We Float Upon a Painted Sea (7 page)

I cannot emphasise enough the need for discretion - you must not discuss your revelations with anyone else, and take extra care not to be followed. The Shackle communicator we have sent you is a standard satellite device with all the normal built in functions, such as GPS and internet access. It is encrypted and DNA activated, so can only be operated on your wrist. The Shackle’s credit facility has also been activated and will provide you with sufficient funds for sundries, until you get to your destination. Furthermore, we would ask you not to use the communicator facility, as Government intelligence surveillance will be attempting to locate you using voice recognition techniques. The curfew will not be suspended until the Prophylaxis Trident Satellite systems are back online, which we believe will be imminent, so until then, we have a window of opportunity to conduct daytime operations. The MoDs will be aware of our increased activity and will counteract this with manual surveillance, such as the personnel currently stationed outside your apartment.

We have provided you with a Tracked Electric Vehicle (TEV) which will be parked on Duncan Terrace, Islington earlier in the day. You will be travelling under the name, John Muir. I would like you to leave your apartment at 6pm on the 31
st
of August 2036, locate the vehicle using the fob and make good your escape. We shall arrange for the surveillance van, parked on the street, outside your building to be delayed. Make your way to the TEV Portal where you shall enter the following coordinates: 55.9485° N, 3.2001 and 9am as your time of arrival. Automation will commence and will continue until you arrive in Edinburgh. We shall arrange for CCV cameras, on the roads from your London flat, the track network and onboard carriage surveillance to be manipulated; so rendering your journey undetected. On arrival, make your way to a bar called the Splurge Bucket, which is located on Giles Street, Leith. Edinburgh is an ideal location as surveillance satellite systems have documented problems with image detection in this part of the world. Your contact in Edinburgh is an ecommando called Lúthien who will provide you with details of where and when we can meet. I would advise you to destroy or re-encrypt this message. Do not to discuss any of the contents with anyone, including closest family members. I will say no more until we meet.

Yours, Itaridlë (Leader of the ELF)”

The Professor had entered the coordinates at the Portal and the TEV climbed the ramp and then accelerated to join the high speed track. He felt uneasy with the sudden loss of control. It reminded him of the childhood experience of a rollercoaster, ascending the rail, the body storing more kinetic energy with every metre climbed, until being subject to the forces of gravity. Finally, out of the urban sprawl of London, he sat back and stared out of the window. His gaze fixed on the multiple rows of green painted
laboratory
meat processing plants lining the track for countless miles. He sat upright on his seat and began to recall everything he knew about his involvement in a covert project called
Silent Wave
. He extracted his notepad from his leather satchel and began drawing schematics and equations. Later, he began to write:

“For eleven years I have led a research team at University College London, investigating tsunami wave counteraction measures, through the deployment of Pulsed Power Technology. The concept of artificial oceanic wave generation is an esoteric theory, but not a new one: American scientists had first identified the potential of harnessing the catastrophic forces of the tsunami wave during World War II. The theory was rudimentary and involved the detonation of ten thousand tonnes of TNT explosives on the seabed. It was hoped that the anticipated shockwave would create a tsunami, which would then be targeted against the Japanese fleet.”  The Professor remembered the black and white film of the project and how, as a means of maritime warfare, initial tests proved very disappointing. This provoked Admiral Chester Nimitz to comment on camera,
I could make a bigger wave farting in my bath tub
.” The Professor managed a painful smile at the image in his mind. He continued writing: “The Government have been aware for years that, as sea levels rose exponentially, billions of Euros were being spent on flood defences, only to find that they were still exposed to the risk of large tidal surges or freak waves. The National Oceanic Centre provided evidence that recent tsunami wave activity in the North Atlantic was a result of ice shelves calving into the Arctic Ocean, and propagating as the wave reached the shallow waters of the North Sea. A tsunami with a vertical height in excess of 10 metres would easily breach both Thames flood barriers, putting London in perpetual danger. To negate the tsunami, my plan had involved a safety net of Cyclone Particle Accelerators, drilled into the ocean bedrock, and linked to pulse propulsion devices, with electro-magnetic guidance systems. These would be located at various points circling the British Isles, and ready to be detonated to create a counter-wave, thus expunging the kinetic energy of the original pulse. My theory was designed only to be used in the event of a mega tsunami approaching a coastal area with a high population density. I believed that the use of such technology could be justified to save the lives of millions, despite the potential for a minute level of radioactive contamination.”

The Professor took a carton of iced tea from vehicles mini-bar and sipped. He stared at the passing clouds and reflected on the ramifications of his actions. He had disclosed top secret information, copied intelligence files and worst of all, had contacted a prescribed terrorist organisation. His passport had been revoked and his credit cards frozen. He had been put under surveillance. The prospect of being smuggled out the country, applying for political asylum in a foreign land, and never seeing his nation again, was a daunting one. And then he thought of the creeping radicalisation of the Government, aggrandising their powers by exaggerating the threat to democracy from terrorism. Using embroidered fears, they colluded with the media, infecting people’s minds to create a siege mentality for a nation. He thought of the hundreds of journalist, political activists, civil right lawyers and internet bloggers, arrested by tyrannical governments around the world for speaking out. They were the true champions of democracy, thought the Professor.  He returned to his writing with a new resolve:

“I suggested the utilization of marine hydraulic fracturing drill sites in the North Atlantic, which could provide a number of suitably discrete test sites. Using an existing borehole, the device could be placed at a sufficient depth under rock strata. The cause of the detonated pulse could be covered up due to hydraulic fracturing activities out in the North Atlantic. There have been several seismic occurrences in the area after methane hydrate extraction processes commenced at the Anton Dohrn seamount. The wave would be blamed on another accidental submarine landslip.  Myron Clone announced that a decision had been made to test Silent Wave on St Kilda, after evacuation of the small local population. In essence, I was confident that a tsunami wave could be controlled in terms of size and direction and no lasting harm would be inflicted on the environment. In the long term, I believed that the nations of the world could benefit from my research, and I planned to share my findings on an international stage. However, much to my annoyance, I was warned that the programme was of the highest national security, and subject to special intelligence constraints. It was at this point I received a notification, from a source within the Government that the MoDs were preparing to adapt my research and use it to develop a weapon of mass destruction. After confronting Myron Clone, I resigned my position with immediate effect. Hence forth, I have been under constant Government harassment and intimidation.”

