by R T Green
Skimming the top of the Thames barrier domes, past the runways of London City airport, it banked steeply to the right, then immediately to the left, a sharp semi-circle around the O2 Arena. Seconds later the offices and apartments of Canary Wharf were disappearing behind it, and the unmistakable shape of Tower Bridge straight ahead.
The pilot didn’t waver. Pedestrians on the bridge covered their heads in terror as the black missile flew between the waves and the parapets, just feet to spare above and below. Faster still, in seconds London Bridge and Southwark Bridge had passed inches beneath it. Closer to the waves, the black probes just clearing the tops of the river cruisers, in moments it had passed over the Golden Jubilee Bridge, the driver of the train that had just left Charing Cross station slamming on the brakes as the wake of the black missile almost shook his cab off the rails.
And just seconds later, heading straight for Westminster Bridge, with milliseconds to spare the pilot pulled back the tiny joystick on the console in front of her, and the shuttle rose into the air. Climbing at incredible speed, the sharp-pointed nose of the craft pointed vertically into the clear blue late-December sky. Still she held the stick back, the vapour trail forming a perfect circle in the air directly above the Houses of Parliament as the shuttle, upside down, began to head back towards the ground, the thousands of astonished onlookers hearing the note of its engines rise again as it dove back towards them.
And with a sound like thunder it leveled out feet above the water, clipped the top of the lamps on Westminster Bridge as is streaked over it, and banked to the left following the course of the river. Finally it began to slow. Calmer then, it’s crazy flight almost over, it cleared Lambeth Bridge, and through the windshield the pilot could see Vauxhall Bridge a half-mile ahead.
She eased the throttles back, and a smile spread across her face as the anticipation of what she was about to do sent a wave of excitement through her whole body. Gently she brought the ominous-looking black craft to a stop, hovering a hundred feet above the waves just before the bridge parapets. And slowly it turned ninety degrees, to face the building that was its final destination.
She’d made a spectacular point, the awesome flying display seen by thousands of humans, and filmed on almost as many mobile phones. But now it was time to make it a lot more personal…
The shell-shocked silence Zana’s revelations had sent us into didn’t last long. At the same moment as I saw something moving outside the window, the door burst open and one of the techies from the operation’s room a floor below us ran in, his face twisted with fear.
He didn’t say much either. He wanted to, he just simply didn’t have the time for anything more than a breathless, ‘Sir…’ before the middle one of the three windows overlooking the river disintegrated into a million jewels of toughened glass, showering the room with supercharged fragments of light that bounced around with a life of their own for a few seconds, before dying away to a glittering glass carpet in front of us.
The window, super-tough though it was, hadn’t stood a chance against the evil-looking black probe on the front of Tiri’s shuttle, which was now sitting motionless six feet inside the room.
Yes my queen, that’s typical of you. Make the grandest entrance possible, and stick your nose right where it isn’t wanted.
Jane the detective looked terrified. Understandably… she’d never come face-to-face with the Calanduran queen’s power-plays before. I put a reassuring hand on her arm. ‘It’s ok, she’s not here to harm us.’
‘How the hell do you know that?’ she almost screamed.
‘Just trust me.’
No one else seemed to have anything to say. But someone hadn’t been stunned into silence. Through the speakers in the nose, a voice I knew and loved filled the room with its ominous presence, and just for a moment chilled me to the bone as it brought back the memory of the clearing in the Tobago rainforest, when that same voice had boomed out through the same speakers.
‘Just thought I’d stop by and see how you are, my dear sister. You are looking well, I must say.’
For a moment it seemed like Zana was about to make a run for cover. But then she lifted her head, matched her sibling’s sarcastic tone. ‘Good to see you are also back to your despicable self, Tiri.’
‘I am touched by your concern. Perhaps we will find time for a coffee sometime soon, enjoy a little sightseeing while I am in London.’
‘There is only one sight I wish to see.’
