Christopher Nuttall: The Fall of Night

They appeared as they marched towards the city, hundreds — no, thousands — of infantry, marching in an eerie silence. Briggs was only delighted to see that they hadn’t brought shackled prisoners as part of the march, as they had done in Berlin and Paris; it would only have inflamed passion on both sides. The irony was killing him; he had spent time enforcing ever-harsher bans on guns, and the net result was that now the Army had been destroyed, or at least soundly beaten, there would be no one to resist the Russians. There were still plenty of criminal guns on the streets, some of which had been used in the riots, but what good would they do against an organised army? The Russians had played it smart; before they had indulged in the victory parade, they had secured everywhere of vital importance, from power plants to the water supplies. They could cause the entire population to die of thirst if they felt like it; what could anyone do to stop them?

The Russians halted, just outside the gates; cameras were flashing, recording the historic moment, as a Russian stepped forward. He was tall and very pale, with jet-black hair; his cold blue eyes seemed to flicker power and responsibility. Briggs understood, finally, why some people couldn’t face a soldier; here was a man who had killed others, many of whom had been trying to kill him. The Russian stood in front of him, looked the Lord Mayor’s outfit up and down, and saluted.

“I am General Aleksandr Borisovich Shalenko,” he said. His English was perfect, without the hint of an accent, or even a tinge of Russian words. “I understand that I have the honour of addressing Lord Mayor Inspector David Briggs?”

Briggs winced inwardly. “I resigned my position in the police when I accepted the role of Lord Mayor,” he said, wondering who the Russian spy had been. They knew who he was, and about his role; they had to have had someone on the inside, somewhere. “I am the Lord Mayor of London.”

“Good,” Shalenko said, very slowly. “I must formally ask for the submission of London to my control.”

Briggs wanted to defy him, he wanted to spit in his face, but there was no choice. There were millions of civilians still caught within the city; a fight would be disastrous. They would all be killed when London burned like Dover had burned; the citizens had all seen the signs of battle from the hills. They knew what could happen…

“I surrender the city,” Briggs said finally. He saw a flicker of respect in Shalenko’s eyes as the Russians formally took possession of Buckingham Palace. “What now?”

“I need you to answer a question,” Shalenko said. “Where is the command post?”

Briggs shook his head. “I have no idea,” he said, honestly. Langford had never shared that information with him. “I was never told that.”

Shalenko looked down at him sadly. “That’s not good enough,” he said. He nodded to two burly-looking Russians, who seized Briggs, handcuffed him, and marched him off towards a large truck. “It would be much easier on all concerned if you just told us what you know.”

“I don’t fucking know,” Briggs protested. The two Russians could have given the worst policeman lessons in brutality. The pain in his arms was utterly beyond comprehension. “They didn’t tell me…”

“Take him to Maliuta Vladimirovich,” Shalenko ordered tiredly. He still spoke in English. “Tell him to get what he can out of him.”

They marched Briggs away to an unknown fate.

In the end, it took nearly a fortnight to locate it, despite the British command post being right under their nose. Shalenko hadn’t wasted the time; occupation authorities had reached as far north as Newcastle and would reach the lowlands of Scotland before too long, while Wales and Cornwall had felt the touch of Russian power. There had been an entire series of skirmishes with the remainder of British forces, but most of the surviving soldiers had either been captured, or had gone underground to await the chance to either escape, or launch a war against the Russians. Other elements of the Russian program had been launched almost at once; prisoners had been divided up as they had been in Europe, and the entire male Muslim population of southeast England had been conscripted to help repair the damage caused by the invasion.

There had been a brief, very brutal fight, before the Classified Joint Headquarters had been penetrated, a last ditch attempt to trigger a self-destruct system thwarted in the very nick of time. Shalenko entered the complex and examined it, pausing in passing to salute the body of a short blonde woman who had commanded the defence, her resistance finally ended by four bullet wounds to the chest. Others lay strewn around the complex, including a young Indian girl who had been shot down by a nervous commander, and a helicopter pilot who had used the helicopter’s guns to mow down soldiers before he had been killed. A few more moments, Shalenko reflected, and he might have made it out and escaped.

“Impressive,” he said finally. The CJHQ had only been discovered by chance. There might well be others out there somewhere in the English countryside, or somewhere far to the north in Scotland; time alone would tell. The Russians had put all of the civil servants, those who had survived, back to work; they had been interrogated, repeatedly, to see what they knew. None of them had known about the CJHQ; without that little bit of foresight, how long would it have been before the British pulled themselves back together. “I think we can make use of this compound, Anna; it could come in useful.”

He sat back as the helicopter headed back to Buckingham Palace. The President had been delighted with his work and his success, even though there were still so many urgent requirements to handle before Britain could be termed truly pacified, but then… who knew what would happen in the future? Perhaps he would have the honour of the invasion of Spain, once the conflicts there had burned out, or…

For General Shalenko, the future looked bright and full of promise.

For Khadijah, the future had become a nightmare, one that was reaching out to embrace them all in its claws. She had never been superstitious, as opposed to religious, and she knew that parts of Islam’s holy writings were parables, rather than direct orders — a point that many extremists missed — but she had the sense that something unpleasant was about to happen. She could feel it, right at the back of her head, even while she had been kept in Manchester General Hospital; something was going to happen.

She had been treated for smoke inhalation once the ambulance had finally arrived, her survival more a matter of luck — or Allah’s blessing — than judgement. Khadijah had become an ideal patient at the hospital, helping out as best as she could with the thousands of other wounded, but finally it was time for her to be discharged. The nurse had told her, in whispers, what had happened to London… and implored the young Muslim girl to hide and sneak west to hopefully find a ship to Ireland or somewhere else that was free. Bad Things were happening to Muslims…

Khadijah had had no choice, but to go home. As a hospital patient, she had had no choice, but to be left out of the first wave of registration, but as soon as she was on her feet, she had to go register. Manchester looked, in places, as if it had been turned into a war zone; the Russian authorities had very strong ideas on what should happen to people who revolted against their rule. She saw, hanging from a lamppost, a young English boy… one of her tormentors from the burning mosque. He hadn’t died well…

The Russians had taken her details, cross-checked them with other details in their vast database, and then asked her dozens of questions. Still terrified because of the body, she answered as many of them as she could, before the Russians gave her an ID card and told her the rules. Stay in your homes after curfew, unless there is a medical emergency; ideally, stay in your homes unless you have work. Report yourself for duty if summoned; do not attempt to leave the city without written permission.