2079- Beyond the Blue

by Florence Watson

  ‘No, I’m talking about before attack. When you met Starla. You changed. You seemed happier somehow, despite this terrible business you’d uncovered. I don’t know; maybe it’s because you knew you were right all along about Myers and in a strange way, it was satisfying. I know you never agreed with his politics and clearly you were right to doubt the system. Anyway, I just wanted you to know.’

  Chapter 7

  The door closes and I sit down beside Hero. I listen as he explains how he followed Starla until she became aware of him, then approached her in a dingy diner that she’d turned into, off a main road in Holloway. The account is brief and unembellished, as is typically his style.

  ‘She took it quite well then.’ I say, when he’s finished speaking.

  'She was suspicious, naturally. But she recognised me.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘She told me that she’d seen me in her dreams. The theory is that women have greater resistance to CIA as they attach emotions to most of their experiences, and emotions are more difficult to suppress. That’s why they assigned Miles to watch her. She sensed that she already knew him, but interpreted it as an instant rapport with a member of the opposite sex. Seeing him evoked positive feelings based on their earlier interactions as initially, she’d found the supervisor attractive.’

  'I see. Did she remember me?’ I ask, strangely fixated on the fact that she’d dreamt of Hero.

  'She’d remembered almost everything when I met up with her twenty four hours later.’

  ‘Wow.’ I say, genuinely astonished and frankly, a little intimidated. What if I haven’t remembered everything by the time I see her? It’ll be like meeting a complete stranger. I’ll be wondering, as I am now, if we reached any level of intimacy and if she’s aware of it. The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that this is a possibility.

  ‘I told her the plan.’ He says, moving on quickly.

  ‘Okay. So what is the plan?’

  ‘You’re going to send your mother a message asking if you can use the yacht this weekend. You’ll tell her that you want to take a trip to France. It'll take some convincing but eventually she’ll agree.’

  Won’t that seem strange? As we’ve already established, I have agoraphobia. Why would I decide to...’

  ‘We’ll get to that; just let me finish.’

  ‘Fine.’

  ‘On Friday afternoon, you’ll sail from Brighton Marina and head fast along the coast to the Seven Sisters. Starla is going to fake her suicide from the cliffs at Beachy Head. She’ll jump wearing a gliding suit. I’ll be waiting for her on the water. After deactivating her chip and dropping her tracker into the ocean, we’ll have a small window of opportunity to get away. The Lina Bo can be tracked by satellite, but by the time agents realise that there isn't a body in the water and that your diversion to the cliffs wasn’t a coincidence, we’ll be beyond British shores.’

  I mull over the scheme and fill in the details; first in my head then aloud whilst he awaits my verdict. ‘So, under the relative cover of darkness and secluded cliff face, Starla will base jump into the sea in a fake suicide stunt. You’ll pull her from the water into a small boat and deactivate her chip immediately. Then with any luck, the three of us will disappear across the English Channel. It’s brilliant.’ I say, unable to find fault with the scheme and wishing that I’d had time to come up with it myself.

  ‘The yacht will be programmed to dock at Le Havre but we’ll disembark three miles from the port and travel in the boat to a small inlet at Hon Fleur. The Lina Bo will then continue on to its destination. It’s impossible for the authorities to patrol all of the shoreline and in the dark, we’ll be hard to identify. The spot I’ve chosen is a beach bordered by trees. There’ll be a car waiting for us in a car park near the botanical gardens. We’ll continue through France. They’ll be two car changes before we arrive in Southern Italy.’

  I visualise the journey as he speaks, then nod approvingly when he’s finished.

  'Has Starla ever base jumped before?’

  'No. But not a lot can go wrong with the suit and she’ll overcome her nerves by keeping in mind that she has to jump if she wants to see her father again.’ He turns to me suddenly. ‘Why didn't you tell me about Heather?’

  That was unexpected. I respond with a look of bewilderment, then realise. The cameras. He must have seen us returning from dinner on Saturday night. 'She was a Genie match.’ I say. ‘It was one date, nothing serious. I won’t be seeing her again.’

  'Since when do you date Genie matches?’

