Dark Skies CORONET
Episode 1: Key
(Part one)5thJune 1957,
LondonA tall window silhouetted the man sitting behind the desk. Its curtains lay parted exposing a broken overcast sky above the glistening roofs of Whitehall. On the varnished rosewood desk before him lay an open manila folder holding some typed foolscap pages. Beside it sat a large glass ashtray, a blotting pad, a pewter cigarette box and a carafe of water with a glass tumbler inverted over the top. He turned a few sheets in the manila folder. A startled pigeon fluttered off the windowsill, casting a shadow on the pale ochre walls and across the dark olive filing cabinets with the sepia prints of biplanes perched atop them. Selecting one sheet, he held it in nicotine stained fingers, angling it to the light so that the lines of typed text were visible through the near translucent paper.
Facing him, seated on a plain cane chair, was a young dark haired woman in a pastel blue woolen suit. She sat stiffly, knees pressed together, hands loosely clasping the handbag on her lap. What did the room smell of? Old books, perhaps. An occasional shaft of sunlight would penetrate the room illuminating mote sized spangles turning in the slightly musty air.
In the corridor outside, this place seemed so busy, vital; an air of almost urgency prevailed beyond the door as if this were the heart of some great and vigorous industrial enterprise. People moved quickly and resolutely, crisp voices could be heard, occasional laughter, footsteps cracked with purpose on the hard floors and in the stairwells. Lifts rose and descended, gates shunted and clattered. But the heavy oak door sealed that away from the stillness in here. It was, she thought, like a room embalmed.
The man gave a faint dry cough.
How old is he, she wondered. Fifty-five? Sixty?
More important, who is he? Certainly not a senior RAF staff officer, not in uniform for a start.
She had been expecting … what? Someone younger, certainly a representative of her chosen career … It was bad enough coming down to London for your first ever job interview but on top of that there was this bizarre carry-on. Where was the interviewing panel? A friend had told her she would be facing one and she had been anticipating it, rehearsing answers to imagined questions all the way down on the train this morning.
What was the problem? Was there something wrong? All he’d said when she walked into the room was for her to sit. Nothing else for the past ten minutes. What’s going on, she thought? What’s he playing at?
Closing the folder, he removed his spectacles and pushed the chair back slightly allowing her to see his features more clearly. The face was strong and lean, heavily lined and with receding iron grey hair. It was dominated by a hook nose protruding like a beak between thin lips and thick, wiry eyebrows. But it was the eyes that shook her. Immensely sad eyes, large and dark and tired; eyes that had seen more grief and horror than was ample for a man.
“You’ve been very patient, Miss Black,” he said, the voice quiet and slightly hoarse. He coughed again, harder. “Excuse me.” Then he took a large crumpled handkerchief from a pocket in his dark brown jacket. He turned and coughed into it a few more times, then sniffed and pushed the handkerchief back. Once again he said, “Excuse me.” Then took a deep breath and went on, “This is very impressive.” He tapped the folder with a bony forefinger. “Your teachers speak highly of you and your academic record is… exceptional.”
She wasn’t sure whether or not he wanted her to say something. Her stomach was trembling and this indecision was making matters no better. If she spoke it would probably be a string of silly pointless words. So she pursed her lips and said nothing.
After a few moments she saw a small crooked smile flit across his thin mouth. He continued. “You are looking for a career in the Royal Air Force, hmmmm… I suppose that’s understandable enough. Your father was an exceptional man.”
My father! She thought. Why did they have to dig into all that? Can’t people leave well alone?
“But you’d much rather be judged on your own merits, I imagine.”
She cleared her throat and replied, “Yes, sir, I would, er - I’m afraid I don’t know your name, sir.”
“And you might never have the very dubious privilege of knowing it, young lady. That depends on the outcome of today.”
Somewhat confused, she sat back in the chair. Evidently he was waiting for her next words.
She could feel a swell of anger in her chest as suspicions she had been suppressing reared up, leering. She said, “Then I’m not being interviewed for a position in the Woman’s Royal Air Force, am I? This has something to do with, what? Espionage of some sort?”
He laughed. It was a surprisingly soft and gentle laugh. “My oh my, but we are quick on the uptake and … forthright are we not? An observation made by your old tutor, Doctor Roy, I notice.” So saying he flicked open the manila folder once again and extracted a typed sheet. “A double first in maths and astronomy, post-graduate work in astrodynamics. Something of a luminary in the student debates as well. Committee member of the student union board. Very social, very … interested in people. That’s some of what it says here.”
“I don’t recall asking Dr. Roy for a reference,” she said, feeling slightly uncomfortable.
“You didn’t, of course. We did.”
“Perhaps you should know that I was invited to … how was it put, now … Make observations on my fellow students, while I was at university? Look out for radicals and troublemakers, that kind of thing. I rejected the offer. A career move to MI5 was not what I had in mind for my future. It still isn’t.”
