Alias

by Tracy Alexander

  ‘On your mum’s side or your dad’s?’

  ‘Mum’s, of course. Or it would be wizard blood.’

  ‘Just checking you knew the difference,’ he said.

  It turned out he was driving later, so he had a Coke and I had a pear cider that we drank on the roof terrace. Nice.

  ‘So what’s the weirdest thing you’ve been asked to ship?’ I asked.

  ‘A hot tub,’ he said. ‘We arranged a pick-up and the driver got there to find it still full of water.’

  ‘Seriously?’

  ‘People can be incredibly stupid.’

  ‘What else?’

  ‘Nearly packaged up a kid once.’

  I couldn’t tell if it was true, but it was definitely funny. He said a kid had hidden in the drawer under a bed that was being shipped to India.

  ‘Who was that little boy you were with?’ he asked.

  It was so odd not seeing Mack – normally I couldn’t get away from him.

  ‘In the café,’ prompted Liam.

  ‘Just someone I met,’ I said. ‘He’s a sort of stray I feed occasionally.’

  ‘He looked a bit uncared for. Poor kid.’

  The caring side of me, which was so well hidden even I could hardly find it, wanted to grab Liam’s hand and go and face Mack’s drunken excuse for a mother. Luckily, I was good at suppressing kind thoughts.

  I changed the subject back to the SendEx operation, hoping to get him talking about any X-rays or scans that might interfere with the grand plan.

  ‘What aren’t you allowed to send?’

  ‘Kids, like I said.’

  ‘No, really.’

  ‘OK, starting with A. Aerosols not for personal use, asbestos, ammunition, batteries, clinical waste, controlled drugs …’

  ‘Surely people are always sending batteries. Every good toy needs a battery.’

  ‘If the battery’s attached to a “device”, then you can send it, but there are restrictions. This is dull, Saffron. And you are far too conscientious.’

  We moved on to how much he liked bears and how much I liked cheese on toast (with paprika).

  ‘I’m picking up my brother from Cubs or I’d have loved to take you for one, or maybe even two, pieces of cheese on toast …’

  ‘Another time,’ I said.

  ‘Tomorrow?’

  Brakes! shouted the sensible girl inside.

  ‘Thursday?’ I said.

  ‘You’re on.’ He got out his phone to put me in his calendar and, like all iPhone users, couldn’t resist a quick check of his mobile apps.

  ‘Guess what’s trending on Twitter,’ he said.

  ‘No idea.’

  ‘Hashtag Save Dan Langley.’

  ‘Is he the Dronejacker kid?’ Less-than-interested voice.

  ‘Yes, he’s the one they want to extradite. Look there’s a video.’

  Liam and I watching Dan talk about Dronejacker? Not a good idea.

  ‘I thought you had to go,’ I said.

  ‘I’ve got a few minutes.’

  We spent them kissing instead – an all-round better solution.

  I couldn’t imagine how Dan had whipped up enough support to be trending. My certainty that the past couldn’t catch up with me faltered. I needed to know what exactly was going on, and that meant breaking the rules again and going online.

  37

  I left Liam to catch his bus and went straight to the university’s Edward Boyle Library, using Polly’s student ID to get in. I worked out her username by shoulder surfing – it was a combination of the department, the year of entry and her initials. Her password was equally straightforward.

  In no time, I was up to speed. Dan Langley had been busy unpicking my plot in an attempt to clear his name. Somehow he’d made contact with Annacando, the American girl who’d given me tons of bots. She, unbelievably, had made a YouTube video confessing her part and declaring in pseudo-legal words that neither she nor Dan knew what I was up to. All true. I watched it twice with the volume right down. At one point she stared at the camera and said, ‘She is the only criminal,’ meaning me. It was quite powerful, helped by her accent and the fact that she was only eleven. The video had only been up for two days and she’d had over 200,000 hits!

  More incredible still, her actions had given another of my recruits a guilty conscience – the guy who’d made the simulation of a drone crashing into a forest had fessed up too.