  'Apparently, since I was brainwashed by the government.’ I reply, looking up at the screens just in time to see a Govco delivery vehicle at the gate. Hero sees it too but doesn’t react. It’s a food order arriving; we have no reason to suspect it’s anything else. ‘Actually’ I continue ‘I had very little choice in the matter. Heather pursued me for weeks. It reached the point where taking her out was preferable to receiving daily messages and glamour shots. She practically threw herself at me.’

  'And you didn't think that was strange?’

  'I’m one of the most eligible bachelors in the country, so no. Anyway, I've dealt with it. She won't trouble me again.’

  He shifts slightly on the bed. I hear the old metal frame creak as it struggles to take our combined weight. 'Jo, she's an agent.’ He says.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Heather is an agent.’

  My mind races, as I try to make sense of what he’s telling me. 'No, she's the daughter of the Bromley MP, Victor Rhodes.’

  'She's an agent Jo.’

  'I'm telling you she's not.’ I say adamantly. ‘Do you really think I'd be stupid enough to go out with a new Genie profile? This is a legitimate person, raised and schooled in London. A marketing PA, maths graduate, socialite...’

  'Who is also a trained spy. Her father is one of the most outspoken members of parliament; a former campaigner for the reintroduction of the One Chance programme with the backing of two thirds of his constituents. He’s known for his firm stance on LOSERs - you know this. Heather and her father are on the inside Jo. The PA job is just a cover.’

  ‘Martial arts.’ I whisper, remembering that I saw it listed under sports when I’d taken a cursory glance of her profile, just minutes before our date. I wish I’d read it properly now. But it didn’t matter at the time. She didn’t matter. ‘Plenty of people study martial arts and self defence.’ I remark, clutching at straws.

  ‘Not to her level. She took a gap year after university...’

  ‘And went travelling to South America. She told me.’ It was one of the few things I’d actually paid attention to over dinner. Her experiences abroad seemed at the time to be the only interesting thing about her life - the only thing that distinguished her from the pampered offspring of other parliamentary figures and the likes.

  ‘Or, she never went travelling.’ He offers in response. ‘She was recruited by PEACE and spent the year undergoing training instead.’

  ‘This is farfetched.’ I say, doubting my own words as I speak them.

  ‘Jo, you had amnesia. You weren’t your usual paranoid self.’

  It’s true that I had no reason to doubt anything before I found the diary. I was living in a bubble of ignorance and grief. I take a moment to think it through and eventually arrive at the conclusion that he’s right; she is an agent. All the signs were there; her shameless persistence, Jess’s perfume, the colour green that she always wears; a theme in my life since the incident. It was the colour of the recovery suite in the hospital; fern walls and a cut glass vase by my bedside. It’s the first colour I saw when I woke up. And Hero of course has emerald coloured eyes; the stones in her trinkets are always green. I relented, unconsciously guided by a sense of security.

  'What did you do to make them send an agent to watch you?’

  Thinking past the sick feeling brought on suddenly by a flashback of my night spent with Heather: ‘About three weeks ago, I watched a documentary t
hat featured a roller hockey player. Her name was Starla. Different surname, I don’t remember it now. Her father was interviewed describing the journey to her success. Certain words stuck in my mind - things that her father said. It was as if there was a hidden message in the report; something I was meant to pay attention to. I played it back a few times then did a general search for women named Starla in professional sport.’

  ‘That would do it.’ he says, matter of factly.

  ‘So Heather was sent in after to make sure I hadn’t woken up. I’m not rid of her, am I?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What do I have to do?’

  ‘Invite her sailing.’

  I stare at him side on. ‘Are you serious?’

  'If you don't, she'll follow you.’

  ‘Let me get this straight; you want me to invite Heather to Italy?’

  ‘No. I want you to invite her on a romantic sailing trip to France and hopefully she won't suspect anything. Even if she does, you'll sedate her before Starla and I get to the yacht.’

  I stand and start pacing in the small area between the sink and the shelves. 'Ok, hold on... firstly, I've never sedated anyone. That’s your area.’

