“Danny?” Ro sat up, and so did her cell-mate. “What are you doing?” his sister asked.
“What does it look like I’m doing? I’m getting you out.”
“You’ll get in deep shit.”
“And?”
“They might shoot you.”
Danny stopped and looked at her. “I say again – and?”
She gave a crooked smile. “Just checking. Bruv.” She looked at her cell-mate. “You coming?”
The kid stood. “What about the others?”
“I’ve unlocked all the cells,” Danny said, looking him up and down. “You’re the one they got yesterday over near Canary Wharf, aren’t you?”
“Er yeah, that’s me. Olly.”
“Danny.” Danny looked at his sister. “Ro, help me get the other doors open. We’ve only got a few minutes. We need to get everybody out, and to the APVs.” He looked at Olly again. “DedSec, right? Means you know computers and that?”
Olly frowned. “Yeah?”
“Merry Christmas.” Danny tossed him Hattersley’s Optik. The lad caught it with a dawning look of glee. “Think you can make use of this?”
“Oh yeah.”
“Good.” Danny joined Ro in opening the cells. “Everyone out, we don’t have much time.” There weren’t many left – a dozen. Not all of them were DedSec. “Right, people! This is a prison break.” He ignored the barrage of questions, the suspicious looks, and said, “If you want to come, follow us, or stay here – don’t matter to me.”
“Where are we going?” Ro asked.
“APVs at the back. We get one of them moving, we can get out of here.” He gestured. “Everyone follow me. Be quick. We’ve only got a few minutes at most…”
An alarm began to blare. Danny turned.
“Scratch that. Let’s go!”
It took Olly a few moments to crack the encryption on the Optik and download his customised app suite. By the time he was up and running again, alarms were going off. He looked at Ro. “Your brother isn’t exactly the stealthy sort, is he?”
“Danny’s more of a door kicker.” She looked at her brother. He was up ahead, leading the way. “This is your plan? We run?”
“Technically, we’re driving,” Danny called back. “The APVs are just up ahead. We just need to – shit!” He leapt back as shots pinged off the metal grating around them. People dropped flat, yelling or screaming. Half-crouched, Danny swung his weapon around and up, returning fire. At first Olly couldn’t tell what he was shooting at. Then he heard the tell-tale whine of motors.
The bulky shape of a riot drone hurtled by overhead. As it sped along, it dropped smoke canisters. Coloured haze filled the air, making it all but impossible to see. People were coughing, crouched against the sides of the corridor. Through blurring vision, Olly recognised one of them. “Krish?” he coughed.
“Fam, that you?” Krish grabbed him by the shoulders. “Shit, man, I thought they’d wasted you!” He pulled Olly close, nearly cracking his ribs in a hug.
Olly pushed him away. “Good to see you too.” He looked up as Danny made his way back to them. “What’s going on up there?”
“Riot drones. Three of them – one up ahead is armed. Rubber bullets, but that doesn’t mean shit close as it is. Between us and the APVs. Other two are spotters. They’ll pop smoke and keep us corralled while the response team closes in.” He looked at Olly. “You do anything about that, DedSec?”
“Depends on whether this system is running on cTOS,” Olly said. He held up the Optik, squinting at the screen through the stinging smoke. He found what he was looking for soon enough. He tapped the screen and there was an echoing clang as every gate in range automatically locked. “Right, that should hold them for a bit.”
“What about the drone?” Ro asked.
Olly shook his head. “Got to be in sight of it. Hard to do anything when it’s shooting at you, though.” He looked at Krish. “Any ideas?”
Krish gestured. “Gimme.” Olly handed him the Optik, and Krish tapped at the screen. Olly blinked as his display was suddenly crowded by multiple visual feeds. “That’s the security feeds for everything in here.” He grinned at Danny. “For a military contractor, Albion don’t know shit about security.”
“Good thing for us,” Olly said. He could see armed men moving through the chain link corridors on all sides. The response team had split up to cover more ground and cut them off. “We’re about to be surrounded. They can open the gates manually. I can lock them again, but it’s not going to stop them for long.”
“Then we’ll have to fight.” Danny handed his sister a pistol.
“Now we’re talking,” she said, as she checked the weapon’s magazine.
Olly shook his head. “Maybe not. Gimme your Optik.”
Danny looked at him. “What? Why?”
“I can take out the other two drones while Krish keeps the response team pinned down. That leaves the last drone for you two. Think you can handle that?”
Danny looked at his sister. “He for real?”
“Must be if you locked him up,” she said. “Give it to him. I don’t give us good odds otherwise.” She started pushing her way towards the front. Danny handed over his Optik and followed. Olly took it and looked at Krish.
“Right. You know what to do?”
Krish nodded. “Think this will work?”
“We’ll see. Just keep them off our back.”
“Yeah, man.” With a tap, Krish activated the sprinkler systems, filling the warehouse with sheets of water. It mixed with the smoke, making a greasy haze on the air. An instant later, the alarms cut out with a strangled squawk.