He nodded, “Had you accepted it, I doubt very much we would be having this conversation. You feel a greater loyalty towards your fellow man - and woman - than to any flag, or religion or political creed. Am I correct, Rebecca? Ah, I’m sorry. May I call you Rebecca?”
She took a deep breath and shrugged and reached into the lacquered red handbag. Her fingers were trembling but she hid this by burying them in its interior. “May I smoke?”
The man leaned forward and nudged the pewter box across the table. “Please, have one of these.”
So, instead of hiding her shakes she would have to display them under his scrutiny as she fumbled with the lid. She decided against it and stood and picked up the cigarette box, removed a cigarette and placed the box back on the desktop.
“A light?” She asked.
He stood and extended an American style flip top lighter with a ragged banner of yellow flame.
She inhaled and stepped back and he spoke, ‘For over twenty years now Her Majesty’s Government has been aware that creatures from another world are present on this planet of ours. Their intentions are not exactly benevolent, so our relations with them are less than cordial …’
She slumped into the chair, spluttering and coughing, her eyes watering.
‘However their technical and scientific powers are superior to our own, immeasurably so. As I’m sure you can imagine, this does not help our efforts to contain them. We are also trying to contain these facts from the public at large. Mass panic is quite awful, I assure you.’
‘What?’ she finally croaked. ‘What are you talking about?’
Wiping away the tears from her cheek she suddenly felt her face growing hot as anger rose in her throat. ‘Is this some kind of game?’ she said, keeping her voice controlled, sharp but not loud. ‘Exactly what is going on here? And just who are you? What is your rank - ’
‘No, Rebecca,’ his quiet cracked voice rolled over hers silencing it with ease. He was shaking the his long narrow head. ‘No games, I assure you. This is serious, my dear; quite deadly serious.’
It took just a few seconds to compose herself. Then she said, ‘You expect me to believe that there are … Martians or something walking about out there in the streets?’
His smile was lop-sided and tired. ‘They’re not Martians. That much we do know. My understanding is that they don’t come from any of the worlds in our Solar System. They’re from far beyond even them, from some other distant star with its own brood of planets.’
‘Nonsense,’ she snapped. Her breath was coming much faster now, the rage rising higher. ‘That is arrant nonsense. I don’t know what’s going on here, but I am going home.’ So saying she stood, leaned forward and ground out the almost complete cigarette in the large glass ashtray.
‘Rebecca - ’
‘You may call me Miss Black. In fact you may call me Doctor Black! Yes, I do have a post-graduate degree in astrodynamics and I can tell you, as an expert, that right now flying to the planets is all but Dan Dare fantasy stuff and any talk of flying between the stars is the havering of a lunatic!’
She turned and strode to the coat-stand by the door and took down her navy raincoat.
He continued. ‘Ten thousand years ago we didn’t even have the wheel. As we speak the Americans are preparing to put an artificial moon into the sky; it will travel round the whole world once every hour and a half. Ten thousand years from now we may well be preparing to go to the stars…’
‘But not right at this minute,’ she said placing her bag on the seat and thrusting an arm into a sleeve.
‘Dr. Black, use that mathematical brain of which your mentor speaks so highly. If the universe is twenty thousand million years old, as many suspect, and intelligent life began appearing say only during the past one percent of that time, then roughly how far advanced on us would such space-people be - all things being equal?’
She stopped, hand on the door, bag under her arm, to button the coat.
‘I’ll answer that question myself, shall I?’ His voice never raised, never menaced or commanded. It stayed dry and quiet, delicate and brittle like autumn leaves. ‘Tens, perhaps hundreds of millions of years beyond our current state. Think upon that …’
Without so much as bothering to close the door behind her, Dr. Rebecca Black strode off down the corridor, leaving his arid tones stirring the air in her wake.
The Formica had a mosaic pattern of tiny multi-shaded yellow brown triangles which looked almost random. If she put her mind to it, she could work out the repeat structure across the small table. There would be a repeat. The universe was structured. Rebecca Black believed that. She placed her cup on the table and set herself down in the corner chair facing out towards the door of the café or ‘coffee bar’ as it was styled.
The phone call to Mum, relaying the bad news had been an ordeal she could well have done without but she knew her mother would be sitting by the phone in the hall of the family’s big rambling flat in Glasgow’s Kelvinbridge, waiting and waiting. It had to be done. When she pushed her way out of the phone box, Becky had started walking aimlessly through the West End.
She had found this place a few hundred yards from Piccadilly Circus. The rich coffee smell had distracted her from the chaotic thoughts tumbling relentlessly through her mind, thoughts persistently drawn back to that terrible interview two hours earlier, if indeed it had been an interview at all.
What had all that been about? Thinking on it still gave her a jolt like a small electric shock. Going over everything step by step she tried to pinpoint where things had gone off the rails. The advertisement in the Sunday Express had been for the Women’s Royal Air Force. When she received the reply it had been on what appeared to be official stationery. She had phoned to confirm her appointment and been connected to a proper switchboard. Then there was the woman she had spoken to, the officer in recruitment.