  He stares up at me, wide eyed. It’s a look that means I have to do what he says because there is no other way. But I’m not convinced. ‘Look, if Heather was a regular person, then no problem at all. But if she is a spy, then I don’t stand a chance of knocking her out. She’ll see it coming. I’m not up to it Hero, you said so yourself…’

  'She is a spy, and you don’t have a choice Jo. Starla and I can't be seen. She’ll have just committed suicide and I’m a wanted man who no longer exists in the system. You need to sedate her as soon as you’re on the yacht. You’ve got till Friday to get your head around it.’

  He stands and walks past me to one of the boxes on the shelf. He slides across the lid of one at shoulder level and reaches in. He then turns and hands me a tiny vial of clear liquid with metal caps at either end. Clearly there’s no debating this matter. I’m going to have to sedate Heather, whether I’m ready to or not.

  ‘Pick your moment, then inject this end into her neck.’ He says, pointing. ‘It’s easiest from behind. Press down here to eject the needles and release the serum simultaneously. It works instantly so be ready to catch her if necessary. It should last around four hours, even if she has a counteractive drug in her implant.’

  It won’t kill her will it?’ I ask, because there’s a fraction doubt in my mind as to whether or not she is a spy. ‘I mean, if she doesn’t have a counter drug, she won’t die?’

  ‘No.’ He replies, sliding the lid back over the box. ‘She’ll just sleep for longer. You’ll also need this.’ he says, handing me a tiny rolled up piece of paper. ‘Times and instructions. Commit them to memory, then destroy the note.’

  'Fine.’ I say, now almost resigned to the fact that I have to do this. ‘Second problem; I've just broken up with her.’

  'Then un-breakup with her.’ he replies, reaching behind me for the glass of water on the cabinet then putting it to his lips.

  'It’s not that simple Hero. I made it absolutely clear that it was over between us. At best she’ll think I’m fickle and decline. At worst, she’ll work it out. Either way, I’m in trouble.’

  ‘Not if you do it right. Tell her that you’re ready to deal with your depression…’

  ‘Agoraphobia…’

  ‘All of it. Tell her that you now realise that you need her. You’re known to be eccentric - and impulsive. Play on it.’

  ‘So if flattery fails, convince her that my neurosis is part of my charm. What if she’s not available? Two days is short notice.’

  ‘If she’s not available then I’m wrong; she’s not an agent.’

  He sits again. I don’t believe for one minute that he thinks I can do this. We both know I’m not myself. I’m not fully in control. But it seems I have no choice. Heather must be dealt with or we won’t get away. ‘There’s something I need you to do.’ I say, putting the vial and the instructions in my pocket, then from my other pocket, pulling out the note I’d stuffed in the back of my office draw.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Luvel’s son, Arthur. He’s a recluse.’ I say, unfolding the scrappy piece of paper that I’d brought as a reminder. ‘What do you make of it?’

  ‘There’s a chance that he found out something and received CIA.’

  ‘That’s what I thought.’ I say, looking down at my notes. ‘I need you to pay him a visit and find out if he knows anything. If there’s time of course.’

  ‘There’s time. But I have to wait until he’s alone in the house. Even then it’s likely that the new housekeeper is a P400 and linked to the security system.’

  ‘Don’t risk it if you don’t think you can do it.’

  ‘I won’t.’

  ‘Hero’ I begin, changing the subject. ‘I need to talk to you about Sam Steele.’

  ‘You worked it out.’ He answers, in sombre tone.

  ‘How could we have been so stupid?’ I say, screwing the piece of paper up into a ball. ‘Of course they’d trace the transaction back to me.’

  ‘There was no other way we could have got that evidence. But they only made the connection because we got caught.’

  ‘So if Starla hadn’t re-entered the Health Farm…’

  ‘It would only have been a matter of time Jo. The fact is, there was no plan after we got the bear because we didn’t know what we’d discover.’

  ‘What do think happened to their daughters, the twins?’

  ‘I don’t know. Family perhaps. An orphanage.’ He says quietly.

  ‘The first casualties in our quest for the truth. Hopefully the first and last.’

  He nods and rubs the scar on his hand. ‘Hopefully.’ He says.