  The revelations had snowballed into a whole campaign to try to save Dan from being extradited. Interesting, given that whichever way you looked at it, he was guilty of hacking the US Military and stealing a Predator drone.

  All the coverage was focused on the hearing, set for a week’s time, not the original crime – which was a huge relief. I was only mentioned in passing, accompanied by the usual unrecognisable photo.

  I decided to take a calculated risk and watch the kind of YouTube video that does put you on GCHQ’s radar – a tutorial on how to make a remote detonator. I could still remember the basic method from when I was trying to impress Sayge but wanted to see it once more. The university IP address was firmly planted in Leeds, but there were thousands of students who might want to remotely detonate fireworks … The chances of one dodgy search being picked up were tiny.

  I paid close attention, memorising each step, and then reluctantly logged off. I wanted to stay and research possible targets for the bomb, but the library closed at eight and anyway, it felt like I was pushing my luck. Another day …

  The cider had given me the munchies, so I took a diversion via the chip shop.

  I ambled through Hyde Park, eating, and thinking, not for the first time, about what I’d be doing now if Dan hadn’t ruined everything.

  ‘What you staring at, bitch?’ The words snapped me out of my daydream.

  A familiar face appeared out of the shadows – Mack’s mum, Maggie.

  ‘Nothing,’ I said, speeding up to get away from her.

  ‘It’s your fault,’ she shouted, grabbing my shoulder and digging her nails in. I batted her away. She stumbled.

  My instinct was to leg it, but …

  ‘What’s my fault?’

  ‘Why don’t you go back to where you come from?’

  Did she know who I was, or was she just off her head?

  ‘Toffee-nosed cow from the pub – I know who you are.’

  There was my answer.

  ‘I haven’t seen Mack lately,’ I said, keeping my distance. I pictured Mack’s hot little face the last time I saw him.

  ‘Not bloody likely to,’ she said, and lunged at me. I should have been fast enough to step out of the way, but she fell like a boulder, all twenty-plus stone of her. I landed on the bony bit of my bum with one of her tree-trunk legs on top of me.

  ‘Get off me!’

  In the few seconds it took to untangle myself from her vile, sweaty body and escape her sickly-sweet breath, two blokes in uniform appeared. I should have known better than to walk through the park at dusk – it was full of troublemakers and cops.

  ‘Up you get, Maggie,’ said the one with a moustache, clearly familiar with Mack’s mum.

  ‘And you are?’ he said to me.

  I looked away.

  Snap decisions – you have to be able to make snap decisions. I didn’t want to give my name. I couldn’t give a false name, because, drunk though she was, Maggie might know my name from the pub and tell them I was lying. So I ran. Wrong word for it – I sprinted. It was suspicious behaviour, but they probably wouldn’t recognise me again, and if they asked Mack’s mum who I was and she remembered where I used to work, the bar manager would deny knowing me because we had a cash-in-hand arrangement. It was the best move, under the circumstances.

  The cop called after me. Some reassurance that I wasn’t in trouble. Little did he know.

  Instead of going straight through the park I took a detour, in case they were waiting on the other side. I didn’t want to be on their radar. The chance of a bored copper delving into th
e history of Saffron Anderson was remote, but not one I wanted to take.

  Only when I was safe in my room did I let myself consider what Mack’s mum meant when she said I wouldn’t be seeing Mack anytime soon. Surely he wasn’t …

  Damn that boy! I should never have been kind to him.

  38

  On the way into work the next day I gave myself a talking to. Saffron Anderson had a record on the NHS, someone using a Leeds IP address had shown far too much interest in the Dronejacker affair before searching for how to build a remote detonator and my face had been eyeballed by the police. It was only a matter of time before I had a brush with authority that led to some seriously awkward questions. I needed to knuckle down.

  In the first lull I had, I checked the restrictions on sending batteries internationally – because a mobile phone without a battery wasn’t going to ignite anything – and went through the security screening procedures. My conclusions were that I needed to send the parcel from a business account, and there needed to be a legitimate reason for the lithium-ion battery inside.