It all was so … ordinary; so real and normal and unexceptional. Once again she opened her bag, removed the letter and unfolded it.
Again, the stationery was apparently official. The writing gave no clue as to who would be present. She was merely asked to attend an interview. It gave no other information apart from a room number. The signature at the bottom was a squiggle -Wing Commander something or other - and the name was not typed in below it. Perhaps that had been an indicator that something was amiss? Yet when she reported to the reception desk, she was expected. The receptionist had scanned down a sheet of names attached to a clipboard, found hers, scored it off and given her directions to the interview room.
It made no sense. Well, one thing did. That man, whoever he had been, was nothing to do with the WRAF!
A new tune burst from the jukebox, Bill Haley’s two-year old ‘Rock Around the Clock’ a perennial favourite with the ‘Teddy-Boys’. Two of them started dancing, jiving, in the other corner. One wore a bright red suit with black velvet collar and trim, black ribbon tie over a frilly salmon shirt and his dirty-blond hair stacked high and wavy, arms and legs thrashing out, feet shod in the inch-thick crepe soled shoes everyone referred to as brothel creepers. He can’t dance for toffee, Rebecca thought, but what enthusiasm!
She smiled, chuckled to herself.
At the table beside her sat two middle-aged women ignoring the world around them and talking intensely between sips of steaming tea, shopping bags at their feet. One of the women had her shoes kicked off, one foot massaging the other. They were talking about boxing of all things! About Sugar Ray Robinson and Gene Fullmer! Rebecca suppressed a grin.
A broad built man in a pilot style leather jacket came through the door, bought cigarettes at the counter, and carried his cappuccino over to a free table. The Italian espresso coffee served here was black and sweet and very good and this place was vibrant with youthful good feeling, laughter, colour and of course music. It had a pulsing reality a million miles away from the lunacy of the afternoon.
Beings from other worlds were the stuff of comic strips like ‘Jeff Hawke’ in the Daily Express or radio serials like ‘Journey into Space’. They were an entertainment, a fiction, nothing more.
Not that there was anything particularly crazy about spaceflight. From her very first day at Glasgow University, listening to Professor Roy describing the dynamics of the heavens she had determined to focus on her father’s dream. It was rational. Fifty years ago the very first crude powered aeroplanes were taking to the air and today jets flew through the skies faster than sound. Her working life would be dedicated to developing flight beyond the Earth. She used to be called her Daddy’s little tomboy. What she was going to do was bring his great vision to reality.
‘Fancy a dance, my lovely?’
She looked up. It was the Teddy-Boy in red. Up close she realised he couldn’t be more than sixteen, seventeen at most. She smiled and shook her head, ‘I’ve had a hard day and I really am tired but it’s great watching you and your friends.’
‘Well well well - an Irish colleen, is it? Good at accents, I am. Okay, but listen I made a bundle on the Derby today. What about an ice-cream to celebrate?’
‘Well … thank you very much, yes. That would be nice and … congratulations!’
‘Nothin’ to it when you know the gee-gees like I do, darlin’. Oi, Freddy! Knickerbocker glory for the lady in the corner over ‘ere. My treat. Put an extra one of those stupid little paper umbrellas in it! You hear?’
There was general laughter. He was going round table to table buying ice creams for every one of the women and girls in the café. His generosity spread even more warmth and good cheer amongst the customers.
Two men in business suits sat just inside the door. Their pale macintoshes and dark bowler hats were on the coat-stand beside them. One was reading, his face obscured by an Evening Standard with a front-page follow-up story on the detonation of Britain's first H-Bomb a few weeks earlier. The other man, balding and bespectacled, was glancing at her. He twitched his eyes away and quickly lifted the briefcase from between his legs, opened it and dug out a twenty packet of Senior Service. She thought the two of them looked about as out of place as fish heads in a sherry trifle.What if they had something to do with that strange man, the interviewer? What if he’d had her followed? She sighed and shook her head. This was becoming an obsession. If she didn’t do something to distract herself she’d wind up thinking about it all night, her imagination completely running riot as well. Rebecca opened the copy of the Spectator she’d purchased that afternoon in Euston station. It was still fairly early, half past six. If there was a decent review of a show or a play she might have time to take it in before making her way back to the hotel. Hopefully that might do the trick. With any luck that Audrey Hepburn film ‘Funny Face’ might be on somewhere. Fred Astaire was in it and she adored them both.
There were some other articles of interest; the IRA on the rise in Ulster; how MacMillan was shaping up as Prime Minister; the coming sunset of the British Empire with the independence of the Gold Coast.
By the time she had finished the large colourful ice-cream dessert and her second coffee, it was coming up on seven o’clock - just over half an hour until the curtain went up on the show she’d chosen. Folding the magazine she pushed the tall raspberry-smeared glass aside, the long handled spoon tinkling within. Standing, buttoning her coat, lifting her handbag she turned …
They were still there.
