The House Next Door Trilogy (Books 1-3)

by Jule Owen

  “Sure we can,” Bob says. “Funny though. I thought they’d cleared Blackheath. I didn’t think anyone lived there anymore.”

  They are on the main stretch of the river. There is a wide open stretch ahead and to the side. They sail under the two parts of the broken Hungerford Bridge. Mathew cranes his neck up to look. The bridge is a garden of weeds, shrubs and trees.

  Mike says, “The clearances are pointless. No sooner has the army got rid of all the people, than they come back. What do they expect? They have nowhere else to go. Even if they demolish the buildings, folks build camps there made from the ruins.”

  Bob grunts and asks Mathew, “How long have you lived in Blackheath?”

  “All my life.”

  “Wow. Your parents must be bloody stubborn.”

  They pass through Waterloo Bridge. Like Hungerford Bridge, it is blasted in two. Mathew realises it is because the water level is so high. People have blasted the bridges to make a way through for the boats.

  “I don’t understand,” Mathew says. “Why does the government want to make people leave London?”

  “Lots of people don’t understand that,” Mike says.

  “Bah! Don’t listen to her. It’s a cesspit of disease. No running water. The drains all flooded. Cholera, typhoid, trachoma and worms, to name a few things,” Bob says.

  “But that’s not the real reason,” Mike says.

  “No, it isn’t,” Bob agrees.

  “What is, then?” Mathew asks.

  “Terrorists.”

  “They’re not really terrorists,” Mike says.

  “Depends which side of the gun you’re on, doesn’t it? To us, they’re terrorists. It doesn’t matter to them that all we’re trying to do here is save historic buildings for the nation. To them we’re vamps, bloodsuckers, leeches, and roaches. Hence this,” she kicks at the muzzle of the gun with her boot.

  “I hope that’s on safety,” Mike says.

  Bob continues, “No one goes anywhere without one now. To the Edenists, the Accountants are freedom fighters and saviours of the people, to us they’re terrorists. Since the government vacated, they’ve moved in and the place is crawling with righteous looters and vigilantes with a cause. They’ll steal from you and tell you that it’s their moral duty to do so.”

  “They’ve always been here,” Mike says. “The side you’re on is often random. We have bioIDs and were put through a sponsored education programme. If we hadn’t, we’d probably be with them.”

  Bob shoots Mike a glance.

  “We would!”

  “I don’t think they like our kind, quite frankly.” She stares at Mathew, “You’re not an Accountant are you?”

  Mathew laughs, “I’m sixteen.”

  Bob shrugs, “I’ve met much younger boys carrying pretty serious weapons. Their military recruitment people don’t do age discrimination.”

  “Do accountants normally carry weapons?”

  “What kind of Non Grata propaganda have you been fed, boy? That’s their stock in trade. The violent revolution.”

  Mike says, “He thinks you mean business accountants.”

  Bob bursts into laughter, her belly heaving. “No he doesn’t.”

  “Actually, I did,” Mathew says.

  Bob laughs louder and the sound carries across the water.

  Mike says, “Shhh! Button it, will you? You were just saying this place is crawling with terrorists!”

  Bob stops short; her face falls, sheepish. “Yeah, you’re right.” She settles on her seat and pulls a sour face.

  “Where are all these terrorists, anyway?” Mathew asks, looking at the half-drowned buildings lining the river, as the boat glides past them. “The whole city looks deserted.”

  Mike nods. “Over there. Where you’re looking.”

  “What? In those empty buildings?”

  “Not all of those buildings are empty. More than ten million people used to live here. They haven’t evaporated into thin air.”

  “But the buildings are all flooded! They’re uninhabitable.”

  “Of course they’re not. Only the lower floors are flooded. There are lots of floors and rooms above the water line.”

  “So people didn’t leave?”

  “Oh, sure. Lots of people left. But some stayed to protect their own homes; others moved into other people’s buildings when their owners left. Years ago there were hundreds of amazing apartments ready for the taking. For a time the most desperate and destitute people of England lived in palatial apartments, the abandoned homes of the rich and luxury hotel rooms.”

