“Fuck! Shit! Bollocks!” The sinking sensation dropped deeper.
“I’m real sorry. Hey, at least the car’s okay. It was right in front of me…bus and…” Steven decided not to mention the government car for now. “…it’s a terrible mess. If you can send someone else they’ll have to go round a different way. Nothing’s moving…”
“How many dead?” Jerry snapped.
“At least four…maybe more.”
“Pictures?”
“Yeah…couple of general ones, couple of close-ups.”
“Great. The Western Mail won’t give a monkey’s over a fatal RTA so it’s pointless e-mailing the pix through. It’ll make an early lead for our first edition tomorrow. Find out what you can from the scene. Names, addresses, usual bullshit. See you later.” The line went dead.
“Yes Jerry. Fuck you too Jerry.”
The rain began to fall heavily and, through the steamed up windscreen, he could see the flashing lights of another ambulance pulling alongside. It was cold and he was tempted to turn on the heater but he knew it would be touch and go on making it back if he did. There was no telling how long he could be stuck here. He tapped through the mobile’s directory until he found the emergency services section, then clicked autodial.
“South Wales Police press office.”
“Oh, hi! Steve Elan from the Echo. I’m after some details on the RTA on Western Avenue westbound. Bus and a car.” It would be an hour or two before the press office could tell him any more than he already knew but he had to go through the motions. How much they would eventually reveal about the black Jaguar and its occupants was the key to whether or not he had a run-of-the-mill fatal RTA picture lead or something much bigger.
*
Thomson House, home to the South Wales Echo, The Western Mail and a host of other publications, stood proudly opposite the Millennium Stadium, near the banks of the River Taff. Steven glanced up at its polished glass fascia as he drove the Micro-Metro around the corner to the side lodge where he would begin the ritual of parking that involved signing for the pool car park barrier swipe card, provided security could find it, then a Herculean effort to squeeze the tiny two-door into a gap big enough for a motorbike. Then, and only then, could he sign the card back in and return to his desk on the second floor.
Thirty minutes later he was pacing along the corridor toward the massive open plan editorial floor, glad of the warmth of the radiators after two hours sat in the car. Pausing to buy a strong black coffee from the vending machine, he passed the row of subs’ desks where a few equally weary faces stared at screens filled with the early shapes of tomorrow’s feature pages. He could feel the hot liquid burning his numb fingers through the plastic cup and hurried past toward his own workstation. Passing the picture desk he was glad to see that the picture editor had gone home for the night. The lights were off in the editor’s office, there was no sign of Jerry at the newsdesk and the only other inhabitant of the Echo section was a junior reporter whose overnight task was to monitor the broadcast bulletins, Press Association copy and make hourly calls to the police, ambulance and fire brigade control rooms.
Steven carefully placed the cup on his ‘Don’t let the bastards grind you down’ mouse-mat and shrugged off his damp coat, extracting the camera and his notebook before hanging it on a peg above the nearest radiator.
“Hi,” he offered as the junior, a ginger-haired girl called Menna, smiled up at him.
“You’re late back.” She stopped typing.
“Yeah…got stuck behind a bus crash for two hours.” He sat down and switched his PC over from hibernate.
“I’m just typing in the details into the news queue now. I’ll send you a copy.”
“Cheers. Anything else on the go?”
“Nah…’s been pretty quiet so far. Early days though.”
“Sure,” Steven checked for recent e-mails before logging into his news basket. “Tends to liven up around 11. First week on nights?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Jerry gone?”
“If only. Nah, he’s just popped outside for a fag and a bag of chips. Said he’d stick around ‘til you got back.”
“Can’t bare to leave the place, that’s his trouble. He’ll probably die in here, and be quite happy about it too. Old school, Jerry is.”
“Doubt they’ll allow him to be buried here as well.” Menna sniggered, typing again.
“True…he’s probably got his eye on a spot just over between the newsdesk and the fax machine.” Steve dug around in his drawer for the cable to connect the digital camera to his PC.