The two business men were still seated by the door. The one whom she’d caught looking her way was now taking his turn at reading the paper. In an instant she realised that they were not merely sitting there, not simply sipping mugs of tea; they were waiting. Waiting for what, for whom?
A slight shower started just as she stepped past them, through the door and towards the kerb. She looked back over her shoulder to see if they were moving, peering round after her … and collided with someone who had just sprinted across the road. The young man stumbled back into the traffic, narrowly missing a taxi, the driver shouting abuse.
‘Oh, heavens, I’m sorry, so sorry!’ Rebecca blurted as he skipped back onto the pavement. ‘My fault. What a fool I am!’
‘Becky?’ said the young man, looking round as he picked his fallen hat from the gutter. ‘What in the name of God are you doing here?’
‘Jammy?’ she gasped.
He grinned and threw his arms round her. Jamal Faisal had been one of her student crowd up until last year when he graduated and left Glasgow for a job in the oil industry. All the girls had fancied him, most quite a lot. Rebecca was no exception. But none had captured him and here he was in London, standing with his arms about her in the rain, that familiar blaze of white teeth in the strong-boned olive face, those liquid chocolate eyes gazing down into hers. Maybe this trip wasn’t going to turn out a complete disaster after all.
‘…and, after Christmas it was six months in Tehran. Now that’s over so I’m back for a few weeks. Rumour has it I’ll be spending the rest of the year either in New York or Amsterdam.’ Jamal was bubbling with news and clearly excited to see her again.
They had skipped. Laughing, across the puddle strewn pavements and roadways to a small Greek restaurant situated, appropriately, in Greek Street.
‘Tehran!’ she grinned. ‘And now Amsterdam, my God! They’re grooming you, Jammie. ‘Dropped you on the fast track to the top, I’d say.’
‘I live in eternal hope,’ he intoned with mock piety. ‘But what’s really exciting is that I might have a chance to go to Alaska. There’s a lot of activity up in the Kenai Peninsula. Fancy myself a bit as Nanook of the North!’
He chuckled, then sighed. ‘On the other hand, President Eisenhower’s trying to push money into Middle Eastern countries to stop their oil falling into communist hands. That probably means the Americans will foot the bill for Standard Oil and BP and Shell and so forth to explore for more oil on behalf of the Middle East governments. That might put me back out there indefinitely!’
‘Hmm, Jammy, I wouldn’t talk too loudly about that. Remember, Eisenhower’s paranoia about commies in the Middle East is exactly what stopped him backing us last year when Nasser nationalised the Suez Canal, declared it Egyptian property despite the fact that Britain and France had purchased that land and built the damn canal in the first place. When we sent in the troops, the Americans totally froze us out. No financial backing for us; no oil from the Land of the bloody Free either. Anthony Eden had to resign as Prime Minister in January if you recall. Ike is not the most popular US President in these sceptred isles!’
‘Ah, yes, of course. So… what about you, then?’ he asked quickly, changing what was obviously a sensitive subject. ‘Still hoping to send rocketships to the planets?’
Plates and cutlery were suddenly set on the red white gingham tablecloth in a flurry of attendance. A serving platter of dolmades, stuffed olive leaves brushed with oil, was placed on the table before them. The herb rich aroma was mouth-watering. She selected one and bit into it carefully, the crumbling delicacy erupting intensely under her tongue.
Still chewing, Rebecca shrugged. It took a moment to swallow and then she sighed. ‘Well, I had an interview here today, as I mentioned. It wasn’t good. I think it was some kind of stupid slap in the face, but a very official slap in the face – the bureaucrats letting me know in what esteem they hold the prospect of a woman space scientist.’
‘Really. They rebuffed you? But didn’t you say you got a double first?’
She dabbed her mouth with a napkin and finished off the morsel.
‘Oh, yes,’ she said with a full mouth. ‘I have a doctorate astrodynamics from Glasgow but down here that and a first class honours degree in maths and astronomy is evidently only regarded as a decoration on a woman. Like a brooch or a new hat!’
‘What happened?’ His hand stretched forward and gripped hers. It was warm and dry and squeezed comfortingly.
She quickly outlined her meeting with the man in the Air Ministry, her anger resurrecting as she did so.
`Wow,’ he said.
‘I’ve never never been so damn humiliated! They might at least have saved me the bloody fare. They just had to say no they weren’t interested. Would that have been so hard?’ She slumped back in her seat, the rage subsiding with her mood. Now she felt exhausted and worn. There was a pause filled with a swell of vigorous bazuki music.
Jamal frowned and leaned forward, placing his elbows on the table and making a tent of his fingers.
‘Seriously?’ he said. What was it flickered over his face? Dismay? Incredulity? He gave a little half laugh and immediately apologised. ‘I… I’m sorry, Becky. It’s just so… surreal. A chap from the Air Ministry saying there Martians knocking about the place. Good grief! Did he mean, well, like down here? London?’