Olly waited for the drones to come back for a second pass. When one got close enough, he took aim with his Optik and snagged it. A moment later, it was banking left and heading back the way it had come, popping smoke across the warehouse. He took control of the second a few moments later. Through its display, he spied Danny and Ro moving towards the third. It waited for them, hovering in the open space leading to the parked APVs like some malign wasp.
Danny drew its attention, firing short bursts that splashed across its frontal armour like droplets of water. The drone followed his movement, returning fire. Rubber bullets punched into the floor and wall around him. Ro stepped out of the corridor and fired her pistol with more enthusiasm than skill. The drone whipped around, responding to the threat, and Danny took it down, blowing out its motor and sending it hurtling to the floor.
Olly sent the remaining two riot drones back towards the Albion operatives struggling with the gates. Searching the on-board directories, he realised they were armed with tear gas canisters as well as smoke. Grinning, he gave them new orders. He looked at Krish. “Time to leave, bruv.”
“Past time,” Krish said. “I’ve locked them out, but they’re already trying to reset the whole system. More drones coming online as well.”
Between them, they got the rest of the prisoners moving. Danny was already behind the wheel of one of the APVs, and its engine roared to life. Ro had his rifle and was gesturing frantically for everyone to get aboard. Krish headed for the back, and Olly climbed into the front. “What about the doors?” he asked.
“What about them?” Danny asked.
“They’re still shut!”
Danny laughed. “That’s their fucking problem. Rosemary – get your arse in here!”
“Don’t call me that,” she snarled, squeezing in beside Olly. “Everyone is in – let’s go if we’re going to go!”
On his display, Olly saw banks of tear gas filling the makeshift corridors, and Albion operatives coughing and cursing as they shot the hinges off the gates and broke through. Then he was flung back into his seat as Danny threw the APV into motion. As they hurtled towards the doors, Olly tapped at his screen. At his direction, the remaining APVs grumbled to life. They rolled from their berths and sped towards the loading bay doors, alongside the one they’d commandeered but they got there first. Metal buckled and tore as
the armoured vehicles punched through, and out.
Danny followed them a moment later. Olly heard a sound like rain and realised someone was shooting at them. “Hang on,” Danny growled, dragging the APV around and crashing it through a chain link fence and onto a side street. “Where to?” he asked, looking at Olly and Ro.
“You don’t know?” Ro asked, staring at him.
“Hey, I got us out – now pick a direction…”
28: Aftershock
Sarah Lincoln sat in her empty dining room in her Whitechapel home, watching a replay of footage from the mass of raids that had occurred yesterday evening and late into the night. Police officers and Albion operatives – it was hard to tell one from the other in the jerky footage – smashed in doors, dragged out “dangerous subversives”, hauled them towards waiting vans or just clubbed them down in the road in front of the cameras. She finished her coffee and refilled the cup, again.
“Don’t you think you’ve had enough?” Hannah asked, from the doorway.
“No,” Sarah said, softly. Then, “The others?”
“Winston was the last to leave. The streets are in utter chaos.”
“I expect so.” Sarah took another swallow of wine. She finished it, considered having another and then put the glass aside. She stood. “Any word from Jenks?”
“Not yet.”
Sarah had sent Jenks out to find out, well, anything she could. Not that she expected there to be anything. No one seemed to know what the hell was going to happen next, though it was plain that Albion had mobilised in force to flood the streets ahead of the TOAN conference. Mass arrests were being reported. Other private security firms were also vying loudly for the government’s attentions, and Nigel Cass himself was reportedly claiming a great victory for the forces of law and order. He was going to get what he wanted, and there was very little she could do about it right now. Winston and the others were scared into uselessness, and she didn’t blame them.
She was scared too, as scared as she’d ever been in her life. Something monstrous had been let loose and she knew already that getting it back in the bottle would be a titanic struggle.
She wandered out of the dining room, already planning her next move. Or trying to, rather. Her home was a relatively modest terraced house in Varden Street. It had been expensively decorated, by a professional interior designer. She went to the kitchen and looked through the sliding doors at the superbly appointed garden space at the rear of the house. The air was hazy with smoke. The breeze was carrying it east, from the river.
Of late, she had the feeling that there was a hell of a lot going on that she couldn’t perceive. Currents of power were shifting. But to where? And to whom?
“What now?” Hannah asked. She’d followed Sarah, quiet as a mouse.
Her boss studied her. Finally, she cleared her throat and said, “Did they know it was going to happen? Did they… get out?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“We both know that’s not true.”
Hannah turned. “How did you convince Faulkner to let me go?”
Sarah paused. “I… gave him something he wanted.”
“What?”
Sarah studied her assistant. “Why does it matter?”
Hannah met her gaze without flinching. “I think I have a right to know.”
Sarah turned away. “It doesn’t matter now. That particular bullet has been fired.”
Hannah grabbed her arm. Sarah stopped. Looked down. Then looked up at Hannah.
The young woman didn’t let go. “Sometimes I wonder why I stay,” she said, softly. “People ask me all the time how I can work for someone like you.”
Sarah was silent for a moment. “And what do you tell them?” she asked, finally. She fixed Hannah with a cold eye. “What is your answer to that question, Hannah?” She let some of the anger she was feeling creep into her voice. She was angry that Hannah could be so ungrateful. Angry that she was hiding something. But mostly she was angry that everything seemed to be spinning out of control, and there was nothing she could do about it.