Ouch. I could feel the hatred, filling the room with a red mist. Tiri however didn’t seem fazed.
‘Oh come, Zana. Always so hostile. Perhaps you are becoming more human than I realized.’
‘You’ll never know what it means to be human, sister.’
‘Perhaps not. But talking of Madeline, how are you my dear?’
My turn to speak then. I could just see Tiri’s smiling face through the shuttle’s windshield, twenty feet away from what was the window. The bridge lights were on, my favorite queen making sure she could be seen. Peroni the delicate wallflower sat in the seat to her left, glaring evils at me. Somehow, that gave me strength… maybe because I knew she couldn’t get her iron grip around me right then.
‘Oh, I’m fighting fit, my queen. A couple more days for my feet to mend, and you’ll hear my heels clunking ominously on the floor of your parlour. Looking forward to catching up, Tiri.’
I could feel the distain. ‘As am I, Madeline. There is much to talk about. I am sorry your feet have suffered, your trek through the forest must have been painful.’
‘You know what they say, your highness. The pleasure of getting away from you was worth every bit of the pain of getting away from you.’
‘You don’t mean that.’ For a second her voice faltered. I’d got to her. With perhaps the only weapon I had to fight with… the green-eyed jealousy that consumed her because her sister had something she wanted.
Me.
The falter didn’t last long, of course. And neither did our cozy chat. ‘However, there is much to do. I will bid you good day. Please take care, both of you. I’ll be in touch soon…’
The shuttle began to back away. And then it vanished, as Tiri switched the cloak back on.
She’d made her point. She didn’t need to be seen anymore. Until the next time.
Jane slumped back into her chair. ‘What the hell was that?’ She looked devastated, and I knew then Tiri’s display of defiance had created just the effect she wanted.
If a hardened detective could look like her world had come to an end, how would the rest of the population react?
Coop looked wide-eyed at Zana. ‘How the fuck did she know where you were?’
She seemed as dumbfounded as the rest of us. ‘I have no idea. My pendant is powered off. But my sister has her ways.’
Duncan Scott shook his head, gazed out thoughtfully through the non-existent window. ‘Well Zana, I will say one thing. Your sister certainly has balls.’
The broken glass crunched beneath her feet as she joined him. ‘My sister lacks many desirable characteristics, Mr. Scott, but bravery isn’t one of them. She is fearless.’
‘Hmm…’ He removed his gold-rimmed spectacles and cleaned them. They didn’t need it, but I was coming to know it was something he did when he was working out how to take back control. He replaced them over his piggy eyes, and did just that.
‘Well folks, that was… interesting. If not exactly unexpected. But now, as you are all well aware, it has added a new element to the situation. The existence of aliens in London is no longer a secret. We are now in damage limitation mode, to try and avoid widespread chaos turning into anarchy.’
Jane pulled herself together. ‘What do you want me to do, Duncan?’
‘Go to your superiors, right now. Tell them everything, I will back you up. The Met and DIAL must work together to find the alien men before they can inflict more suffering. However, we must keep their true intentions under wraps as long as we can. Once the news of that breaks,
any human who looks even slightly different to the norm will be lynched. And then anarchy will rule for sure.’
Jane nodded, struggled to get to her feet on legs that didn’t seem to want to work. Scott put a concerned hand on Zana’s shoulder. ‘You ok?’ She nodded, he looked at me. ‘And you?’
‘Oh, I’m used to Tiri playing the drama queen… as well as an actual queen. She doesn’t faze me.’
‘Glad to hear it. Zana, give Coop and Miles every scrap of intel you know that might be at all relevant. Everything, you understand?’
She nodded silently again. Coop glanced to Scott. ‘What’s your next move, sir?’
He threw me a momentary glance, which for some odd reason made my heart beat a little harder. ‘I will be gone for two hours. On my return we’ll sit down for a council of war. But first, Madeline and I have an urgent meeting to attend. Which, given very recent events, has to take place now.’ He headed to the door. ‘Come along, agent.’