She nodded. ‘I think so. Oh, I mean who knows? Who cares? It wasn’t meant to be taken seriously. It was a message. They were slapping me down, hard and fast.’
Jamal beamed suddenly, a sparkle reborn in his eyes. He smiled, ‘Hey, just hang on there. Unless I’m mistaken you once told me that there might be life on Mars. One very drunken night at a party off Byres Road. Or did I dream it?’
Rebecca sighed. The sour discomfort of the whole affair had returned. A happy carefree evening with her old pal was what she wanted. This was far from happy.
‘Look,’ she said, ‘I’d really rather just forget about the whole thing. It was a bad episode and I just want to put it behind me and get on with things.’
He nodded. ‘Good thinking, Becky. Any alternative plans?’
She shrugged. ‘Don’t really know what to do now. I mean if I’d gone into the RAF for post-doctoral research, I’d’ve been able to push the specs for anti-aircraft missiles and sounding rockets. Push and push and change policy. Start them thinking about orbital bases. The day of the Royal Navy will soon be over, Jammy. To keep the Commonwealth secure we need half a dozen orbital bases. That’s all. From them we can drop troops, equipment to any part of the world in minutes and run air strikes with high velocity aircraft. We could have them up before 1970 if we have the political will and - ’ She stopped. ‘But it’s never going to happen now, is it?’
‘There have to be other options. What about this steerable radio telescope Manchester University’s been putting together at Jodrell Bank?’
She grinned without much humour and said, ‘Me doing radio astronomy would be rather like you doing, what, building electronic computers? Not my area of expertise.’
‘I see. Well … who else is there?’
‘Only the Americans,’ she said. ‘They’re doing something for the International Geophysical Year. Putting a small satellite up.’
‘Ah,’ he said. ‘Of course, the dreaded Yanks! They were mixed up in what happened to your father, right?’
She nodded slowly. Waiters appeared with their main courses but she was no longer hungry; the rest of her dolmades sat untouched on the plate. The old darkness was returning.
It was 1950 again. Again she was walking home from school with her friends and there were the three black cars parked in front of her house, sitting at an odd angle with the driver’s side wheels up on the pavement and she knew…
The front page of the next morning’s Scottish Daily Express was headlined
BRITISH ROCKET-PLANE EXPLODES
DR RANALD BLACK DIES
Two pictures below. One showed the smiling face of her father, hair caught in the wind. Beside it the explosion, the flame cloud with debris trails feathering out in all directions.Rebecca poured herself a measure from the glass jug of iced water on the table. She sipped and then she spoke.
‘My father had a company, Alba Aero Engineering. He designed and built an incredible air-breathing rocket engine. It was sabotaged – although no one has ever said so openly. And most people assume that I only say this because I’m his daughter. But I have my reasons. There was an American company that was intensely interested in his work on the jet-rocket. They even had a few representatives at the test flight. Immediately the accident happened that company vanished. In fact it closed up its offices in Dayton, Ohio, the evening before the test flight. Disappeared in a puff of blue smoke as they say. Yet its people stayed around long enough to watch the test fail. But when we turned around to ask what they thought had gone wrong, well they were gone too. Really gone. As if they had never ever existed. When the investigators arrived and went to go through my father’s things they found his workshop had been ransacked. The safe had been forced. The thieves had taken the drawings, plans, schematics, notebooks... Everything was gone. Everything…’ her voice trailed off into silence and she lowered her head.
Jamal cleared his throat and said, ‘Well, er, I can understand why you might not be overzealous about taking a job across the Atlantic…’
A tear dropped from her downturned face to the tablecover.
His hand came forward, the back of it caressing her wet cheek. ‘Looks like I’m a failure as the Great Lothario, Becky.’
She gave a small laugh and a sniff and pressed his hand to her face, leaning on it. His skin was dry, warm and scented faintly with cologne.
Abruptly she stiffened.
‘What is it?’ Jamal asked.
She frowned. What was it? The thought or memory or whatever it was she had glimpsed had slipped away like a fast trout through her hands.
‘Oh, nothing. I’m just being a ghastly companion,’ she said, straightening up, sitting back.
‘Right. I say we drown our sorrows,’ said Jamal and ordered a bottle of white retsina.
And so the night wore on and the hurt wore off. The wine fuelled their determination to shrug off the bleak world beyond and this they proceeded to do with a vengeance. They laughed, they sang, the waiters broke plates and they all danced. As midnight approached the world was somewhat askew but a much happier place, brighter and carefree.
Swirling her coat about her, Jamal was making pretence of being Sir Walter Raleigh or something equally silly. Rebecca loved it, giggled like a teenager. He swung the restaurant door open with a crowd of grinning over-tipped waiters in attendance, one running out to prepare the waiting taxi, another praising her skill on the dance-floor, another singing a song to her beauty.
