The Fall of Night (13 page)

No one had come to help them, she realised; the librarian was puffing and gasping for air.  It wouldn’t be long before the fire brought down the Mosque and they were still trapped inside the Mosque; they had to get out and the side doors were bound to be blocked.  She pulled the librarian to his feet – she realised, for the first time, that he was an old man – and they staggered off towards the men’s section of the Mosque.  It was the only way out…and it was locked.  She banged at it, too tired and weak to scream again…and it opened, a worried dark face peering at her.  Strong arms took her and the librarian and carefully carried her out of the Mosque; she wanted, desperately, to save the rest of the books.  A pair of hands passed her a cup of water and she sipped it gratefully; she felt like collapsing as she stared at the Mosque.

It had been built by the resources of the community, trying to escape the flow of poison money from the Middle East.  More and more people were boiling out of the houses…men only, she noticed; some of them were carrying makeshift weapons.  They were all staring at the Mosque as the flames grew higher…and then the dome caved in, crashing down on the prayer rooms, crashing down on the washing rooms…and crashing down on the library, where she had enjoyed so many days. 

A young man came over to her.  She saw his eyes and his beard and just knew that he was going to be trouble.  She almost mouthed his words along with him.  It would be something insanely ridiculous in the face of the disaster that had just overtaken the community, something so banal as to almost be foolish.

She was right.  “Where’s your headscarf?”

The librarian cut loose with a hideous torrent of Arabic, mixed with coughs and gasps for breath, including several words that her father would have beaten her brother for using.  The young man, clearly an Arab himself, paled, muttered apologies too softly for her to hear most of the words, and fled to one of the groups of young men who had gathered with weapons.  She could hear some of their conversation, calling for
Jihad
, calling for war…and reminding everyone that neither the Police nor the Fire Brigade had come to help them.  Everyone knew some of the attackers, people known for hating them…and they had to pay.

“Khadijah,” a voice called.  It was her father, coming running from their house, sweat running down his face.  It was almost worth the pain in her chest to see the fear on his face at what had nearly happened to his daughter.  The young man protested to him and he quelled him with a glare, all of his attention on Khadijah.  “Are you all right?”

The young men were marching off now, heading towards one of the poorer parts of Manchester, carrying their weapons in hand.  They would attack the whites themselves, or perhaps they would just attack a church or a Hindu Temple or something that would only make the violence worse.  Khadijah had read enough extremist propaganda, even the fearsome
Turner Diaries
-like
Aisha of Arabia
, to know what would happen and what would result.  People would die…

Lots of people would die.

Khadijah put her head in her hands and wept.

Chapter Thirteen: Cry Havoc, and Let Slip the Dogs of War, Take Four

The curious fact about British preparations for total war is that the British Government has never seen fit to share any such information with the people who voted it into power.  Such attempts as there have been in informing the public have always been of the ‘there, there, it won’t be that bad’ category, rather than the facts.  The blunt truth is that the problem was insolvable.

Unnamed Commenter

Major-General Charles Langford tossed aside a Police report on the spread of illegal copies of
Aisha of Arabia
and threw himself to the ground, away from the windows, before his thinking mind quite caught up with what was going on.  He hit the ground hard enough to hurt, cursing himself before the noise of the first explosion echoed out over the area.  More explosions, fainter, followed; he realised dimly that he had heard the noise of a cruise missile passing overhead.  It was absurd…and it had happened; instincts that had kept him alive in Iraq were warning him that something was very badly wrong.

“It’s not bloody likely that I personally am the target,” he growled, as the lights failed.  There was a major transformer station nearby, something to do with the power supplies for the city; it was quite possible that it had been the target nearby, or one of the barracks, or the TA base, or…his mind caught up with his thoughts and realised, with horror, that London was under attack.  The building shook violently as another explosion, far too close for comfort, echoed out in the distance.  “What the hell is going on?”

Soldiers were trained to seize the initiative; it had been the goal of NATO, before NATO had passed away into the ashcan of history, to overcome Warsaw Pact numerical superiority with better trained and better equipped soldiers.  Langford knew that his leave had just been cancelled; even if he was wrong and it was just –
just
– an unusually dangerous terrorist attack, he would have duties.  He snatched at his military-issue mobile phone as he came up to the window, looking south towards the London skyline.  It was like something out of a nightmare; he could see flames and smoke rising up into the distance, some of them alarmingly large.  He did a quick mental comparison; unless he was very much mistaken, some of the missiles had come down in Whitehall, where the…

The Prime Minister! 
He realised.  The thought was almost impossible to grasp; only one major world leader had been assassinated since 2009, when the leader of the French National Front had been shot down in the streets by a rogue Algerian.  A single cruise missile might have been a terrorist attack, but so many meant only one thing; they were at war.