  “But where do they get running water, energy or comms?”

  Mike shrugs. “Lots of people live without. Some people have managed to hack things. There’s wireless power, wireless internet. They stick solar panels and water tanks on the rooftops. People travel around the city using boats, ropes and wires.”

  “Ropes and wires?”

  “Look more closely.”

  Mathew focuses his Lenzes further onto the riverside apartments and office blocks. They are laced together by a web of lines.

  “What are they?” Mathew asks. “How are they used?”

  “Some folks use harnesses; others walk across. Tightrope walking is a skill every London Non Grata child learns.”

  “If you are actually from London, you’d know all of this. Where are you really from? How did you get stuck in the building in the first place?”

  Mathew knows he needs to scrape together a story and has been inventing a line since he started throwing objects off the roof. “I was taken there and left. I don’t remember how I got in.”

  “You were attacked?” Mike asks.

  “For God’s sake, will you stop feeding him?” Bob says, exasperated.

  “It would explain why he hasn’t got any stuff and he doesn’t remember anything. Perhaps he has amnesia.”

  “Who took you there?” Bob asks Mathew, ignoring Mike.

  “I was kidnapped.”

  “Kidnapped?” Bob pulls a face. “Why?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Were you mugged?”

  “Yeah. They took my stuff.”

  “What stuff?”

  Mathew feels the heat of embarrassment spreading up his neck to his face. He stammers as he says, “My bag. My… things.”

  Bob cocks a sceptical eyebrow. “But they didn’t hurt you?”

  “No.”

  “Where were you when they picked you up?”

  “I was at home.”

  “They broke into your house?”

  “I was in the road.”

  “Where did you say your house was again? Blackheath?”

  “Yes.”

  “So these… muggers, they kidnapped you and took you all the way to the Shell Centre where they left you without harming you, all for a bag?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What was in the bag?”

  Mathew thought frantically. He had no idea what might be considered valuable enough to steal in 2091. “Food,” he says.

  This rings true for Bob, who nods her head slightly to one side and pulls an expression that says, Maybe.

  “Did you know them,” Mike asks, “the people who took you?”

  “Yeah, I knew them,” Mathew says.

  “So your friends kidnapped you?”

  “Not friends exactly,” Mathew thought quickly. “These boys I know. They don’t like me.”

  “Why do you have a lifejacket?”

  “I found it.”

  “There was a perfectly good lifejacket lying around on the floor of the Shell Centre building after it had been looted several hundred times?”

  “Yes. I found it in a drawer.”

  “A drawer?”

  “A drawer in a side room.”

  Mike says. “Bob, stop giving the boy a hard time. He nearly drowned.”

  Undeterred, Bob says, “Do you really come from Blackheath?”

  “It was my family home,” Mathew insists. He can
see Mike doesn’t believe a word he’s saying. She’s reading it in his face. He’s flustered and angry with himself.

  Mike says, “Was?”

  “Yes,” Mathew says.

  “That’s not what he said before. He said he’d lived there all his life. He said that’s where his friends or whatever they were found him. But he doesn’t know a thing about London or Silverwood. He might as well be from another planet. You might think you’re being nice, but someone like him shoots people like us.”

  Mathew says, “Honestly, I’m not an Accountant or an Edenist. I’m trying to get to Silverwood to get help for my mother. She’s sick.”

  “Bob,” Mike says, “Have you ever met an Account who laughed when you mentioned their name?”

  “Hmmmph,” Bob says, but Mike knows it’s a concessionary noise.

  Mike asks, “Why don’t you think you remember how you entered the building? Did someone knock you unconscious?”

  “Oh, for mercy’s sake!” Bobs splutters, exasperated. “Why don’t we get him back to Greenwich and have security check him for us? They’ll get to the truth.”

  “They won’t get to the bottom of anything. They’ll send him to Internment, to one of those horrible camps,” Mike says.

  “So, what do you propose?”