Laughing she stepped into the street and was knocked aside by Jamal hurtling in backwards through the door from the street. The waiters were shouting and there was a man in a wet leather jacket stepping toward her and -
Darkness and pain, red pounding pain…
… and voices …
Well, I don’t know why it didn’t take. Sometimes it just doesn’t.That is not good enough. Have you any idea how important she is?
Then take her up. Let them try. They’re the experts.
Don’t be so stupid – the Great Ship won’t be back for another week. We can’t keep her on ice that long! Do something!
There is nothing we can do. I suspect there’s nothing they can do either. We’ve tried five. She’s rejected every one. Violently!
Then find Lionel and tell him to get rid of her.
“Whu…” and she coughed.
Christ, she’s coming round. Nurse!
Rebecca opened her eyes. A man. A woman. Lab coats. All hazy and another woman rushing toward her holding -
‘Feeling any better?’
The familiar voice came from a man with bandages swathed about his head.
‘Jammy?’ She tried sitting up but a bolt of pain knocked her back onto the pillows. ‘Uhh…’
‘What’s left of me.’
‘Don’t try to move, Miss Black,’ It was another voice, female. ‘You’re best to just lie back and relax for now.’
Jamal was sitting by her bed, his head and hands covered in dressings. Behind him stood a couple of police officers and a nurse… a nurse – why was that significant? Last night…
‘Where is this?’
‘Casualty,’ said the nurse. ‘The pain in your head is not just the wine, my dear. You’ve suffered some head trauma. Someone or something seems to have damaged your sinuses and the wall of your mouth. Painful, I’ve no doubt and pretty curious as well.’
‘Jammy, what happened?’
‘You don’t recall? Well, when we left the restaurant we were jumped. Four or five thugs. Knocked me on my back and kicked the living daylights out of me and dragged you off into a car. I was helped back into the restaurant and the staff called the Bobbies.’
One of the police officers stepped forward. ‘Miss Black you were found lying unconscious in the Brompton Road just after seven o’clock this morning. One witness claims you were pushed out of a car. Have you any recollection of what happened to you, anything at all?’
‘What? Pushed out a car? Really? No. No, the last thing I remember was finishing off that second bottle of retsina. Ohh, it does hurt.’
‘Anything else? Anything at all?’
Rebecca sighed. ‘I have a vague feeling of doctors and nurses being about but … nothing more.’ She sat up and looked around. It was a single room. Bare walls of brick painted off-white and a dark brown wooden door with a frosted glass pane. Outside figures moved past and she could hear footsteps echoing in hospital corridors.
Jamal said, ‘Well that might be relevant. They say there’s a couple of small puncture wounds. Looks like you were injected with a sedative or anaesthetic or something.’
‘I was?’
The nurse nodded. ‘Yes, but there’s no signs of any other, well, violations. If you follow me.’
For a moment Rebecca was puzzled. Then she understood and the horror of what might have happened seeped through her. She shuddered.
‘Right, I see,’ she said. ‘What time is it?’
‘It’ll be twelve noon in twenty minutes,’ said the nurse. ‘Doctor wants you in here for another twenty-four hours, though. He’s worried about those wounds to your sinuses.’
‘Could someone be good enough to call my mother and tell he what’s happened? She’ll expect me to be on a train heading for Glasgow right now.’
‘Let me,’ said Jamal.
‘With those bandages on your hands?’ said the nurse, smiling at him. ‘No, I’ll do it. What’s the number?’
‘A few more questions, ma’am,’ said one of the policemen. ‘Any idea at all of who might have done this?’
The questioning continued for almost another half-hour. By the end of it Rebecca was exhausted and her head pounded worse than ever. Thankfully she was given a sedative and allowed to rest.
Jamal hung around after the police had gone. Sometimes chatting but mainly just sitting by the bed looking pathetic, she thought. He spoke softly, reassuring her simply by being there. The smell of his cologne told her he was nearby even when her eyes were closed and he was silent. She’d smile at him and drift off into a daze but the pain always washing her back to a troubled near-consciousness.
Then he was gone. She realised, rather dimly, that he had been at her bedside for hours. What a nice fellow, she thought. Pity it all turned out like this. It looked quite promising for a while…
Rebecca sat up in bed. My God, it’s dark outside, she thought, looking out through the window and seeing the occasional swipe of car headlights cross the rain spattered glass. How long have I been here? What time is it?
Pain surged back, making her gasp.
How do I ring for a nurse? She looked round in the muted light from her bedside table but nothing was overwhelmingly evident.
Can’t wait. Must visit the toilet.
She swung her legs off the mattress and stood up. Pain impacted hard in her head once more. She inhaled sharply and leaned on the bed-rail, steadying herself.
As she reached the door it opened. And standing before her was a broad built man in a pilot’s flying jacket. He was almost silhouetted and curiously familiar.
‘Who – ‘ she began but another wave of pain broke over her and she felt herself falling and falling and falling without hitting the floor, just falling forever through pulsing agonies.
Exactly when she realised the pain was gone was when she also realised she was moving.