Oh fuck. This is it.
I saw Zana look at me with sad eyes, smile a weak smile.
She knew.
At the door Scott glanced back. ‘Oh, and gentlemen, call the glaziers please.’
Chapter 141
A black Jaguar was waiting for us at the front entrance of the MI6 building. The driver opened the door for me, and I sank into the sumptuous rear seat feeling like the criminal I was. Duncan Scott dropped into the seat beside me, and spoke to the driver. ‘Same destination as yesterday please, Mike.’
I was beginning to understand the mind-numbing dread some of the victims of the old me must have felt for the few seconds they had to know their fate, before I made it a reality.
It wasn’t a nice feeling.
But at least they only had a moment in time. For me it was a car ride to… where?’
‘Sir, where are we going please?’
The voice was contrite, small. Suddenly I felt about two inches tall.
His damn face gave nothing away. ‘To decide your fate, Madeline. You’ll know soon enough.’
That’s really not helping, Scott.
‘Sir…’
Whether it was the pleading, desperate tone in my voice, or the pleading, desperate look in my eyes, I couldn’t be sure, but he sighed deeply. ‘Madeline, in these extraordinary circumstances there is only one person on the planet who can decide what happens to you. That is where we are going now, to meet her. But please, I have important calls to make.’ He pulled out his phone, and said no more.
Her? Where the hell was he taking me? There wasn’t a lot of point asking, he wasn’t going to give. I had no choice but to sit back and enjoy the ride through the streets of London.
Sure.
I might be heading to hell, but it was matched by the hell of getting there. Every vehicle in the city was on the streets, most of them stationary. Maybe it just seemed like it.
It sure felt like it.
I’d not expected such a long journey. Buckingham Palace wasn’t that far away, and if I was about to have an audience with the queen… the English one… we weren’t going in the right direction. Did the monarchy still have the power to condemn murderers to the gallows? Maybe not.
Number Ten Downing Street was in the opposite direction too, so I wasn’t being brought up before the Prime Minister to be given my punishment.
Was the head of the movement to bring back hanging a woman?
Ok Madeline, stop with the crazy thoughts. You’ve not been given a concrete boot and flung into a quiet reach of the Thames.
I said stop it.
We were heading east on the A2, the traffic lighter since we’d left the city behind. Where was he taking me? The man seemed oblivious to the torture he was inflicting on me, chatting away on his phone to very important people.
I got the feeling though he wasn’t oblivious at all. Maybe this was the first segment of my punishment.
As usual, he’d got that dead right.
We left the main road, drove alone wide, tree-lined streets. Bexleyheath; not a bad place to live if you could afford it. It didn’t make much difference to the abject terror turning my stomach into a boxing ring for butterflies.
But then I didn’t have to wait any longer to know our destination. We turned off the road, and through the stone-built entranceway of the Four Pines Nursing Home.
What?
Mike the driver dutifully opened the door, and I climbed out onto the graveled forecourt, looked up to the four storey Elizabethan building with its leaded windows and stone casements, which seemed to tower menacingly over me.
Was the nursing home just a front, hiding a much more sinister retirement home for rogue secret agents who knew too much?
Shut up.
‘Come along,’ said Duncan Scott matter-of-factly, led me through wide stained-oak entrance doors into the elegant foyer. It looked like a real nursing home, one or two nurse-like people wandering around, and a couple of elderly residents sitting in armchairs next to a roaring log fire.
The smiling receptionist seemed to know my executioner. ‘Good morning, Mr. Scott.’ She indicated a door in the far wall. ‘She’s in the private sitting room, waiting for you.’
Who is?
Still my infuriating boss wasn’t giving anything away, walked over to the door and ushered me inside like a lamb to the slaughter.
It was a very nice slaughterhouse. A high ceiling with ornate plaster coving and a gold chandelier topped off creamy-yellow walls. Two floor-to-ceiling windows with thick drapes held back on brass holders allowed the winter sun to stream in.
