Stephen Baxter - Flood

East London opened up beneath her. The Thames was a band of ugly gray. The neat line of the Thames Barrier, just a kilometer from the airport, was stitched across the water, its steel cowls shining in the rain. Gary pointed out that the Barrier was closed, the massive yellow rocking beams lifted beside each pier, and foam was thrown up as white-crested waves slammed against the raised gates.

The bird rose higher, dipped its nose, and soared east down the Thames estuary and over lorry parks and storage sites and defunct factories, the gray-brown industrial zone that surrounded London. Lily was struck by how heavily developed the flood plain was, with new housing estates and shopping precincts in Barking, Woolwich and Thamesmead sparkling in the rain like architects’ models. She made out the soaring bridge at Dartford where the M25 orbital motorway crossed the river, the last crossing before the sea. Streams of cars and freight from the docks at Tilbury and Grays queued at the toll gates for the bridge and the tunnels. A little further east both riverbanks were more or less walled with glass, huge retail developments summoned into existence by the motorway.

Further east yet, as the estuary slowly widened, she saw the sprawling docks of Tilbury to the north, and to the south the matching development of Gravesend, beyond river-lashed mud flats. All this was downstream of the Barrier, outside its putative protection. The Barrier was designed to protect central London from tidal surges heading upstream. Further on and the river swung around to the north, widening rapidly. Even out here there was extensive development, with acres of refineries and oil stores and gas tanks at Coryton and Canvey Island, an ugly industrial sprawl. And then the estuary opened out to embrace the sea.

Southend-on-Sea was a tangled old town that hugged the coast inside the line of an A-road to the north, a trace across the landscape. Lily made out a remarkably long pier, a narrow, delicate-looking line scratched across the surface of the sea. Waves broke against the town’s sea wall, sending up silent sprays of white, and water pooled on the promenades.

The chopper took them over Southend itself to a small helipad a little further to the east, close to Shoeburyness. A pier roofed by Plexiglas led off over a stretch of sandy beach to what looked like a small marina, a row of blocky buildings with boats tethered alongside. But the “buildings” were afloat, Lily saw, sitting on fat pontoons.

Despite the gathering wind, the pilot dropped them down with scarcely a bump. A couple of AxysCorp flunkies in blue coveralls, hoods up, came running out to the chopper towing a kind of extensible tunnel. Lily and Gary were barely exposed to the wind and rain before hurrying through the tunnel and into the pier. Looking along the covered pier, with the rain pouring down the glass walls, Lily saw a party in full swing, laughter and lights and glittering people.

Another flunky took their outer coats, and they were given towels to wipe the rain off their faces; there was even a small bathroom. In a discreet black suit, the man was perhaps twenty-five, unreasonably good-looking, and spoke a soft Sean Connery well-educated Scottish.

When they were ready the flunky led them onward. At the end of the passageway they were met by a waiter with a tray of champagne, and they took a glass each. Then they walked into a cavern of a room, with square walls and a high ceiling. A tremendous chandelier, a stalactite of glass and light, was suspended over a wide doughnut-shaped table on which drink and food were stacked up. The walls, painted in pastel colors, were underlit, and expensive-looking works of art hung in rows. The paintings seemed oddly dark, glowering, relics of antiquity in this modern opulence.

People moved through this space, easy and confident, the men mostly suited, the women in long dresses. Their brittle conversation was crashingly loud as they ate the food and drank the drink, marveled at the chandelier and inspected the artwork. News crews followed them, teams of cameramen and interviewers with microphones. In one corner a string quartet played, their music inaudible under the babble of talk.

And all this was afloat. Lily could feel the sea surge, just gently, and that great chandelier tinkled and glittered. The rocking wasn’t unpleasant, in fact; it went with the buzz of the champagne-but Lily reminded herself she had had five years of detox, and wasn’t yet used to drink.

“This,” said Gary thickly, “is the fucking Titanic.”

George Camden approached them, looking dapper in a tuxedo and bow tie. “Ah, Mr. Boyle,” he said. “I’ve missed your wit these last couple of days. This isn’t a ship at all-I think Mr. Lammockson would be offended to hear you say that-it’s part of a hydrometropole, a floating city. If a small one.”

“It’s a what-now?”

“And Captain Brooke.” Camden smiled at Lily. “You’re very welcome. You are the guests of honor this afternoon, the four of you.”

She glanced around. “Helen and Piers are here?”

“Oh, yes. Mr. Lammockson apologizes he’s not here to greet you in person; he has some calls to make.”

“That doesn’t surprise me,” Gary said. He had drained his champagne and was reaching for another. “Guys like that always have calls to make.” He pointed at the left-hand wall. “Isn’t that a Gauguin?”

“Never had you down as an art lover, Boyle.” A couple approached them. It was Piers Michaelmas, in a crisp new British army uniform, with Helen Gray on his arm. “But of course you’re quite right. And Gauguin is exactly the sort of obvious choice this gang of hedgies and market players would splash their money on. Hello, you two.” Piers stood straight. His dark hair was cut short, military style. Only the lines around his eyes might have been a clue that here was a man who had spent much of the last few years in utter silence, his face hidden under a filthy towel from captors he could not bear to have look at him.

They compared notes. Their lives the last few days had been similar, a round of medical checks and debriefings and family visits and media events.

Only Piers seemed itching to get back to work. “All this ruddy climate stuff,” he confided to Lily. “It’s really kicked off while we’ve been banged up, quicker than the boffins ever expected. Something new going on, so I’ve heard, though nobody knows quite what

…” He didn’t have a word to say about their captivity or its aftermath.

Behind his back, Gary mouthed to Lily:“Denial. That guy is a walking case conference.”

“Hush,” she hissed back. She turned to Helen, who wore a simple black dress; she was beautiful, Lily thought, her blond hair cut short and expensively teased. But the dress, the hairstyle, just brought out her thinness and pallor, and a haunted look in her blue eyes.“So any news about Grace?”

“Nothing but dead ends,” Helen said. “He was an AxysCorp employee, that doctor who took hold of Grace in the first place. But since then they’ve passed her around like a live grenade. A US Army medic took her from AxysCorp, and then the British army took her from them, and then the Foreign Office got hold of her, and then… When I call any of them they put me on hold or refer me to a counselor.”

Gary said, “I’m sure she’s safe. They wouldn’t harm her-”

“That’s not the point,” she snarled at him. “She’s not with me. I don’t care if she’s the bastard child of a Saudi prince or not, I’m her mother.”

“We’re all as baffled as you are,” George Camden said.“And we sympathize, Helen. We really do. And we intend to do everything we can to help.”

“That’s true, that’s very true, I endorse everything George has said on AxysCorp’s behalf.” The new voice was booming, commanding; they turned as one, on a reflex.