She opened her eyes briefly and saw a white surface, heard a bell ringing - a police car? An ambulance? That’s it. She was in an ambulance and everything felt so soft and warm and just so nice…
And then the voices, again…
What kind of idiots are you? You’ve no idea the damage you did by letting her go!We tried five times. Five times. She is not a suitable host. I challenge you or any of the Hive to prove me wrong.
I was there, doctor! You should have told Lionel to dispose of her – permanently - you idiot!
I am no murderer, madam! That kind of thing is for you to order not an upholder of the Hippocratic Oath.
Let me explain again, little man. There are nine keys to unlock the destiny of the human species and the Hive has computed them all, factored in every variable and identified the individuals concerned. The Hive will now either own these people or destroy them. Ownership is preferable but if it cannot be achieved then that person must, I repeat, must be obliterated!
Am I expected to… to soil my hands with -
It will take some years to generate sufficient symbionts to control all major power-players on Earth. Until then we shall continue to rely on people like you, doctor, people who work with us for monetary gain and the promise of power. You see, we shouldn’t need to waste a valuable symbiont on someone like you. The problem is not your willingness to work with us. The problem is your stupidity! If she cannot become a host, she becomes a corpse. She is a key! A key! When I instructed you to get rid of her, I did not mean dump her out of a car. Well, at least not alive!
But… I…
But you? But you have left us with a problem, doctor. Now when Rebecca Black turns up dead - after having been kidnapped, beaten up, undergone illegal invasive surgery and, finally, abducted from the hospital in which she was recovering - a lot of questions are going to be asked. Coronet might just have believed she was the victim of an accident before but not now. Now they are going to be very suspicious indeed. They may not know about the keys but they’ve been keeping an eye on her for years. Well? Have you any suggestions?
Sorry, sorry. Yes, er, I see what you mean. Um, well I suppose it would be valuable to determine why she rejects the symbionts. I assume that information would be quite valuable?
Very valuable. Do continue.
I suggest that we remove the brain and some of the lymphatic nodes for a detailed analysis.
We would need an ordinary subject to compare the material with, though, wouldn’t we? A control?
Well, er … what about the American?
What about him?
Well, we could use his brain and lymph nodes for the control sample. There’s another thing - if he’s found dead with her and it looks like he killed her or there was some kind of fight and they both died maybe in a really spectacular fire, say. I’m certain Lionel could set it up.
Hmm … Yes, I think we can dispense with the American now. We have all we need from him. Arrange it, doctor. The Hive is concerned. A legate has been dispatched from the Great Ship. It will be here tonight to oversee what steps we take. Also to evaluate this element of the European operation and in particular our ‘camp followers’ - like you. Makes certain Lionel does it correctly this time and who knows? Perhaps you may have a future with us after all…
Like dream voices they drifted, speaking in riddles, wafting like a breeze, fluttering strings of words without meaning, tone without content.
Consciousness came back hard and unforgiving the very moment she tried to turn and could not move. She realised she was strapped down and in that instant was fully awake and in panic.
She shouted and twisted, heaved, bucked against the restraints. The minutes passed and with them her struggle and she lay gasping and looking about in the blackness. So she listened. There was a drip dripping which echoed as if she were in a hall of some sort, perhaps a large garage. Was she still in the ambulance?
For a moment Rebecca entertained the crazy thought that they’d simply forgotten about her, left her in the ambulance and gone home. But not with that echoing.
Then she heard the breathing, not loud but shallow and ragged as if it came from someone old and sick.
‘Is… is someone there?’
‘No point in all that shouting, lady. No one’s going to hear you.’
‘Uh?’
She turned her head in what she thought was the direction of the sound, the voice.
‘They brought me down here just before you arrived.’
An American voice?
‘Who are you?’ she asked. ‘Where am I? What in the name of God’s going on here?’
‘My name is Phil. I don’t have a clue where we are but we’re prisoners of the Hive. How does that sound?’
There was something odd about the way he spoke, as if he were chewing as he uttered each word.
‘Who? What? What are you talking about?’
She began screaming for help again, screaming for minutes on end, until her throat grew raw and painful.
When she stopped the man called Phil asked, ‘What’s your name?’
Breathlessly she replied, ‘Black. Dr. Rebecca Black. I shouldn’t be here; this is some kind of horrible horrible mistake.’
‘Horrible. You got that right. But they don’t make this kind of mistake. If they’ve got you here, its for a reason.’
‘They? They? Who are they? What is happening here?’
‘The Hive, of course.’
‘What the hell is the Hive? Never heard of it. And who are you? I know you’re “Phil” but who are you? Is this Hive interested in you? Hive, must say I don’t like the sound of that.’
‘You don’t know about the Hive?’ He sounded sceptical.
She sighed and then shouted, ‘No! I don’t know about the bloody Hive! Okay?’
‘Okay, calm down, lady. I believe you. If you say you don’t know about them, you don’t know about them.’