Britain
was at war.

Training asserted itself and he tapped a command into the mobile phone.  It took him a second to realise that there was no signal; the phone had power, but there seemed to be no signal at all.  Sheer disbelief held him for a heartbeat – he had overseen the improvements to the military communications network himself and knew how robust it was – and then training swept it away.  He switched to a civilian network, and then another, and then another.  Nothing.

“This is impossible,” he muttered, too stunned to focus properly.  The British Army taught skills like adapting quickly, but most of the time, soldiers had some idea of what was going on.  Britain had been plunged into war…and he didn’t even know who they were fighting!  Was there any resistance at all?  A billowing explosion rose up from the rough direction of Regent’s Park and he cursed; were they in the grip of a mass insurgency? “I don’t know…”

He dived into the kitchen and opened a cabinet, carefully opening a second, secure cabinet inside the first one, removing a pistol, an assault rifle and several rounds of ammunition.  The military insisted on soldiers having some weapons with them, or at least within easy reach; it was one of those precautions that never made the news under most circumstances.  He chambered a round, and placed the pistol carefully in his holster; the assault rifle he slung across his back, before picking up the radio and activating it.  The battery, much to his private relief, was full; it was a court-martial offence to allow it to slip below one-third power.

“Home One, this is Hercules Grytpype-Thynne,” he said, using the radio call sign that had been assigned to him when he took on the role of Chief of the Joint Staff.  “Are you receiving me?  Over.”

A screech of static answered his words. 
Jammed
, he realised, feeling cold.  The Americans might have developed powerful jamming equipment, but it had only a limited range; that meant that the unknown attackers had to have a base somewhere on English soil.  Even if it was in France or the Netherlands, the range wouldn’t be enough to be effective…who the hell was it?  He was sure, now, that his country was at war…and he didn’t know…

“No point in staying here,” he snapped, and headed out of the flat, locking it behind him.  Some of the other residents saw his weapons and turned very pale, others demanded advice, or instructions.  They had known who he was, or at least that he worked for the Army, but Langford didn’t even know what to tell himself, let alone them. 

“Stay in your flats, lock the doors, and listen for broadcasts,” he snapped finally.  He heard, in the distance, a rattle of gunfire; he didn’t recognise the precise weapon.  “For God’s sake, stay off the streets!”

He ran up the stairs, trying to reach the top; the landlord had locked the door permanently after one of the resident’s daughters had been caught sunbathing in the nude.  Langford hadn’t understood it, until he had seen the landlord’s wife; she would never have allowed her husband to spend his time ogling a teenage girl, even if she did look lovely in the nearly-altogether.  A swift kick brought the door down and he burst through…to see a scene from hell.

London was burning.  There were at least seven columns of smoke rising into the air, one of them clearly coming from the Docklands, where – if he recalled correctly – there had been a Russian LNG tanker stuck there while strikers fought over their rates of pay or something.  He hadn’t been paying attention at the time…and he remembered, suddenly, what a bunch of Saudi terrorists had done to Oakland.  An aircraft zoomed into view suddenly, one jet fighter, heading towards the south.  There seemed to be no other aircraft in sight.

“That can’t be right,” he said, grimly.  The scene was one of unimaginable horror.  Whichever way he looked, he saw fires.  There were normally at least a dozen aircraft stacked up over Heathrow and Gatwick; PJHQ had been becoming increasingly worried about the chances of an accident for years.  The lone jet fighter up there might have a link into MILNET…or he or she might be trapped in the sky, unable to communicate with the ground.  It looked as if there was nothing to do, but walk to the PJHQ, or at least the local police station and try to find out what was going on.  “I wonder…”

He looked down at his mobile phone again, flicking through the different options.  There should be an option…
wait
; had he seen a signal?  Heart pounding, he flicked back…and saw it, a signal on the military network, very faint, but there.  He lifted the phone and selected the emergency option; the call should be routed at once to the emergency control centre at PJHQ. 

There was a long delay…and then a voice answered.  Young, female, and terrified.  “State your name, rank and identity number,” she said.  The fear underlying her voice made her sound on edge.  “I repeat…”

“Major-General Charles Langford, Chief of Joint Operations,” Langford said, and recited his serial number.  “I request a situation brief.”