“He might get away with an urn of his ashes on the bookshelf above the copier.” He checked the battery level. There was enough power left to download before it needed recharging.
“How long you been on the Echo?”
“Too long.” Steven opened a new set of image files on his PC and began the process of downloading the gory images he had captured on the roadside. “Came off Celtic…Merthyr Express…two years ago…thereabouts. Time to move on again…soon.”
“Where to?” Steven glanced away as the gruesome thumbnails slotted into place on his desktop. Menna, he noticed for the first time, had striking features…young clear eyes, a strong straight nose and a determined mouth. Her cheeks and forehead were dappled with a sprinkling of freckles. He made a mental note to ask her out for a sociable drink, get to know her a little better…but not tonight. He did not fancy hanging around until 2am.
“INB probably…or maybe further afield. Who knows? Broadcasting anyway, bigger bucks.” He grinned. “How about you?”
“I’m still on probation.” She blushed. “Another week and I’ll have done three months. I was on the Newcastle course. Paid my own way. Offered a job here. I never really fancied broadcast much, talking heads, no substance. Always preferred print. Old fashioned kinda gal, I guess.”
“You’ll end up like Jerry…if you get the chance. Print’s dying you know…except in the weeklies. Talking heads or not, digital media is most people’s first choice for regional and national news. And one day every street corner will have its own news webpage and every suburb will have some barely trained geek armed with a webcam. The presses will fall silent and dinosaurs like Jerry will no longer roar around the corridors of newsrooms like this,” Steven clicked onto the first image, the twisted wreckage of the Jaguar. “Thank fuck!”
“Jesus, you’re depressing me now!”
Steven sniggered. The picture was disappointing in its lack of detail. It was impossible to tell what type of vehicle it had once been – one of the drawbacks of digital ‘idiot boxes’ as they were dubbed, the resolution of professional snappers’ digital cameras much greater. Steven noted that the registration plate was out of focus and unreadable.
“What did the police say about the car involved?” He opened the second JPEG file. It was not much better. His heart began to sink. At least he had noted the registration number in his notebook – EBM 162G. And the pictures of the bodies, taken at close range, should be much clearer.
“What car? Oh…sorry. Hang on.”
There were three images of general wreckage, a policeman directing traffic and one of a paramedic helping an elderly woman from the buckled doorway of the bus. With a little PhotoShop know-how and ruthless cropping they would make publication.
“Here we go. 16.55. Friday. Serious RTA on the westbound carriageway of Western Avenue blah blah blah, Stagecoach bus with 26 passengers and an old type Jaguar petrol-engine saloon. Four dead…driver of the bus…driver of the car…two car passengers. Eight seriously injured, all bus passengers. All conveyed to the University Hospital of Wales. One minor injury treated at the scene, conveyed to Heath Hospital as a precaution.”
“That’s it? That’s all they said?” Steven wondered if the lack of reference to the government vehicle was because the information had not been released or because Menna had not bothered asking for any more detail. She was, after all, a junior.
“Pretty much. They said they’d be releasing the names of the deceased fairly quickly and we could find them on the press office website…round about…” Menna glanced up at the office clock. “…ten minutes from now.”
“That can’t be right. It usually takes them hours to contact next of kin and identify the bodies. I doubt if we’ll get the names tonight.”
“ID cards, retina scans, print scans. The coppers will have known who they were within minutes of arriving on the scene. And the bus company…” Menna was scowling.
“Yes, I know they will know who the victims were…but you know what the cops are like for double-checking, going through the proper channels, before giving us the names. We’ve had cases before where…” Steven suddenly realised why she was scowling. “Hey, look, I’m not doubting you were told…it’s just…it’s just very unusual, that’s all.” He turned back to the screen as the first grisly close-up filled the frame.
“Fucking hell!” Menna looked away.
“Yeah, sorry.” He quickly closed the file and thought better of opening the remaining two. “Bit of a mess. Had your tea yet?” he quipped.
