Archive: April 11th 2012 (first draft)
The following is a record of the events of April 11th 2012. It has been reconstructed primarily from a transcript of my own DVD recording of the original broadcast, and, due to the nature of our enemy, the account of David Pryson-Smith, then a political sub-editor for The Telegraph and a direct eyewitness on the day. He also assisted with confirmation of the identities of the participants where they do not appear on screen. His words are presented in italics to distinguish them from the transcript. His account is understandably subjective - I shall edit it for the permanent archive at a later date.
Allison Larkin.
Transcipt begins.
The recording opens with the Prime Minister (PM) standing behind a podium in No. 10 Downing Street. Standing behind him to his right is the Home Secretary.
PM: Ladies and gentlemen of the press, and people of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, good morning. I have a statement to read out, and I shall be taking questions afterwards. Thank you. Over the past few days, we have all heard stories of disturbances in our cities. Newcastle, Brighton, Dover, Glasgow, Liverpool and Cardiff... we have heard rumours of the worst kind of mindless violence carried out on our streets. We have all been shocked. We have all been... afraid. But speaking before you today, I can assure you that we - the government, the police service and the legal system - have learnt the lessons of last summer, when we were last faced with a hardcore criminal minority who only know how to spread fear and anarchy, and this time we will not be a soft touch. This time, the perpetators of these crimes will be brought to justice, swiftly, and where they stand if they trouble the homes and businesses of decent, hard-working families. To all those real citizens of Britain, I ask of you, please, keep calm and... I'm sorry, no questions until after the statement.
Lord Hal: Oh, I would not ask anything of you, Prime Minister.
The camera turns to face the assembled press. The focus adjusts on an empty seat in the second row.
Cameraman: What the fuck?
I don't know why I didn't clock him earlier. I knew everyone in that room. Maybe I mistook him for Spencer from The Spectator. I must have been tired or... But yeah, we all turned to look when he, Lord Hal, spoke up, all the cameras too. He stood up to speak. That's what you're missing there. He was... He looks like he does on the posters, they're a good likeness. He's pale, that you can't really tell I suppose. He was wearing a suit, dark red tie. No notebook, phone, or anything, that should have been a clue. He isn't particularly tall, in the flesh. His eyes, you can't tell what colour his eyes are. They're dark - not like how they go black - all the time they're dark, like they're in permanent shadow.
The camera remains on the press, who are all turned to look at Lord Hal.
PM: Right, if you could retake you seat...
Lord Hal: I believe you were in the midst of comparing recent days' events to a few gangs of hooligans running around looting shoes and oversized television sets.
The picture shakes momentarily. This is assumed to be the cameraman banging the camera to try and capture the image of Lord Hal.
PM: Excuse me...
He started walking forwards, slowly, measured steps. The people in front of him, you can see, they just moved out of his way without thinking. The whole room was transfixed. He didn't look at them, he just stepped through them.
Lord Hal: Frankly, we should be insulted.
The guy on the camera was trying to track him, obviously. He'd reached the front now - you can tell by where the PM and the Home Secretary are looking - he - Hal - stood just there, in front of the podium. He was looking at the Prime Minister for a moment or two, but then he turned to us. He stared at us, speaking clearly, like a well-trained actor who knows how to reach the back row, but his voice was cold, and... Well, you can hear it.
The Prime Minister opens his mouth to speak. He looks to someone off- screen right as if for guidance, then back at Lord Hal. A broad, solidly-built man in a black suit approaches the vampire's location, ready to detain him. His head drops forward suddenly, and his gasp of breath is truncated by a crunching sound. He drops to his knees then sideways. The PM appears fixed to the spot, too frightened to move. The Home Secretary cries out and backs into the wall close behind her. One journalist comes forward to help the man on the ground, to no apparent effect.
He punched the guard in the throat. I think - it looks like he broke his neck. He didn't even pause in his speech, he just glanced sideways at the guy coming at him and his arm just shot out. Then he folded his hands in front of him again.
There is a shout of fear from very nearby the camera. This is assumed to be the vampire identified as Nick Cutler incapacitating the Cameraman and taking control of the equipment.
Lord Hal: But I suppose we should let that slight pass. Your myopic species does not believe anything these days unless it can be paraded before your eyes. This has been to our advantage until now. But now, now you have mistaken our revolution for a common street riot, and this will not do. We must disabuse you of your pig-headed denial. And so, I introduce to you all, my associate, Mr Snow.