“One moment,” the girl said.  He heard, very briefly, another voice in the background.  Langford had good ears, but it was hard to pick out voices in the faint signals.  “I need a voiceprint check; recite the standard rhyme.”

Something had to be really wrong, Langford realised.  He forced himself to remember the normal choice of words.  “ Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers; a peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked.  If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers, where's the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?” 

He paused.  The routine had always struck him as silly.  “Now; identify yourself.”

“This is Captain Erica Yuppie,” a new voice said.  She sounded a lot more assured than the first voice, and clearly was much more in control of the situation.  “Sir, we need to arrange a pick-up for you; please can you give me your location?”

“Of course,” Langford said, and gave his address.  There was another hail of gunfire, mercifully brief, over the city.  It sounded as if there was a war going on out there.  “What the hell is going on?”

“I have dispatched a helicopter to pick you up,” Erica said, without answering his question.  “It should be there in five minutes.”

Langford scowled as the connection broke.  Erica had sounded as if she had known what she was doing, but it was hard, looking out over the city, to feel any confidence at all in the future.  A helicopter that close suggested that it would be coming from one of the barracks, or perhaps the emergency vehicles at Buckingham Palace; just for a moment, he wished for a pair of binoculars he could use to check to see if the Palace was still standing.  He would have given his right arm to know if it was still standing, a reminder of happier times, or even…

In just under five minutes, a small helicopter – a generic civilian model used by rich kids mainly - hovered into view, hanging just above the roof and allowing Langford a moment to scramble onboard before it rose up above the city and headed north, away from London.  Langford was so relieved to see the helicopter, proof that someone, somewhere, was responding to the…crisis that it took him a moment to realise and protest.

“Flying Officer,” he snapped, “where are we going?”

“We’re going to the command centre,” the pilot said.  Langford looked back at the looming towers of smoke; London had millions of people living within the city, and all of them would be caught up in a nightmare.  “The Major will brief you when we arrive.”

They passed the remainder of the flight in silence, waiting for the journey to end; finally, they came down over a small industrial estate.  There was little remarkable about it, right on the edge of London’s outlying suburbs, but Langford noticed with some surprise that the entire estate looked as if it had been sealed up tight.  It was dotted with antenna and satellite dishes, not unusual in a corporate paradise, but odd to see them in such numbers.  The helipad itself was well-concealed; no one looking in with binoculars would be able to see them as they disembarked.

“Right this way,” the pilot said, as he shut down the helicopter.  He led the way into an empty warehouse, seemingly innocent, but Langford could see traces of oil on the floor and an open door up ahead, leading to stairs, which led down into the ground.  “This is as far as Her Nibs will allow me to go.”

“Sorry, Landie, but you’re not cleared for the remainder of this,” a female voice said.  “Major-General, welcome to the Classified Joint Headquarters.”

Langford shook her hand automatically.  Captain Erica Yuppie – if that was who it was – reminded him of Tasha Yar; she was tall, had short blonde hair, and a body that looked deceitfully slight.  Her handshake was firm and her blue eyes cold and hard, with only a hint of betraying grimness under the dispassion.  Langford wanted to know more; something that could shake a lady like Erica Yuppie was obviously worrying.

“Thank you,” he said, automatically, as she led the way into a small conference room.  “What is this place?”

To give Erica her due, she didn’t seem put out or surprised by the question.  “This is the Classified Joint Headquarters,” she said.  She altered her voice slightly; reciting from memory.  “To provide emergency command and control for British forces in the event of a major outrage in the United Kingdom, generally expected to be the Big One; a terrorist nuclear attack.  Crew; fifty, commanded by an officer on the reserve list.  Status; permanently on stand-by, ready to take over if there is a major interruption of command and control for global military operations.”

She smiled, rather thinly.  “Or at least that's the theory.”

Langford nodded.  “How come I never heard about this place?”

“Security,” Erica said.  “There are roughly sixty people who know about the existence of this place since it was set up in 2018; you may remember that there was a major nuclear threat at the time, from Pakistani nukes.  One possible target was London and it occurred to the then Prime Minister that if London was taken out, there would need to be both a command centre nearby – that’s here – and another one somewhere out in the country.  This place was set up later that year and has continued to run silently until now.”

“Very clever,” Langford said.  “Captain…what the hell is going on?”

Erica’s face became grimmer.  “I think that you need to hear it directly from the horse’s mouth,” she said.  She picked up an internal phone and spoke without dialling a number.  “Lieutenant Sargon, report to the main briefing room.”