  When Elisa brought me my mid-morning coffee she asked if I wanted to go to Harvey Nicks at lunch.

  ‘Not today, thanks.’

  ‘There’s a sale.’

  ‘Out of my range,’ I said.

  Instead I bought a cold pack in every stockist I sauntered past, and put them in the lockable cabinet attached to my desk when I got back. It was a tedious business. I considered placing a bulk order with the manufacturer, even looked up the number and wrote a little script to use on the phone. I thought I could ask for it to be sent by SendEx to the physio place round the corner, and intercept the delivery. Luckily, I came to my senses before I did anything. The security agencies issued warnings about products containing ammonium nitrate, which included cold packs. A big new order might attract attention. Better to stick to the strategy. Hare and the tortoise and all that.

  I came out of work to find that the clouds had disappeared and the sun was hot, so I walked home. There were loads of kids in the park, shouting and laughing, kicking balls and cycling – and one girl standing completely still.

  She was flying a quadcopter, like a helicopter but with four rotating blades. I watched her manoeuvre it. My brain automatically added missiles.

  She saw me looking.

  ‘That looks fun,’ I said, walking past with something new to think about.

  I made chilli con carne for Freddie and Polly, because we’d agreed to eat together once a week on a Tuesday, and it was my turn first. It was delicious because I used my secret ingredient, chorizo.

  ‘I vote Saff does all the cooking,’ proposed Freddie, ‘because I can’t match this. Deal, or no deal?’

  Polly was too busy adding a photo of her dinner to her Snapchat Story to answer, so I said, ‘Deal,’ which surprised Freddie.

  Until I said, ‘And you, Freddie, can do the bins and the recycling every week. And Polly, you can clear up. I’d be happy with that.’

  ‘Deal,’ they both said.

  I left them to it.

  I got myself comfy in bed, flicked open my A4 pad and drew six quadcopters. What if, instead of a warning letter, I sent each journalist a parcel containing a letter and a quadcopter? A quadcopter was a toy drone – the symbolism was nice. That was what PR was all about – using gimmicks to get publicity.

  I drifted off with a little made-up video playing in my head. One of my parcels was in the middle of a huge room, surrounded by armed guards pointing their guns at it, when out flew a mini-drone. Neat.

  39

  Wednesday, Elisa was off sick.

  ‘Hangover,’ said the receptionist.

  So it was frantically busy.

  Just after eleven Liam came to see how I was coping.

  ‘Fine,’ I said. ‘I’ve done the same-day deliveries, sent the pick-up schedules and I’m going on the phones at two.’

  Liam’s boss believed in rotating the tasks so we could all do everything. It suited me. I now knew how to prepare quotes, process orders, sort by weight and destination, take payment, track and solve customer queries. I also knew Liam had been in the monthly results meeting, because I’d given myself access to his digital calendar.

  ‘Do you mind only taking half an hour for lunch?’ he asked.

  ‘No, that’s fine.’

  ‘Great. Thanks.’ He winked.

  In the end, lunch took a back seat.

  ‘Saffron, can you go on the phones at twelve. Everyone’s chosen today to ring up for a chat!’ said the team leader.

  ‘Sure.’

  I spent the next hour dealing with idiots asking stupid things like, ‘I’d like a pick-up at my office, but I’m not sure when it will be ready. Can your driver call me when he’s passing?’

  And, ‘I sent a parcel last October, or maybe it was November, and my daughter says she never got it.’

  But then I took a call from a theatrical make-up company in Beeston and learnt a few more things.

  ‘I hardly dare say it, but we’re really busy, and I’m pretty sure spending half my day in the queue at the Post Office isn’t the best use of my time.’

  He wanted to arrange a daily pick-up. Usually I’d have passed it to Elisa …

  ‘Can I put you on hold for a second while I find someone to help you?’

  ‘Do you mean a second, or half an hour?’ he asked.

  ‘I mean about twenty seconds.’