Mr Snow walked into the room from the left. There was a vampire on the camera by now, and obviously he knew better than to try and get a shot of it. No, he turned the camera on us to get our reaction instead. You want me to describe Snow? Well, Lord Hal, he could hide among us, pass if he had to, before the posters went up. Snow couldn't. Have you ever seen a body that was left out to freeze in winter? Imagine that, walking. I... I can't remember what he was wearing. I think it was dark. I don't think Lord Hal moved, but no one was watching him anymore.
Lord Hal: Prime Minister, mine is not a question, but an order. Kneel.
The PM does not kneel, he watches Mr Snow approach, apparently still frozen with fear.
Mr Snow: Hal, come now. No one kneels to another without a reason to do so. No one submits to another's rule before the right to reign is established.
Lord Hal bowed his head slightly as Snow passed him.
Mr Snow: Some of us, I admit, thought that our actions in recent days would be sufficient. They have not gone unnoticed - it seems even the grey men haven't been able to bury all the bodies. Perhaps they have given up on you.
Snow seized the Prime Minister by the neck with one hand, and forced his head up. The man was scrabbling uselesly against Snow's grip. I think he must have been lifted partially off his feet - he couldn't get any purchase or push himself away at all.
Mr Snow: But as Hal here has said, you still do not comprehend the nature of the threat against you. And so you have made me resort to this theatrical gesture instead. My young friend over there tells me this will convince the world that it is under new management. I had intended this to be a more private affair, but I am assured this is necessary.
The PM is dragged out from behind the podium by Mr Snow. There are shouts from off-screen.
Police: Armed reponse! Move away! Move away!
The extremely loud noise of automatic gunfire is heard from nearby off-screen.
When the police barged in, Snow just smiled indulgently at them, like they were guests who turned up half an hour late to a garden party. They hesitated for half a second before they fired. It was enough time for Lord Hal to step in between them and Snow. I think that movement might have been when I realised what I was seeing. He moved too quickly. He was standing there, perfectly still, about ten feet away, then he was there in front of Snow. It didn't even look impossibly fast - it wasn't a blur. Perhaps it was just the speed of the reaction time. It was just so unnatural. He was standing silently there, then within a second he was standing there. It wasn't a dive. He was suddenly just standing there in front of the guns, facing them down like a brave man might stand before a firing squad. He had no expression on his face. The rounds hit him in the stomach, chest and shoulder. He staggered back but didn't fall. I remember thinking for an insane moment: not "why isn't he dead", but "that isn't enough blood". He didn't even bleed enough for any to drip onto the floor. He found his footing, then bent over forwards and coughed up a few mouthfuls of thick, dark red-brown blood onto the floor. Then he wiped his hand across his mouth, stood up again and wiped his hands on a hankerchief from his pocket. The only thing left to show for the last five seconds were the lines of ragged puncture holes in his suit.
The camera throughout this remains fixed on the PM. The Home Secretary behind him screams when the gunfire breaks out, along with many of the assembled journalists. There is also a noise of chairs scraping as people try to exit. It is presumed that all this drowned out the noise of a vampire or vampires killing the armed response team.
Lord Hal: Do. Not. Move. The doors have now been locked.
He glanced at someone at the back of the room, he looked furious. I suppose whoever let the police get as far as they did failed in their task. Then he looked back at the press, and his face was blank again.
Lord Hal: I can assure you, as members of the press, we want you all to live through this, and report what you've seen to the world.
Nick Cutler: (whispered, off-screen) For God's sake, it's a live bloody broadcast!
Mr Snow: Thank you, Hal. Indeed, we mustn't waste any more of their precious, oh-so-limited lives. Let us begin. What can I say?
His eyes went black, he bared a set of brown, rotten teeth for a moment, and then he bit into the Prime Minister's neck. It was a deliberate, controlled action - he didn't just rip his throat out. He sunk his teeth in then slowly sucked the life out of him in front of our eyes. The Home Secretary screamed again and tried to run, but Lord Hal reached her before she made a step. He caught her in one arm, and turned her head towards Snow and the Prime Minister with the other. He whispered something in her ear. She pressed against him - towards the creature she'd just seen kill a man and absorb a hail of gunfire - desperate to get as far from Snow as possible, but Lord Hal wouldn't let her look away. The Prime Minister's eyes rolled up into his head, and a few seconds later, Snow pulled his teeth out with a bubbling sound and let the body drop. The Home Secretary let out a shriek, but it was cut off as Lord Hal twisted her neck round one hundred and eighty degrees and let her fall too. He stepped over her to stand behind Snow's right shoulder. Their eyes were black, huge in those pale, calmly malevolent faces.
