The Age of Zeus

12. POSEIDON PASSING

It had been trailed on the BBC and the cable news channels for days. Poseidon was making a state visit — paying a courtesy call on the new Prime Minister, who had been swept to power last autumn on the strength of a platform of policies that included pensioning off a third of the nation's already substantially depleted armed forces, siphoning yet more tax revenue away from defence and towards education and social welfare, and decommissioning the very last of Britain's nuclear submarines. Five months after taking office, Catesby Bartlett was still enjoying a huge groundswell of public support, his approval ratings hovering around the 70 % mark, a level unprecedented in modern political history. To his critics Bartlett was an Olympianite of the worst, most craven kind, and it was certainly true that he made no secret of his admiration for the Olympians and all that they had wrought, even if he had been known to cavil over some of their methods. His ovine devotion to the Pantheon had prompted a political sketch writer to dub him Baa tlett, and the sobriquet had stuck. But his victory in the polls had proved, if nothing else, that he was a man in tune with the mood of the electorate, even though his party had scraped in with only a tiny majority.

"I'm not blind," Bartlett had told reporters outside Number 10, shortly after his swearing-in. "I realise there are things the Olympians have done that are, y'know, not quite the done thing. I wouldn't for a moment condone, say, the Obliteration, or the regime change they carried out in certain countries. I mean, human rights, you know what I'm saying? Due process of law — I'm all in favour of that as well. As an ex-barrister, why wouldn't I be? But on balance, weighing up the pros and cons, you've got to hand it to the Pantheon. They made some tough choices. They took the bull by the horns and did what needed to be done. They took responsibility for humanity's security, because they had the power to. Full credit to them for that. So let's accept the status quo, shall we? Let's be pragmatic. Let's live in the world as it now is, not as some people might wish it to be. That's my take on the situation. Thank you."

For Poseidon to come by, for him to agree to make a personal appearance at Westminster and thereby put the Pantheonic seal on Bartlett's premiership, was a terrific coup for the Prime Minister. He was playing it down, though, modest as ever.

"Look at me," he said in a TV interview on the eve of the great event, "I'm just an ordinary chap, and tomorrow I'm going to step forward and shake the hand of the god of the oceans himself. Poseidon the Wide-Ruling, the Securer, the Cleaver Of The Rock. I'm as thrilled at the prospect as anyone would be. It's like meeting a superstar, one of the all-time greats. Elvis, or Frank Sinatra."

"A junkie and a gangster," Barrington muttered at the screen. He and a handful of other Titans were watching the interview in the rec room. "That'd be about bloody right."

"Both dead, though," Sondergaard pointed out.

"There is that," said Barrington.

"What I want most to come from this meeting," Bartlett went on, "is for people to see — not just here in the UK but around the world — that we can get along with the Olympians. We don't have to fear them. All we have to do is give them our complete co-operation, and they'll leave us be."

"Co-operation," said Harryhausen. "From his lips it sounds like another word for cowardice."

"That," said Bartlett, "is the Catesby Bartlett philosophy."

"Beware the politician who starts referring to himself in the third person," said Ramsay.

Sam felt obscurely embarrassed at Bartlett's performance and the reaction it was provoking from the non-Britons in the room. She didn't, as a British citizen, like being associated with Bartlett. She didn't want to be tarred with the same brush. He wasn't speaking for her, he didn't represent her, and she didn't want anyone to think he did.

For reassurance that she wasn't alone in this, she looked to her only compatriot present, Chisholm. He was staring fixedly at the television, his jaw clenched hard, the tendon below his ear taut and twitching. Irked by Bartlett too? No, the source of his tension wasn't, she realised, the Prime Minister. His jaw began clenching even more tightly as some library footage was aired showing Poseidon sailing majestically across the sea, riding the crest of an immense wave. Tomorrow the Olympian would be making a complete circuit of the British Isles, a kind of lap of honour before sweeping up the Thames into London for his rendezvous with the PM at Parliament. A map appeared onscreen, tracing the route of his circumnavigation and marking out the best vantage points along the coastline from which to see him go by. He would, it turned out, be passing Bleaney Island sometime around 3pm.

And so, sometime around 3pm, the Titans assembled on the island's highest hilltop, armed with binoculars — and not in their battlesuits, naturally — to observe the godly transit. This was Landesman's idea. "Know your enemy," was his reasoning. "Take the opportunity to see him in the flesh when you can." He himself was out there, as were Lillicrap, McCann, and all the technicians. There was only one absentee.

"Any of you guys seen Nigel?" Sparks wondered.

"He said he preferred to stay below," Tsang replied. "He has no wish to be here."

"Why not?"

"His family, as you may remember. It was Poseidon who…" The rest was left unsaid.

"Oh. Oh yeah."

