the news. Wherever he was he had lots of power to burn.
'Good evening, General,' said the man. His voice was thin and reedy.
Even with all the clues the screen offered me, nothing prepared me for what the general said next.
'Good evening, Mr President.'
'Fuck,' whispered Dad under his breath.
'Progress report?' wheezed the old man.
'We've eliminated all local resistance, as ordered.'
'And the English soldier, Keegan?'
'Dead.' So the general wasn't above lying to his Commander-in-Chief. Interesting.
The old man smiled a little at this news. It was not a pleasant sight. 'Good. About time. Did he give you anything useful before he died?'
'No. He didn't break.'
The old man gave a harrumph of displeasure. 'Pity. We'll just have to make do with the satellite images. Did you receive them?'
'Yes, Sir. Are you sure about the choice of target, Sir? I still believe that it might be better to take out the Tsar now, before his power base grows even more.'
'We considered it, General, but we've decided that a strong Russia is actually to our advantage at this point. Let the Tsar continue his rise to power. He cannot threaten us. We predict that he will control most of Russia within two or three years, and that suits us. We have long term plans in that respect.'
'In that case, Sir, we've prepared flight plans and fuelled the planes. We're ready to go whenever you give the order.'
'Good, good. No time like the present, General. In your own time, proceed with the plan. Destroy Operation Motherland and take control of their arsenal at your earliest convenience. Establish marshal law in as wide an area as you can. Put the techniques you've honed in Basra to good use. Terrorise the population, bring them to heel, by any means necessary. They shouldn't be too much trouble now they've been disarmed.'
The main doors cracked open and a soldier poked his head in. The general waved him to enter, and a group of four heavily armed men silently filed into the room and stood waiting. It looked like there was now no chance for us to kill the general without sacrificing ourselves.
'I'd like to initiate a secondary operation, if you'll permit it, Sir,' said the general.
'Explain.'
'I've received intelligence about an armed camp. It's outside our target area, but I believe that a show of force there could send a strong message that our operations are not confined inside our perimeter.'
'Where is this camp?'
'Somewhere called Groombridge Place, Mr President. I believe it's the base of operation for a group of Special Forces, a training school for new recruits. One of them came here to retrieve Keegan and killed some good men. We dealt with him, but I think it would be wise to shut the facility down.'
'Do I detect a lust for revenge, General?'
'Just doing my job, Mr President.'
'Very well, proceed as you see fit.'
'You can count on me, Mr President. By this time next week, England will be in American hands and we can proceed to the next phase.'
'Don't let me down, General.'
The screen went black, there was a momentary burst of static, and then silence.
The general rose and barked 'follow me' at the soldiers who'd waited patiently during his teleconference. They filed out of the room and we were alone again.
My mind was whirling with the implications of everything I'd just heard. But one awful image was inescapable: me on a video screen, tied up in front of a blue sheet, yelling for someone to find the school and tell Matron about my death.
They must have found the tape.
Oh God, what had I done?
Jane.
PART TWO
Jane
Chapter Seven
Work hard, keep your nose clean, own your house. That was the advice Kate's gran always gave her.
'It's not difficult, dear,' she'd say. 'Just follow those simple rules and you can end up like me and your granddad.' Of course, when Kate was seventeen that was the last thing in the world she wanted. But she loved her gran, so she'd nod and smile, and say 'Yes, Gran.'
On one hand I was glad that her gran died before The Cull, as it spared her all this horror. On the other, she'd have been magnificent, riding out the apocalypse on a wave of warm, milky tea and allotment carrots. It was at moments like this that I missed her most.
But Kate and her gran were gone now.
Rowles strained at his leash, trying to pull away from me. I cuffed him around the head.
'Don't mess me about,' I growled.
He whimpered.
The guard in front of us smiled a gruesome, black-toothed grin.
'Can I come in and trade these kids or what?' I said. 'Olly's expecting me.'
The guard ran his slimy tongue along his lower lip, considering us carefully, then sucked his disgusting teeth and nodded. Lee once told me he used to give people descriptive names to help him keep track of them in his head. It was something that helped him focus when he was under pressure. So I christened the door guard.
'S'pose,' said Blackteeth. 'Come on in, love.'
He turned and waved to the man on the wall behind him, who shouted something to someone in the courtyard. The huge doors swung inwards with a shriek of rusty metal. The guard leered at me and mock-bowed, sweeping his right arm towards the doors, inviting us to enter.
I remembered Kate willingly walking into danger – a heavy, steel-reinforced door, a cold, dark warehouse, and a man standing there with a machine gun strapped across his chest, saying exactly the same thing to her. 'Come on in, love.' And Cooper's voice in her ear had whispered: 'we're right here, don't be afraid.'
Eight years ago.
I shook my head and dismissed the memory. If Lee were here he'd tell me to stay focused on my objective.
I so wished Lee were here.
I flashed the guard a disgusted look. 'About time.'
Drawing myself up to my full height – I'm 5'3'' and I was wearing flats, but it's all about posture – I strolled through those gates with all the dignity and attitude I could manage. As I passed the guard he goosed me.
I stopped dead, turned towards him slowly, gave him my most seductive smile and slapped him hard across the face.
'Touch me again, sunshine, and I'll rip your balls off and feed them to you.'
I heard Kate's gran saying 'Now, now dear, don't be a potty mouth'. I had to bite back the urge to giggle. It's something I do when I'm scared.
The guard laughed.
Caroline sobbed involuntarily. I tugged her chain hard and aimed a half hearted kick at her shin. She looked up at me, chin wobbling, wide eyes full of tears.
'Button it, you,' I said.
