London Wild (20 page)

‘Then don’t hand us in
,’ Sunshine said suddenly, surprising both the other pets. ‘You’re a member of the Elite Guard yourself. Tell them that you’ll run the tests; there’s no reason for us to have to go to the Cattery.’

‘Whatever it is they intend to do to tell the difference, they haven’t told me
,’ Charles replied, ‘and they would tell me that I’m too close to you to be objective enough. I’d be considered too biased.’

‘Can’t we just stay here until the deadline?’ Moonbeam asked pitifully. ‘It’s only a few days
, I know, but it would be better to spend even just a few days with you.’

Sunshine nodded her agreement.

Before Charles could answer Moonbeam’s question, the computer terminal in the bedroom sprung into life. In a female voice specially selected by the manufacturer to sound sexy but not obviously so, it relayed, ‘Call for you, sir, shall I put it through?’

‘Audio only,’ Charles commented. The use of feminine voices in computer equipment and household appliances had been a common practice for many centuries now, and Charles didn’t give it a second thought.

‘Please confirm,’ the computer asked, a gentle inquiring lilt in its voice.

Charles hated that, the computer always wanting things confirmed before it would do anything. He remembered he
had once had to tell it five times to shut something down because the program he had been running at the time had three checks before it would quit and the computer then had its own checks. At least it was better than the computer quitting out of something Charles was still trying to use. ‘Confirmed,’ he said irritably, ‘I’m still in my bedclothes.’

‘Hello
, Slim,’ came a new voice. It belonged to Charles’ superior, Colonel Davis.  He was the man directly responsible for the setup in the shopping center that had made Charles a hero. Charles distrusted the man; whatever motives the Colonel might have had, he had proven himself untrustworthy. Charles couldn’t help the feeling that he was just a pawn in a game the Colonel was playing and that he would only be the
Cat Killer
for as long as it suited the Colonel’s purpose. It wouldn’t surprise him to find that Colonel Davis was directly responsible for the current action against domesticated cats. ‘Are you there? I can’t see you.’

‘I’m here,’ Charles replied
, wishing he wasn’t. ‘You’ve come through to my bedroom terminal.’

Starlight ushered the other two towards the bedroom door
; Charles might need to be alone for this call. Sunshine obeyed willingly enough, while Moonbeam hesitated and then also obeyed. As he left his entire body seemed to be limp.

Charles watched them leave with a sense of guilt.

‘Are you not up yet?’ the Colonel said, quite oblivious to what was happening on the other end of the call. As usual, his voice came across as cold and unemotional, something else Charles didn’t trust in the man.

‘I’m up,’ Charles replied,
eyeing his three pets as they left the room, closing the door quietly behind them. ‘The newspaper is in the bedroom; I was just checking the news.’

‘Good, good,’
the Colonel said. His voice seemed to be little more than a monotone; Charles had known computers with more personality in their voices than the Colonel seemed to have. ‘I need you to come to my office. I have a task for you; I can’t talk about it over the link. By the way, did you read about the story of the alien invasion?’

‘Er
, well, I saw the headline and assumed it was just some crackpot. I’ve been seeing stories about alien invasions and flying saucers since I was a kid.’

‘It probably is,’
the Colonel replied coldly. ‘Some farmer saw a strange-looking shuttle land in one of his fields. A figure that he described as humanoid got out and the thing lifted off again. The figure supposedly took cover in some nearby trees. The farmer says he doesn’t think the creature saw him, but seemed to be in a hurry anyway.  He also seemed to think that the vehicle in question couldn’t possibly be capable of interstellar travel and that there must be a mother ship of some description.’

Charles was a little unsure where this was going
. ‘What’s the problem if it was just a shuttle, sir?’

‘I want you to look into it anyway. Don’t talk to the farmer
; I don’t want you to risk blowing your cover. Just go to the field and check the ground for imprints and the like, see if anything unusual might have landed there recently. I’m not willing to consider alien visitors at this point. If this is the real deal, it’s more likely to involve cats in some way. And if they have access to shuttles and are up to no good in that area, we need to know about it. Normally we would ignore something like this, but when you see where the farm is, especially when you consider which way the figure ran, you might understand why we’re taking this so seriously.’

‘Wouldn’t it be better to send a standard patrol, sir? Suppose someone sees me?’ Charles suggested
. He didn’t mention that he didn’t want to be alone that close to a possible cat gathering.

‘We are stretched to the limit as it
is with this latest government edict. Every police station has been turned into a dropoff point for cats, and they aren’t capable of holding them overnight. Every spare man we have is currently visiting these stations and taking them to the Cattery. Even our trainees are busy calling door-to-door and trying to get cat owners to surrender their pets early. You’re the only man in the outfit who isn’t already doing something.’

‘Sir, I have three cats I need to drop off myself. I could take them straight to the
Cattery, if it’ll help,’ Charles offered.

‘No,’
the Colonel said calmly and reasonably, ‘just go and check the field out and then come and see me. You can drop your cats off on your way to the field. Take them to your nearest police station. If people know you have cats and you aren’t seen handing them in, tongues could wag.’

Charles nodded his agreement, and then
, realizing he couldn’t be seen, added, ‘Okay.’

‘I’m sending you the exact coordinates of the field in question now.’

The sexy female computer voice spoke suddenly: ‘Incoming signal; do you wish to receive?’

‘Yes,’ Charles said
, more calmly than he felt.

‘Please confirm,’ the computer asked.

‘Confirmed,’ Charles seethed.

The computer ignored or didn’t perceive the anger in Charles’ voice
. Instead it got on with printing out the map that had just been sent.