  ‘Right you are.’

  The team leader was only too happy for me to set up the account with her sitting next to me, showing me how. It was the usual stuff – name, address, nature of the business, bank account details, blah-blah …

  ‘Would the packages contain any of the following restricted items?’

  I read the list.

  ‘We send nail varnish …’

  I explained the volume restriction and he agreed to abide by the rules, and that was that. Subject to checks, he was set up on our system, and I was one layer deeper into the SendEx systems.

  After work I went to Gadget Man in the Trinity shopping centre to see what quadcopters they had in stock. The sales assistant, who looked about ten, let me have a go with a 400-quid Phantom GPS Drone. He was very attentive – obviously paid on commission.

  ‘Is it for your boyfriend?’ he asked, entirely sexist, like the silly name of the shop.

  ‘No, it’s for me,’ I said.

  I flew it round the shop, narrowly missed crashing it into a glass cabinet and then said, ‘I’m definitely having one —’

  His eyes widened.

  ‘— but not this one.’

  I didn’t want to spend thousands on toys that would most likely end up as evidence. I chose one for ninety pounds. Probably only cost a tenner to make, I thought. And that led to more thoughts. Why not send the bomb to a manufacturer of military drones? The very place the evil machines were created. The place that profited from their growing popularity. I parked the idea until I could find out more.

  ‘I finish at six,’ said the sales guy. ‘So if you wanted me to charge it up and then give you a bit of a lesson —’

  ‘I’m good, thanks.’

  The quadcopter was half a metre squared. The box was the size of a planet. I went shopping for some other bits and bobs I needed, including a cheap phone, and then caught a bus to the storage facility, laden with bags.

  The whole place was deserted as usual. Alan, the manager, was there between eight and six, supposedly, so I always went after that. Not that there was anything incriminating for him to see.

  I let myself in, took off my jacket, spent a few minutes tidying, then put everything I needed in the space I’d made on the floor. Time to make a detonator.

  Sitting cross-legged, I took the soldering iron out of the box and read the instructions before filling it with lighter gas.

  Fifty minutes later I’d taken apart the new phone, found the vibrator, cut a hole, done a bit of soldering, put it back together, added a relay and a battery, and w
as ready to try it out. I used crocodile clips to join the wires that were poking out to a circuit board with a bulb. If it lit up, I was in business.

  I stood up, brushed the dust off my trousers and rolled my shoulders a couple of times – I smelt bad! It was the concentration.

  My phone was in my jacket pocket. I got it out, tapped the number in and pressed Call, eyes trained on my contraption. The new phone did nothing. The bulb remained unlit.

  Somewhere along the line, I’d messed up.

  It was gone seven and I was tired and hungry – not the best time to start again. But I could just check each part, I thought.

  Using my finger as though I was doing guided reading in the infants, I followed the circuit round. It all looked good, but clearly wasn’t.

  I got my own phone out again and saw the symbol for signal leap from zero to two bars.

  Silly girl. Can’t make a call without coverage!

  I tried again. The default ringtone gave me a bit of a shock, sounding far too loud in the deserted building, but the bulb still didn’t light up.

  Flummoxed.

  I closed my eyes and tried to recall the YouTube video. It was really badly done, white text on a black screen, rubbish photos and no audio.

  That was it!

  I switched the phone to vibrate mode, keyed in the number – third time lucky. The bulb shone brightly for me.

  Job done.

  40

  The next morning I ate my muesli deep in thought.

  Sending quadcopters was one way of making my point – guaranteed, I’d get more coverage of the drone wars by using toy versions. But how much more dramatic would it be if I decorated each quadcopter with the story of an innocent victim? A glued-on photo, a name scrawled in permanent ink and a date would point the journalists in whatever direction I chose to send them.

  Quadcopters, or similar, were also the answer to the battery issue. All I had to do was scan SendEx’s list of business accounts to find one that regularly sent items with batteries and slide my parcels, and the appropriate paperwork, in among theirs. It felt right.