Poseidon came into sight somewhat later than scheduled. His progress was attended by a swarm of news helicopters, flying flat out to keep up with him. Through her binoculars Sam beheld a powerful, muscular physique that was running to flab, like a retired wrestler's. Long aquamarine hair and a long aquamarine beard flowed backwards from his face. A necklace of clamshells nestled on his hairy chest, while shiny fish-scale longjohns clad his lower half. He brandished his trident in one hand like a royal sceptre. His feet were lost in the foam of the wave that was supporting him and bearing him along. The wave was four or five metres high at its peak, and cut a white chevron half a mile wide across the sea's surface.

"Look at that," McCann said. "How does he do that?"

"You mean you don't know?" said a colleague of his, Rajesh Patanjali, responsible for all things IT at Bleaney. "Didn't you read the New Scientist special on the Olympians?"

"Must've missed that one. I prefer my magazines to have pictures of nudie girls and articles about the Grand Prix in them. So what's the trick? Magic?"

Patanjali rolled his eyes, as though it was his greatest burden in life to have to be confronted with such childishness on a daily basis. "Aquakinesis. Poseidon manipulates water with his mind. Water or any other liquid. He can control it down the molecular level. Shape it, congeal it, turn it to vapour — I've seen him on TV doing all of those."

"Turn a man's blood to mud in his veins," said Eto'o. "I've seen him do that. And not on TV."

"A very dangerous creature," said Landesman. "Perhaps second only to Zeus in terms of threat level. We shan't be tackling him 'til we've a few lesser Olympians under our belt first."

"You're wrong there, Mr Landesman," said a voice from behind.

Everyone spun round to see Chisholm marching up to the hilltop from the direction of the bunker entrance. On his face was a look of implacable determination — and in his arms was a rocket launcher from the armoury.

"We're tackling him right now."

Cresting the hill, Chisholm swung the rocket launcher up onto his shoulder and put an eye to the sight.

"Round's already in. Laser-guided high-ex. I'm blowing the bastard out of the water."

"No!" Landesman barked. "I forbid it. Put that thing down, Nigel. This instant. You are not going to do this."

"Looks like I am, actually," said Chisholm.

"Shoot, and you jeopardise this entire operation."

"Not if I don't miss."

"Even if you don't. Attack Poseidon, and whether you kill him or not the Olympians will retaliate. They'll come down on us like a ton of bricks."

"Don't care. This is for Debs and Megan." Chisholm depressed the launch lever and curled his finger round the trigger.

Sam stepped in front of him.

"Mr Landesman's right, Nigel," she said. "Put the launcher down."

"Out of my way."

"No."

Chisholm moved to one side, re-sighting on Poseidon.

Sam sidestepped too, keeping her face level with the launcher's front opening.

"Get out of the bloody way," Chisholm growled.

"Or what?" said Sam. She kept her voice gentle but firm, as you did when talking to the deranged and the weapon-wielding. "You'll shoot me instead?"

"He'll be out of range in a couple of seconds. I need to do this. Move, Sam. Please."

"You'll get your chance, Nigel. But when the time's right. Not now."

"Sam…" The launcher trembled in Chisholm's grasp. She saw a tear roll down his cheek.

"Just wait. Poseidon is yours, I promise. You'll have first crack at him. But you need to be patient. Stow the launcher. There are cameras in those helicopters. If anyone zooms in you, we're sunk."

She laid a hand on the launcher and slowly pushed it down, getting no resistance from Chisholm. It was a relief not to be staring into that lethal hollow any more.

"Fuck," Chisholm breathed. His eyes were glassy, his expression one of crumpled, abject misery. "All right, you win. God, I was so furious, and there he is, parading by, arrogant as you please, and I… I just…" He shook his head like a man emerging from a trance. "I've made an utter tit of myself, haven't I?"

"Not at all."

"What was I thinking?"

"You were thinking about your wife and daughter. You were remembering them and how much you loved them. And there isn't one of us here who wouldn't at least have been tempted to do what you did, in your shoes."

"Rocket probably wouldn't even have got him. He'd have seen it coming and thrown up a wall of water to protect himself."

"And then would have conjured up a massive tsunami to swamp the entire island and drown the lot of us," Sam said. "Your motives were noble, Nigel. Your strategy, on the other hand…"

"…was atrocious. Mr Landesman — everyone — "

Chisholm found he couldn't look any of the assembled company in the eye. He couldn't even finish the sentence. Letting the launcher drop to the ground, he turned and walked off, shoulders slumped in shame.

Poseidon by now was a dwindling speck on the horizon, the helicopters too, the ruckus of their rotors reduced to a faint locust whirr.

Landesman came over to Sam. "Adroitly handled," he said. "Well done."

All of the Titans present were of the same opinion. They didn't have to say anything; Sam could see it in their faces. Ramsay gave her the merest ghost of a nod, and that seemed to sum it up. If any of them had been harbouring reservations about her, they weren't now. Like it or not — and for Sam it was still the latter — she was team leader. This incident had been her unofficial anointing. There could be no going back.