Hannah let her go. “I think… I think you mean well. But I think somewhere along the way you forgot why you got into politics. It’s become an end unto itself.”
Sarah stared at her. Then, she laughed, low and long. She shook her head and looked away. Hannah’s words stung. Maybe there was some truth there. Maybe Hannah was just naïve. Both could be true.
“Things are going to get worse now,” Hannah continued. “They’ve been getting pretty bad for a long time, but now…”
“Now the fuse has been lit,” Sarah said. She took a deep breath. “There’s no going back from this. We can only go forward.” She looked back towards the window, trying to decide what sort of politician she was going to be.
A scattering of ash, carried by the breeze, fell over the garden. Decision made, she turned back. “You want to know what I told Faulkner?”
Hannah said nothing. Sarah told her. Then, she turned and left, giving her aide some privacy.
Olly looked out the window of the grimy corner café, watching the new Albion checkpoint being constructed across the street. “This is so bad,” he said. The café was empty, had been closed down for months. According to Ro, it was a Kelley business, now shuttered and just waiting for the day they burned it down in order to collect the insurance money.
The interior smelled like stale coffee grounds and rotten bananas, but it was tolerable. They’d come in the back, looking for a place to wait out the confusion. Unfortunately, things didn’t seem to be getting any better.
Albion was all over the city now. They were looking for something, but Danny couldn’t tell them what. The fugitives had abandoned the APV as soon as possible. Krish and the others had scattered, as per DedSec protocol. Olly had told them he was planning to do the same. And he would, as soon as he found Liz’s killer.
“I can’t believe we’re doing this,” Danny said. “We should be getting out of the city.” He sat across from Olly in the same booth, watching his former comrades in arms set up their checkpoint. His ACR assault rifle was on his lap, concealed under a newspaper, and he was stripping it down and rebuilding it without looking at it. It seemed to soothe him, though it made Olly nervous.
“Feel free,” Ro said. She sat at the counter, her elbows resting on the countertop. She gestured to Olly. “Me and him got unfinished business.”
Olly nodded. “Me and your sis had a good talk while we were banged up. We’re both looking for the same person. And from what she says, maybe you are too.”
Danny grunted. “And who might that be?”
“The bloke going around shooting people with an Albion murder-drone.” Olly watched Danny’s expression change from annoyance to confusion to interest. He looked at his sister.
“Holden,” he said, flatly.
She nodded. “Now we know why your boss killed him.”
“Shit.” Danny sat back, rubbing his mouth. “Faulkner knows. That’s why he had me looking into the death of your pal, Colin.”
Ro nodded. “Colin was the common thread. He’s the one who delivered everything. If anyone knew where this guy was, it was Colin.”
“Every vehicle these days has GPS,” Olly said, looking back and forth between them. “If it hasn’t been tampered with, it’ll have a record of every stop he made.”
“Including wherever he dropped off the drone. Shit.” Danny rubbed his chin. “So where’s the van?” He looked at Ro.
She shook her head. “The night Colin died, they took the van somewhere out of the way, stripped it and set the rest on fire. There’s no way we can get that information now.”
Olly ran his hands over his head, trying to think. There had to be a way. He wished he could call for help. But he knew better than to even try to contact Bagley or anyone else. When a member of DedSec got arrested, they were cut off.
“We know what he was delivering, at least.” He looked meaningfully towards the ho
rizon, where dark smoke still rose in towering columns.
“He wouldn’t have done it knowingly,” Ro said. “Colin was a twat but he wasn’t a murderer.” She knotted her hands together. “Maybe he found out. Maybe that’s why they killed him.”
“I don’t think so,” Danny said. He looked out the window. “I’ve seen shit like this before. Not here, but overseas. Somebody is cleaning up all the loose ends.”
“That includes us now,” Olly said. Everyone fell silent, thinking about this.
Danny gestured. “Yeah. Albion just needed an excuse – an enemy. The best enemies are nebulous, innit?”
“Nebulous?” Ro asked.
“Word-a-day app on my Optik,” Danny said. “Anyway, DedSec can be anything – nobody knows shit about you, right? So if that tosspot Nigel bloody Cass says you lot are terrorists, who’s to say different?”
Olly nodded. “Go on.”
“An enemy is only as good as their actions – nobody cares about propaganda bombs, or street murals. But hacking drones to turn them into sniper devices…” Danny trailed off.
“And then you hire somebody to eliminate the witnesses, so nobody knows the truth.”
“Albion was behind all this?” Ro said, disbelief in her voice. She looked at Danny, but he could only shrug and look away.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I thought…” He trailed off and shook his head. “I was wrong though. What I’ve seen? Yeah, I could believe it.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Olly said. “We need to – wait.” A call-alert had popped up on his display. It was a number he didn’t recognise. He looked at the others, and then, warily, answered. “Hello?”
“Olly?” A young woman’s voice, audibly nervous.
Olly frowned. “Hannah?”
“You’re still alive. Thank goodness. Where are you?”
“I’d rather not say, love.”
Day Zero Page 27