A couple of expensive-looking cream sofas sat facing each other on a floral-patterned Axminster carpet, an old oak coffee table positioned between them. A silver tray sat on it, an antique china teapot with matching cups and saucers completing the time-capsule ambience.
An elderly lady sitting on one of the sofas looked round as we entered, gave us a warm smile. And finally Duncan Scott introduced me to the woman who it seems held my destiny in her hands.
‘Madeline, I’d like you to meet Grace Mitchell.’
Mitchell? Somewhere in the back of my mind, that name rang a vague bell. I couldn’t put a face to the name, but then the kind-looking Grace made everything crystal clear.
‘It’s good to meet you, my dear. Mr. Scott tells me you were the one who murdered my grandson. Tea?’
Chapter 142
‘Where is he taking her, Coop?’ Zana’s words were hesitant, almost whispered.
He raised frustrated hands from his sides. ‘Hell only knows. He’s not said a word to me… not that he had the time, given your sister’s party-games.’
‘I am sorry. She was never shy at coming forward.’
‘Yeah,’ said Miles. ‘And she doesn’t like using the door either.’ He saw the desolate look on her face, put an arm around her. ‘You ok?’
‘No. I do not know what to do, Miles, and that is not a nice feeling.’
‘Tell me about it,’ said Coop.
They’d left the devastation of the conference room, regrouped in Scott’s office. Raised higher off the floor so the boss could watch the action below him, the huge operations room below them was full of techies, monitoring virtually every part of London.
Virtually every employee DIAL had were at their posts, watching out for any suspicious activity, but Coop was all too aware that that on its own would never be enough to nullify the threat. He turned away from the big windows, slumped into the boss’s chair behind the big silver desk.
‘How the fuck do we find eight aliens who don’t want to be found, and look just like humans?’
Zana gave him a wry smile. ‘That isn’t quite true. The chances are most of them will look the same as me.’
‘But I thought…’
‘Only a small percentage of us can transform, Coop… morph, as you put it. It is a puzzle of Calanduran life that even our genetic scientists have never been able to solve. Even within the same family, only one or two members have that ability. I h
ave it, my sister does not. Of the three remaining females on her shuttle, only the girl you… Madeline knew as Lisa, can transform.’ Her eyes lowered, the pain in her heart showing on her face. ‘Her real name is Azola.’
Coop knew he had to ease her away from that train of thought. ‘But all of your original cell looked human?’
‘They were chosen not just because of their knowledge of biogenetics, but also because they could transform.’
Miles was thinking forward. ‘So given the panic on the ship when they realized it was disintegrating, with so little time only those closest to the escape pods could have made it out, so there’s no way they can all morph.’
‘Not a chance. If we take an average, less than twenty percent of Calandurans can transform, so by default only two of the males now in London can morph. Maybe even just the one.’
Coop leant his elbows in the desktop. ‘That’s both good and bad shit. It means if we find one, we’ll know for sure we have. But the downside is the ones who look like aliens will be holed up somewhere, well hidden. They ain’t got no friends, so there’s only one choice. You any idea how many disused buildings there are in this damn city? How the hell are we gonna smoke them out?’
Miles nodded. ‘And before they violate any more women. Zana, fill us in with all you can about your people… any bloody thing that might be a weakness.’
She shook her head despairingly. ‘We are so much like you. We can breathe your air, eat your food, drink the water… one reason your planet was so attractive to us. Apart from our outward appearance, there are very few differences. Nothing that can be called an inherent weakness.’
Coop stood up, walked thoughtfully to the window, unseeing eyes watching the technicians milling around below him. ‘There is one thing we might be able to use, something only we know about. In a couple of hours, every cop in the country will be on the hunt for alien rapists, and that’s a lot more manpower than DIAL can muster. So combing the streets and buildings is pretty much covered. We need to concentrate on the other side of the coin, and the one thing we know the rest of the world doesn’t.’