s room, he tossed her a shrink-wrapped sandwich and a bottle of water. Locking up, he took a lift to the shelter in the Commune’s sub-basement. The walls were lined with sandbags, electric lights swaying from the ceiling. The air stank of cigarette smoke, a coffee urn stewing on a trestle table. The General nodded curtly. “Welcome, Comrade Paolo.”
“The Leagues attack.”
“We’re ready.”
“The cameras are back online General, covering the western perimeter,” said a stern-faced woman in black fatigues. The omni showed the horde surging across a broken fence, smoke grenades and petrol bombs heralding their advance.
“Blow the bastards up!” Ignacio ordered.
The girl in black nodded. “Detonate the first device,” she ordered into her mic.
A sphere of light bleached the omniscreen white. When the camera refocussed, it revealed a flaming crater. Gunfire from the balconies raked the surviving attackers, young leaguers wriggling like landed fish. Others retreated, dragging their injured with them. The Spaniards punched the air in delight. The omni switched to the southern perimeter. A clutch of blazing municipal police vehicles lay abandoned by the gate, leaguers dismantling barricades with picks and hammers. Young men danced crazily, firing maroons into the inky sky.
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