The Fall of Night

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

London, United Kingdom

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.”

She turned to Langford. “Lieutenant Aaron Sargon is one of my best analysts,” she said. “Like me, technically, he’s on the reserve list…”

“And you’re more than a Captain,” Langford realised. “What is your actual rank?”

“Major,” Erica said shortly. “I have the pay and responsibilities of a Major; the rank and uniform of a Captain. There aren’t enough Majors for one to vanish without exciting attention.”

Langford felt a sudden moment of sympathy for her, mounting her lonely vigil for years over London and the United Kingdom. The door opened, revealing a vaguely oriental-looking young man, slightly overweight by army standards. Headquarters staff officers normally were slightly out of shape. He had short dark hair, a friendly face, but one that was creased with worry.

“General,” he said, saluting. “I don’t have a proper briefing prepared…”

“Never mind the PowerPoint presentation,” Langford snapped. In his opinion, PowerPoint and other programs like it were the worst thing that had ever happened to the military. The security bugs could have been handled, but for sheer confident irritation, it was hard to beat PowerPoint and the other Microsoft products. “Just give me the bad news.”

“We maintain a direct feed from MILNET — the PJHQ, the UKADR and so on — into here,” Sargon said. “At roughly 1000, the MILNET links started to fail, starting with the European satellites that were supposed to provide us 24/7 coverage of Europe, and continuing with a handful of our own dedicated servers, which came under cyber attack. At the last moment, some of them reported signs of multiple missile launches from home waters, but the system failed before a perfect response could be generated. Ground-based radars, part of the UKADGE, attempted to engage the missiles, but absent the precise targeting details, it was impossible to generate an intercept solution in time. Around — we don’t know for certain — three hundred missiles were launched in positions that suggested that we — Britain — were the targets.”

“Dear God,” Langford breathed. “Who the hell is doing this to us?”

“It’s impossible to be certain as yet, but preliminary information suggests that it is the Russians,” Sargon said. “They and the Americans are the only people who might have the capability to do this… and, from rather garbled transmissions from France, it seems that we weren’t the only ones hit. As far as we know, sir, Ireland wasn't hit, but our communications links are badly fractured and we have only limited contact with our own bases…”

“God damn the EU,” Langford swore. He — and almost every other commissioned officer in Europe — had argued against putting all of their eggs in one basket. “That system was meant to be foolproof!”

“There are some very smart fools out there,” Sargon said, seriously. He learned forwards. “At least ten missiles came down in London, sir; two of them hit Ten Downing Street and devastated the area. Westminster also appears to have been hit, along with Albany Street Barracks and Cavalry Barracks, where we had infantry soldiers based. We should have a direct line here to Aldershot… and that, too, is gone. We haven’t been able to locate the source of the jamming yet — we need to triangulate and our non-radio communications are in tatters — but the reports from Flying Officer Jackson suggest… that we are looking at a total loss.”

Langford felt his knees buckle. “There was that session in Parliament today,” he breathed. “The Whips were going around saying that they had to go to Parliament, even if they went on their deathbeds; illness wasn't an excuse. They were going to debate the Falklands…”

“Yes, sir,” Erica said. “It is quite possible that the Prime Minister and everyone in the line of succession is dead.”

Langford swore under his breath. “And the PJHQ?”

“Hit,” Sargon said. “Again, it was a bunker-busting weapon, from preliminary reports. The building has certainly been rendered useless.”

Langford stood up and paced. “What the hell do we do now?”

Erica looked at him. “Under the emergency protocols, when the country is at war, command of the military and local government devolves upon the senior military officer alive,” she said, sternly. The protocols were developed with nuclear war in mind, where the local garrison commanders would work under the local commissioners… something that has slipped since the end of the Cold War, but never mind… and they had never been revoked. Democracy simply didn’t get a look in during the planning for total war.

“You, sir, are the senior surviving military officer… and, as such, the powers of government devolve upon you.”