“What the hell were you doing taking close-ups like that? We never use stuff like that!”
Steven knew she would never accept the invitation for a drink unless he could come up with a satisfactory excuse for his morbid photography but he was loathed to trust her with his real reason for taking the pictures. Menna had another six hours in which to dig around and there was a chance, however slim, her byline could be on tomorrow’s first edition front page exclusive splash about a Eurostate defence minister or high ranking officer’s sudden and tragic death.
“They’d use it on WWWdotCardiffCam!” There goes a good night out, he thought as she turned her shoulder toward him. “I guess I got carried away.” Shame, she was quite cute.
“You’re sick!” Menna continued typing the remainder of her hourly round-up and he momentarily pondered how much CardiffCam would pay for his gory pictures.
Ten long and silent minutes later Steven was scrolling through the list of names on the police press office website when Jerry returned amid a teasing waft of freshly smoked tobacco and vinegar soaked chips.
“What you got for me then?” he demanded, his tone marginally less sharp for the benefit of a recent nicotine infusion. He stood over Steven’s shoulder and began unwrapping his chips, reminding Steven how long it had been since lunch.
“Not sure yet.” Steven clicked on the print icon and glanced across at Menna, who was ignoring them both. “Got a minute?”
“Sure,” Jerry mumbled through a mouthful of succulently fried potato.
“In private.” Steven’s voice was almost a whisper. Jerry gave him a quizzical look before pacing across to the conference room. Steven joined him, printout in hand, a minute later.
“What’s the big secret? You quitting? Found another job?” Jerry’s favourite paranoia, largely because he was usually blamed by those who did quit for making their lives a miserable overworked hell, and that didn’t go down well with the Investors in People obsessed editor.
“How’d you guess?” Steven waited long enough for the flash of indignation to pass and the worry to furrow Jerry’s brow. “No, nothing like that. It’s this RTA. The police have released the names of the four dead in record time. Trouble is the details they’ve released don’t match what I know from the scene.”
“Police cock-up. No problem. Menna can get onto it and they’ll have it sorted by tomorrow’s first edition.” Jerry eyed his chips longingly. “Just type up what you’ve got, caption your pix and get away. You’re off tomorrow, aren’t you?”
“Yes…no!” Steven flapped the printout in frustration. “I mean yes, I’m off, but no, I don’t think it’s a police cock-up. It’s starting to look more…sinister than that.” Jerry cocked an eyebrow, his wooden fork hovering agonisingly close to a large vinegar-doused chip. “It was a government car…a black Jag, one of the old petrol limo types. It had EBM plates…military.”
“And they’ve released the names of the people inside? Remarkable!”
“That’s just it. According to this…” he waved the printout under Jerry’s nose. “…the three inside were vagrants…waste-dwellers.”
“Stolen car, obviously. It’s not unknown, though it must have taken some nerve for waste-dwellers to nick a military vehicle. Bet some MOD chauffeur’s had his arse seriously kicked for that!”
“The police say it was stolen, but the point I’m getting at is that the three people who died in it this evening were not the three people the police have named on this press release. Look! ‘Driver, Timothy Allan Gillislade, aged 19, no fixed abode. Loss of Eurostate Citizenship in April. Category: unresponsive to correctional penalties. Pronounced DOA. Front seat passenger, Edward Ian Bessant, aged 21, no fixed abode. Loss of Eurostate Citizenship in July. Category: unresponsive to correctional penalties. Pronounced DOA.” Steven was quite animated by now.
“What are you getting at?” Jerry interrupted. “If you don’t mind, my chips are getting cold!” Steven glared at him momentarily, then instantly regretted his audacity.
“I took pictures of the three people they pulled out of that government car.” There was an effort of restraint in his voice.
“You did what?” Jerry’s voice was so loud that Menna was now paying attention to what was going on in the conference room, though it was unlikely she could make out what was being said with the door closed.