Charles examined the map
. The field was a little to the west of London and a lot closer to the Cattery than seemed possible by coincidence. No wonder the Colonel had thought this might be important. The cats could be planning a mass rescue involving shuttlecraft.

‘Did you receive the map?’
the Colonel asked after a reasonable pause.

‘Yes sir, I think I see the reason for your worry. I assume they have been warned, sir,’ Charles said. He wouldn’t say who over the link.

‘They’re on alert, yes,’ the Colonel confirmed. ‘We think something is likely to happen there very soon, maybe tonight or tomorrow night. That’s why we need to confirm that something landed last night. It would be a quick and easy way to escape, but the farm is the closest area big enough for a shuttle to land on. It’s unfortunate that this had to happen now, when we’re stretched out as it is.’

‘Indeed, Colonel
,’ Charles replied. ‘I can’t imagine they’ll return to that area once they realize that we know. But it’s probably best to be prepared.’

‘Good,’
the Colonel replied. ‘Get there, check out the landing area and see if it was a landing area. And be careful not to blow your cover. I’d have sent someone else if I had anyone to spare, but as I said, everyone else is tied up. I’m also sending you a database of information about known shuttle types currently in commission, and those recently decommissioned. If you find evidence of something having landed, work out which shuttle this one correlates with and let me know when you see me. It might help to trace them, if we know what they’re using. I’ll meet you in the usual place at seven tonight.’

There was a click as the Colonel closed his connection.

‘Incoming signal….’ The computer said almost immediately.

‘Yes,’ Charles spat
. He didn’t normally get this angry with the computer; he put it down to the fact that he was about to hand three of his best friends over to the authorities. His choice was to get angry or to get depressed, and he couldn’t afford to be depressed when there was work to be done.

‘Please
confirm,’ the computer asked, unperturbed.

Charles sighed, ‘Confirmed.’

‘This is a private, eyes-only signal. Please plug in your handheld,’ the computer said slowly. The handheld was an extra layer of security. The data would pass straight through the computer, effectively bypassing it, to the handheld. The information would then only be accessible with a password. If a hacker had gotten past the computer’s firewall, the information wouldn’t be there to steal. ‘Say ‘go’ when you’re ready for data transfer.’

Charles sighed
; now he’d have to get out of bed. He removed his miniature, army-issue handheld computer from where it was charging on the small table by the side of his bed and plugged it into the little slot specially designed for it just below the main computer interface.

‘Go,’ he said.

The computer was silent for a minute as it transferred the data. When it was done it said simply, ‘Transfer complete. You may remove your handheld.’

Charles relieved the computer of the handheld and made a quick check of the data that had been sent:
a list of tread lengths, distances between treads, number of treads, emissions on takeoff and when cruising, heat on the surface at takeoff and, where pertinent, expected radiation emissions.

He flipped off the handheld and placed it gently on the bed. Then he started to get dressed. He had been looking forward to a nice relaxing day
; now he had a lot to do and he wasn’t looking forward to it. Once dressed, he put the handheld into a shirt pocket, first checking to make sure he had turned its power off. It wouldn’t do to burn the battery before he needed it. Then he sat on the bed again and started to eat the breakfast Starlight had brought him, thinking as he did so that it would be the last time she would ever do that for him again. She would never forgive him for taking her in on the first day of it. But he didn’t think he had a lot of choice. He had the feeling that something was in the air and he was going to be busy in the next week or two.

It was nearly eleven before he was ready to leave. He bundled his three pets into the car, leashes around their necks in accordance with the law. Sunshine was the most resistant; Moonbeam seemed to have resigned himself to his fate
, while Starlight seemed to have trouble believing he actually meant to go through with it.

He then drove them to the nearest police station in silence. They had been an energetic, happy bunch in the past,
but now none of them seemed willing to say a word, as if they were all too busy contemplating their fate.

Charles felt
that he had let them down, but he didn’t know what else he could do. He also felt that the three were punishing him by not talking to him, and perhaps there was a little truth in that, though most likely they were too upset to talk even if they wanted to.

Somehow one of the newspapers had gotten word that Charles would be handing his pets over today. There was only one person he could think of that might’ve done that, one person who might want Charles to have even more publicity than he already had
: Colonel Davis. Charles walked past the reporter, knocking the microphone, which had been placed under his nose as he entered, out of his way. He wasn’t going to put up with any nonsense from the newspaper on this of all days.

As they reached the counter, Starlight turned to look at him. Tears and anger in her eyes, she said nothing. Her expression said it all. An officer took the leash control box from Charles and led his three closest friends away to the station’s cells to await transportation to the
Cattery.

Charles waved sadly as they were taken around a corner and out of sight. This moment of grief
was invaded by the newspaper that had filmed every movement, every detail since Charles had entered. Every emotion was captured to show their audience later, every pitying look, every flash of anger or remorse and every tear.

He left the station, feeling as if he might never see his pets again. It was silly
; all that was going to happen was they would be tested to see if they had any wild tendencies, and when it was seen that they didn’t, they’d be returned to him.

He climbed back into his vehicle and drove to the outskirts of London to the location of the field as marked on his map. All the while
he was thinking of how quiet his apartment would seem now and how he’d have to do all his own chores, at least until they were released again.

If every road between the police station and the field had been empty, the journey would probably have taken Charles a little more than twenty minutes. It wasn’t really that far away. However, the roads in central London were amongst the most congested in Europe. Parts of the journey took twenty minutes just to cover a mile
, and that was outside of the rush hour. The journey to the field took just over one and a half hours, and the journey back would be worse because he wouldn’t be able to avoid the rush hour getting back.