Lord Hal: Now, kneel!
The camera swings round from the politicians' bodies to the press, who scramble to get onto their knees.
The camera switches off.
End of transcript.
Archivist's notes
I have been unable to identify the meaning of Mr Snow's reference to "grey men". Cross-referencing with other recorded speeches by vampire commanders has uncovered no additional clues, but my research continues when it can. The cameraman killed by Nick Cutler was Mike Church. His death was reported by colleagues at ITV news later that day. I have made efforts to identify the names of the bodyguard and the police killed, without success as of yet. Record keeping from this date until around Autumn 2012 is partial at best. At an informed guess, I think Fergus Mackinnon was probably present that day, given his long track record with Lord Hal and Nick Cutler. A brutal if chaotic henchman, his profile fits the vampire that annoyed Lord Hal by letting the armed police get through to shoot him, but then killed them all possibly singlehandedly. I will have to think about whether to name him within the record in a later draft if further evidence is not forthcoming.
AL
Additional notes
David Pryson-Smith
David Pryson-Smith was an invaluable aid in documenting the vampire takeover of 2012-13. Moving into radio, he continued to broadast independent news until all frequencies were either blocked by the vampires or recquisitioned by the resistance for military communication only in February 2014. Before that point, ghost intelligence reported that Nick Cutler believed that "letting Pryson-Smith leave that room was the biggest mistake we made that week". He was voluntarily infected with lycanthropy in 2016. He was captured in the drive to retake Durham two years later, and is presumed dead after being taken to the Whitby resettlement camp.
Nick Cutler
Nick Cutler was born in Liverpool in 1928, qualified as a solicitor in 1947, and was likely recruited in 1950 by either Lord Hal himself or Fergus Mackinnon. He began working for Lord Hal at this date and killed his wife Rachel some months later (he reported her missing). He spent the intervening years as a solicitor in Reading, Swindon and most recently Barry, presumably providing legal assistance to the local vampire communities. There is evidence to suggest he was a crucial player in the Box Tunnel Massacre cover up, along with unknown human or vampire collaborators in the local and/or national police forces. This was apparently his first foray into media management, which is now his main role within vampire command. He is believed to be the one who stage managed the events detailed above, and his propaganda campaigns are instantly recognisable to vampire, human, werewolf and ghost alike. He is arguably the most influential non-Old One vampire, largely due to his close working relationship with Lord Hal.
Fergus Mackinnon
Very little is known about Fergus before the Fall. Evidently not an Old One, he seemed to be well over 150 years old, possibly more than 200. His surname, retrieved from his papertrail with the Barry police force, is likely a fabrication. Larkin's assessment of him as "brutal if chaotic" is astute, and her theory that he was present on 2nd April is commonly accepted. He was publicly executed by Lord Hal in 2031 for his botched quelling of the human revolt in York, which Lord Hal seemed to see as failure on his home soil.
Allison Larkin
A werewolf since July 2011, Allison Larkin was one of the first people to notice what was happening when the Old Ones began their takeover in early April 2012. Crucially, she immediately began efforts to both document events and warn others - both supernatural and human - regardless of danger to herself. Her blog and twitter feed from this time provide a comprehensive record of vampire activity, as well as one of the best early accounts of defensive measures. These included her deductions that religious icons do not affect Old Ones, and that they do not require invitations to enter private households. This is all the more remarkable given that she had no experience in combat prior to the Fall. After vampire control was established, she made it her mission to create a full historical record of how the vampires took over and how the resistance fought back. Despite her rapid work rate, her attention to detail can be seen even in what she referred to as her "first drafts", of which the above is an example. She was killed in a raid on her Northampton safehouse in 2023.
Paperclaire's notes:
What do you think? I know the style is a little odd, but I got the idea and had to write it. UPDATE: Thanks to ShoePigeon for the tip on the dates, which I've now corrected, and to all the very kind reviewers.