“I took pictures,” Steven continued more quietly, “because I figured whoever had died in that car was not going to be your average Joe Bloggs and because if we could identify whoever that person was ASAP we’d have a head start on a major story…”
“Good thinking…I think.” Jerry had forgotten his chips. “It was a public highway.”
“The bodies I took pictures of are not those of the non citizens named here. One was wearing some kind of uniform, another looked more like late forties, early fifties than 21!” Steven gestured at the printout again as Jerry’s chips were deferred to the conference table. “And they say the third victim was a Sally Redmountain, aged 22, no fixed abode, loss of citizenship through repeated drugs offences. The woman I saw was much older…well groomed, well dressed and certainly no waste-dweller.”
“Let me look at that!” Jerry snatched the printout. “You’ve got pictures, you say.”
“Yes, they’re on my desktop.”
Jerry’s chips were stone cold by the time Steven left Thomson House for the weekend. It had been decided that Menna would type up the story according to the official police line, the picture of the paramedic aiding the walking wounded from the wrecked bus would be published alongside it. There were only two editions of the Echo on a Saturday – the first and the late extra – and Jerry had given him until Monday morning to dig around for more information about the real identities of the three bodies pulled from the ‘stolen’ government Jaguar.
“This could be a cracking yarn,” assured Jerry, slapping him heartily on the back. “Maybe a real big scoop. We can’t afford to jump to conclusions but something ain’t smelling too sweet about this.”
“I couldn’t hang on to the pool car over the weekend, could I?” Steven ventured, already knowing the answer.
“Bugger off! See you at seven, Monday. Now, where did I put my chips?”
Armed with his contacts book and printouts of the JPEG pictures, two of each, Steven made his way along the corridor, down the steps and out through the side lodge into the rain, acknowledging security as he passed. He was tired but excitedly happy. A story like this could provide the platform he needed to make the jump to television, maybe even to International News Broadcasting, the 24-hour state-funded digital news network forged from the ashes of the BBC. That would be an irony…earning a place as a roving reporter for Ted Hallder’s prime time Eurostate Today show on the strength of uncovering a government conspiracy.
“This is Steven Elan, reporting for Eurost
ate Today…” he rehearsed aloud.
It was only when he reached the bus station that the first major clue to his conspiracy mystery returned to his attention. It clanked in his coat pocket as he brushed against the neon-lit shelter as he waited for the 10.40pm service to Ely. He pulled it out and examined it in the orange-yellow neon glow. It was a round medal, perhaps made of brass. He remembered picking it up from the roadside where it lay among the sea of glass that had been a Jaguar’s front windscreen. One side bore a semi-relief of the Eurostate circle of twelve stars, each representing one of the federation’s founding member states. Inside the circle was a winged dagger and the words ‘Who Dares Wins’. The other side was inscribed with the words ‘Awarded for exceptional valour in the call of duty’ and then ‘Abamae’. Finally, there was a date – some 20 years had elapsed since this medal had been issued.
*
V
STEVEN Elan awoke to a cold flat and the sound of drilling from the road outside. The cold was something to do with the communal heating system being out of sync with Greenwich Mean Time and his landlord’s unfulfilled promises, dating back weeks, to get it sorted. The drilling, he guessed, was something to do with the cabling work for the new closed community opposite. A company called CyberVision was planning some kind of inner city ‘televillage’. He remembered reading about it months ago in the Echo. The story, not one of his, only caught his eye because the address was familiar. The thought of living opposite some high security commune of paranoid cyber geeks made him shudder…or was it the cold.
He wrapped himself in the quilt from his bed before moving into the lounge/dining and kitchen area of his modest flat. His hair was dishevelled, like a blond Brillo pad, and his chin bristled with three days’ growth. He padded quickly across the icy floor tiles, wishing he had invested more effort trying to find his slippers, toward the electric kettle. Flicking it on, he scooped a generous spoonful of instant Earl Grey, ready sweetened with added milk granules, into a relatively clean mug. Its motif was ‘Facts times importance equals news’, a quote from some 20th century television satire on the media that had been completely lost on Jerry.
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