  “We could just let him go.”

  Bob frowns at Mathew. “When did your family last live in Blackheath?”

  “2055,” Mathew says.

  “To be honest,” Bob says to Mike. “I think letting him go would be as bad for him as sending him to Internment.”

  11 Security

  At Greenwich, the half-submerged gates by the Royal Steps are open and they sail into the Grand Square towards the Queen’s House, between Queen Mary and King William Court, water lapping the top of their porticos of Wren’s masterful architecture. They turn right and travel along what used to be Trafalgar Road and turn left and head towards the Park. The old park gate has been removed to form a wide entrance for boats. There are two makeshift wooden watchtowers on either side of this. One of the towers is manned. As they go through a man shouts to them.

  “Dr. Bob! Dr. Mike! How’re the Houses of Parliament coming along?”

  “Slowly, Pete. Very slowly,” Bob says.

  “Got to do it right, though, Dr. Bob.”

  “Very true,” Bob says.

  “Who’s that with you?”

  “A friend, Pete.”

  “Any friend of yours is welcome here. He’ll need to go to security, though.”

  “We’re on our way.”

  The foot of the hill is a muddy beach. The lower park is a lake. There is a long wooden pier constructed across the sludge, with places to dock small boats at the water’s edge. Larger boats are moored in deeper water, nearer the river.

  Mike stands on the bow and jumps as they approach the pier. Bob cuts the engine and they glide in. Mike ties up and says to Mathew, “Come on, then. This is the last stop.”

  Mathew clambers through the clutter at the bottom of the boat. Bob stops him, “Here, make yourself useful,” and she passes him one of the boxes. “Give it to Mike.”

  They unload the boat and Bob comes ashore with two machine guns.

  Everywhere, people busily unload their little boats. Just beyond the pier there is a high chain link fence topped with barbed wire. Workers file through gates. Their bioIDs automatically buzz them in. Three uniforms with guns stand to one side, watching. Beyond this, tents, prefab buildings and wooden shacks and sheds cling to every available part of the hillside, amongst the ancient chestnut trees. Flamsteed House still perches on the peak of the hill in quiet dignity, like the one person of refinement in a room full of hooligans. It is now an army control centre.

  Bob says to Mathew, “See that cabin?” She points to a prefabricated building on tall wooden stilts, built into the fence with an open door and an old sign above the door that reads ‘Security’. “Go and wait for us there. We need to take our stuff back to our house, otherwise it’ll be swiped.” Mathew hesitates. Bob pushes him forward, “Go on, you’ll be all right. Say you’re with Dr. Roberta Calvin and Dr. Michaela Vear. Tell him we’ll claim you in fifteen minutes.”

  Mathew is doubtful. He doesn’t want to have to deal with security.

  “We can’t leave him,” Mike says.

  “We can’t leave this stuff either, and the gatehouse won’t let him through until security has checked him in.”

  “He’ll be stamped for the camps.”

  Bob sighs, “Maybe. Do you have a better plan?”

  “No.”

  “Mathew, you go there.”

  Mathew watches forlornly as Bob and Mike walk off through the gate and climb the hill. People hurry past him, walking around his still body, carrying boxes and bags brought from the boats, keen to get through the gates. People stare at him, slightly above his head, as they do at home when they’re reading his data, but less discreetly, more rudely. One man knocks into him and says, “Sorry, Mathew,” and then bursts out laughing. Mathew realises he is still broadcasting and remembers what Mike had told him about turning it off. He uses voices commands to switch off the signal.

  Gazing up at the security hut, he wonders what will happen to him if he goes inside. If he is locked up, it is only a matter of time before one of Lestrange’s friends comes to find him to take him home. He curses himself for not leaving the boat sooner, not persuading Bob to drop him somewhere along the Thames. He has come here unprepared mentally; unable to spin a simple believable yarn, unable to keep his mouth shut when he needs to.