‘And?’
‘The Hive is a collective intelligence. Y’know, like an anthill or a beehive, only its not made up of insects.’
‘Not insects? Then what?’
‘Mainly EBEs but some humans, not a lot yet but in a few years probably hundreds of thousands of humans. For some reason they’re not ready to make a major move on the human population but – ‘
‘What the hell are you talking about? What are EBEs?’
It was his turn to sigh. ‘EBEs – extraterrestrial biological entities. E. B. Es. Okay?’
My God, she thought, I’m trapped in here with a lunatic.
What was this, some kind of mass madness creeping over people down here? First that man in the Air Ministry this morning and now this insane American. She felt like screaming again.
‘So you think I’m nuts, right?’ He was laughing softly. ‘You think you’re alone in here with a total fruitcake?’
‘Something like that, yes,’ she replied quietly.
‘That’s under – ‘
A door crashed open somewhere beyond her feet and a thin haze of amber illumination cut through the dark briefly. Then several sets of fluorescent lights flashed fitfully to life, completely blinding her.
Something metallic rolled and rattled nearby and there were voices, curiously familiar voices.
‘Lionel, find an extension lead; this flex isn’t long enough.’
‘Yes, ma’am’
Then another man’s voice, ‘Anaesthetic. Where’s the anaesthetic?’
`We won’t be requiring any, doctor.’ The woman’s voice again.
‘What? That’s barbaric.’
‘They’ll feel nothing when the legate decides so.’
Through her scrunched up eyes Rebecca could make out blurred figures. ‘I demand to be released! Immediately!,’ she shouted.
‘Gag her,’ snapped the woman.
‘I’m busy here,’ replied the doctor. ‘You want her gagged, I suggest you do it yourself.’
‘Lionel! Where’s that extension cable?’
‘Coming ma’am.’
‘Let me out of here! Let me go! Police! Po - ’
The figure of the woman appeared. She raised her hand and slapped Rebecca hard and repeatedly across the face shouting ‘Shut. Up. Shut. Up. Shut. Up…’ finally leaving her victim gasping, bleeding from nose and mouth. And silent.
‘That’s the extension cable hooked up, ma’am.’
‘Thank you, Lionel. Now help the doctor wheel the American over here.’
Even with eyes swelling with abrasions and tears, Rebecca could see clearer now. A barrel-chested man was rising from the floor. He was wearing a leather flying jacket. She had seen him before. In the café and at the hospital and wasn’t he outside the Greek restaurant when they left?
Stepping outside the pool of light cast by the shaded fluorescent strips, he turned and she heard a metallic squealing as he pushed a wheelchair into view.
Rebecca inhaled sharply.
Roped to it was a naked man with fair hair cut in the American crew-cut fashion and matted with dried blood. His skin was a mass of yellow and blue bruising. Burn marks on his shoulders and chest had turned to dark distended sores. Puffed up, his distended, discoloured mouth muttered muffled obscenities.
Someone else appeared in the light: a small bespectacled woman in her mid forties, black hair dragged back from a square bony face. Her black bird-like eyes scythed back and forth, alert with a brittle intelligence. Pity about the dress sense, Rebecca thought on the brink of hysteria. The big pale brown tweed suit almost engulfed the woman’s small frame, smothering her somewhat jerky body movements.
‘Ah, Mr Albano,’ she said to the tortured American. ‘Doubtless you’ll be delighted to know that your ordeal is all but over.’
‘Go screw yourself, Helena.’
A tall man, thin and blond and wearing a lab coat appeared beside her. He spoke with a strong London accent, ‘This will be extremely difficult without anaesthetics. They’ll thrash about like mad things. The operation requires precision, hardly achievable in such circumstances.’
‘Try severing the carotids, doctor. Quick and efficient.’
‘How utterly disgusting.’
‘Let me demonstrate.’ So saying she reached down to a metal tray and lifted up a scalpel, its blade catching the light like a semiphore. Rebecca inhaled sharply, heart suddenly thumping wildly.
‘Scuse me, ma’am.’ A gruff voice this time from the dark.
‘Lionel?’
‘Just wonderin, ma’am. Maybe better wait till the legate arrives first. Er, just in case, if you know what I mean.’
‘Ah, of course,’ she said, lowering the instrument. ‘Thank you, Lionel, for some intelligent advice.’
As she spoke a chill breeze swept about them and there was a sparkling of green light in the air.
‘Doesn’t look like we’ll have much of a wait, though. Does it?’ she added.
Rebecca strained her head round as far as she could. Something was moving by the door, a child? No, not a child, some poor deformed soul – wait, there were two of them, no three, four – five.
And they aren’t children, she thought. My God – they aren’t human!
The woman Helena was making noises at them, a kind of throaty rasping and sucking sound. Was she talking with them?
Then the woman turned from the things and lifted the scalpel once more. She smiled down at Rebecca.
‘Time to die, my dear.’
Rebecca screamed…
(end of part one)