He put his pen down and reclined his seat, stretching out his legs until his knees clicked. Rain pelted the vehicle window. Ahead, lay a darkening scene, night was almost upon him. He had left London behind and imagined he would never see the city again. His mind was soon flooded with memories of when he first came to the city, and browsed the antique shops of Islington with his wife and child. At first he thought they would be happy there, but as his work commitments increased, he drifted apart from his wife and eventually they returned to Scotland. He began writing again, but this time he penned a letter to his daughter. When he had finished, Professor Burke scratched his bald head, wiped his spectacles with his handkerchief and allowed the hypnotic rhythm of the vehicle to rock him to sleep.

Later, when he woke, sunlight was spilling in from the east, over the floodplains, and elucidating the rape fields that clung to the slopes of the Lammermuir hills, south of Edinburgh. He studied the farmland. At first appearance it seemed benign, but in terms of colour, quite a remarkable sight. A typical glimpse of modern agriculture through the window of a slow moving vehicle, thought the Professor. And then he noticed the absence of trees and hedgerows. He remembered the devastating collapse of bee colonies which once pollinated the crops, and was now carried out by insectoid automatons, but with the dual purpose of mass electronic data surveillance gathering. The wheat fields of the countryside were once the bread basket of the nation, now they were industrialised processes, its produce destined for the manufacture of bio-fuel rather than food.  

Chapter 5: Prima Facie.

Andrew Douglas Ulysses Holmes was attempting to piece together the series of events leading up to the sinking of the Andrea Starlight. His mind was a maelstrom of confusion. He had been on deck, taking an evening stroll and brooding over the dark islands stretched out over the horizon. He had been thinking about the demise of his marriage when he felt a rumble from under the ship and a strong wind on the nape of his neck. He hadn’t seen the wave coming but he had heard screaming passengers and the alarm sounding. He had held on to the grab rails for as long as his strength would allow, then he was thrown forward and clear of the ship.

His world had gone black.  Seconds later he was submerged in the sea, tumbling and struggling in the churning cold waters. He had dithered, becoming distracted by the unfolding scene. The sea was giving up its victims. His world had stalled, skidding into a slow motion drama and all around him the muffled shouts for help filled the air. Finally, the panic within him had subsided with the acceptance of his desperate fate. The floating wreckage coiled and coalesced with several corpses, and then drifted by in the current like a funeral procession.

Andrew’s attention had been drawn towards a struggling woman. She reminded him of his ex-wife. He swam closer to her. One of her hands gripped a piece of floating wreckage, the other remained still. He winced when he remembered the fragments of bone protruding from her exposed arm. Her hair seemed tousled and matted on her face, obstructing her sight, and then she was gone. He dived down searching for her but he returned empty handed. He had treaded water, his eyes darting between the swells when he noticed a life raft floating adrift. He swam towards it. He was wracked with fatigue but had managed to pull himself up and through the aperture. The only other survivor onboard the raft was an unconscious man with a head wound. He had busied himself attending to the man’s wound, partly as a distraction from the feeling of desperation that had threatened to overwhelm him.

He felt a frustration well up inside him and untameable anxieties grow inextricably. The voices had returned to torment him, as they did daily. But this was not a normal day so he couldn’t be sure how many times he would wrestle with his demons, before he could think clearly. Like Prometheus, he thought, chained to a rock, but only his brain and not his liver pecked at and consumed every day by Zeus’s Caucasian Eagles. He patted his jacket and felt a pang of despair on realising that he had left his pills on the ship. His despairing thoughts were interrupted by the untimely entrance through the aperture by a large naked man.

He observing Bull with a choleric expression, sneering at the shivering figure, coiled up at his feet, in his foil blanket. He studied his face – bloated and crimson from the exertions of the swim, fat swollen lips and panting heavily like a pub dog on a hot summer’s day. He had a vacant, gormless eyes, thought Andrew, reminding him of a baby harp seal prior to being clubbed to death by a Russian fisherman. Andrew wondered if the man was in shock or like him, just glad to be alive. Was he revaluing his life? Now was not the time for such luxuries, he thought. It was hard to tell his age - much younger than he was himself, but it was difficult to determine with modern western society’s obsession with cosmetic surgery – he could be a pensioner for all he knew. He examined the man’s head of long black hair. He remembered loosing his own hair – it hadn’t really bothered him - all men should have short hair anyway, he declared.

Andrew heard his wife’s voice resonate in his head,
There you go again darling, making assumptions about people based on their appearance. It is pure, unadulterated presumptuousness and arrogance, and you know it.
His mother’s voice interrupted Ashley’s moralising lecture. Her words were challenging and contradictory. At first an impotent Andrew welcomed the interjection, but then she would qualify her objections by offering excuses for her son’s behaviour. She made references to a young Andrew locking himself in the toilet for hours, being a
loner
and a
fairly odd boy
. Andrew’s deceased Grandfather interjected with a deep booming voice to put the two bickering women to flight, much to Andrew’s delight.