  Unlike his first trip through one of Mr. Lestrange’s doors, this is not a game; it matters. He considers his options and surveys the scene. He could steal one of the boats, but Pete in the tower has a gun and would probably use it. If he didn’t, someone else might. He could hide somewhere, perhaps a cabin, or under a tarpaulin on one of the boats, wait until dark and swim, but his earlier experience of Thames swimming does not give him much hope for his chances of survival.

  Realising he doesn’t have a choice, he sets off towards the security hut.

  There is a ladder secured to the side of one of the wooden stilts and it leads to a platform made of planks. The tide is out. The stilts have a waterline at three quarters height and at the top they are furred with green moss. He reaches the top. The door to the prefab is open. He peers inside, knocking gently on the door.

  “Hello?”

  An elderly man with wispy grey hair and a grizzled two-day beard is slumped over his beer-belly. He wears a uniform but somehow manages to make his clothes seem like sloppy casuals. A name badge is askew on his breast pocket. Mathew has never seen anyone wear their name like this before. The badge reads, “Sergeant Charles Baker.”

  “Hi,” Mathew says. “I need to be checked in.”

  “You visiting?” the sergeant asks, straightening up.

  “Yes,” Mathew says.

  “Who are you visiting?”

  “Dr. Roberta Calvin and Dr. Michaela…”

  “You mean Dr. Bob and Dr. Mike?” The sergeant chuckles. “Okay. You sit there.” He indicates to a seat in front of his desk. “Now, this should only take a second.” He gets to his feet a little unsteadily and hobbles around the front of his desk. “I get stiff sitting here all day,” he says. “I’d rather have an outdoors job, but this is where they put me. Now, drop your head forward a bit. Just want to get at your bioID… Good, you’ve done this before.” The man runs the scanner across the back of Mathew’s neck. There is a loud beep. “Okay. That’s done.”

  Mathew freezes and waits for the man to react. He waits to be told his data isn’t right. But the old man hobbles back round to his chair and slumps heavily into the old, soft leatherette. Mathew can’t imagine him doing an ‘outdoors job’. Having made himself comfortable, Sergeant Charles Baker looks up, surprised Mathew is still there. “The gates will automatically recognise you. You’re free to go.”

  “Everything alright?”


  “Yes. You’re checked in. That’s it.”

  Mathew stands uncertainly, waiting for the catch, not believing he’s got away with it. He says, “Dr. Bob told me to wait for her here.”

  “She did? There’s more chairs over there if you’d be more comfortable.” The man points to the other side of the prefab unit. A bank of uncomfortable shrilk office chairs lines the wall. Mathew takes one of the chairs.

  A Canvas on the wall shows the news. The volume is muted. The headlines run across the bottom of the screen. They read: “The Coalition government, represented by Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Nystrom, is in talks with the Welsh National Party about border skirmishes. Fighting continues in West Antarctica as the United Republic of Latin America sent troops to Palmer Land. Prime Minister Bartholomew Dearlove is in Washington this week to continue to negotiate the Atlantic States Treaty.” Mathew watches an image of Bartholomew Dearlove as he descends the steps of an impressive looking neoclassical building and gets into a car. He stops to talk to a journalist and the camera pans to his face. Thirty-four years on, he looks the same age, perhaps younger.

  “Do you want the volume up?” the sergeant asks.

  “Yes please,” Mathew says.

  The sergeant commands the Canvas to unmute. The news report has cycled to the story on the Atlantic States Treaty.

  The reporter says, “The treaty will effectively form a new international economic and military superstate composed of much of the former EU. It will run from the Russian border, through Scandinavia, including Iceland, Greenland and all of North America to the new US border with the Republic of Latin American Nations in Texas. Proponents of the treaty argue the proposed superstate, dubbed ATLAS, is necessary for the survival of western ideals and tradition under increased pressure from the newly formed Federation of People’s Republics.

  There is widespread concern that the Dishonest War, characterised by undeclared biological warfare, cyber attacks, unclaimed terrorist acts by robots and drones and territorial encroachment in Antarctica from Federation members, as they attempt to annex mineral deposit-rich land, will escalate into total war.