  Chapter 8

  An hour after leaving Hero I called Heather. Time was of the essence but the imminent proposal loomed over me like a cloud waiting to burst. We arranged to meet in a lunch restaurant near her office. Convenient for her, neutral territory as far as I was concerned. However, my reluctance to leave the house on account of my genuine or CIA induced fear, was compounded by the weather. I don’t normally feel the cold, but perhaps having stayed indoors so long, I’ve lost my resilience to it. The wind tore through my blazer and chilled me to the core as I strode from the car to the escalator at the shuttle port - always my preferred mode of transport. I missed my leather jacket. I could have taken a taxi all the way to Canary Wharf, but decided that I should bite the bullet and face my fears. The quicker I returned to my old ways, the quicker I would remember everything. But I soon regretted the decision. Once on board, I searched for the least threatening person I could find to sit beside - a teenager in a crimson bobble hat, also wearing a face mask to filter the flu contaminated air circulating in the air conditioning. I noticed after a few seconds that my fists were clenched tight, my knuckles were white and my palms were clammy; a combination of the imagined fear of crowds which I kept telling myself wasn’t real and the worry that my powers of persuasion were no match for the agent, highly trained to sniff out lies. It was late morning so only moderately busy, but I was paranoid about the other passengers to the point of perspiring. I caught my reflection in the glass; beads of sweat had appeared on my forehead. I began to feel like a wild animal trapped in a container, searching for a way out. I became fixated on the fact that I was travelling at high speed through a tunnel deep underground and added claustrophobia to my list of existing irrational fears. I was sure that the Jo not experiencing symptoms of CIA reversal and not afflicted with multiple phobias, would have no trouble at all taking the shuttle to meet a dangerous woman sent to watch him, with the aim of convincing her to leave the country with him. I knew I’d have to dig deep to find my old self because if I couldn’t make this happen, the rest of the plan wouldn’t work. Starla would never be reunited with her father, the truth about the government might never come out and Jessica’s death - and the
Steele’s - would have been in vain. Noticing my condition which bore some resemblance to the symptoms of flu, the girl beside me stood up and went to sit elsewhere.

  I arrived early and used the spare minutes to send the all important message to my mother. She replied straight away, asking me to meet her outside her office at 1.30pm. This gave me plenty of time to work on Heather. I took a table by the window near the entrance so I could leave easily if need be. It was airy and light, but busier inside than out. I tried hard to ignore the bustle of the restaurant. I felt safer somehow sitting by the glass looking out at the white walkway and up at the sections of sky I could see between the narrow buildings. There are less hologram ads in this part of London - ironic given that it’s the centre for marketing and promotion. I looked at the now iconic Ford Fitness statue of the entwined blue figures - an impressive structure that has come to define the era. The transient billboards around it were easy to ignore. It was the stream of pedestrians that made me uneasy. Any one of them could be a LOSER as statistically, attacks are more likely to occur in the capital city. But as the passersby were mostly businessmen and women wearing masks, I told myself I had nothing to worry about. Anybody not dressed in a suit or expensive sportswear is a striking oddity - which is one of the reasons I chose to wear a suit.

  I bring up the menu on the tabletop and order a tea which is promptly delivered by a Bug, similar in design to the P400. There are no human waiters or shop workers on this urban island; everything has been mechanised. As I sit silently rehearsing my lines and resisting the urge to focus on any given individual that my imagination is trying to convince me is a threat, a hand lands on my shoulders. I jump off the seat, almost head butting Heather from behind in the process.

  ‘I’m so sorry.’ I say, then swallow the metallic tinged saliva on the tip of my tongue.

  She stands back looking stunned. ‘No, it’s my fault. I should have thought...’

  ‘No, really, it’s me.’ I insist. ‘I’m still not used to being out of the house.’ I move round the table and quickly pull out a chair for her. I remain standing as she removes her coat to reveal a dark grey pinstripe trouser suit. She sits on the curved, Perspex seat and I see her cross her legs under the transparent table top. As I glimpse the dark green stiletto boots she’s wearing, a disturbing thought pops into my head. It's an image of being crushed beneath one of the heels, screaming in agony as she repeatedly stamps on my face. Fleeting as it is, the picture in my mind’s eye is so horrific that when I finally sit, the opening line I’d rehearsing escapes me and I’m forced to think off the top of my head.